Richard Tangradi was born in June 1924 in Philadelphia [Annotator’s Note: Philadelphia, Pennsylvania]. He grew up there. He enlisted in the Air Force in 1942. He got out of the service in September 1945. He was a tail gunner. He was working in construction and had his radio on playing music when it was interrupted and announced that Japan had attacked Pearl Harbor [Annotator's Note: the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor, Hawaii on 7 December 1941]. He decided right then he was going to enlist. He loved flying and that is why he enlisted in the Air Force. He lived with his mother and she did not say anything. His brother was in the Navy. His mother had to work to raise them. He enlisted in Philadelphia. He went to Biloxi, Mississippi for basic training. Basic training was bad. They lived in tents. He was there for a month. Then he went to Arlington, Texas for aerial gunnery school. He went in to be a tail gunner. The propaganda is why he wanted to be a tail gunner. He was small and fit in the tail.

Richard Tangradi went to Casper, Wyoming to get his crew. [Annotator’s Note: Tangradi talks about his crew.] The crews were like family. Tangradi was a sergeant. They went to Denver, Colorado for the second phase of training and then to Boise, Idaho for the third phase. They went to Nebraska to pick up a new plane and flew to Maine and then on to Scotland. They stopped in Iceland, where they did not like Americans too much. Once they got to the base, they had to stay there. When they got to England, they got an old plane instead of keeping the new plane. They were known as the “Bloody 100th” [Annotator’s Note: 100th Bombardment Group, 8th Air Force; Tangradi was with the 349th Bombardment Squadron]. Rumors got around that they were losing a lot of bombers. His crew was broken up when they got there. The pilot had gonorrhea and that caused the crew to get broken up. They were all spare men. The pilot flew his 25 missions and was killed on his last mission over Berlin [Annotator’s Note: Berlin, Germany]. It was a direct hit in the bomb bay from flak [Annotator's Note: antiaircraft artillery fire]. [Annotator’s Note: Tangradi talks about the pilots he flew with.] For the mission over the Alps, they had to wake up at two in the morning. In the briefing, they were told they would be bombing the Alps and then go to Africa. They lost six out of 21 planes. They lost 61 bombers on that mission. When they got to Africa, their plane was shot up pretty badly. They could not repair the plane. As soon as they hit France, the German fighters were on them. They did not have an escort. The English Spitfires [Annotator’s Note: British Supermarine Spitfire fighter plane] left them in France.

Richard Tangradi’s missions lasted about eight hours [Annotator’s Note: while serving with the 349th Bombardment Squadron, 100th Bombardment Group, 8th Air Force in Europe]. Most of it was preparation. Getting into formations took an hour. They wanted to get there and get it over with. The German fighters were waiting for them. They would trail them all the way to the target. Regensburg [Annotator’s Note: Regensburg, Germany] was in the Alps. They were chased by Germans through France and then once they got across the Alps, the Germans in Italy were after them. They followed them into Africa. They lost 61 bombers. Regensburg had a lot of flak [Annotator's Note: antiaircraft artillery fire]. They could not fight against it. They could hear it and feel it as it went off. When the flak stopped, the fighters would come in. The fighters always went for the tail first. Tangradi was a staff sergeant after he got out of gunnery school. He earned 170 dollars a month. His 17th mission was Regensburg. There were hundreds of fighters coming at them. They only had about a minute to start firing at the fighters before they were in trouble.

Richard Tangradi remembers when the pilot called him to the front and gave him a cigar during a mission. The wing had a hole in it. Paris [Annotator’s Note: Paris, France] was a two-hour mission. They never bombed Paris itself. On another mission, they had to ditch the plane. The pilot landed it nicely and it stayed afloat. Two Spitfires [Annotator’s Note: British Supermarine Spitfire fighter plane] came out and protected them while they were in the water. Once they heard a plane went down, the other men would raid their lockers. They were making good money then. He earned 170 dollars a month. Some men would leave the base if they heard the mission would be for a hard target. He did not fly to Berlin [Annotator’s Note: Berlin, Germany]. They had thousands of flak [Annotator's Note: antiaircraft artillery fire] guns and hundreds of fighters protecting Berlin. That was the longest mission and the most dreaded. Kiel [Annotator’s Note: Kiel, Germany] was his first mission. They were going after ball bearings on the Stuttgart [Annotator’s Note: Stuttgart, Germany] mission. There was a lot of flak. The P-51s [Annotator's Note: North American P-51 Mustang fighter aircraft] could escort them all the way to the target and back to base. On his last mission, they got shot down. One guy did not make it and Tangradi was shot in both arms. He had to have help putting his parachute on.

Richard Tangradi’s last mission was to Frankfurt [Annotator’s Note: Frankfurt, Germany]. They had to abort the mission because something was wrong with the plane. One German fighter popped up out of the clouds right behind them. Tangradi’s guns were frozen and had to be charged up. Tangradi thought they were going to blow up. He was shot in both arms. He could move his fingers, but not the rest of his arms. The radio operator was hit. The ball turret gunner was hit. They made a hospital out of a ski resort for prisoners. Tangradi had his arm all bandaged up and his arm was held up. He was in a bed next to a P-47 pilot [Annotator's Note: Republic P-47 Thunderbolt fighter aircraft] who had bandages wrapped all around his face. Tangradi bailed out at 10 thousand feet. It was overcast outside. The war was over for him. It was not long before they heard the Russians. Then they had to move. They marched for 60 days in January and February. It was cold. They escaped during the march through the woods. They were in the woods for three days. When they exited the woods, they came upon a British soldier driving a jeep. He knew they were POWs [Annotator's Note: prisoners of war]. He directed them to a town and then three days later they were flown back to England.

Richard Tangradi was marched for 60 days in the winter. He knew he had to escape. They ate raw potatoes and stale bread. He was a POW [Annotator's Note: prisoner of war] for 14 months. British bombers flew them back to England. He was scared of flying when he got back. He did not think he could get back into a B-17 [Annotator's Note: Boeing B-17 Flying Fortress heavy bomber]. They came across five German soldiers in the woods who were deserters. The Germans told them which way to go. The next day they ran into British troops. Tangradi took a buckle from a young German soldier. He would write his mother once a week until he was a POW. She must have thought he was dead for those 14 months. He was put on a Liberty ship [Annotator's Note: a class of quickly produced cargo ship] to go home. It took 11 days. They arrived in Boston [Annotator’s Note: Boston, Massachusetts]. His father and uncle picked him up.

Richard Tangradi thought about getting married to an English girl. He remembers some things like it just happened. He was scared of freezing to death when he bailed out of the plane. Two German kids helped him to a farmhouse. A half-hour later, the Gestapo [Annotator's Note: German Geheime Staatspolizei or Secret State Police; abbreviated Gestapo] walked in. They put him in a jeep and took him to the hospital. When they returned to the base, they got to shower and eat good food.