John T. Fallon was born in March 1922 in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. He had one older sister and three younger brothers. His father originally worked for the Pennsylvania Railroad as a shipping clerk but lost the job during the Depression [Annotator's Note: The Great Depression, a global economic depression that lasted from 1929 through 1945]. He became a real estate salesman and broker. Fallon has very vivid memories of the Depression. People would come to their house begging. It was difficult but they managed to eat all the time. He worked from the time he was a little boy. He got better jobs while in high school. He graduated with two partial scholarships. His father was not making much money and they had a lot of children, so Fallon decided not to go to college and to go to work. He went to work for Acme Markets [Annotator's Note: grocery store chain] at 17. He kept looking around and found out the University of Pennsylvania [Annotator's Note: University of Pennsylvania in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania] had a night school at the Wharton School [Annotator's Note: Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania, also called Wharton Business School, and Wharton School in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania], so he went. That was the luckiest thing he ever did in his life. He quit the market and got a nice job with the Atlantic Refining Company [Annotator's Note: then called Atlantic Petroleum]. He was working there when Pearl Harbor hit [Annotator's Note: the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor, Hawaii on 7 December 1941] and that was the end of his prewar experience. He was sitting with his father listening to the radio waiting for the Eagles [Annotator's Note: Philadelphia Eagles, professional football team] to play the Washington Redskins [Annotator's Note: professional football team]. Everybody knew there was going to be a war and it was in all papers. He told his father the Japanese were probably going to hit us in Dutch Harbor, Alaska. Shortly after that, the news came on that the Japanese had hit Pearl Harbor. That day was the end of a lot of things. He knew he was going to have to go someplace. His sister wanted him to be a Marine. There was a full-page ad asking for volunteers who were familiar with marine navigation or signaling. Fallon had been a Boy Scout [Annotator's Note: Boy Scouts of America, scouting and youth organization founded in 1910] and knew about signaling so that his how he ended up in the Engineering Amphibian Command in Camp Irwin, Massachusetts [Annotator's Note: Camp Edwards, Cape Cod, Massachusetts]. He took basic training with them. He scored high enough that he could take the test for West Point [Annotator's Note: United States Military Academy in West Point, New York]. He said the war would be over by then, so he did not want to do that. They asked about OCS [Annotator's Note: officer candidate school], which he thought was a good idea. He finished basic and guarded boats for about a month before they sent him down to Fort Belvoir [Annotator's Note: Fort Belvoir, Virginia] to OCS.

Around the end of 1942, John T. Fallon went to Engineer OCS [Annotator's Note: officer candidate school]. He graduated in the spring. He wanted to go back to the Engineering Amphibious Command, but the Navy took that over. He asked for the Air Corps, but they put him in the Combat Engineers. He went to Camp Carson, Colorado [Annotator's Note: now Fort Carson in Colorado Springs, Colorado]. The second day he was there, they were on a forced march in full packs up a mountain. He was panting like crazy. When they came down his feet were bloody. He was limping in the officer's mess and the Colonel saw him. The battalion surgeon looked at his feet and put him in the hospital. He got out and went to maneuvers in Louisiana. Western Louisiana and Eastern Texas are not ideal places. He got orders overseas and went to Fort Patrick Henry [Annotator's Note: in Warwick, Virginia]. He got on a big ship called the Empress of Japan [Annotator's Note: the RMS Empress of Japan] that was changed to the Empress of Scotland [Annotator's Note: RMS Empress of Scotland]. He was in a room with about 15 other lieutenants. First day out they formed up on the deck. They were told there were not enough lifeboats for everybody. They had a blimp circling, and some Navy destroyer escorts. They landed outside of Casablanca [Annotator's Note: Casablanca, Morocco]. They went to Oran [Annotator's Note: Oran, Algiers] and then different places. He went to many different schools. The British Commando schools were very tough. From there he was going to go to Italy. They went to Naples [Annotator's Note: Naples, Italy] which was in bad shape. The fighting was going on in Anzio [Annotator's Note: Anzio, Italy] and they went there. He was in the 36th Engineer Combat Regiment. There was an air raid nearly every day. The Germans were bombing ships in the harbor. They went to the woods to the headquarters between the front line and town. The men were split into different companies. He said he wanted them to be the last men to jump in the hole in an attack. Fallon went into G Company [Annotator's Note: Company G, 3rd Battalion, 36th Engineer Combat Regiment]. Fallon could not go to his platoon because they were up on a hill. He spent the first day in company headquarters and got all the horror tales. He met his sergeant the next night. They could not stand up on the hill and they had to crawl around. He could see G Company in a reinforced building. The Germans and the Americans patrolled every night. Artillery was going all the damn time. Most of the nightly air raids were in the town. It looked the 4th of July [Annotator's Note: American Independence Day] every night. He watched a couple of dog fights. He could see out into the ocean. Some fighters were ditching near the ships. That went on for a long, long time and there were a lot of casualties. They were there 45 days without relief. They were attached to the British 56th Infantry Division. The British officers were good guys. They liked to shoot artillery. They had British tanks dug in and were firing direct fire. They got word they were being relieved by the British 5th Infantry Division. They got into a big building. The Germans immediately hit them [Annotator's Note: the British]. Fallon was glad they had gotten out of there fast.

John T. Fallon and his outfit [Annotator's Note: Company G, 3rd Battalion, 36th Engineer Combat Regiment] were in Anzio [Annotator's Note: Anzio, Italy] in nice big buildings. He was too ignorant to be scared. The first night in the hole he thought they were aiming right at him. They had mines in front of them and he would hear a mine go off here or there. He could hear the patrols not far away. There was a hedgerow to his right that had a .50 caliber [Annotator's Note: Browning M2 .50 caliber machine gun] there. They had a 37mm [Annotator's Note: 37mm gun M3 anti-tank gun] that kept taking potshots at German positions. The Germans kept shelling artillery, but they were never hit. His battalion colonel came over to play cards one night. Fallon owed the colonel about 50 dollars. They had air raid, the shutters blew open, and the colonel was hit right in the chest. They tried to revive him, but he died in a short time. He was a West Pointer [Annotator's Note: graduate of the United States Military Academy in West Point, New York] and was a handsome man. They got a captain from D Company [Annotator's Note: Company D, 1st Battalion, 36th Engineer Combat Regiment] as their new commander. He became a Major within 24 hours. He told them that night they were moving in between two divisions. They had no idea where they were. They just kept down. They were pulled back after two days. He got new men. The Regiment colonel told the men who had British Commando training there had been a change of plans. They had a new General. One third of the people would patrol and the newer people would be on the line. Fallon got a patrol and reconnaissance platoon. He was given his pick of the sergeants and he got great guys. They were training and Fallon was at Mass [Annotator's Note: the central liturgical rite in the Catholic Church]. He was tapped on the shoulder to come out. He was to take two men and go up to the 1st Special Force [Annotator's Note: 1st Special Service Force; a mixed American and Canadian commando unit; nicknamed The Devil's Brigade from 1942 to 1944] was on the Mussolini Canal [Annotator's Note: final channel of a drainage system in the Pontine Marshes, Lazio region, Italy]. He was to learn what was going on in preparation of the regiment coming up. They went out every night on patrol. They were deliberately looking for something to shoot up. A big German patrol rammed them and blew up a building. Fallon and his men lain in wait for them. Not many of the Germans got back to their lines. Finally, the company came up. The Colonel said he wanted the Germans to think the Special Force were still there. So they patrolled every night.

John T. Fallon patrolled every night and sometimes in the daytime. He took out one squad and sometimes less. The advantage was that in the daytime they were back of the lines and could walk around and wash up. One of his men had been a sign painter. On the back of one white farmhouse he drew a map of the front. Each day, Fallon could tell them where they were going. Toward the end it got really hairy. A couple of times he took out some new men who were really good. One was an Indian [Annotator's Note: Native American] they called Chief Williams [Annotator's Note: unable to identify]. Fallon would take him and another on private patrols. Once, off to their left was a road that would go straight into German lines in the open with no cover. There were trees ahead. They came to a bridge that was mined. They disarmed the mines and pushed through. Chief Williams whispered. There were two Germans talking to each other. Fallon said for each man to take one but not to shoot unless trouble started. Fallon went up the road in the woods. A German soldier came from the left and Fallon emptied his Tommy gun [Annotator's Note: .45 caliber Thompson submachine gun] into him. Behind him, his men knocked off the others. They got out alright, but the Germans peppered them all the way back. [Annotator's Note: The interviewer asks Fallon when it is that one gets used to shooting people.] Fallon was doing very well. He "made a real ass of himself sometimes" taking too many chances until he got wounded. When he got out of the hospital, he was not quite the commando, and he was a little more careful. The second time he got wounded, he became even more wary.

John T. Fallon lost his Colonel Lombard [Annotator's Note: of the 36th Engineer Combat Regiment] and was not the first person he saw killed. Most of the time he was not as close. He was only two feet away from him. It brought the war home to him. You get hardened to it. You see a lot of bodies laying around including your own guys. You have to keep moving. Being responsible for his men did weigh on him. His men were marvelous, and the sergeants were just wonderful. Most of them were draftees. He got in trouble with some of his guys. His sergeants and corporals were Southern boys [Annotator's Note: boys from the southern states of the United States]. He had one corporal from Chicago [Annotator's Note: Chicago, Illinois] who wanted to know why the Southern boys were being promoted to sergeant. Fallon told him if he stopped drinking all the time, he might make it too. They always found something to drink, and he invariably drank it. Fallon had to bust a couple of sergeants for getting drunk. One guy got drunk and stole a GMC [Annotator's Note: General Motors Company truck model] and drove it about 50 miles. He was busted. His best sergeant blew up in January [Annotator's Note: January 1945] after having had about all he could stand. They were hiking through snow and had to cross an open space. He suddenly started crying, pulled out his pistol and aimed it at his own head. They grabbed it just in time. He was the "bravest damn sergeant" and already had a Silver Star [Annotator's Note: the Silver Star Medal is the third-highest award a United States service member can receive for a heroic or meritorious deed performed in a conflict with an armed enemy] and a Purple Heart [Annotator's Note: the Purple Heart Medal is award bestowed upon a United States service member who has been wounded as a result of combat actions against an armed enemy]. They sent him back to a place where they had tents with warm clothes and food. He stayed for three days and slept. He came back and was alright. He was not quite as brave as before but was a good man. That was at the Battle of the Bulge [Annotator's Note: Battle of the Bulge or German Ardennes Counter Offensive, 16 December 1944 to 25 January 1945].

John T. Fallon was wounded at Anzio [Annotator's Note: Battle of Anzio, 22 January 1944 to 5 June 1944, Anzio, Italy]. They [Annotator's Note: Company G, 3rd Battalion, 36th Engineer Combat Regiment] were told the Germans were pulling out near the Mussolini Canal [Annotator's Note: final channel of a drainage system in the Pontine Marshes, Lazio region, Italy]. The Colonel told Fallon to take his platoon out. He left one squad back at the forward line in case something happened. He did not quite trust the Colonel. They got past a place where they had removed mines and shot some Germans. Suddenly his two scouts got hit and machine guns opened up from both sides of the road. A hand grenade hit Fallon. He does not remember too much after that. He wound up in a hospital. The grenade had landed by his foot and hit the left side of his face, opening it up. It also went into the right buttocks. The hospital at Anzio was dug in. All of Anzio was under artillery fire all the time. The hospital was next to an emergency airstrip that the Germans were always trying to hit. A couple of nurses got killed. Fallon would wake up a couple of times. He heard a guy screaming and screaming. A nurse told him to shut up and he did. That impressed Fallon. Mark Clark [Annotator's Note: US Army General Mark Wayne Clark] came through giving out medals. He passed out again. He woke up on an airplane being flown down to Naples [Annotator's Note: Naples, Italy]. He got off the plane and into an ambulance to a hospital. He went to the operating room and the doctor could not get the shrapnel out. The doctor congratulated him on now having "two assholes." Fallon was in the hospital for three months. An officer came in and told him he was promoted to First Lieutenant and got a Bronze Star [Annotator's Note: the Bronze Star Medal is the fourth-highest award a United States service member can receive for a heroic or meritorious deed performed in a conflict with an armed enemy]. When he came out, he was put in a truck to his battalion headquarters. The men were on ships practicing landing for Southern France [Annotator's Note: Operation Dragoon, Provence, Southern France, 15 August 1944]. He had some new people, and his sergeants were in the hospital then, but they soon joined back up.

John T. Fallon and his outfit [Annotator's Note: Company G, 3rd Battalion, 36th Engineer Combat Regiment] landed in Southern France [Annotator's Note: Operation Dragoon; Provence, Southern France; 15 August 1944]. Major Lombard told him to take a sniper patrol after they landed on the beachhead. They found a couple. It was a pretty easy landing with few casualties. The Germans were not raiding like they did before as they did not have as many airplanes. The French were still trying to get into Toulon [Annotator's Note: Toulon, France] and Fallon was sent to see what was going on. He could see French officers sitting and having coffee. He could see a big gun shooting down into the town. The Army took Marseilles [Annotator's Note: Marseilles, France] instead. They stayed for over a week and had to go catch up to the others going north. The other two battalions were commanded by skilled engineers. In Fallon's battalion, only the commander was an engineer. So they did all of the scouting patrols. There was a lot going on in the harbor. One night, German E-boats [Annotator's Note: Allied designation for German fast attack craft, Schnellboot, or S-Boot] came in. The sky lit up. When it all ended there were no dead Germans so maybe there was not anything there. Then they went north. It was nice living actually. They had nice weather and nothing to do. They took a boat and had some fun. Somebody found a board with a rope, and they pulled it around behind them. A big, fast boat came over and told them to knock it off. The French people treated them wonderfully. Fallon could speak high school French to them, and they loved it. Most of the places were little villages. In some where the fighting was going on the people would be in their potato cellars. In one small town, the farmers were out, and the Germans had it surrounded. Fallon's outfit relieved the French 2nd Armored Division. A French officer asked for a doctor. Fallon only had a "little, cross-eyed kid" as a medic. They blasted that place every night. Fallon likes to keep the good memories in mind and shove the bad ones aside.

John T. Fallon and his outfit [Annotator's Note: Company G, 3rd Battalion, 36th Engineer Combat Regiment] made the landing [Annotator's Note: as part of Operation Dragoon, Provence, Southern France, 15 August 1944] and headed north. They replaced an infantry regiment. They only served as a complete infantry regiment four or five times. Most of the time they operated as separate battalion on the front line as a blocking force. Not until after he was in the north, things seemed to calm down. A bridge had to be built. They were moving north so fast, that they had not had combat in several weeks. The 103rd Infantry Division had to get their tanks and equipment across a bridge [Annotator's Note: in Alsace, France]. Their engineers had been blown off the bridge so they could not finish it. Fallon was told to be up there by dawn and finish the bridge. They were marched down, and the German artillery started plastering them. He got hit and he never did get to build a bridge. He got hit in the back. He got sent back to the hospital. He thought he was going home. He was enjoying life in the hospital, and they were going out. The Germans had counterattacked [Annotator's Note: Battle of the Bulge or German Ardennes Counter Offensive, 16 December 1944 to 25 January 1945]. He got on a train heading north but barely moving. He and another lieutenant just jumped off the train. They were in plain uniforms with no insignia. They hitched a ride to a depot. The driver told them the Germans were coming through in American uniforms. They got into the replacement depot on Christmas Eve [Annotator's Note: 24 December 1944]. Fallon asked for a couple of bunks. They had no bedding other than straw mattresses. They saw lights and decided to go to Midnight Mass [Annotator's Note: special Christmas liturgical rite in the Catholic Church, at midnight Christmas Eve]. Two Me-109s [Annotator's Note: German Messerschmitt Bf 109 fighter aircraft] came over and dropped a couple bombs. They went back to bed and not to Mass. The next day a jeep took them back to the unit. New Year's Day [Annotator's Note: 1 January 1945] the company was going to have turkey. They got in line and then a jeep came up and told them they were heading out that minute to replace a battalion of the 45th [Annotator's Note: 45th Infantry Division] They did not get dinner. Fallon did grab a turkey leg.

John T. Fallon ended up in Germany [Annotator's Note: with the Company G, 3rd Battalion, 36th Engineer Combat Regiment]. They were scattered covering an enormous distance. Fallon has read about this since. The Germans had two SS [Annotator's Note: Schutzstaffel; German paramilitary organization] mountain divisions in Norway. Fallon was pulled back and went to the Maginot Line [Annotator's Note: a series of defensive fortifications roughly paralleling the Franco-German border built by France in the 1930s]. They took some prisoners. They then moved back to the Vosges Mountains [Annotator's Note: range of low mountains in Eastern France] in wonderful positions. The Germans finally hit them, but they had had not had much combat. He took men up on patrols each day. He was told the Germans were easy to drive off. He told Russell LaFontaine [Annotator's Note: phonetic spelling; unable to verify identity], one of his finest sergeants to take them up to make sure everything was alright. Fallon saw them coming back carrying LaFontaine who was dead. Fallon says it should have been him, and he thinks about that regularly. LaFontaine was a wonderful guy and was a Cajun [Annotator's Note: an ethnic group mainly living in the United States states of Louisiana and Texas]. His men adored him, and he never raised his voice. He was always on the front with his men. Fallon had been taking them up regularly. [Annotator's Note: The interviewer asks if this was the same time another sergeant of Fallon's broke down.] That was after that when Belcher [Annotator's Note: phonetic spelling; unable to verify identity] tried to blow his brains out. The weather was unbelievably cold. Two guys got trench foot [Annotator's Note: immersion foot syndrome] and got sent back. They had not been a building in a long time. They were in holes day after day, wearing every piece of clothes they could. They tried burning ration boxes, but it just smoked them out. Fallon's feet were killing him, and he went to the aid station. The doctor told him he should be ashamed of himself because he was an officer. They gave him two pairs of socks.

John T. Fallon and the men [Annotator's Note: Company G, 3rd Battalion, 36th Engineer Combat Regiment] had to make something nice happen. One fellow stole a 10-in-1 ration [Annotator's Note: 10-in-1 food parcel, intended to provide one meal for ten men] from a tank outfit. They decided to make ice cream. The snow was very deep. They put cocoa, snow, and sugar in a mess kit and had ice cream. At night, they would get a German or two on the wire. For the most part, they were French-Alsatians that had been drafted into the German Army and were trying to sneak back. But they got blown up. The Germans were pulling back, and Fallon and the men were put into nice little houses getting ready to cross the Rhine [Annotator's Note: Rhine River, Germany]. They went across like passengers. They headed south and went back into the usual routine of patrol and reconnaissance. Fallon's job was to try to find a bridge not being defended. They got to a real big bridge. They came down through the woods. They heard a loud boom and the bridge had been blown. On the first span, there was a young German girl laying there in a black dress, with black boots. There was a big circle of blood around her. She had a satchel with bread. If Fallon had been there faster or an hour later, she would have gotten across. Timing is so important. [Annotator's Note: Fallon gets quiet.] That is something you remember for a long time. He could have been faster or slower. That is when God decides. After that they had some little problems.

John T. Fallon and his outfit [Annotator's Note: Company G, 3rd Battalion, 36th Engineer Combat Group] went in through Garmisch [Annotator's Note: Garmisch-Partenkirchen, Germany]. [Annotator's Note: The interviewer asks Fallon about finding an aircraft factory.] They were heading south and there was big mountain [Annotator's Note: likely Walpersberg, mesa near Kahla, Germany] with big doors on it. They went in. One of his sergeants, Snuffy Smith [Annotator's Note: likely Army Sergeant Burl Smith from west Virginia], was a miner and did not want to go in. They went in and it was fully equipped factory. They went on and came to an open field with two German jet planes [Annotator's Note: German Messerschmitt Me 262 jet fighter aircraft] sitting there. They probably did not have any fuel. The day before they had seen probably 200 B-17s [Annotator's Note: Boeing B-17 Flying Fortress heavy bomber] flying. They saw two German jets hit the formation. Each one knocked down two B-17s. It looked like the B-17s were standing still. Fallon also saw a labor camp. He cannot remember which one it was. They passed a little labor camp after leaving Garmisch. There were four huts with a fence around it. There were dead prisoners all lying in the streets. A few were alive and they were skeletons. The battalion ordered them to leave them in there. They pressed on. He thinks they might have worked in the factories. There was only room for about 120 prisoners. After the war ended, Fallon's company was assigned above Mittenwald [Annotator's Note: Mittenwald, Germany] in a fort built by the French in 1823. They were all by themselves and it was wonderful. During the war, they got to Austria when they got the word it was over. There was no celebration. He saw the pictures in the paper of VJ-Day [Annotator's Note: Victory Over Japan Day, 15 August 1945], and he was on a mountain with his men. They thought they were going to Japan. Word came up about the Japanese surrender. There was no elation, they just wanted to know when they could go home.

John T. Fallon had to wait to go home. He had enough points [Annotator's Note: a point system was devised based on a number of factors that determined when American servicemen serving overseas could return home]. They [Annotator's Note: 3rd Battalion, 36th Engineer Combat Group] kept telling him reasons. He got two new Second Lieutenants. He got word he was relieved. His next assignment was in Berg Castle [Annotator's Note: in Berg, Germany]. He had a nice room. His job was to go to his offices in Augsburg [Annotator's Note: Augsburg, Germany] and in Munich [Annotator's Note: Munich, Germany]. He was the "Director of something" in railroad reconstruction. He would just sign the drawings. There were some beautiful German girls staying there in the castle. It was on the lake [Annotator's Note: Lake Starnberg in Bavaria, Germany] where King Ludwig [Annotator's Note: Ludwig II, King of Bavaria, 1864 to 1886] was killed [Annotator's Note: 13 June 1886]. They were visited by a German crown prince. The girls curtsied to him. It was a beautiful part of the country. Fallon wrote home frequently, but it was usually to tell his mother he did not have time to write. His mother sent him letters via V-mail [Annotator's Note: Victory Mail; postal system put into place during the war to drastically reduce the space needed to transport mail]. He was in the hospital after being wounded at Anzio [Annotator's Note: Battle of Anzio, 22 January 1944 to 5 June 1944, Anzio, Italy] and wrote her to tell her where he was. She wrote him one letter and said to keep his head down. She wrote the next letter and said to keep both heads down. One of his buddies he met at a reunion told him he kept all the letters that Fallon censored. He got assigned to some engineer battalion. Nobody knew each other. He went to Camp Lucky Strike [Annotator's Note: one of the transit and rehabilitation camps in France named after popular cigarette brands; Lucky Strike was near Le Havre, France] and took off for Paris [Annotator's Note: Paris, France]. When he got back, the colonel was irate. There was nothing he could do to him now though. Fallon came into port in New York [Annotator's Note: New York, New York] in a little ship. They did not like that at all. Fallon was supposed to go down in the hold to see how the men were. They were getting sick, and it was smelly. The night before they got into the harbor, everybody was on deck to see the Statue of Liberty. That was a sight. They went up the Hudson and the people of New York were waving flags. They landed at Camp Shanks [Annotator's Note: in Orangetown, New York]. They got milk and ice cream right away.

After the war, John T. Fallon was asked to stay in. He considered it but would have had to stay in Germany. He decided to go home. He took a train to Harrisburg [Annotator's Note: Harrisburg, Pennsylvania] and then to Philadelphia [Annotator's Note: Philadelphia, Pennsylvania]. He took a bus home about four in the morning. He woke up his mother who told him to go right down to the dock because his brother was setting sail. He got a Reserve commission in the Navy. He had served in the Merchant Marine during the war. Some things Fallon cannot remember. He does not know how he got from Paris [Annotator's Note: Paris, France] to Marseilles [Annotator's Note: Marseilles, France]. No G.I. [Annotator's Note: government issue; also, a slang term for an American soldier] was allowed out unless they were in groups of four. It was a tough time. At OCS [Annotator's Note: officer candidate school], he got a stack of books. He still has most of them. They are very technical. When you go overseas, nobody goes through all of that. Fallon is sure the war changed him. When he came home, he was paid ten percent of his pay for his old company. He went back to work for them. He went to night school but had to quit and go full time to day school. He got out of Wharton School [Annotator's Note: Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania, also called Wharton Business School, and Wharton School in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania] in no time. He felt he was too old to be in school. He did not go back to Atlantic Refining. He decided to be a salesman and ended up with 3M [Annotator's Note: 3M Company], where he retired from. He did not stay in touch with too many buddies. They were so scattered. They were going to have reunions. Some good friends got him to go to one in Lebanon, Pennsylvania. They did that for 45 years. They ran out of people eventually. Three others and he decided to run it themselves in 1999. They made it smaller. About three years ago there were nine people and then six and then just three. Fallon decided to have the final one in Avalon [Annotator's Note: Avalon, Pennsylvania]. It was wonderful and the mayor turned over the city to them. Fallon did enjoy some of the discipline and routine of the Army. As he got older, he grew tired of routine. At the 1999 reunion [Annotator's Note: of the 36th Combat Engineer Regiment], a fellow went to him that had been in his platoon at Anzio [Annotator's Note: Anzio, Italy] and went on patrols. Fallon had a picture taken. Fallon went to San Francisco [Annotator's Note: San Francisco, California] on vacation and visited him there. There are 27 of them by actual count that are supposed to be alive [Annotator's Note: at the time of this interview]. Fallon writes them all every three months. He hears from some and not from others. One guy writes on the backs of other pieces of paper to make the effort. Fallon appreciates him.