"I turned seventeen after I was in school awhile. The war broke out and I broke out of school. I just had to get in the Navy," Bill recalls. Because his brother was stationed at Hickham Field when Pearl Harbor was hit, Bill was itching to go into the service, too. Born in Coushatta, Louisiana, he was attending Louisiana Normal (now Northwestern State University) when he joined the Navy in "October or November" of 1942. Aboard the USS Suwanee (CVE-27), he participated in battles across the Pacific, missing only one major campaign--when the ship was in repairs in Bremerton, Washington during the struggle for Iwo Jima. As part of the occupation forces of Japan, Bill entered Nagasaki while ruins were still smoking from the second atomic bomb. He began flying as an aircraft gunner shortly before the war ended. Discharged January 4, 1946 at the rank of petty officer, first class, Bill joined the Air Force two years later, and served until he retired June 30, 1965.