[Annotator's Note: The interview begins with Jones Quincy Adams Jr. and the interviewer in conversation.] Adams was born in September 1924 and raised in Royse City [Annotator's Note: Royse City, Texas]. His father was a World War 1 veteran and he had two great-grandfathers who fought in the Civil War [Annotator's Note: American Civil War, 1861 to 1865]. During the Great Depression [Annotator's Note: Great Depression; a global economic depression that lasted through the 1930s], his father was a farmer and in later years had an automobile and truck dealership. His grandfather owned a bank in the town. Adams and his family were returning from church when they heard over the radio that the Japanese had bombed Pearl Harbor [Annotator's Note: the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor, Hawaii on 7 December 1941]. After graduating from high school, he began taking courses at Texas A&M [Annotator's Note: Texas A&M University in College Station, Texas] but decided to drop out and apply to the Army Air Corps Aviation Cadet Program. He chose the Army Air Corp because he felt that the Army just suited him better than the Navy or Marine Corps. Adams was inducted in Dallas, Texas in August 1943 then went to Miami Beach [Annotator's Note: Miami Beach, Florida] for basic training. The Air Corp had taken over most of the hotels in Miami and turned them into military barracks. The parks around the hotels were turned into drill fields and obstacle courses. He enjoyed the friendly rivalry he had with other cadets from different states as they sang their own drill songs. After basic training, Adams was sent to Cedar City, Utah for six weeks, and then went to Santa Ana, California for preflight. He was classified as a bombardier and sent to Victorville, California. Adams completed bombardier training and was commissioned as a second lieutenant on 10 June 1944. He was sent to Lincoln, Nebraska to assemble his crew who were sent to Hampton Roads, Virginia for deployment to Naples, Italy by ship. He traveled by truck to Cerignola, Italy [Annotator's Note: to Torretto Airfield, part of the Foggia Airfield Complex, Province of Foggia, Italy] where there were several 15th Air Force bases. His primary targets were Germany, Austria, and Italy. He had bombed Vienna [Annotator's Note: Vienna, Austria] several times. The Germans were very good and had great equipment. He held no animosity towards them because they were young guys fighting for their country like he was doing. Adams flew on a B-24 [Annotator's Note: Consolidated B-24 Liberator heavy bomber].

Jones Quincy Adams, Jr. was sent to Santa Ana, California for classification [Annotator's Note: after completing pre-flight training for the Army Air Forces in Cedar City, Utah]. He was classified as a bombardier because he was not tall enough to be a pilot. He was sent to Victorville, California for bombardier school, dropping bombs on pre-built shacks in the desert. His crew was from all over the United States, and all got along extremely well. They practiced in a Beechcraft airplane that was converted into a trainer for bombardier school. He was tested on accuracy and recalled many guys washed out and went to gunnery school. Many of his missions in Europe lasted about eight hours from takeoff to landing. They would fly as high as 30,000 feet. Adams remarked how cold it was in that high altitude and wore special suits to keep them warm. Adams used the Norden bombsight [Annotator's Note: Norden Mk. XV tachometric bombsight] which he thought was a magnificent piece of equipment. He was instructed to destroy the Norden bombsight if he ever crashed in enemy territory so the Germans would not copy it. The Army Air Corps was short on bombardiers, so Adams would fly on other missions. They did not receive credit for a mission unless they dropped their bombs. If they could not drop their bombs on the primary target because of cloud coverage, they had secondary targets that they could bomb. If for some reason they could not drop their bombs on the secondary target they would find a target of opportunity. Adams's plane was shot up several times, but he never lost a crew member.

When Jones Quincy Adams, Jr. received his commission and wings from the Army Air Corps in June 1944, his mother and aunts were there for the ceremony. He really enjoyed his instructors and thought they did a great job training him for his commission. During bombardier school, he remembered he had to pay attention to every little detail, including how his bed was made and how his clothes were hung. Any little slip could make a guy wash out. Adams does not recall any fatalities during training in his outfit, but he did see lots of fatalities with the fighter pilots. Adams was sent to Davis-Monthan Field [Annotator's Note: Tucson Army Airfield; now Davis-Monthan Air Force Base in Tucson, Arizona] for crew training after he received his commission. He graduated a few days after D-Day [Annotator's Note: D-Day; the Allied invasion of Normandy, France on 6 June 1944], and recalled hearing about it over the radio in his barracks. Then Adams and his crew were sent to Hampton Roads, Virginia for deployment to Naples, Italy by ship. It took 34 days to cross the Atlantic. He really appreciated the work of the ground crew. They worked all night to prepare planes for a mission the next day. Adams was assigned to the 826th Bombardment Squadron, 484th Bombardment Group [Annotator's Note: 15th Air Force]. The designation for his plane was a red bar on the tail. Adams thought the Germans had good intelligence and were tough competitors. They overheard Axis Sally [Annotator's Note: Rita Luisa Zucca] congratulating a colonel for the birth of his new baby, and the colonel had not yet received that information from home. [Annotator's Note: The interviewer shares a story from 0:28:39.000 to 0:29:47.000.] The United States citizens were really behind the war effort. The thought was if someone was a capable man, he should be in a uniform. Everyone had a Victory Garden and a scrap pile. Every car had a sticker on it for gas rations. If a person needed new shoes, they had to receive a certificate first. Everything was rationed.

In late October 1944, Jones Quincy Adams, Jr. was sent to Naples, Italy by ship. The voyage took almost two weeks. After the war, Adams saw a huge fight between some infantry officers and paratroopers at an officer's club. All these guys were young with a lot of fight in them. Adams was part of replacement crew for the 826th Bombardment Squadron, 484th Bombardment Group, [Annotator's Note: 15th Air Force]. By the time he was sent overseas, the 25 mission limit was more of a theoretical goal. He remained in combat until the end of the war. Adams recalled one of his missions was to drop a fragmentation bomb. Every flyable plane in the 15th Air Force went up and each bombardier had a specific target. The goal was to wipe out a whole area of Italy so the infantry troops could move in rapidly. Most of Adams' missions were to drop 250, 500, and 1000 pound bombs. Targets were in Germany, Austria, and Northern Italy. The missions took six to eight hours to complete. The German antiaircraft gunners were well trained with good equipment. After every mission, the crew would be debriefed. Adam told his superior officer that he saw a German jet, but his superior officer did not believe him. On Christmas 1944, Adams went on a mission in Austria, and received red and green colored flak [Annotator's Note: antiaircraft artillery fire] from the enemy. In a superstitious way, Adams would prepare his plane the same way for every mission to make sure everything is working properly. The base facilities were primitive. They lived four officers to a tent, and the area was either dusty or muddy depending on the weather for the day. Food was scarce. They served him powdered eggs, SPAM [Annotator's Note: canned cooked pork made by Hormel Foods Corporation], and coffee. He would receive packages of sweets and cheese from home. Adams lost several pounds during his time overseas. They would go to town in Cerignola, Italy as a diversion, but there was not much to do, see, or eat. There was an officer's club that served American beer and Italian wine.

Jones Quincy Adams, Jr. thinks the Norden bombsight [Annotator's Note: Norden Mk. XV tachometric bombsight] was a miraculous piece of equipment. It allowed the bombardiers to do strategic bombing versus pattern bombing. As a bombardier, Adams took over the plane as they came upon the target site to complete the mission by dropping the bombs on the target. The Norden bombsight help him accurately determine the target site. Most of their targets were marshaling yards, ball bearing factories, fuel depots, and buried manufacturing facilities. At the base, there were bombsight maintenance men that worked on the equipment to make sure it was ready for the next mission. The ground crew also work all night long to prepare the planes for the next mission. Adams recalled that there was a lot of camaraderie within his crew, but he tried not to develop friendships with guys from other crews because he did not want to be negatively affected if they happened to be shot down. There was not much to do in the town of Cerignola, Italy, where he was stationed during the war. To pass the time, they would play cards, read, and converse. To keep warm on the plane while in high altitude they wore electric suits, however the suits did not work all the time. Adams remembered being cold for most of his missions and does not have much resistance to cold weather anymore. Daily things will trigger Adams' memory to some of his missions in World War 2. One unforgettable mission was to Austria. They developed engine problems and had to drop out of formation. After the problem was fixed, they returned to the formation in a different position at the tail end, called tail end Charlie position. As they came over the target, Adams saw the plane that was in his original position hit with flak [Annotator's Note: antiaircraft artillery fire] and blew up. There was nothing left of the plane. It could have been him. On another memorable mission, Adams was working on the Northern bombsight about to drop bombs on a target, when his navigator hit him. Adams saw that his navigator was bleeding profusely from the head. He had been hit in the head by a nose cone from a 20mm round. After Adams dropped the bombs, he attended to the medical needs of the navigator. He was so wounded that he was sent back to the United States. The navigator was eventually sent to the South Pacific, and he was killed on a mission.

[Annotator's Note: The interviewer and Jones Quincy Adams, Jr. converse about a non-related World War 2 experience.] Adams' crew members came from all over the United States, including two from Chicago [Annotator's Note: Chicago, Illinois], two from Connecticut, one from Alabama, one from Nebraska, one from Baltimore [Annotator's Note: Baltimore, Maryland], and one from Kansas City [Annotator's Note: Kansas City, Missouri]. They bonded over fighting against the enemy and kept in touch after the war. His crew was informal as far as the relationship between officers and enlisted men. On one mission, his tail gunner from Connecticut, received three confirmed kills. On Adam's third mission, he received heavy flak [Annotator's Note: antiaircraft artillery fire] for the first time. His very next mission, he had to repeat the same route and hit the same target because they did not destroy everything they needed too. Adams flew a B-24 [Annotator's Note: Consolidated B-24 Liberator heavy bomber] during the war. [Annotator's Note: The interviewer shares a story.] Adams compares the B-24 to the B-17 [Annotator's Note: Boeing B-17 Flying Fortress heavy bomber]. The B-17 was a more stable platform but took a lot of strength for the pilot to hold in formation. The B-24 flew higher, faster, and farther. The German fighters would attack head on, weave through the formation to find a weak spot. Adams did not have coverage support in the beginning of the war, but later had P-51 [Annotator's Note: North American P-51 Mustang fighter aircraft] fighter support. [Annotator's Note: The interviewer shares a story from 1:12:02.00 to 1:12:33.000]. Adams did think about the people on the ground that were in the target area but tried not to dwell on it because it was war. One time, when he dropped bombs on a train, he thought many times what or who was on the train.

Jones Quincy Adams, Jr.'s worst mission was his third mission because it was the first with heavy flak [Annotator's Note: antiaircraft artillery fire] from the Germans. It was the first time he realized that people were trying to kill him. On days he was scheduled for a mission, he woke at three in the morning to begin his day. He would eat breakfast, then go to a briefing, and then to the plane for takeoff. His last mission was to Austria before Germany surrendered. Adams remembered the announcement of Roosevelt's [Annotator's Note: Franklin Delano Roosevelt, 32nd President of the United States] death. It came over a loudspeaker at base. He only hoped that Truman [Annotator's Note: Harry S. Truman, 33rd President of the United States] would be a good president. In the end, Adams thought Truman had more guts than any other president because he ordered the atomic bombs to be dropped on Japan [Annotator's Note: nuclear weapons dropped on Hiroshima, Japan on 6 August 1945 and Nagasaki, Japan on 9 August 1945]. Adams was stationed at Midland [Annotator's Note: Midland Army Airfield in Midland, Texas] preparing for the invasion of Japan when he heard the news of the atomic bombs. Then the war was over. Adams flew over 50 missions before returning to the United States. Even though he did not want to go, he was ready to continue fighting and help with the invasion of Japan. In September 1945, Adams was discharged at Fort Sam Houston [Annotator's Note: San Antonio, Texas] as a first lieutenant. Adams received a Distinguished Flying Cross [Annotator's Note: the Distinguished Flying Cross, or DFC, is awarded to members of the United States Armed Forces for heroism or extraordinary achievement while participating in an aerial flight] before he was discharged. The award came as a surprise. [Annotator's Note: Adams pauses the interview and gets up to get his medal at 1:23:42.000.] After the war, Adams took advantage of the G.I. Bill and returned to college at SMU [Annotator's Note: Southern Methodist University in University Park, Texas]. During the summer he worked in his family business. He met his wife while in college. He did not have trouble transitioning from military to civilian life. He was just happy to be back home. He did not miss being in Italy because the living conditions were basic, the food was terrible, and the people were worn out. He eventually started a real estate business.

Jones Quincy Adams, Jr.'s most memorable experience during World War 2 was his third mission because he was a brand-new crew, and it was the first time he received heavy flak [Annotator's Note: antiaircraft artillery fire] from the Germans. He was not used to people trying to kill him. The war changed his life because he realized he was blessed and proud to be an American. Today, he is enormously thankful for the opportunity to be part of World War 2 and thankful he survived. He wanted to do his part to the best of his ability. Adams believes most Americans today do not have the knowledge of World War 2. He does think it is heartwarming to have people come up to him and thank him for his service. He fought in the war because it was his turn, like it was his father's turn during World War 1 and his great grandparents' turn in the Civil War [Annotator's Note: American Civil War, 1861 to 1865]. He hopes that people understand he did his job when he was called upon and that they are proud of him and his service. Adams believes it is important to have organizations like The National WWII Museum [Annotator's Note: in New Orleans, Louisiana] and to continue to teach it to future generations. He admires those who dedicate their efforts to research about World War 2.