[Annotator's Note: Very odd beginning. There is no sound for quite a while and then footage of an empty chair with noises in the background. Then the interviewer comes in frame. Interviewee is looking for a talk on his computer then he gives a compact disc to someone off camera. He talks about a talk he gave then talks about a lieutenant colonel. There is a loud noise and then the interviewer puts a microphone on Beck.]

[Annotator's Note: The interview starts abruptly.] In December 1944, Carl Beck was 19 years old and had just gotten back from a pass to Paris, France. He was put on a truck and someone came by in a jeep and said to mount the machine guns on the sides of the trucks because the Germans were just up the road. Beck said he did not need this stuff. It [Annotator's Note: the war] was supposed to be over. Turned out that was Bastogne, Belgium [Annotator's Note: the siege of Bastogne in December 1944; part of the larger Battle of the Bulge, 16 December 1944 to 25 January 1945, Ardennes, Belgium]. He got on the truck and they went up and set up around Foy, Belgium. The fighting was intense, but casualties were light until they moved out into the Bois Jacques [Annotator's Note: Jacques Woods]. The Krauts [Annotator's Note: period derogatory term for Germans] had sent over a surrender group. General McAuliffe [Annotator's Note: General Anthony Clement “Nuts” McAuliffe, acting commander of the 101st Airborne Division during defense of Bastogne, Battle of the Bulge] said "nuts" to them but what Beck was thinking was that the Germans should surrender to them. They started to attack some Germans on a hill. The ground was so hard Beck could not dig a hole. He came across a German medic who was treating a soldier in a foxhole. The medic left and then Beck took the German out of the hole and took it over for himself. An American tank trooper came walking up the trail and was shaking with what Beck calls the "battle rattles." Beck told him to take cover, but he wanted to find another tank. They teamed up and went and got a tank out of the woods. As they came out, they saw two German tanks leading a battalion of Volksgrenadiers, old men and kids. [Annotator's Note: Beck likely means Volkssturm, or "people's storm"; the national militia established by the Nazi Party on order of Adolf Hitler on 16 October 1944. Volksgrenadiers were a type of German Army division formed in Autumn 1944. They were professional military formations with effective weapons, equipment and training.] Beck took aim on the group and watched his tracer bullet go right through a German kid.

On 5 January 1945, Carl Beck and his unit [Annotator's Note: Company H, 2nd Battalion, 501st Parachute Infantry Regiment, 101st Airborne Division] got word that they were going to attack the Germans. They were hitting the units leaving the Bulge [Annotator's Note: Battle of the Bulge or Ardennes Counteroffensive, 16 December 1944 to 25 January 1945, Ardennes, Belgium]. The P-47s [Annotator's Note: Republic P-47 Thunderbolt fighter aircraft] would fly in pairs and were shooting the tanks well. Some good people were lost but they were doing well. The Bois Jacques [Annotator's Note: Jacques Woods] is creepy and scary. Replacements would come in that they did not know. [Annotator's Note: Beck gets emotional.] They got to a point where they were almost like animals and their senses got pretty developed. A replacement got a package and Beck was bringing it to him, when 88s [Annotator's Note: German 88mm multi-purpose artillery] started on them. The package broke open and it was a pecan log. Beck just sensed the kid was dead, so he ate the candy. The regiment moved to Alsace-Lorraine, France and took up positions alongside the French 2nd Army. They lost more people there and then moved back. Around April 1945, a company commander was with them outside of Reims, France. The war ended and everyone was celebrating. This commander said that he was headed to Japan next and he was taking everyone with him.

Carl Beck had been wounded in Bastogne, Belgium and laid on a stretcher all night. He made it back to his outfit [Annotator's Note: Company H, 2nd Battalion, 501st Parachute Infantry Regiment, 101st Airborne Division] and he stayed on the line. The point system was in play for when soldiers could go home. The Purple Heart [Annotator's Note: US military decoration awarded to those wounded or killed in combat on or after 5 April 1917] was worth five points and Beck had the medic give him his five points. He reenlisted in the 82nd Airborne Division, XVIII Airborne Corps, and retired after 20 years. He was injured on a jump in 1953 and spent a year in the hospital. He retired from Waltham College in Spartanburg, South Carolina in 1963. His claim to fame is parachuting into Normandy, France three times. He jumped in 1944, in 1994 and in 2004. [Annotator's Note: Beck talks at length about skydiving and his feelings about women in the world. He tells the interviewer good luck on his trip to Bastogne. The interviewer says they are looking for someone to go along with them. He talks of traveling through Europe later after the war and he gets very emotional. He talks about working with Dutch sixth grade students who care for the monuments of the country.]

Carl Beck does not know exactly where he parachuted into on his way to Normandy, France [Annotator's Note: in the early morning hours of 6 June 1944] after his aircraft was hit by enemy fire. He and another soldier, Robert Johnson, wandered around for two or three days. They managed to evade the Germans, but they were cold, hungry and miserable. They heard some French people talking. A woman saw the other soldier first, and then a man saw them. They were loyal French people and motioned them to come in. They led them to a barn and helped them into the loft and fed them that that evening. One morning, the man came in to get them and they joined up with F Company, 508th Infantry Regiment [Annotator's Note: Company F, 2nd Battalion, 508th Parachute Infantry Regiment (separate)], who were attacking a nearby town. A small, two-man German tank came down the road. Beck had gammon grenades [Annotator's Note: No. 82 Gammon Bomb hand grenade; developed by Captain R. S. Gammon of 1st Parachute Regiment, British Army] and threw one at the tank. He missed and blew up the house across the street. Another soldier hit it, and someone killed the German driver when he tried to escape. This was late July 1944 and they rejoined their own regiment [Annotator's Note: Beck was a squad leader in Company H, 2nd Battalion, 501st Parachute Infantry Regiment, 101st Airborne Division] outside of Carentan, Normandy, France.

Carl Beck joined the Army at 17 in November 1942. He was born in 1925. He had been working with his father during the summer. He replaced a guy who had enlisted in the Airborne. He came to visit in his jumpsuit and that's when Beck enlisted. The whole country wanted to go to battle after the Japanese attacked Pearl Harbor. The sleeping giant of the United States woke up. People were doing anything they could to help the war effort. Beck went to Camp Toccoa, Georgia for basic training. In January 1944, he went to England with the 101st Airborne Division. Each Division had three parachute regiments and one glider regiment. Their largest weapon was an 81 mortar [Annotator's Note: M1 81mm medium caliber mortar]. They only had light machine guns in 12 man squads. Beck ran Currahee [Annotator's Note: Currahee Mountain, Stephens County, Georgia; training site for the 506th Infantry Regiment, 101st Airborne Division stationed at Camp Toccoa, Georgia] a lot. Jump school was a piece of cake after that. He went to Camp Mackall, North Carolina, then Tennessee maneuvers then to England. The idea of the airborne basic was to just see if they could take it. They ran everywhere instead of walking. Jump school was at Fort Benning, Georgia.

Carl Beck jumped into Eerde, Holland using a leg bundle with an A6 machine gun [Annotator's Note: .30 caliber M1919A6 light machine gun] and 250 rounds of ammunition. It was a homemade contraption with a yoke and he had to be placed on the airplane because it made him as stiff as a board. He was on their objective within 30 minutes. They took the town and took part in the battle of the sand hills in the Brabant area of Holland [Annotator's Note: Noord-Brabant, or North Brabant, Netherlands]. They took "Hell's Highway" [Annotator's Note: Highway 69, now N69, Eindhoven, Netherlands] across the Maas river in a British plan to drive a salient north. The 101st Airborne Division was operating in the southernmost part around Eindhoven, the 82nd [Annotator's Note: 82nd Airborne Division] was operating around Nijmegen and the British 6th [Annotator's Note: British 6th Airborne Division] was at Arnhem which is known as "A Bridge Too Far". [Annotator's Note: The 1977 film by Richard Attenborough based on Operation Market Garden, Netherlands, 17 to 25 September 1944.] The 101st held Hell's Highway. The town of Schijndel was the site of a night attack on the Germans. They were cut off there and were supported by the RAF [Annotator's Note: British Royal Air Force]. In the sand dunes, they were out of food. The Dutch managed to get some potatoes to them. Beck and another soldier had picked up potatoes. C-47 [Annotator's Note: Douglas C-47 Skytrain cargo aircraft] resupply planes were coming over when German 20mm antiaircraft guns opened up on them. The rounds were bouncing and landing all around, so Beck took cover while trying to hold onto the potatoes. Beck saw a C-47 flying low and a Messerschmitt strafed it, causing it to crash. Beck describes it as murder and says it was so sad to watch. A couple of days later, B-24s [Annotator's Note: Consolidated B-24 Liberator heavy bomber] came in to resupply them. They were flying really low and they dropped the equipment pallets. Beck turned and saw a motorcycle under an equipment bundle and it reminded him of a painting. Switching to the B-24s from the C-47s to receive resupplies was how the unit [Annotator's Note: Beck was a squad leader in Company H, 2nd Battalion, 501st Parachute Infantry Regiment, 101st Airborne Division] kept going. The British finally broke through to them. All told, they spent 72 days on the front line around a brick factory near Zeteren [Annotator's Note: likely Heteren, Holland]. They looked right over the Rhine River and were using the kiln area as the observation post. One company relieved the British at night. The Germans came into the brick kiln and a friend of Beck's was sleeping nearby using his overcoat as a pillow. The Germans surprised the British soldiers and told them to surrender. Beck's friend shot and killed the German lieutenant and then there was a gun battle. His friend would later put on the overcoat that was now riddled with bullet holes and tell other soldiers he had been shot in each place there was a hole. The time there was mostly static but also scary. The Dutch underground fighters were good. The men would do night patrols in rubber boats with only a Tommy gun [Annotator's Note: .45 caliber Thompson submachine gun] and an oar. It was scary. They thought there was a boat coming at them one night, but it turned out to be a British Lancaster [Annotator's Note: British Avro Lancaster heavy bomebr] that had been shot down. Beck tells the story of "The Incredible Patrol" [Annotator's Note: 30 October 1944; six men of 501st Parachute Infantry Regiment, 101st Airborne Division crossed the Rhine River and captured 32 German soldiers]. They were through Thanksgiving 1944 when the Canadian engineers took boats to bring back the remnants of the 6th British Airborne. Beck says that some historians will say the operation [Annotator's Note: Operation Market Garden, 17 to 25 September 1944] was a failure but all he knows is that he was there with the men, they kicked the Germans' ass, and he was ready to come home. He returns to Holland quite often.

Carl Beck was in Berchtesgaden, Germany when his unit [Annotator's Note: Company H, 2nd Battalion, 501st Parachute Infantry Regiment, 101st Airborne Division] deactivated. He was then assigned to the 502nd Infantry Regiment, 101st Airborne Division, and stationed in Brock, Germany for occupation duty. They were not to fraternize with the Germans. They ended up in Auxerre, France. He returned home in November 1945. Beck did not like civilian life, so he reenlisted and made it a 20-year career. He married and his wife was a soldier for the last six years of his time in service. They then moved to Atlanta, Georgia. In June 2004, Beck received the Legion of Honor [Annotator's Note: Legion D'Honneur, France's highest distinction; may be awarded to American Veterans who fought in one of the three main campaigns for the liberation of France; awardees are given the rank of Knight of the Legion of Honor]. In 1994, on D-Day [Annotator's Note: Normandy landings 6 June 1944] plus 50 [Annotator's Note: years], Beck and a group of men he calls the Return to Normandy group jumped into Normandy, France. In 2004, the Pentagon told the group that they could not do the jump again. They rented a French airplane and did their own commemorative jump on 7 June instead of 6 June. The French put Beck and his friends in a hotel in Paris. He talks of plans for jumping again in 2014. Beck stayed another month in Europe traveling. When Beck talks to kids who are leaving high school, he advises them to backpack their way around Europe. He had a former student who made the trip. He feels that these kinds of trips are an education in themselves. Beck himself spent some time at Saxon Yard, near Lambourn, England, which is horse country. He likes to travel alone most of the time.

In 1944, in a town called Baupte, France, Carl Beck says there was a man named Henri D. Schmidt, a Belgic [Annotator's Note: from Belgae, a Germanic tribe living in Gaul starting around 3rd century BC] soldier in World War 1, who lived there but was a bit of an outsider. On D-Day [Annotator's Note: the Allied Invasion of Normandy, France on 6 June 1944], Henri pulled some American soldiers out of the water and was honored for his work doing so. Beck met him. He returned in 2004 to visit him, but Henri had died. Beck returns there a lot and hosts dinners for the people there. He maintains his connections with both French and Dutch people who treated him well. [Annotator's Note: The interviewer has Beck hold a picture of Company H, 2nd Battalion, 501st Parachute Infantry Regiment, 101st Airborne Division at Fort Mackall, North Carolina 1943. He is not in the photo though. He also points out other photos on the wall. There is a tremendous amount of background noise]. Beck holds up a picture of himself that was taken during Christmas leave from jump school in 1943. [Annotator's Note: The interviewer does several slow pans of the Company H photo with no sound. Then they both move into a bedroom while Beck talks of working at a library and then puts his uniform on for the camera. The interviewer zooms in on the Legion of Honor medal on the uniform while Beck describes receiving it in Paris as well as pointing out his other medals. The video then cuts to outside Beck's home with very loud traffic noise. Beck shows the interviewer a Currahee [Annotator's Note: Currahee Mountain, Stephens County, Georgia; training site for the 506th Infantry Regiment, 101st Airborne Division stationed at Camp Toccoa, Georgia] Oak tree with a granite stone and inscription. Beck tells a story of growing up there and the story behind his property.