Earl Angel was born in August 1923 in Hanover, Pennsylvania. He had ten siblings, four sisters and six brothers. His father was sickly, so the children had to do a lot of work on the family farm. There was no pay, only room and board. He bought his first car and then began work in a shoe factory at age 16. He was drafted five days after marrying his wife. Angel's father died at age 44, leaving no time for Angel to get an education. He was 18 when the Japanese attacked Pearl Harbor [Annotator's Note: the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor, Hawaii on 7 December 1941]. He did not really understand what it meant for him and America at that time. He was inducted at Fort Meade, Maryland [Annotator's Note: Fort George G. Meade in in Anne Arundel County, Maryland]. From there he was sent to Camp Mackall, North Carolina [Annotator's Note: in Hoke, Richmond, and Scotland Counties, North Carolina] for training. The camp was new, so the recruits did not have barracks to sleep in and instead slept in tents. Angel found the training to be no different than employment. The military put him into a variety of positions: squad leader for a .50 caliber machine gun [Annotator's Note: Browning M2 .50 caliber machine gun], supply sergeant, and mess sergeant. From basic training, Angel was sent to the 11th Airborne [Annotator's Note: 11th Airborne Division] for additional training. [Annotator's Note: A person's voice is heard off camera.] Angel says she [Annotator's Note: the person off camera] saw how busted up the glider troops were coming back from maneuvers and did not want him to be part of the gliders. Because the 11th Airborne was half glider and half paratrooper, he volunteered for the paratroopers with the added incentive that it paid 50 dollars more a month to send back home. Instead of being sent to Camp Benning [Annotator's Note: Fort Benning in Columbus, Georgia], they did all their paratrooper training at Camp Mackall. They were not given jump boots [Annotator's Note: boots specifically designed for and given to paratroopers] and there were a couple of instances of parachutes not opening properly during training. The soldiers looked after each other, and on occasion had to share a parachute on the way down from the jump due to someone's not opening properly. Angel enjoyed paratrooper training.

Earl Angel and the 11th Airborne [Annotator's Note: 11th Airborne Division] traveled overseas on the USS Edellyn [Annotator's Note: named the Dorothy Luckenbach until 1944 and then became the hospital ship USAHS Ernestine Koranda], a former World War 1 troop transport. In the middle of the voyage the ship broke down, and the 11th Airborne was stranded for three days. While stranded, Tokyo Rose [Annotator's Note: nickname given by Allied servicemen to any English-speaking female radio personality broadcasting Japanese propaganda in the Pacific Theater] came on the radio with messages targeting the 11th Airborne, telling them that the Japanese knew where they were and that they were never going to get where they were supposed to go. After repairing the ship, they arrived in New Guinea [Annotator's Note: 25 May 1944]. There, Angel met one of his brothers who was also in the military. From New Guinea, the 11th Airborne moved to Leyte [Annotator's Note: Leyte, Philippines, 11 November 1944] where they made a beach landing, Angel's first combat experience. The soldiers had their carbines [Annotator's Note: .30 caliber M1 semi-automatic carbine], a sidearm, two clips of ammunition, and two grenades as their only equipment. After Leyte, they moved on to Luzon [Annotator's Note: Luzon, Philippines, 27 January 1945], where Angel met his brother a second time. From Luzon, the 11th Airborne were supposed to go to Mindanao [Annotator's Note: Mindanao, Philippines] where they would prepare to parachute into Okinawa [Annotator's Note: Okinawa, Japan] for the invasion of Japan. Three days before they were scheduled to jump into Japan, the war was over. The 11th Airborne executed the famous Raid on Los Banos [Annotator's Note: liberation of the Los Baños Internment Camp on 23 February 1945; Los Baños, Luzon, Philippines], Angel was not a part of this mission. While injured and infirmed, the Japanese attacked the hospital Angel was in. Some Filipinos helping the Japanese revealed the position of the hospital by unwinding a cord that led from the hospital's position to the mountains where the Japanese were hiding, allowing the Japanese to have a trail to the hospital at night. The Filipino Guerillas who were on the side of the Americans shot any Filipinos they found to be helping the Japanese. Angel felt some sympathy for the enemy Japanese soldiers. They expected to die in battle, were given poorer rations than the Americans, and had to hunt for their own food. He was wounded while in a foxhole fighting the Japanese. He thought that his commanding officers did an adequate job while he was in the military. Angel jumped into Japan to clear the airstrips following the use of the atomic bombs [Annotator's Note: nuclear weapons dropped on Hiroshima, Japan on 6 August 1945 and Nagasaki, Japan on 9 August 1945] and Japan's surrender. Angel says that if the Allies needed to invade Japan, they would have never come back. The islands were full of caves and the Japanese could have been heavily entrenched. Angel was put on occupation duty and spent about six months in Japan. The point system [Annotator's Note: a point system was devised based on a number of factors that determined when American servicemen serving overseas could return home] was started and allowed for people to be sent home. He had already accrued some points for himself due to his status as married, having a child, having experienced multiple battles, and being wounded in the line of duty receiving a Purple Heart [Annotator's Note: the Purple Heart Medal is an award bestowed upon a United States service member who has been wounded as a result of combat actions against an armed enemy]. The Army offered Angel a promotion to Second Lieutenant but he refused because he wanted to come home to be with his family. The Japanese were not combative towards the occupying American soldiers.

Earl Angel returned to the United States in November 1945. His infant daughter had trouble sleeping at night until the day that he came home. Angel was discharged at New Cumberland, Pennsylvania. He began training to be a bricklayer but received a call from the War Department about a job as a recruiter, which he took. He would drive recruits to the induction center, they would receive their physical, and he would turn them over to the military. He would also pick up dignitaries from the airport. His wife did not like him working this job because he would often be gone until midnight, so after four months he quit and went back to bricklaying. He used his 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 buy his first house. He is unhappy with the VA [Annotator's Note: United States Department of Veterans Affairs; also referred to as the Veterans Administration]. Angel is very impressed with The National WWII Museum [Annotator's Note: in New Orleans, Louisiana] and says that all museums in the United States serve a very important purpose.