"As far as I can tell from the genealogy records, [my mother's] family came from Holland in the mid-1850s and settled in the central London area in the Jewish district. My [maternal] grandfather was a cigar maker and also worked with…

"[My mother] was born in 1927 in London, in Stoke Newington, and, you know, it was between the two wars, and times were tough. And they lived in a multilevel series of flats in Stoke Newington. In fact, the same apartment that she lived in, my…

"Then we had VE [Victory in Europe] Day. And that’s a funny one. I had my little motor scooter that I had mechanics build for me, that I designed in Paris. I was riding up and down the streets of Paris on VE-Day with a beautiful young lady…

"We went back to England and got ready for the Holland invasion, biggest invasion we ever had. 1,876 gliders. And we went in the 21st of September, I believe it was. We were in there 21 days. It was a long steal. But it worked out all right. We…

"We went into southern France. Of course that was an easy mission. And we had anti-glider and anti-parachute poles, pine trees that they’d [the Germans] planted in the big field we were going to land in. So we landed the gliders in between the…

"We were going to fly from England to Italy for the southern France invasion. And [Rev. Fitzgerald was] all set to go. I told him I’d take him to Rome, and we’d go and see the pope and all this. I’m just talking [laughs]. And they said, 'We…

"The day that we went over to in the, D-Day, the night before, this chaplain [named] Fitzgerald came up to me. He said, 'Lieutenant, you mind if I pray for you?' He said, 'I’m Catholic, and I know you’re Protestant.' And I…

"Let’s see, from there we went up to England in Oct-, March of ’44 to train for D-Day. And they sent me down to my base. We were based in Cottesmore, England, 316th Troop Carrier group. I was in the 36th Squadron."

"A C-54 came over with President Roosevelt in it. And he came over to do whatever he was gonna do to Patton. And a bunch of generals were waiting there for him. And when Patton came up, they all walked away from him. They wouldn’t have anything…

"We were picked up the next day by a Greek destroyer. And they took me into Algiers to the hospital. And of course the only thing they know to do in these army hospitals is cut your leg off if something’s wrong with you...They were gonna take my…