Born in Shreveport, Albert studied mathematics and physics at Centenary College and flew in the Civilian Pilot Training course, all while working a forty-hour week. He entered the U.S. Navy in the summer of 1942 and was accepted into naval flight school. Albert trained in the PB4Y, the equivalent of the B-24. He shipped overseas and was based at islands such as Funafuti, Apamama, Kwajalein, and Eniwetok, living in tents with wooden floors. "On Apamama, two nurses came by and toured the island," he recalls. "Everybody stood around gawking at them. We hadn't seen a white woman in about six months." As a co-pilot Albert flew aerial reconnaissance missions. One one, twenty Zeroes attacked the formation of six airplanes, shooting one down. He also made night surveillance flights, tracking typhoons with radar. Back in the states in December of 1944, Albert took additional training in the PB4Y, and then returned to the Pacific as part of a replacement squadron. He flew from Iwo Jima and Tinian on patrols along the coast of Japan, and attacked Japanese shipping. "We were flying patrols off Japan, and then one day they cancelled all flights and nobody flew that day," he recalls. "Then we heard that they had dropped the atomic bomb." Reaching home by Christmas of 1945, Albert remained in the Air Force and served in several duty stations in his post-war career. At many he "bore holes in the sky," as he says, in test flights after his military career. He returned to Shreveport and spent fifteen years working for the city in housing. He retired in 1969.