Arthur J. Frongello was born in July 1925 in Cambridge, Massachusetts. He grew up in a poor family, but felt rich because the family would get together for weekly dinners. They did not have many material things, but Frongello felt wealthy. All schools were local. He walked to school, which was across the street from his house. He played in rail road yards and in the school yard. His neighborhood was racially diverse. He had a friend that was Greek. They never considered their ethnic backgrounds. Frongello's father was a bootlegger [Annotator's Note: importer of illegal alcohol during Prohibition] and a gangster. He taught the kids to be honest, to work, and to get an education. His father was Italian and his mother was German. The parents only spoke English in the house. Frongello would help his father with his liquor business. His father made knockoff liquor in his bathtub. When Frongello got sick, his mother would use alcohol to help ease the pain. His father would be sent to racetracks to help bookies. Frongello's father was strict in the house. His mother was short, but feisty, and would punish the kids if they misbehaved. She would also threaten to tell their father, which was a big threat. Frongello's maternal grandfather was arrested during World War 1 because, as a German, he did not want to fight the Germans. His father did not want him to join the service because he would have to fight against Italy. The year before Frongello joined the Navy, Italy stopped fighting in the war. All of Frongello's Italian family had already moved to the United States before the war. Frongello was in a movie theater in Cambridge when news came out about the attack on Pearl Harbor [Annotator's Note: the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor, Hawaii on 7 December 1941]. He did not know where Pearl Harbor was at the time. He was 16 year old when the attack happened. The following day, all of Frongello's friends tried to join the military. During World War 2, men only walked around in a uniform. Frongello joined the Navy because Boston [Annotator's Note: Boston, Massachusetts] and New York [Annotator's Note: New York, New York] were a ports, giving him a better chance of getting home regularly.

Basic training was easy for Arthur Frongello because he did not smoke. He grew up running alot and playing games that involved running. The strangest thing that happened to Frongello in the Navy happened while running on the drill field. As a penalty, the men would not be allowed to smoke, but that did not bother Frongello. One night, Frongello was awakened to go to the drill field. He was then directed to return to his bunk for an inspection. The drill instructors found a locker full of dirty socks. The recruit who owned the socks was thrown into a shower with them. He was trained at Newport [Annotator's Note: Newport, Rhode Island], and could see boats passing by from Melville [Annotator's Note: the Motor Torpedo Boat Squadrons Training Centermin Melville, Rhode Island]. He liked the PT Boats [Annotator's Note: patrol torpedo boat]. Frongello told everyone that despite not finishing high school, he was not stupid. He was told to get good grades in his class and he would have the option to serve on a PT Boat or submarine. He chose PT Boats and was sent to Melville for training. He was sent to navigation school at Carnington Point. He loved the job. Frongello was constantly learning. He enjoyed looking at the stars, learning about the stars, and knowing where he was going.

Arthur Frongello was transferred to Squadron 22 [Annotator's Note: Motor Torpedo Boat Squadron 22 (MTBRon 22)] as a replacement. His ship was sent to Oran [Annotator's Note: Oran, Algeria], Africa and then Bizerte [Annotator's Note: Bizerte, Tunisia], where Frongello joined PT-302. At Melville [Annotator's Note: the Motor Torpedo Boat Squadrons Training Center in Melville, Rhode Island], Frongello was trained at night on how to work on a PT Boat [Annotator's Note: patrol torpedo boat]. He trained on semaphore, light signals, tracking targets, navigation, and strategy. On his boat, Frongello was a quartermaster. On a large ship, the quartermaster winds and sets all the clocks on the ship. Every week, the quartermaster was given a bulletin outlining different hazards located in their ship's area. The quartermaster then marked all the obstacles on the ship's charts. Frongello enjoyed the work. His ship had red lights to illuminate the chart house. His skipper would come in to get new carts as the boat entered new areas. Frongello indexed each chart so they were easy to find. Frongello was promoted for that action. A PT Boat had a crew of 13 men. One night, there was a card game the executive officer lost. The next day, the men were in line to get their cigarette allowance. The executive officer argued with the man he lost to about giving him his cigarettes. Frongello laughed at the argument and was told to clean the bilge [Annotator's Note: the bottom floor of a ship, usually collects an assortment of fluids that regularly needs to be cleared out], but the skipper commuted the punishment. On his way to North Africa, his ship took a zig-zag [Annotator's Note: a naval anti-submarine maneuver] course, leading to a two week voyage. During the first two days, he was so seasick, he did not participate in anti-submarine drills. On the third day, he got very hungry and ate soda crackers, which helped his seasickness. He remained in Oran for a month. He went from Bizerte to Madalina [Annotator's Note: an island in the Mediterranean Sea near Sardinia and Corsica]. On the island, he saw the grave of Garibaldi [Annotator's Note: General Giuseppe Garibaldi, contributed to the unification of Italy] but Frongello did not know who he was. The island was cold and windy. He was on the island for Christmas and New Year's. He was then told he would be going to France. On the voyage, he got seasick again, but this time he had no crackers. When he moored in France, Frongello's skipper told him to take a walk. On the walk, he ran into a French girl. Three days later, he was back in the town and met up with her again. They became very good friends.

Just before sunset, Arthur Frongello's boat [Annotator's Note: PT-302, Motor Torpedo Boat Squadron 22 (MTBRon 22)] would go out to sea, test fire its gun, and then join other boats for a patrol. The boats were loud, so when they would reach the patrol area, they would close the mufflers, making the sound go underwater. The boats could not go very fast during those times, so they slowly patrolled their sectors. The skipper would use a whistle to sound general quarters if a target was spotted. The first time Frongello experienced combat was during a patrol. Someone sent up a flair, so the skipper flashed a signal to see if the vessel was a friend or foe. It turned out to be a friend, but Frongello was shaken by the experience. Some patrols were closer than others. On one patrol, a French destroyer joined the patrol. Frongello's skipper tried to warn the French of an oncoming German vessel, but the French skipper would not listen. The destroyer was hit by a torpedo, so Frongello's boat had to pick up survivors. His ship could not carry all of the survivors, but managed to get 26 men out of the water. There was oil burning on the surface of the water. Once the boat was away from the scene, Frongello's skipper called to the base for emergency units to prepare for them. Frongello frisked a sailor for weapons. He found a picture of his family in his wallet. The sailor looked at him with apprehensive. Frongello did not want to kill that sailor. He thought it was all stupid. On another patrol, Frongello's ship was caught in the daylight. The Army Air Corps would strafe his boat during the day. They had to paint the boat with red, white, and blue stripes so they would be recognized from the air. One day while on patrol, the vessel pulled up to a buoy, but it had been targeted by the Germans. They reported that the buoys were German targets when they returned to base. As the war was winding down, Frongello's crew was told to shoot old torpedoes at sea walls near Genoa [Annotartor's Note: Gennoa, Italy]. Hitting the sea walls worried the Germans. They had to save their heavy ammunition for larger ships, so they normally did not fire back. Frongello felt fortunate for that.

In April 1945, President Roosevelt [Annotator's Note: Franklin Delano Roosevelt, 32nd President of the United States] died and some of the sailors cried. Arthur Frongello and his crew thought he was a great leader and loved him. Shortly after that, the war ended. The crew was worried they would be sent to the Pacific. For the last month he was in Europe, Frongello was allowed to live like a tourist. When the month was over, Frongello's boat [Annotator's Note: PT-302, Motor Torpedo Boat Squadron 22 (MTBRon 22)] was sent back to Oran [Annotator's Note: Oran, Algeria]. On the way, he visited Naples [Annotator's Note: Naples, Italy], Leghorn [Annotator's Note: Livorno, Italy], and the Isle of Capri [Annotator's Note: island off the coast of Italy]. Between Bizerte [Annotator's Note: Bizerte, Tunisia] and Oran, the skipper was toggling between engines. One of the boats screws [Annotator's Note: propellors] fell off. In Oran, the skipper told the harbor master about the screw. The harbor master put the boast on a larger vessel heading for the United States. Frongello believes his skipper was smart for making the screw fall off. Frongello was put on a refrigerator ship, so he was able to eat like a king. He felt good knowing he was going home. The PT Boats [Annotator's Note: patrol torpedo boat] in the Pacific did not fight what Frongello calls a "civilized war." When ships were in for repair, the hatches were closed up and a 30mm gun was put on it. Frongello was glad he did not have to serve on a boat like that. The crew's quarters were below deck. From the chart room to the crew's quarters was five steps. One night while on patrol, Frongello went below deck. A gallon of ketchup fell and made a bang. Frongello thought he had been shot, especially after seeing the red ketchup on the ground. While returning from another patrol, he was caught out in the daylight. The boat was lost. They came across an airman in the water. They did not tell him they were lost when they got him on the boat. He rarely went out to pick up downed airmen. Frongello picked up Germans from the water and then gave them over to the MPs [Annotator's Note: military police]. Churchill [Annotator's Note: Sir Winston Leonard Spencer-Churchill; Prime Minister, United Kingdom, 1940 to 1945] said they fought World War 2 to protect French champagne. As he crossed the continental shelf on his voyage home, Frongello's skipper wanted the PT Boats radar turned on so they could see New York [Annotator's Note: New York, New York]. The skipper of the freighter was invited to watch the radar. With radar, Frongello could spot the enemy before they saw him. His torpedoes were launched in the water, not from a tube. This allowed the crew to fire the torpedo without being seen by the enemy. When he arrived in New York City, he called home. He then bought some milk. After returning to the boat, the skipper told the crew that only seven people could leave the boat. Frongello was one of the first people that was allowed to go home on a 30 day leave [Annotator's Note: an authorized absence for a short period of time]. His skipper gave him a three day travel pass, even though it only took half a day to get home. Frongello appreciated his skipper because he looked out for the crew. Frongello was happy to see his family. His mother had gray hair when he returned home.

When the war started, Arthur Frongello was still in high school, but joined the Navy anyway. When he left the Navy, Frongello went back to high school. He had a good social life the second time he was in school. He graduated two years later. Afterwards, he told his mother he would not go to college out of state. He wound up attending Harvard [Annotator's Note: Harvard University in Cambridge, Massachusetts]. After school, he went to work with the Air Force. He built the first jet engines for the Air Force at the General Electric factory in Massachusetts. One of his friends got him a job at the factory. The jet engine was simpler than a regular engine. Everything is actual flow in one direction. It was easier to inspect the jet engine. Frongello would have liked to have them on his boat [Annotator's Note: during the war Frongello served aboard PT-302, Motor Torpedo Boat Squadron 22 (MTBRon 22)]. He enjoyed working for the Air Force. He went to Washington [Annotator's Note: Washington, D.C.] to discuss the jet engine. A colonel asked why the men were not in the Air Force during the war, so Frongello told him there was no Air Force back then. He was paid good money when he created an innovation. The military was open to suggestions and would take up good ideas. Frongello noticed when an engine went to a client, they did not go out with the tools needed to fix it. Frongello suggested sending a list of tools with the engine so the clients know what they needed, leading them to buy more product. He was given more money for that idea. He also suggested they buy spare engines to cannibalize, instead of just buying the part. They did not adopt that suggestion. When Frongello went on work trips, he would be reimbursed for things he bought. He suggested the company give him a company credit card. They did not adopt it then, but they have that procedure now. He was treated well while working for the military, which he liked. He worked with the best companies. They cared about the men using the machines they built. During his time in the service, he never wanted for anything. They were given everything they needed. The crew would inspect everything they used on the boat, especially bullet clips. Frongello came to realize how important quality is, especially with weapons systems. While working as a chief for the company, Fongello was investigated for taking bribes. Frongello told the investigators all of his men were honest men, veterans, and would not take from the company. He told the investigator he was not there for the money. His men were not greedy.

Arthur Frongello believes the Navy uniform is the most innovative piece of clothing a man could wear. The stripes, stars, and buttons all have meaning to them, the pants can be used as a floatation device, the seams are on the inside, and it can be easily washed. When he sees a sailor in uniform at the airport, he likes to tell them about the uniform's history. The jumper fit tightly allowing the sailor to gauge how much they should eat. His first night in the Navy, Frongello cried. Two days later, he was enjoying it. The recruits slept in hammocks. One night while lying in his hammock, Frongello was angry. He started shaking a safety bar, which shook someone else out of their hammock. The man had to go to sick bay for the night. The following night, he did it to the man again. On the third night, the man refused to get into his hammock. He did not want to go back to the sick bay. He enjoyed messing with that recruit. He was taught how to fish. While he was fishing, his friends pushed him into the water. While on patrol, the boats would race to the pier. His skipper did not want to win the race because the boats would moor together. When the other crews came back from leave [Annotator's Note: an authorized absence for a short period of time], they would not jump on Frongello's deck because it was the last one tied up, allowing them to sleep without noise. The Germans took all of the able bodied men from French towns. In Nice [Annotator's Note: Nice, France], there were more women than men in the town, which the sailors enjoyed. While in France, Frongello and a buddy were lost and could not speak French. His buddy thought the French people were foreigners. Frongello thought North Africa was a disaster. Bubonic plague was rampant, so he was confined to his base. They watched the same movies for several days. He thought it was all nasty. The only women around were military nurses. While in North Africa, Frongello received a "Dear John Letter" [Annotator's Note: a letter from a female to a male serviceman serving overseas breaking off a romantic engagement] from his girlfriend. Some of his buddies grabbed the letter and put it on the bulletin board. The crew then sent as many nude pictures as they could back to the girl. The crew wore Army boots when working. The sailors liked the height, so they would replace the boot when the heels wore out. At the end of the war, the crew sold 200 pairs of boots to locals in Nice. The crew bought perfume with the money they made. Frongello accidentally destroyed his clothes. Another time, he tied his dungarees to a line and threw them into the water to get cleaned. If he kept them in the water too long while the boat was moving, it would ruin the clothes. When he came ashore after a patrol, the crew would eat. The food was good. Frongello liked to eat Spam on French bread. In boot camp, everyone was called "mate." His first cup of coffee in the Navy consisted of coffee with condensed milk. He put in a lot of milk and sugar. The mate told him the coffee would be bad, but Frongello enjoyed it.

Arthur Frangello did not have any issues adjusting to civilian life. He was happy to make it back. Some of his friends died and others came back wounded and maimed. One was shot through the ankle. Frangello never went to the VA [Annotator's Note: Veteran's Administration]. He never had nightmares. His most memorable moment of World War 2 was meeting a French girl named Simone. After they met, they became best friends. They taught each other French and English. Frongello gave her a yard of nylon parachute. She made a bathing suit out of the nylon. They talked about getting married, but she did not want to live in Boston [Annotator's Note: Boston, Massachusetts] because it is cold. She was killed in an accident while Frongello was on a patrol. He visited her grave before he left France. He named his boat "After You" in memory of her. Frongello wanted to serve because he wanted to be a part of the crowd. He had several friends in the service. He wanted to do what his friends were doing. The war improved his life. He was educated, got to see the world, and become a decent person. After the war, nobody recognized the veterans until recently. Frongello admired his skipper and General Patton [Annotator's Note: US Army Lieutenant General George S. Patton, Jr.]. Frongello thought Patton was the best general of the war. In the Battle of the Bulge [Annotator's Note: Battle of the Bulge or German Ardennes Counter Offensive, 16 December 1944 to 25 January 1945], Patton wanted to relieve the 101st Airborne Division because of how they stood up to the Germans. Frongello believes World War 2 was the last war America won. He thinks other countries should fear the United States. Frongello thinks institutes like The National WWII Museum [Annotator's Note: in New Orleans, Louisiana] are important so the history will not be forgotten. He thinks teaching the history is important. He believes it is important to know history because past experiences allows future generations to know tough things are possible to overcome.