William McCowen was born in 1926 in Elmsford, New York. His family moved around frequently because his father worked as an auto mechanic. His father always had a job and was never at home. McCowen's mother raised him, his six sisters, and one brother. Because they moved around a lot, he attended several schools and received his high school degree from Cornwall-on-Hudson [Annotator's Note: Cornwall, New York]. He enjoyed playing sports while in school, and he would have dropped out of school if it were not for the sports programs. While in school, McCowen was working as a housekeeper for Peggy Hull [Annotator's Note: Henrietta Goodnough Hull], who was a World War 1 correspondent. He was at her house when he heard about the Japanese attacking Pearl Harbor [Annotator's Note: the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor, Hawaii on 7 December 1941]. McCowen recalls not really understanding the implications of the attack but observed Peggy Hull's excitement. McCowen enlisted in the military because he really wanted to fight in the war. He recalls drawing fighter planes and wrote "Captain McCowen" on the side while in class. At 17, McCowen tagged along with his friend to New York City [Annotator's Note: New York, New York] so his friend could enlist in the service. While McCowen was waiting for him, a sergeant walked up to him and convinced him to take the exam too. He passed the exam and signed up for the Enlisted Reserve Corps. When he turned 18, he went on active duty, and was sent to Fort Dix, New Jersey for induction and to receive his uniform. He was then sent to Keesler Field [Annotator's Note: now Keesler Air Force Base in Biloxi, Mississippi] by train for basic training and cadet classification. Because he was so athletic, he thought basic training was easy and enjoyed it for the most part. McCowen was disappointed when he found out he was not selected as a pilot but qualified to be a navigator or bombardier. However, the Air Force took his whole class to Lowry Field in Denver, Colorado for B-29 [Annotator's Note: Boeing B-29 Superfortress very heavy bomber] gunnery and remote-control gunner training.

William McCowen was assigned to a P-61 Black Widow [Annotator's Note: Northrop P-61 Black Widow night fighter aircraft] and selected to go overseas to Italy. He received a short leave [Annotator's Note: an authorized absence for a short period of time] to go home but had to report to Albany, New York on Christmas Eve [Annotator's Note: 24 December 1944]. He took a train ride to Cornish, Utah, but was snowed in for a couple of days in Denver [Annotator's Note: Denver, Colorado]. Since he was on the West Coast [Annotator's Note: West Coast of the United States] and the Air Force gave him summer equipment, he assumed he would be shipped to the Pacific. However, they sent him back to New York [Annotator's Note: New York, New York] and he took a ship across the Atlantic [Annotator's Note: Atlantic Ocean]. He remembers the ship zig-zagged [Annotator's Note: a naval anti-submarine maneuver] a lot to avoid German submarines. When he arrived in Naples [Annotator's Note: Naples, Italy] he was loaded into an army truck and driven to a replacement depot about 20 miles outside of the city. The depot was a big tent city on a hill. The first night he witnessed the Germans bombing Naples. He was at the depot for several days waiting to be assigned to a squadron. He was given a jeep and drove to a town in Caserta [Annotator's Note: Caserta, Italy]. During his stay at the replacement depot, he was diagnosed with rheumatic fever and was given penicillin at the station hospital. He was eventually sent to the 16th General Hospital in Naples. Because of the heavy fighting in the Po Valley, hospital beds were in demand, so he selected to return home. He was put on one of the first ships back to the Unites States after VE-Day [Annotator's Note: Victory in Europe Day, 8 May 1945]. All he had on his return was the pajamas and bathrobe given to him at the hospital. His ship arrived in New York Harbor and everyone went on the port side of the ship to see the Statue of Liberty which caused the boat to tip off balance. McCowen was taken to a small hospital in New Jersey for a couple of days and then was transferred to a hospital in Plattsburgh [Annotator's Note: Plattsburgh, New York] where he stayed for weeks. He found out he did not have rheumatic fever and was released.

William McCowen had little interaction with the local population while stationed at a replacement depot outside of Naples, Italy. [Annotator's Note: The interviewer pauses the interview at 0:27:54.000.] After waiting several weeks to be assigned to a squadron, he considered signing up for the "90 Day Wonder Program" [Annotator's Note: officer candidate program through which a serviceman would train for 90 days to become a second lieutenant], but he was diagnosed with a fever [Annotator's Note: rheumatic fever] and sent back to the United States. When he no longer had the fever, he was sent to Fort Dix [Annotator's Note: Fort Dix [Annotator's Note: in Burlington County, New Jersey] to be reassigned. The Air Force sent him to Las Vegas [Annotator's Note: Las Vegas, Nevada]. The first night he was there he met his future wife at a dance. While in Las Vegas, he recalls just running around and not doing very much. He was transferred back to Fort Dix and was discharged. He chose not to stay in the service because he felt he did not have a purpose in the military.

After being discharged from the service, William McCowen attended college at Denver University [Annotator's Note: Denver, Colorado] on the G.I. Bill, but did not graduate. He married his wife while in Denver, then returned to New York [Annotator's Note: Albany, New York], and McCowen went to work for his uncle who owned a plumbing business. He decided he wanted to go into pilot training school, and after he passed the written test, he was sent to Parrin Field in Dennison, Texas for training. He had training in ground, weather, air dynamics, and insurance. He flew a T-6 [Annotator's Note: North American AT-6 Texan advanced trainer aircraft] which he enjoyed flying. He graduated and received his wings and commission with 36 other men. When he went to advanced training in Lubbock, Texas, he flew the B-25 [Annotator's Note: North American B-25 Mitchell medium bomber]. Before McCowen graduated from cadet school, he was in the Strategic Air Command and assigned to Randolph [Annotator's Note: now Randolph Air Force Base, part of Joint Base San Antonio-Randolph, in San Antonio, Texas] to check out the B-29s [Annotator's Note: Boeing B-29 Superfortress very heavy bomber]. While there, he was asked to play basketball, but the season did not start for several months, so he met a pilot at the gym who asked if he wanted to join his crew and go to Korea with him. McCowen agreed and signed up for a tour during the Korean War [Annotator's Note: 1950 to 1953].

William McCowen signed on to a crew for the Korean War [Annotator's Note: 1950 to 1953] and was sent overseas to Kadena [Annotator's Note: Kadena Air Base, Okinawa, Japan]. He recalls living in tents while stationed there. For his first two missions he had a pilot instructor. He was responsible for frontline support missions. On his second mission, during a bad thunderstorm, one of the plane's engine stopped working and they could not repair it, so they were preparing to bail out, however the bombardier could not salvo the bombs because the bomb bay was not working either. All of a sudden, they went into a flat spiral at 3,000 feet. Somehow, McCowen and the pilot, Don [Annotator's Note: unable to verify identity], were able to level the plane and get it under control after loosing about a thousand feet. McCowen was able to feather the engine to get them back to Okinawa. They had a very rough landing, missing their initial runway and landing on a new, but rough, one. The plane began to burn up as they began their descent and McCowen was flown forward into a window and out the plane 200 feet as they crash landed but made it out okay. The plane blew up on impact. They lost the radio man in the crash. McCowen flew two other missions before returning to his crew. [Annotator's Note: The interviewer pauses the interviewee to change tapes at 0:55:52.000.] During bombing missions in Korea, McCowen recalls receiving a lot of flak [Annotator's Note: antiaircraft artillery fire]. He was always assigned on night missions and the flak looked like flashes moving through the sky. Although he would see enemy planes in the air, they would not take a shot at them because the B-29 [Annotator's Note: Boeing B-29 Superfortress very heavy bomber] had a lot of fire power. It had four .50 calibers [Annotator's Note: Browning ANM2 .50 caliber machine gun] in the turrets and 20mm cannons.

After World War 2, William McCowen served in the Korean War [Annotator's Note: 1950 to 1953]. Besides a mission that ended with his plane crashing, he cannot not recall any other memorable missions. As part of a routine mission, he would be briefed about it in the afternoon, and then take a nap. He would report for his station time and prepare the aircraft and get ready for take-off. His mission would take a total of ten hours. If they ever had mechanical problems, they would stop in Japan. He was stationed in Okinawa [Annotator's Note: Okinawa, Japan] for one year. He returned to the United States and because he made first lieutenant while in Okinawa, he received his own crew. He supervised training missions such as RBS [Annotator's Note: Radar Bomb Scoring] runs. He eventually upgraded to the B-47 [Annotator's Note: Boeing B-47 Stratojet strategic bomber] and assigned as a copilot since he did not have enough hours to pilot the plane. McCowen noticed a difference of the public's reaction from when he returned home from World War 2 than when he returned from the Korean War. It appeared to him that most of the public did not even realize they were in a war with Korea. McCowen decided he wanted to change from flying a B-47 to the B-58 [Annotator's Note: Convair B-58 Hustler strategic bomber]. He volunteered to fly the B-58, but ended up testing B-52s [Annotator's Note: Boeing B-52 Stratofortress strategic bomber] in Castle [Annotator's Note: Castle Air Force Base in Merced County, California]. Later he was sent to Albany, Georgia and can remember Martin Luther King became active at that time. Later, McCowen went on to serve in the Vietnam War.

After World War 2 and the Korean War [Annotator's Note: 1950 to 1953], William McCowen served in the Vietnam War. He flew 123s [Annotator's Note: Fairchild C-123 Provider transport aircraft]. He describes the plane as a twin engine plane with no guns. Its purpose was to carry supplies and paratroopers. He trained at Hulburt [Annotator's Note: Hulburt Field in Okaloosa County, Florida]. He was based in Nha Trang [Annotator's Note: Nha Trang, Vietnam]. He recalls that during his experience in Vietnam, he was always in the battle zone. Men would get shot just coming out of their base or coming out of a hotel. He enjoyed flying the 123s. He recalled that there was always ground fire during his missions. He supplied Rangers or troops chasing the VC [Annotator's Note: Viet Cong] and picked up troops and unload them in a safe zone. He flew multiple missions in one day. He dropped supplies for the Army. Most of the airfields were dirt fields. He thought the experience was a "funny situation." McCowen did not have any animosity toward his enemy. It was just a job to him. He would have close calls when he landed in VC villages. He remembers picking up three guys from a hillside and it ended up being three professional football players. McCowen served in Vietnam for a year before returning home to his family. He always enjoyed coming back and seeing his family again. He did not care what the public opinion was about Vietnam. After the war, McCowen was given a black box radio that he kept for the military to contact him if they needed him to go to war with Russia. He would be on alert when he had to prepare a plane for Chrome Dome [Annotator's Note: Operation Chrome Dome was a United States Air Force Cold-War era mission from 1960 to 1968 in which B-52 Stratofortress strategic bomber aircraft armed with thermonuclear weapons remained on continuous airborne alert, flying routes to points on the Soviet Union border]. He was on an alert for two weeks out of a month and he was assigned to Moscow for many years. He was required to specific targets in the city. He enjoyed working under General May [Annotator's Note: USAF General Curtis Emerson LeMay] in the Strategic Air Command. Many of his targets would have been one-way missions with the improbability that he would return. McCowen always wanted to be a pilot and he would have pursued that avenue even if he did not fight in World War 2. He is appreciative for the G.I. Bill because he would not have been able to go to college without it.

William McCowen's most memorable experience of World War 2 was when a nearby town in Italy captured Mussolini [Annotator's Note: Italian fascist dictator Benito Amilcare Andrea Mussolini; also know as il Duce] and his mistress [Annotator's Note: Clara Petacci] and hung them up by their heels. McCowen tried to get a jeep to go see it, but his commanding officer told him not to go. He also remembers watching Naples [Annotator's Note: Naples, Italy] being bombed at night and wondering about the people. He mentions that he was credited for killing over 300 people on one of his missions in Korea. McCowen recalls having dreams when he first returned from the war, but he had no other problems adjusting back to civilian life. He attended reunions and was glad to see all his crew members and their families. World War 2 changed his life because it allowed him to attend college. He fought in the war because everyone else was. He believes his generation is different from the current one. McCowen thinks the American public treats the military friendlier than during the Korean and Vietnam wars. However, he believes that the government does not allow the military to use the weapons they have to fight the enemy properly. McCowen believes it is important to have institutions like The National WWII Museum [Annotator's Note: in New Orleans, Louisiana] and should continue to teach World War 2 to future generations because its part of history. He is glad he made it.

[Annotator's Note: There is a video break then the clip starts when interviewee is in mid-sentence.] William McCowen recalls his time with the P-47 [Annotator's Note: Republic P-47 Thunderbolt fighter aircraft] and his experience in the barracks. One of his friends had to use the bathroom one night and relieved himself in a footlocker. He also talked about an Englishman, George, who was captured at Dunkirk [Annotator's Note: Battle of Dunkirk, France, 1940] and then experimented on by the Nazis. He survived but was mentally damaged. McCowen and his friends took up a collection so George could go on vacation. McCowen believed his potential nuclear missions to Russia during the Cold War was different from the Kamikaze pilots because he had a possibility of making it home, while the kamikazes knew it was a one trip mission. He had a close call when he was on a Chrome Dome [Annotator's Note: Operation Chrome Dome was a United States Air Force Cold War era mission from 1960 to 1968 in which B-52 Stratofortress strategic bomber aircraft armed with thermonuclear weapons remained on continuous airborne alert, flying routes to points on the Soviet Union border] where they were running low on fuel and could not get the gear down. They tried to get a tanker to them but failed due to the weather. He eventually diverted to Georgia and was able to land safely.