Moise S. Steeg, Jr. did not want to be in the infantry. He got in at a fortunate time when bases were being built for training for the Air Corps. He was a lawyer, so he was selected [Annotator's Note: for the Army Air Forces]. He took basic training at Camp Beauregard [Annotator's Note: in Pineville, Louisiana]. He was selected by the Judge Advocate of the base [Annotator's Note: his training base after Beauregard] and was assigned to his office. Steeg stayed with him until the middle of 1944 and was then assigned to Wright Field Contract base [Annotator's Note: now Wright-Patterson Air Force Base in Dayton, Ohio]. He worked for the Judge Advocate at Keesler Field [Annotator's Note: now Keesler Air Force Base], Biloxi, Mississippi [Annotator's Note: before leaving for Wright Field.] He had gotten to Keesler on 15 February 1942. [Annotator's Note: The interviewer backs up to the 1930s.] The Great Depression affected his family seriously. His father's business cared for relatives who were having a hard time or were destitute. Steeg learned money the hard way. His father put him through Newman [Annotator's Note: Isidore Newman School in New Orleans, Louisiana] and then two years at Tulane [Annotator's Note: Tulane University in New Orleans, Louisiana]. Steeg got a job at Tulane after that to get him through law school. He graduated in 1937 and went into private practice in New Orleans. He was doing fairly well for those times when he entered the service on 3 February 1942 at Camp Beauregard.

Moise S. Steeg, Jr. has a Biblical first name; in French it means Moses. His family left Spain during the Inquisition [Annotator's Note: Spanish Inquisition, 1478 to 1834] and went to Holland. They emigrated to Alsace [Annotator's Note: territorial collective region in Eastern France] and then to this country [Annotator's Note: United States]. He was born July 1916 as an only child [Annotator's Note: in New Orleans, Louisiana]. He has three children, five grandchildren, and four great-grandchildren. His father and his brothers ran a printing company called Steeg Printing and Publishing Company [Annotator's Note: in New Orleans, Louisiana]. His father died in 1940. Steeg was practicing law and had to manage the business then until he sold it. Steeg got a deferment [Annotator's Note: postponement of military service] due to his father's sudden death. When Pearl Harbor came [Annotator's Note: the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor, Hawaii on 7 December 1941], he knew he was destined to go and wanted to go. He volunteered for V-7 [Annotator’s Note: V-7 US Navy Midshipmen Officer Candidates Program, 1940 to 1945] in the Navy but was colorblind. He borrowed a book and memorized it [Annotator's Note: the color chart]. He went into the Air Corps to be a navigator but failed. On 3 February 1942, he was inducted as a draftee. [Annotator's Note: The interviewer stops to refocus the camera.]

[Annotator's Note: The interviewer asks Moise S. Steeg, Jr. what basic training was like.] Moise S. Steeg, Jr. delighted in new experiences. He came through better than people who were physically stronger than him. At Keesler Field [Annotator's Note: now Keesler Air Force Base in Biloxi, Mississippi], the training was expanded. [Annotator's Note: The interviewer asks him to tell where he was when the Japanese attacked Pearl Harbor, Hawaii on 7 December 1941.] Steeg was riding in a car to visit an uncle. When he arrived, his uncle told him the news. Steeg was shocked and left. Because Steeg could type, he helped prepare documents for the Judge Advocate's office [Annotator's Note: at Keesler Field.] He also performed as a court reporter sometimes. It was a good assignment. He earned 21 dollars per month. He lived in the barracks. After five or six months, he went to Officer Candidate School. Steeg bought a car after some time. When he first got in the service, he was given a general classification test [Annotator's Note: Army General Classification Test or AGCT]. He did well and was called to be complimented and interviewed. The commander told them that for the first time in history someone had scored 100 percent on the test. It was the man next to him. The guy had fooled the system to get a perfect score.

Moise S. Steeg, Jr. went to Officer Candidate School in Miami, Florida. He finished in the upper one percent of the class. He was ordered out and would not get a commission as he had been reported as being a Communist. He was overwhelmed and infuriated. He ultimately got his commission a month later. In the meantime, he had been sent to Keesler Field [Annotator's Note: now Keesler Air Force Base in Biloxi, Mississippi] and put through a test to see if he would break down. He did not. He had been put on every ugly duty he could have been put on. There was a New Orleans [Annotator's Note: New Orleans, Louisiana] organization called the Coalition of Patriotic Societies [Annotator's Note: American Coalition of Patriotic, Civic and Fraternal Societies]. Steeg was a radical in college. He and another man, Hale Boggs [Annotator's Note: Thomas Hale Boggs, Sr.; politician from New Orleans, Louisiana] made speeches on May Day [Annotator's Note: public holiday celebrated on 1 May or the first Monday of May; also the name of International Workers' Day] calling for no war. He was a liberal and tried to help the African-American community in the 1930s. The mayor had been picking up young Negro men and convicting them in courts and assigning them to paint churches and buildings. A sheriff had been tarring and feathering some Blacks. Steeg went to the US Attorney and they cited the sheriff. There were no civil rights at the time. After he got home [Annotator's Note: from the service], one of the men who had done this to him, apologized. Everybody tried to get into Officer Candidate School as quickly as they could. Several of his friends did. People who had good test scores and were professionals did not want to be enlisted men.

Moise S. Steeg, Jr. received his commission and went to Keesler [Annotator's Note: Keesler Field; now Keesler Air Force Base in Biloxi, Mississippi] on 28 October 1942. He was a Trial Judge Advocate, Defense Counsel, an investigating officer, and a summary court officer depending upon the needs of the office. Some of the cases were strictly military. They also had civil-type cases. An officer would come in and make charges. They would get assigned to three different courts depending on where they fit and the seriousness of the case. Discipline was important. Officers who had objectives took real offense to minor things in some cases. Steeg is proud of having found that there were kids from small towns charged with minor offenses being thrown in with real criminals. That offended Steeg. He was tasked with writing a program that got adopted. He was ordered to Camp Pickett, Virginia to put it into effect. It became adopted. He used it to establish the Youth Leadership Program in New Orleans [Annotator's Note: New Orleans, Louisiana]. The program worked by interviewing the person committing a minor offense by a psychiatrist. The men were segregated away from the serious criminals.

Moise S. Steeg, Jr. was a prosecuting officer in a rape case. He prosecuted [Annotator's Note: produced a guilty verdict] the accused due to the testimony of a young woman. Steeg was told to look into her. He found out that she was a prostitute and the man had not had enough money to pay her. He called the man back in and arranged to get him out of town and cancelled his conviction. The man told Steeg he had been fortunate that he had done it. The man produced a knife he was going to use to attack Steeg when he got out of jail. [Annotator's Note: Steeg holds up the knife for the camera.] The knife had been made from a spent bullet. [Annotator's Note: The interviewer refocuses the camera.] One of the big events at Kessler Field [Annotator's Note: now Keesler Air Force Base in Biloxi, Mississippi] was a visit by three important people. The men in his office were used as guards for these men during a review of the troops. They were General George C. Marshall [Annotator's Note: US Chief of Staff and General of the Army George C. Marshall]; Sir Anthony Dill, Commander in Chief of British Forces [Annotator's Note: unable to verify], and a man who became Prime Minister of Britain. They thought the men were well-trained and wondered how many officers there were. Steeg gave the D-Day Museum [Annotator's Note: The National D-Day Museum, now The National WWII Museum in New Orleans, Louisiana] pictures of this event. Steeg was asked to defend a man charged with desertion. The man's defense was that he had incurred a venereal disease that the Army would not treat, so he had to get civilian treatment. He received a serious sentence. A Senator called Steeg about the conviction and his defense. The Senator was Harry S. Truman [Annotator's Note: Harry S. Truman, 33rd President of the United States.]

Moise S. Steeg, Jr. and the other men stationed there [Annotator's Note: at Keesler Field, now Keesler Air Force Base in Biloxi, Mississippi] listened to radio and read newspapers to keep up with the progress of the war. Some men kept a record of everything. Steeg just followed it generally. He got married. He was told he was never going overseas because of his record and the accusations against him [Annotator's Note: Steeg previously spoke about being accused of being a Communist]. He met a young lady before the war. She kept in touch and he went through her hometown and saw each other. They got married on 23 September 1943 and she came to Keesler to live. They lived in the Tivoli Hotel in an apartment that had become officers' quarters. He left Keesler around the middle of 1944 and was in Akron, Ohio on D-Day [Annotator's Note: Allied invasion of Normandy, France on 6 June 1944]. They knew something was coming up and they were on 24 hour duty. He was out of Wright Field [Annotator's Note: now Wright-Patterson Air Force Base in Dayton, Ohio] then. [Annotator's Note: A telephone rings and then the conversation is restarted.] In this period, men were being assigned to contract duty. Steeg was requested and assigned to Wright Field and went to school outside Detroit [Annotator's Note: Detroit, Michigan] for two weeks. He was assigned to Cleveland, Ohio and then Akron, Ohio as a contracting officer for rubber companies and other companies. End products such as automobiles, airplanes, and such are only assembled by one company but built-in parts by subcontractors. They could not exceed normal pricing. Steeg was assigned to oversee contracts until after the war ended. His wife returned to New Orleans [Annotator's Note: New Orleans, Louisiana] about three months before he did and was very pregnant. He got out of the service the day his first child was born, 30 April 1946.

Moise S. Steeg, Jr. had a hard time believing that Mr. Eisenhower [Annotator's Note: General of the Army Dwight David "Ike" Eisenhower, Supreme Commander, Allied Expeditionary Force; 34th President of the United States] said that Mr. Higgins [Annotator's Note: Andrew Jackson Higgins; New Orleans, Louisiana based founder Higgins Industries] won the war. Steeg handled two things that nobody knows about. Firestone [Annotator's Note: Firestone Tire and Rubber Company] invented the self-sealing fuel tank. Those saved the Air Force. To Steeg, that is as important as the Higgins boat [Annotator's Note: Landing Craft Vehicle, Personnel or LCVP]. [Annotator's Note: The interviewer changes tapes.] Planes going to high elevations would be grounded because of freezes. A company invented an icebreaker. [Annotator's Note: Someone comes in from off-camera.] The planes being sent to the Battle of Britain [Annotator's Note: 10 July to 31 October 1940; Germans include the Blitz of July 1940 to June 1941] could not get across the Atlantic [Annotator's Note: Atlantic Ocean] prior to this invention. They also could not get across due to fuel. They discovered the layers of paint added too much weight. A solvent was invented to dissolve the paint. Steeg's job was to get rid of what was left over. It was all dumped in the ocean. When the war ended, there were hundreds of millions of dollars' worth of goods to be disposed of. He devised a program for that that resulted in him getting an award. He loved the work, and it was the best free education one could get. His service time was valuable later in life. He muddled through adjusting to civilian life and took advantage of every opportunity that came along. It was annoying to see people who had found a way to stay out of the service being well established when he had to start all over again. He did not miss the military lifestyle a bit.