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Lloyd Pittman

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In the fall of 1942, Texas A&M student Lloyd Pittman took and passed the Army Air Corps tests for potential aviators. Like many, he was told to continue college for now, and like just as many, that didn't last and he was sent to training. He worked his way through a series of ever larger planes. (5:05)

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Lloyd Pittman got his wings in May of 1944 and began flight training in the B-24 bomber. Once the crew was assembled and the final exercises completed, he boarded a ship for England. Unlike many of his fellows, he enjoyed the trip. (5:11)

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Lloyd Pittman piloted a B-24 in the 492nd Bomb Group, a special operations unit that only flew at night. Beside high altitude bombing runs, they were called on to drop supplies to various underground organizations. While over Germany, they encountered radar controlled searchlights, which didn't have to search. (4:58)

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He flew an older D model B-24 on his first five missions. Lloyd Pittman had some tense times in that plane, including once when he readied the crew to bail out during a blinding storm. When he got a newer M model aircraft, it felt like driving a new car. (5:14)

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What was it like up there in that B-24? Well it was cold, really cold. Lloyd Pittman recalls the heated suits and the oxygen bottle you had to carry when you moved around the plane. They used the Norden bombsight, which was top secret technology. (4:58)

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He got through the war safely, but B-24 pilot Lloyd Pittman remembers a few times when others weren't so lucky. One morning he awoke to a disheartening sight at the adjacent tents. (3:28)

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After the war, B-24 pilot LLoyd Pittman was taking some supplies to Norway when the war weary plane he was flying lost an engine. The navigator steered them to Bergen, where a small air strip was their only chance. (4:15)

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Lloyd Pittman was lucky enough to be among the first in his unit to be sent home from England after the fall of Germany. He had a nice leave back home but the war in the Pacific had him scheduled to learn to fly the B-29. (2:37)

Carter Tucker

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The Korean War had started when he graduated high school, and though he had started college, Carter Tucker felt the call to join the Navy. At first he was with the Seabee school but he wanted to go further than California so he volunteered for the unique world of submarine duty. (6:08)

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He had joined because of it, but the Korean War ended while Carter Tucker was in submarine school. Without a shooting war, the vessels were used for intelligence gathering and this nearly led to an icy disaster for him on his first patrol off the coast of Russia. (4:49)