SOLE SURVIVORS
When Pearl Harbor was attacked, I was home at the time. It was a Sunday, and we heard it on the radio like everybody else. I was living with my parents and working for American Airlines at LaGuardia Field. We were outfitting planes to go overseas, converting commercial airplanes for use by the military.
I had never been in an airplane except commercially, and I had never flown a light plane. I felt that an aerial line of duty was what I wanted, because I didn’t want to end up in a trench somewhere. It turned out pretty good for me, but my brother Robert was not as fortunate. An Army Air Corps B-24 top turret gunner and engineer, he survived two crashes but was over the Adriatic when his bomber No Time for Love was attacked by enemy fighters on March 24, 1944. He never returned and was listed as MIA. My brother Al also enlisted in the Army Air Corps to fly. He served as a navigator in a B-29 Superfortress and saw heavy action over Japan.
On November 4, 1942, I enlisted to fly in the Navy because a good friend of mine was a Navy pilot, and he talked me into it. Patriotism was the driving force for my brothers and me to enlist.
I CHOSE THE MARINES
