David Eugene Turnbull was born in March 1925 in Lincoln, Nebraska. His family moved to Blue Springs, Nebraska where his father worked as a farmer, while his mother stayed home to take care of the house and children. He is the oldest of eight children. He lived on a windmill farm with no running water, no plumbing, and no inside bathroom. The radio ran off a car battery, so his family could only listen to a few hours a day. His neighbor lived two miles away. During the Great Depression [Annotator's Note: the Great Depression was a global economic depression that lasted from 1929 through 1939 in the United States], Turnbull’s family was very poor. The family ate what they could grow. He walked a mile and a half to school. His father had a car, but it took too long to crank it during the winter. He attended Blue Springs High School, but changed high schools when he moved in with his maternal grandparents. They lived in town and were closer to another high school. He went home during the summer to work on the family farm. Turnbull graduated from high school in 1942. He was living with his grandparents when he heard about the attack on Pearl Harbor [Annotator's Note: the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor, Hawaii on 7 December 1941]. He went back to the farm after he graduated, and his dad started working for the government. His job was to measure the number of crops people were planting so that the government could pay them. Turnbull was drafted into the Navy on 6 June 1944. His father had to quit his job in the government to go back to farming when Turnbull was leaving. His mother was upset to see him leave and was concerned for his life. He reported to Omaha, Nebraska with one change of clothes and five dollars. He went through a physical and after he passed, was able to choose which branch of military he wanted to join. He was shipped to Great Lakes Training Center in Chicago [Annotator’s Note: Chicago, Illinois] for boot camp.

After joining the Navy, David Eugene Turnbull was sent to Great Lakes Training Center [Annotator’s Note: Chicago, Illinois] for boot camp. Turnbull was nervous about what would be required of him, but he was physically fit and was able to manage boot camp. He learned early on that he was able to handle the physical endurance and fire a weapon accurately, but he did not know how to swim. He was taught how to identify planes and took various aptitude tests. After six weeks of boot camp, he graduated as a Fireman Second Class and was given a seven-day leave [Annotator's Note: an authorized absence for a short period of time]. He went home for a few days and then reported to Camp Bradford in Norfolk, Virginia for advanced training before being assigned to LST-654 [Annotator's Note: Landing Ship, Tank] as a trainer for other LST crews. After six months as an instructor, he was promoted to Electrician’s Mate and stayed on LST-654 for the duration of the war. The first time he went out to sea, he got seasick. He was later promoted to Petty Officer and was happy to not chip paint or do painting anymore. He learned that his crew would be heading out to the Pacific and his ship was sent to Baltimore [Annotator’s Note: Baltimore, Maryland] to be outfitted. His ship went through the Panama Canal, and he enjoyed going up on deck and watching the ship go through the locks. Turnbull’s ship headed for Hawaii. While cruising in the Pacific, he manned an aircraft gun and an aircraft spotter. At one point they went to general quarters because they saw planes. Turnbull told the commander that they were friendly, which was a mistake. They were enemy planes. His commander took his top-side duties away after the incident. His crew stayed in Hawaii for a few weeks while they gathered supplies, and then headed out for Eniwetok [Annotator’s Note: Eniwetok Atoll, Marshall Islands] carrying a crew of Marines. His crew stayed there for two weeks and then headed for Guam [Annotator’s Note: Guam, Mariana Islands] with an escort, and then to Okinawa [Annotator’s Note: Okinawa, Japan] after loading supplies. His ship landed on Okinawa while the island was still unsecured [Annotator’s Note: during the Battle of Okinawa, code named Operation Iceberg, 1 April to 22 June 1945]. They had to remain alert for kamikaze planes and were ordered to make heavy smoke to protect the ship. When Turnbull’s ship traveled across the Pacific, they zig-zagged [Annotator's Note: a naval anti-submarine maneuver], did not use lights, and had to detect mines. His ship moved around the Pacific going from island to island until August 1945 when the first atomic bomb was dropped on Japan [Annotator's Note: nuclear weapons dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki, Japan, 6 and 9 August 1945]. Turnbull recalled seeing B-29s [Annotator's Note: Boeing B-29 Superfortress very heavy bomber] on the island of Tinian [Annotator’s Note: Tinian, Northern Mariana Islands] right at the end of the war. His ship was at Okinawa when they heard that the Japanese had surrendered. He was relieved that he was going to make it out of the war alive because previously he was slated for the invasion of Japan and 50 percent of the ships were not going to make it out. His ship played patriotic music and his commander gave a speech.

After the Japanese surrendered [Annotator’s Note: the surrender was announced by Japanese Emperor Hirohito on 15 August 1945 and formally signed on 2 September 1945], David Eugene Turnbull [Annotator’s Note: Electrician’s Mate on the LST-654 (Landing Ship, Tank)] headed to Japan for occupation duty. He was not given liberty [Annotator's Note: an authorized absence for a short period of time] while he was in Japan, but instead loaded up 400 Korean Women that were abducted as children by the Japanese and were sexually abused. They took the passengers back to Korea. Then his ship was loaded with 800 Japanese prisoners, and they took them back to Japan. His ship was then ordered to go to Shanghai, China where they loaded 800 Japanese prisoners and took them back to Japan. Turnbull did not enjoy the duty of transporting prisoners. His ship then received orders to move the National Chinese Army to Manchuria to fight the communists. He continued with the duty until April 1946. While he made these trips, he did receive some liberty in China. He did not have any until June 1946 because someone on his ship sold equipment to the Chinese and was court martialed. Turnbull remarked about the typhoons while his ship was at Okinawa [Annotator’s Note: Okinawa, Japan]. Part of his ship was damaged. After the storm, his ship was 200 miles off the port of Okinawa. Turnbull was put on an APA [Annotator’s Note: Haskell-class attack transports] cargo ship at Shanghai and made his way to San Diego [Annotator’s Note: San Diego, California]. He sent a cablegram [Annotator’s Note: a telegraph message sent by cable] home to let his family know that he was back in the United States. He was discharged in August 1946 in St. Louis, Missouri. He did not want to stay in the Navy because he was anxious to get home. He used the G.I. Bill [Annotator's Note: the G.I. Bill, or Servicemen's Readjustment Act of 1944, was enacted by the United States Congress to aid United States veterans of World War 2 in transitioning back to civilian life and included financial aid for education, mortgages, business starts and unemployment] to attend the University of Nebraska [Annotator’s Note: in Lincoln, Nebraska] but found work at the Swift and Company Meat Packing Plant in the Edible Oil Division until his retirement in 1989. He met his wife before he left for the service and when he came home, he married her. [Annotator’s Note: Cell phone rings at 0:57:40.000 and Video Break.] After he retired, he made a career out of golf and travel.

David Eugene Turnbull believes that War World 2 has greatly influenced him because it opened his eyes to different cultures in the United States and the world. He realized that he never wanted to be a farmer and wanted a different way of life than how he grew up. Turnbull has difficulty being politically correct today and uses a lot of slang. He still holds some animosity towards our wartime enemies by not buying Japanese and German cars. The war hardened his heart regarding certain cultures. His most memorable experience was when his ship went through the 1945 typhoon because he thought that he would not make it out, and when the Korean women that came on board who had been abused by the Japanese. Turnbull had recurring nightmares of being on the LST [Annotator's Note: Landing Ship, Tank] at an older age. He believes that Americans give World War 2 veterans more recognition today than in previous years. There had been a lot of renewed appreciation for military veterans by most Americans. Turnbull believes there should be institutions like the National WWII Museum [Annotator's Note: The National WWII Museum in New Orleans, Louisiana], and we should continue to teach World War 2 to future generations. He thinks that The Museum is the best institution for World War 2 education.