Prewar life

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Bassett, Billy Joining the Military
Billy P. Bassett was born in December 1924 in Deep River, Iowa. He grew up in Des Moines, Iowa with his brother and two...
Goad, Roy Joining the National Guard
[Annotator’s Note: the video glitches throughout the segment.] Roy D. Goad was born in April 1921 in Bell County, Texas...
Stewart, Frank Joining the National Guard, the CCC and the US Marine Corps
When the Battle of the Tenaru River ended, Lieutenant Port recommended Frank Stewart for the Navy Cross but the captain...
Gemmel, Fred Joining the Navy
[Annotator's Note: The interview begins with Fred Gemmel already in conversation with the interviewer.] Gemmel arrived...
Allen, W. "Bill" Joining the Navy
W. P. “Bill” Allen was born in Murfreesboro, Tennessee in May 1925. He was raised in Murfreesboro and went to school...
McKeel, Sam Joining the Navy
[Annotator’s Note: The video begins with interviewee talking about how he wanted to write a book and working with a...
Micklich, Richard Joining the Navy
Richard Micklich was born in 1921 in Pueblo, Colorado. He spent the entirety of his childhood in Pueblo as part of a...
Duck, Cecil Joining the Navy
Cecil N. Duck was born in August 1925 in Bay Minnette, Alabama, and when he was six years old, his family moved to...
Daquana, Joseph Joining the Navy
Joseph Daquana was born in Plaquemines, Louisiana in May 1928. He was the second youngest child in a family of seven...
Pratt, Robert Joining the Navy
Robert W. "RW" Pratt worked in an art studio for an artist. He made picture frames and sometimes was used as a model....
Miller, Rudolph Joining the Navy
Rudolph C. Miller had no place to go and nowhere to live when he was 16. He tried to forge his certificate [Annotator's...
Johnson, Willard Joining the Navy
[Annotator’s Note: Birds can be heard chirping in the background throughout this clip.] Willard Johnson was born in...
Crawford, William Joining the Navy
William Ward Crawford was born in 1914 in Akron, Ohio. He was aware of the Great Depression [Annotator's Note: The...
Werner, Morton Joining the Navy
Morton William Werner was born in February 1927 in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. He grew up in a middle-class home. His...
Nelson, Philip Joining the Navy
Philip Nelson was born in Woodbridge, New Jersey in December 1920. During the Great Depression [Annotator's Note: The...
Brant, Robert Joining the Navy and Overseas Deployment
[Annotator’s Note: chit chat for the first 13 seconds of the interview] Robert Brant was born 10 October 1924 in Denver...
Dorsey, Eugene Joining the Navy Armed Guard
Eugene Dorsey was born in St. Louis, Missouri in July 1924 and grew up in University City [Annotator’s Note: University...
Reeder, John Joining the Royal Canadian Air Force
Colonel John Acree Reeder was born in January 1921 in Indianapolis, Indiana. He attended the Boeing School of...
Barnett, Robert Joining the Scouts and Raiders
Robert Barnett was born in November 1926 in Cincinnati [Annotator's Note: Cincinnati, Ohio] and has lived there all of...
Ashford, Willard Joining the Sea Bees
Willard Ashford was born in Baton Rouge, Louisiana in May 1928. His family was mostly poverty-ridden due to the Great...
Campbell, John Joining the Service
John Edward Campbell was born in August 1920 in Porterville, California. His mother died in 1930 when he was ten years...
Bornstein, Jack Joining the Service
Jack Bornstein was born in Brooklyn [Annotator’s Note: Brooklyn, New York City, New York] in January 1921. He grew up...
Campbell, John Joining the US Merchant Marine
John Campbell was mostly selling newspapers while in high school. He was making as much as a lot of men who were...
Kuhn, Arthur Joining the V-12 Program
Arthur Kuhn was born in 1926 in Chicago, Illinois and grew up in Hammond, Indiana. He grew up with one brother. His...
Doroff, Lorraine Joining the WACS
Lorraine Doroff signed up for the Women Auxiliary Army [Annotator's Note: Women's Army Auxiliary Army Corps or WAAC;...
Smith, Thomas Joining the War to Saipan
When they bombed Pearl Harbor [Annotator's Note: the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor, Hawaii on 7 December 1941], there...
Switzer, Ruth Journey to England
Ruth Switzer was born in July 1934 in Vienna, Austria. Her parents were Jews who moved there from Poland so her father...
Gallego, Anthony Kid in Los Angeles
Anthony “Tony” Gallego was born in November 1923 in Los Angeles, California. His father, a metalworker, made enough...
Barnes, Walter Knowing Judo
Walter Barnes did not see much of a change in New Orleans when he returned after the war. Before the war he and his...
Cowell, Ernest Korean War, Vietnam, and Post Military Life
Ernest Cowell took a train from Fort Mason, California [Annotator's Note: in San Francisco, California], to Fort Lewis...
Nossbaum, Anneliese Kristallnacht
Anneliese Nossbaum lived in Bonn, Germany and was proud of the synagogue there where her father was the cantor. As a...
Sasser, Joseph Landing at Massacre Bay
Joseph H. Sasser Junior was riding in his friend's father's car when he heard over the car radio about the attack on...
Burrus, William Last Thoughts
The horror of crossing the Rhine River [Annotator's Note: Germany] is the one thing that stands out the most in the...
Spielberg, Arnold Learning New Technologies
Arnold Spielberg worked for RCA [Annotator's Note: Radio Corporation of America] and was in charge of designing the...
Ducharme, O'Neill Learning to Be a Marine
O’Neil Ducharme was born in February 1925 near Elizabeth Falls, Maine. His parents immigrated to Maine from Canada in...
Borders, Charles "Wes" Learning to Fly
The war started and 50 of Charles Wesley Borders' classmates went to Canada to join the RCAF [Annotator's Note: Royal...

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