[Annotator's Note: It is very difficult to understand Carleton Cleveland due to sound issues throughout this clip.] Carleton Cleveland was born in November 1921 in Binghamton, New York. He had a brother eight years younger than him. He walked to school. He became a Camp Counselor [Annotator's Note: at summer camps]. He worked in his father's plant in the summer. [Annotator's Note: A person off camera shows him the questions to answer.] When he learned of the attack on Pearl Harbor [Annotator's Note: the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor, Hawaii on 7 December 1941], he knew it was the beginning of a very serious problem. Two wars were going on at the same time. The Air Force was undermanned and under equipped. At the time, he was a freshman in college [Annotator's Note: at Yale University in New Haven, Connecticut]. He was in a quandary as to what to do. He and other freshmen got together. They liked what the Air Force had to offer. They signed on to a program that let them finish their freshman year. They made the right decision. They finished school and were activated in the summer [Annotator's Note: in April 1942].

[Annotator's Note: It is very difficult to understand Carleton Cleveland due to sound issues throughout this clip.] Carleton Cleveland signed on [Annotator's Note: volunteered for servince in the US Army Air Forces] in the Spring and was called up in the Summer [Annotator's Note: Cleveland was called to active duty in April 1942]. He went to San Antonio, Texas [Annotator's Note: to Kelly Field] and then to basic training in Santa Ana, California [Annotator's Note: at Santa Ana Army Air Base]. After basic, he went to Albuquerque Air Force Base in New Mexico [Annotator's Note: Albuquerque Army Air Base in Albuquerque, New Mexico] for navigation training. He then went to bombardier school. Albuquerque was the bombardier school. They wanted the men to be flexible. The B-29 [Annotator's Note: Boeing B-29 Superfortress very heavy bomber] was on the planning boards and was going to use one man to do both jobs. He went to Glasgow, Montana [Annotator's Note: to Glasgow Army Air Base] where they formed their crews and practiced formation flying. They flew individually to Maine to Presque Isle, Maine [Annotator's Note: Presque Isle Army Airfield; later Presque Isle Air Force Base]. He was assigned to the 509th Squadron, 351st Bomb Group, of the 8th Air Force [Annotator's Note: 509th Bombardment Squadron, 351st Bombardment Group, 8th Air Force]. [Annotator's Note: He reads through some papers for the questions and says something hard to understand about the Boeing B-17 Flying Fortress heavy bomber.] They used the Norden bombsight [Annotator's Note: Norden Mk. XV tachometric bombsight]. He liked the B-17. It was new and a very good, tough aircraft. He joined the 351st in Polebrook, England [Annotator's Note: at Royal Air Force Station Polebrook in Northamptonshire, England] and had to work into the routine. They got into combat the first of December [Annotator's Note: 1 December 1943]. They became veterans very fast. His first combat mission was terrifying. He was not sure he wanted to be there. [Annotator's Note: Cleveland stops to read from a paper that has the questions for him.] He had 24 combat missions in all the countries occupied by Germans. His first mission turned out to be a milk run, which is what they called easy flights. [Annotator's Note: He loses his train of thought and apologizes. An off-camera person's arms move in front of the camera and you can hear her talking to someone off and on.] His most memorable missions were to Marseilles, France where they hit a German fighter base. They came up and gave them an awful beating. It was questionable if they had enough fuel to get back. The commanding officer of Polebrook Air Base was killed. Everybody scattered and had to find their own way home. That was probably his toughest mission. The Air Force never sent them on any missions directly targeting civvies [Annotator's Note: slang for civilians]. They needed control of the air to win the war. [Annotator's Note: He apologizes for losing his train of thought.] They did not target cities per se but were attacking industrial targets and the airfields. They knew they were going to kill women and children. They thought and prayed about it a lot.

[Annotator's Note: It is very difficult to understand Carleton Cleveland due to sound issues throughout this clip.] Carleton Cleveland stayed active in England [Annotator's Note: at Royal Air Force Station Polebrook in Northamptonshire, England] for his 34 missions [Annotator's Note: with the 509th Bombardment Squadron, 351st Bombardment Group, 8th Air Force]. He had gone over in December 1943. He finished his tour and was asked to stay on as a squadron navigator without flying any missions. He planned routes and helped bombardiers. By this time the B-17s [Annotator's Note: Boeing B-17 Flying Fortress heavy bomber] were pretty well scattered. On the way home, the Germans would attack them. When he first got over there, they flew in formations. They had no fighter coverage because the RAF [Annotator's Note: British Royal Air Force] could only go as far as the French coast. They would just turn around. The Germans countered the formation by sending a plane to break up the formation to get individual bombers separated from the unit. The Germans would fly outside the range of the B-17s but at the same altitude. They would radio the altitude down to the German gunners. It was pretty brutal at times. Then they got fighters with external gas tanks and that made a difference. One time, the first jet aircraft [Annotator's Note: German Messerschmitt Me 262 jet fighter aircraft] came up but did not really attack. They did know what they were.

[Annotator's Note: It is very difficult to understand Carleton Cleveland due to sound issues throughout this clip.] Carleton Cleveland finished his missions [Annotator's Note: with the 509th Bombardment Squadron, 351st Bombardment Group, 8th Air Force] but stayed on in England [Annotator's Note: at Royal Air Force Station Polebrook in Northamptonshire, England] for a while as a squadron navigator. [Annotator's Note: A woman's face appears on screen and then the interviewer cuts in from 0:25:51.000 to 0:26:13.000.] He returned in December [Annotator's Note: in December 1945] and was assigned to a navigation training school. He was able to see what the folks at home had been doing. He was told he was going to the Pacific and then told he was not. He heard about President Roosevelt dying [Annotator's Note: Franklin Delano Roosevelt, 32nd President of the United States; died 12 April 1945]. [Annotator's Note: Cleveland speaks about Roosevelt, but it is hard to follow.] Cleveland was at a school in Saint Joe, Missouri [Annotator's Note: Saint Joseph, Missouri] when the war was over and celebrated at a bar. The atomic bombs [Annotator's Note: nuclear weapons dropped on Hiroshima, Japan on 6 August 1945 and Nagasaki, Japan on 9 August 1945] were a surprise but needed to be used. Cleveland admires Harry Truman [Annotator's Note: Harry S. Truman, 33rd President of the United States] for the decision. As distasteful as it was, he supported it. He feels the same way today.

[Annotator's Note: It is very difficult to understand Carleton Cleveland due to sound issues throughout this clip.] Carleton Cleveland was separated from the service in December [Annotator's Note: December 1945]. He was promoted to Captain. He signed a lot of papers and forms. At the end was a form for the Reserve. He stayed in the active Reserve for about two years. He got other interests and did not renew it. He did not take advantage of the G.I. Bill because his father was building a family business. He did not need it but thinks it was very important for others to get decent jobs. He felt he was on the periphery of things transitioning. His wife told him he had nightmares.

[Annotator's Note: It is very difficult to understand Carleton Cleveland due to sound issues throughout this clip.] Carleton Cleveland's most memorable experience of World War 2 was the invasion of Normandy [Annotator's Note: D-Day; the Allied invasion of Normandy, France on 6 June 1944]. It was the final mile that won the war. He crossed the Channel [Annotator's Note: the English Channel, and it was cloudy. As far as the eye could see, there were ships and landing craft. There were parachutes. He bombed [Annotator's Note: as a navigator with the 509th Bombardment Squadron, 351st Bombardment Group, 8th Air Force] behind the German troops on the coast to knock out bridges and railroads to slow down any retreat. He thinks future generations should be taught what their fathers had done and how important it is to keep the peace. We hope this will not happen again. The museum [Annotator's Note: The National WWII Museum in New Orleans, Louisiana] is playing a good part in getting people to know what was going and what was done. Early on his third or fifth mission, German fighters were following them back. They knocked out one of their engines and they slowed down and lost altitude. They did not know if they had enough gas to get back to England. They were tempted to go to Sweden, but the crew voted to keep going. They got to England and landed with about a teaspoon of gasoline left. Cleveland appreciates the opportunity to talk and feels indebted to the museum for getting the story of his experience.