WWII Veteran Transcript

Subject: Jacob (Rand) Ranofsky

Interviewer: Miriam Hirschman

Tape Number: 02 of 02

Interview Date:

Transcriber: Matthew McCann


Transcription Date:



---------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Interviewer: Thank you very much for meeting me.  I very much appreciate it.

Rand: My pleasure.

Interviewer: And should we begin?

Rand: Okay.

Interviewer: So you left off last time with your discussion of ASTP and I wanted 
to get more of a feel of what your duty and your tasks were in ASTP what kind of 
role you played.

Rand: The role was a what you call, we were called personnel psychologists and 
involved what is called today human resources so to speak.  In other words we 
had to put somebody at the front or elsewhere in a certain position that they 
were qualified for lets say a rifleman, they’d be a riflemen, so, you able to 
put out as a punchcard, you had a punchcard system and we were able to find, 
let say a riflemen by just putting this, this, this long rod which was like a 
very similar to a rod that is used for knitting, like a knitting rod, you put 
it through a hole in the card, if the hole wasn’t broken then that card would 
not fall, if, if the, if it was put in the right place the card would fall out 
and that there was a rifleman. [?] And then you sent that person to the front, 
that was a replacement depot actually, and that’s what we do and that was 
located, at that point where, where we actually did it was in [?], France.  On 
the Belgian border. And that was the, that was what was done in the replacement 
depot.  And it was a behind the lines job.

Interviewer: So you were in charge of placing new replacements into different 
units?

Rand: Replacements into different thing, that’s, you know whatever was necessary, 
I just gave one example of a rifleman but [?] something else.

Interviewer: Do you feel that your college degree in psychology helped get you to 
that position?

Rand: Yes.  I think so, it didn’t need that much education but, that’s what they 
wanted.  See reason we, when they took a hundred of us, to study personnel 
psychology, we were then supposed to go to officers training school and become 
commissioned officers.

Interviewer: Right.

Rand: But apparently they were in a hurry to [?], so what they did after we 
finished at the University of Minnesota with that three month course they sent us, 
all of us back into basic training, new basic, I went through basic training twice.  
Then following the basic training, then we went overseas as a group.

Interviewer: At what, And, you were attached to which company at this point?

Rand: It was not a company, it was-

Interviewer: You were independent.

Rand: It was this group we were independent. We were a hundred, a hundred men, not 
all of went to Jouvre[?], I don’t know where the others went, they probably [?] 
depots.  But not, [?] a hundred men Jouvre, France.  But we landed in, well first 
you want to know when we went overseas, where we went?

Interviewer: Yeah.

Rand: Well first we went to England, we landed in Liverpool, the ocean crossing 
was on a relatively brand new ship called Aquatania.  Which was a British ship, 
which was converted to a troop ship it was a, it was a regular transatlantic 
ship, you know a.

Interviewer: Like a cruise ship?

Rand: Cruise type of ship.  And they converted it and we had thousands of troops 
on board that ship and we went across without a convoy.

Interviewer: Was it comfortable?

Rand: No.

Interviewer: No?

Rand: We went across without a convoy, most unusual because this was a very fast 
ship it was a brand new ship and we zigzagged across you could see the wake and we 
zigzagged across and we had excellent weather it was like a light, the whole five, 
less then days we went across and it was not comfortable, you either slept in a 
hammock or you slept wherever you could I slept one night, on a bench in they had 
a mess hall and one, a bench and a table, somebody slept on the bench somebody slept 
on the table, and a hammock was swung over the table somebody slept there, and at 
night we weren’t allowed to go up on deck, not allowed to smoke a cigarette because 
of the light, you want to keep the light away, the portholes were covered and 
everything so it was completely dark at night and you had to stay in this sweltering 
thing even though, I mean it was just, there was no circulation of air because 
everything was blocked off, and the first thing in the morning I was one of the first 
people to be up on deck when there was light because it was a, stifling type of 
situation but, that was, that was they it was, and we went across it was a, wonderful 
thing, and the captain, British Captain of the ship, we arrived on fourth of July 
nineteen forty-four yeah, and Captain congratulated us over the loudspeaker and said, 
you know happy independence day and so forth. And these airplanes-

Interviewer: You’re back to Britain.

Rand: Yeah, well these airplanes came out to greet us, you know?  Airplanes couldn’t 
escort us across the ocean, they couldn’t travel that far I don’t think, so they, 
once we were maybe fifteen miles or so out from, I know we had escort, British Army 
Planes, escort.  You want to shut that?  So it was a very smooth trip.

Interviewer: No problems with Submarines or concerns?

Rand: No, we had no problem whatsoever, and then of course the this escort came out 
to greet us which was very happy to see us.  And you wannna hear?  There’s  
something I consider interesting.

Interviewer: Yeah?

Rand: That happened, well you know, I was in twenty, at that point I was twenty 
three years of age and I didn’t I wasn’t used to drinking coffee I used to drink 
milk, I used to drink a quart of whole milk a day you know that was, a young guy 
used to drink a quart of milk.  Now we’re on board this ship and the milk starts to 
taste a little flat, and then they stopped serving milk they served powdered milk, 
which is awful.  At least in those days was awful, and here I was used to drinking 
milk every day, I was really it was a terrible thing, to not have milk you see.  So 
when I got to England and we were in this camp and there were plenty of bicycles 
around because the, the guys who had already gone over to the continent left these 
bicycles there so you could pick up a bike, and if you, you know, on, on leave and 
you can go ride around the countryside, I was aching to get to a farm and drink some 
milk.  Cause after all American in uniform they were very nice to us so I stopped at 
a farm brought the bicycle out into the countryside, beautiful countryside, north of 
Liverpool and this farmer says ‘Sure, I’ll give you some milk’ and he comes back with 
a cup, he’d just taken the milk from the cows utter and he handed it to me it was warm, 
and milk, it tasted awful, cause I was used to drinking cold milk, but I had to drink 
it.

Interviewer: You had to [?]

Rand: And then he invited me in for dinner and I couldn’t understand hardly a word 
he said, you know he sat there, you hear about dialects too and there way of 
speaking and sometimes, you know can’t understand them, so it was quite an experience.

Interviewer: Did you get to see a lot of England while you were there?

Rand: No, not a lot.  No.  Not a lot, I remember for some reason, [?] but we were 
told not to eat in the restaurants, deprived the British of food, they didn’t have 
much food, they didn’t have much food, you know?  And there were a few towns near 
the camp and where I did, I did get some fish and chips wrapped up in the newspaper, 
delicious.  But in general we didn’t, we didn’t restaurants or anything like that if 
we were off duty.  And but I did I get to travel a [?]

Interviewer: Did you get to see a lot of British Civilians or?

Rand: Oh yes British Civilians.

Interviewer: Soldiers?

Rand: Not so, well yes, some soldiers in pubs you know, and then of course, I 
remember seeing a few Italian prisoners of war, they walked around the street in 
their uniforms, Italian prisoners of war.

Interviewer: How were they treated?

Rand: I think they were treated rather well.

Interviewer: Yeah?

Rand: Yeah, yeah.  It’s kind of surprising. 

Interviewer: They were given a lot of freedom?

Rand: I guess so, yeah.  I saw them walking around, that’s, that was that.

Interviewer: Did you have a lot to do with the British soldiers and civilians or 
you kind of kept to yourself?

Rand: No, only in the pubs, you know beer and so forth, drinking warm beer.  And 
then that, you saw the poem about the British-

Interviewer: Oh yeah about the Yanks.

Rand: -Soldiers think about the Yanks.

Interviewer: Did you get that impression from them or?

Rand: Oh yeah, you got the impression, of course they were envious of us because 
we had such a big salary like thirty-one dollars a month, you know?  Something 
like that.

Interviewer: As compared to what?

Rand: Oh they got a lot less.

Interviewer: Yeah?

Rand: We used to say at the end of the day you know what we, another day another 
dollar.

Interviewer: I’m sure they were very envious.

Rand: Yeah, they were, they were envious of that, [?]

Interviewer: In general?

Rand: [?] But in that poem you get that notion.

Interviewer: Yeah.  In general did you get along with them?

Rand: Oh yeah. I got, I never had with any, they were, I suppose, a few fights I 
mean when you mix beer with you know a little bit of feeling of deprivation you 
know you’re bound to get, there were fights I’m sure, you know.  But I didn’t get 
involved in that.  That’s was a, that was the overseas trip.  And then the time 
came when we shipped actually to Normandy, I’m not, there was no combat at that 
time, it was already October nineteen forty-four when we shipped to Normandy, 
and very fortunate you know, not to have the, but we had D-Day.

Interviewer: D-Day.

Rand: And…

Interviewer: When did you arrive in England though?

Rand: July fourth, nineteen forty-four.

Interviewer: And then you just stayed until October.

Rand: Yes, yeah.

Interviewer: Did you have any training at all, during that period?

Rand: Very little of it, I can remember.

Interviewer: So what did you do?

Rand: I don’t know what there were, I don’t know what we did, I think about it, I 
can’t remember.

Interviewer: It’s a lot of time.

Rand: Yeah.

Interviewer: Yeah.

Rand: What they did was gather troops and I guess then take a whole bunch of 
troops over across the channel.

Interviewer: Okay.

Rand: I don’t, I don’t remember any training, or anything.

Interviewer: None, really?

Rand: Don’t remember it’s possible, we did something, maybe marching or something 
like that but.

Interviewer: Nothing too-

Rand: I don’t remember getting any training in there.

Interviewer: So then in October you were shipped into Normandy.

Rand: That’s right.

Interviewer: And from there where did you go?

Rand: Oh from there, from there, we got on to an open truck, because of the 
possibility of being strafed you had to be able to jump out of the truck fast, 
cover would be difficult to get out of the truck.  So here we were, standing a 
truck full of G.I.’s with their duffel bags, standing at night, along the, it used 
to be called the Red Ball highway.  Travelled along and actually, I slept standing 
up.  Slept standing up, even though it was cold, and everything else.  Our clothes 
were very warm though, wool clothes it didn’t get [?] really warm. But I slept 
standing up, and we drove the whole night from Normandy to the this town Jivve on 
the, on the border of Belgium, and then we arrived there and set up this replacement 
depot.

Interviewer: And you entered into the hundred and thirteenth cavalry?

Rand: Well then in February yes.  I was there, till February, in Jivve and then, 
three of us taken out and sent into combat.  May have been a coincidence but the 
three of us were Jewish.

Interviewer: What made them pick the three of you.

Rand: I don’t know, but I think, I think what it was is, they were looking for 
people who in pretty good physical shape, I think most of the hundred men that I 
was with were already a little older, they weren’t terribly old they were 
probably some of them were in their thirties, and some of them were already had 
been teachers and I guess  Lawyers and so forth and, cause they were all well 
educated people, so, and they figured, take the younger guys who were more 
physically fit, you see.  I think that’s the only reason I can understand.

Interviewer: And then where did the rest of that group go?

Rand: They stayed there, I lost track of them.  They stayed there.  And I became 
one of the people who were sent out from the replacement depot, into combat.

Interviewer: So what kind of things did you do for that?

Rand: In combat you mean?  Well, I did very menial things mostly, handle the, I 
was in a half-track I wasn’t in a tank, are you familiar with a half-track? I 
was in a half-track and, in charge of some of the ammunition and I fed the 
ammunition to the, to the tank, when we still we had the artillery on the tank, 
handed them the ammunition, and basically that was it.  That was my-

Interviewer: Day in day out?  Day in and Day out?

Rand: Yeah that, that was it.  That’s it.  I was a lowly G.I. and that’s it.

Interviewer: Everyone plays their part.

Rand: Try to stay out of trouble, you know?

Interviewer: Did you ever experience that?

Rand: Oh yeah, well when we got to the Rhine River where we met with opposition, 
and we didn’t have a bridge to cross the Rhine River and we went, met with stiff 
opposition, then I was one of the observers for the artillery on a, in a, a 
church steeple and that’s when I almost got killed.  I was sure.  Not almost got 
killed, I was sure I was gonna die, I was in a situation where I was sure I was 
gonna die.

Interviewer: What happened?

Rand: Well we were observing and directing artillery from this church steeple and 
at night the three of us went down into one of the parish houses right next to 
the church, I didn’t want to go, I could have had hot food cause I saw that they 
were directing the Germans, directing artillery over there and I saw guys that 
died because they had hot food you see.  So I, these other two guys and myself 
were willing to sit in the kitchen in this parish house and have K-Rations, you 
see, and all of a sudden something came over like a freight train, it was 
terrible, so the three of us jumped down into the basement and basement walls 
were about two feet thick and the next one came over and the wall on, one of the 
walls cracked and we were, it was almost a direct hit and we were, there was dust 
all over the place and there was a an archway, between two rooms in the  basement 
when we figured that’s the safest place to stand and the three of us stood there 
had one guy in front of me and one in back of me, and at that point, these two 
guys were on there knees praying and I didn’t pray, I didn’t realize till 
afterwards that these two guys were on their knees praying.  And, we realized 
that these whatever it was, was coming over and hitting us and they were zeroing 
in on us and, and the artillery was coming over every four minutes, so we decided 
to make a run for it.  And we ran up, there was debris all over the steps and we 
managed to get up to the top and we ran into of the trajectory, towards the river, 
where we knew the other elements of our, of our troop were you see, so we get that, 
we ran and then we realized that we did a terrible thing, that soldier is not 
supposed to do.  In our panic leaving the kitchen we left our, we didn’t have 
rifles we had they’re smaller then a rifle…

Interviewer: Carbine?

Rand: Carbine!  Yeah, thanks, yeah we left our carbines and our helmets in the 
kitchen.  And the following morning we ran back and got our carbines, so that I 
was sure I was gonna die at that point these two guys, which were also, it was a 
terrible situation, what happened was, instead this it must have been a 
tremendous piece of artillery, it hit a civilian house, and the people were 
supposed to go to the bunker, it’s the only expression, you’re supposed to go to 
the Bunker and they didn’t they were in a basement this thing went right through 
the house and killed the people in the basement.

Interviewer: So there were still German Civilians around at that point? 

Rand: Oh yes, the, as a matter of fact when I was in the steeple right?  And I l
ooked down and I see lines wash hanging down there and I see a guy with a little, 
people looking up at us, you know?   Like this.  Civilian.  And I said to my 
Lieutenant, I said [?], but they were probably-

Interviewer: Spies?

Rand: Spying and communicating with the Germans and that’s why they set these 
salvos at, these tremendous artillery, later when we got across we found a tank 
there, probably one of the lesser German’s secret weapons with a piece of 
artillery that we could actually crawl into it was so big like this.  I had a 
picture of it, taken in my crouching in it, I don’t know what happened to it.  
Snapshot, I don’t know what happened to it.  It was probably a tremendous piece 
of artillery, I’m not, I’m not an expert on artillery and I don’t know what it 
was, maybe I’ll Professor Wintermute if he knows anything about that.  But the 
point is, we met with tremendous resistance on the Rhine River, finally we were 
able build a pontoon bridge across the Rhine and we crossed the river, crossed 
the Rhine.  But you see were foolish, they were afraid of the Russians they 
should have made it easier for us to get, no seriously, to get across the 
Rhine.  The Russians were able to come in, and that’s why we could not meet 
the Russians in Berlin, and that’s the point of those two, the letter you saw 
that General Eisenhower did you read that?

Interviewer: Yeah.  I remember.

Rand: Because they put up resistance at the Rhine River we were unable to meet 
the Russians in Berlin, they got there first.  It’s not that we let them in, 
they got there first because we met with more resistance then the Russians, 
the Russians had the Oder River of course which was a small river, we had the 
Rhine.

Interviewer: How long did it take for you to actually cross it?  Entire?

Rand: You mean how long were we at the Rhine River?  Couple of weeks I guess.  
I just don’t remember exactly how long. I couldn’t even find the little town, 
I went back to Germany.

Interviewer: Yeah?

Rand: Yeah.  Tried to find them.  I couldn’t find it.  Zons, Z-O-N-S is the 
name of the town.  Couldn’t, couldn’t find it.  It may just not exist anymore.  
Yeah, at any rate…

Interviewer: Was it decimated because of the artillery that you were talking 
about?

Rand: I don’t think so, no, certainly wasn’t destroyed, [?], no, certainly 
wasn’t, and we crossed the Rhine and between the Rhine and the Elbe, because 
you have to go by, by rivers you know? Between the Rhine and the Elbe, we 
didn’t meet with a tremendous amount of resistance but we met some resistance, 
especially by fanatics.

Interviewer: Civilians or Military?

Rand: No, Military.

Interviewer: Can you elaborate?

Rand: Well for example, we’re going along, a convoy is going along with tanks, 
half-tracks and jeeps, when about the middle of the convoy in a ditch, next to 
the road, apparently this German soldiers hidden there with a Bazooka and when 
half the thing past he shot the Bazooka at us, he missed, missed but of course 
he died immediately because all the firepower of the whole convoy was on him 
and, and he sort of, almost suicidal attacks like you see in modern day but 
it’s rare to see a suicidal attack like that.

Interviewer: Was it a single person or?

Rand: Yes a single person as far as I know it was a single person.  We all fired.  
I mean this guy was decimated.

Interviewer: In an instant.

Rand: Well that’s what we did at night, if I, we were an outfit that was ahead of 
the infantry frequently, so that when we got out that we didn’t know whether the 
Germans were come, come back to this are so we created a circle like they did in 
the wild west you know, create a circle of tanks, halftracks and jeeps and at 
night we had guard duty and if he heard anything, any noise outside that circle 
we fired.  Any noise.

Interviewer: There wasn’t any concern that was another allied soldier?

Rand: On no, there wouldn’t be one of our soldiers wouldn’t be out there because 
we were tight very well disciplined tight group, and we were on guard duty four 
hours on, four hours, that’s another thing we did, guard duty at night, four hours, 
four hours off I never slept eight hours, when I was in combat, never.

Interviewer: So for three months?

Rand: Three months, never.  Four hours on, four hours off.  Sleeping on the 
sidewalk sometimes because they wouldn’t let us go into houses to sleep, because 
they were afraid Germans would come back to the village [?]

Interviewer: Were the villages evacuated at that point?

Rand: Yeah, we took over the village, we didn’t meet much resistance, 
and we were in town for example, in the town square, we created this circle and 
here are stores and what are called, we call them taxpayers.  Stores and then 
there are apartments above.  Right?  I wouldn’t want to go in, no, we had to 
sleep on the sidewalk, sleeping on the sidewalk is worse then sleeping on dirt.  
In April, in April.  It’s cold, you can’t, can’t warm up.  It’s worse then 
sleeping on dirt.

Interviewer: Did you have enough blankets.

Rand: You have to sleep next to your, oh sure we had Blankets we had our coats 
and everything, but we sat asleep next to our vehicles on the sidewalk and 
that’s the way it is.

Interviewer: So how many of you were on and off at, on each interval?

Rand: How many what?

Interviewer: How many people at each interval?

Rand: Oh I don’t know, I couldn’t count, but they called them troop rearment 
troop[?] [?] and, There were three or four tanks to a troop and, you know, I 
guess five or six between per for tank[?] and people for halftracks and jeeps 
and so forth.[?] I don’t know, I never really counted, you know [?]

Interviewer: Yeah.

Rand: Yeah, so, that’s, that’s the way it was.

Interviewer: So this type of system together when you landed in Normandy or 
when you pushed across the Rhine?

Rand: What do you mean the-

Interviewer: The guard, the guard duty.

Rand: Oh the guard duty was once you were in combat.  From the Roer-

Interviewer: Oh once you were-

Rand: -From the Roer River, you’re familiar with the Roer? R-o-e-r from the 
Roer River, till we got to the Elbe River, was guard duty.  And the job of you 
know, handling the thing for artillery and so forth and so on.  And that was 
it.  It’s a simple job.  And then I says, I said I forgot, never told you 
about, we brought Germans for the artillery, for our artillery up in that 
steeple in the church.  That was interesting, but we never expected to be 
targeted, they knew we were there, so you could be targeted.  And but we never 
expected it, they never hit the church, as a matter of fact the priest came 
running out he wanted us to help with the civilians down the street you see, 
got hit, but we weren’t gonna, we had no idea of doing that, the priest came 
running out, he was terribly upset, you know you can’t.  I’m not about to save, 
I meant situation, to do anything about helping German Civilians when I’m 
looking out for my own life, me and two guys from the cellar we just kept 
running, into the trajectory.  We were told, run, if you’re going to run, 
you run into, into the trajectory, you don’t run away from it, you’re more 
likely to get hit if you run away from it then if you go into, into the 
trajectory.  Or at least duck into a, if you were in a town we’d duck into 
the building an I don’t remember once, you could hear the shells come over they 
whistle, and they’d send personnel things over that, that didn’t wait to land on 
the ground, they exploded before they landed on the ground see, you hear the 
whistle and once you hear the whistle you, run for cover.

Interviewer: Right.

Rand: And there were three of us, one guy ran in this doorway ahead of me and 
they I, the guy behind me, got, hit on the pinky.  It was shrapnel on the pinky 
because he was the last one in. [laughs]

Interviewer: Better then the rest of him right?

Rand: Pardon me?

Interviewer: Better then the rest of him right?

Rand: Oh yes, yeah.  But I mean they sent off the, in these personnel things I 
bet you could hear it you see.

Interviewer: Did you feel you were prepared for this kind of service?

Rand: Oh yes because it was simple.  Really was simple.  There was nothing.

Interviewer: And for the scarier parts of combat?

Rand: Oh well I was scared sure but, I expected to be scared.  You prepare yourself, 
I told Professor Wintermute, when I first joined this outfit I was very depressed 
because I thought ‘This was it’ when I first joined them in [?] I thought, you know, 
I’m gonna, this is it I’m get [?] I had brown shoes, ordinary civilian brown shoes I 
got rid of them, I sold them, and I had tail off my mail, you know and so forth, I 
was so depressed, that I thought [?] of course, I wasn’t, as I told him, I was a 
college graduate there was very few in the service, you know I came here to this 
outfit from behind the lines anybody behind the lines was almost like the enemy.  
And I-

Interviewer: Was that fun?

Rand: I had two stripes by this time. I had corporal stripe, college graduate, 
Jewish, and I was really upset and depressed. 

Interviewer: Did you fit in at first?

Rand: At first, but then, but then I did. Sure.

Interviewer: They didn’t accept you?

Rand: I adjusted and that’s over with. I, I experienced Anti-Semitism but not 
seriously, not serious [?], and unfortunately one of the guys who was an 
Anti-Semite terrible incident, they were on May seventh, the war was over and we 
were celebrating and at this point we had already left the area on the Elbe and 
we had taken over an airport a German airport which was utilized, [?], get it?  
Displaced persons.  And we were there and I forget the point, I’m sorry.  Isn’t 
that terrible.  Shut it off for a second while I think.

[RECORDING PAUSES]

Rand: Anyway, we were celebrating, we were happy and having and on this airport 
I think one of these battery operated vehicles, flat-top operated vehi-, battery 
operated vehicle and a bunch of us G.I.s got on top of it and rode around just 
yelling and screaming, drinking and so forth and rode around the airport and 
there was kind of a hillock, and we went up on this hill and the thing turned 
over, most of us jumped off and we weren’t hurt, this one got killed.  Killed by, 
you know, these battery things are very heavy and he, he happened to be one of the 
Anti-Semitic ones, I mean he didn’t deserve to be killed but I’m saying, it’s just 
a coincidence.

Interviewer: Was he the only one that was really so very Anti-

Rand: Yeah about the only one.

Interviewer: Yeah.

Rand: That I know of, you know, I can say I remember he was an anti-Semite.

Interviewer: Did he say anything in particular to you or just a feeling?

Rand: I don’t remember specifically but I just sensed it, people who are 
discriminated against whether they’re Jewish or Black or whatever they are sense, 
sense their discrimination, I don’t remember any specific incident.

Interviewer: What about as a graduate from college did they feel that you were 
above them or?

Rand: I felt myself that I was different from most of them, not that they, many 
of them were very intelligent, but I don’t think they were hardly, very few 
college graduates in that group, maybe none.

Interviewer: Where was it from?

Rand: Oh all over the country, all over the country.

Interviewer: So you got quite a mix?

Rand: Oh, quite a mix yeah, the non-commissioned officers were very good, they 
were very, they knew what they were doing and so forth, the one, lieutenant that 
I knew was not very good he was commissioned, you know, taking the place of 
somebody who was killed in action.

Interviewer: So he was a replacement himself?

Rand: He was commissioned in the field, you see, he wasn’t too smart, and he 
used me as a, that’s another thing that I do, I was a 6A, I knew a little bit of 
German, background, from Yiddish, I was able to interpret for this Lieutenant.  
You see, we went to a house to tell people to get out you know, sometimes we did 
sleep in houses at night.  I would say, the little things like, ‘Wie viel 
bettzimmer haben sie?’ [transcriber’s note: “How Many Bedrooms do you have?”] and 
they’d say ‘three’ okay, ‘Raus!’ [“Out!”] and then we’d get guys and get a good 
night sleep.

Interviewer: So you commandeered the beds?

Rand: Yeah we commandeered the beds.

Interviewer: Where did civilians go?

Rand: Oh I don’t know.

Interviewer: [laughs] You didn’t care.

Rand: No, that was, that was, so I, at Werner’s I said we established this 
Displaced Person, Displaced Persons camp then we wanted to feed them fresh food, 
these poor people were in terrible shape, they never got-

Interviewer: Civilians or from the camps?

Rand: Civilians, slave laborers, Russian and Polish slave laborers.  There was 
no Jews, this is not from the camps, we had-

Interviewer: This was in Germany?

Rand: Yes in Germany.  These were slave laborers, Russians and Polish and we 
established this displaced persons camp for them and so I was told to go out to 
the countryside with a truck not just me alone but, truck driver or two other 
soldiers, to pick up fresh vegetables.  So I would go out to tell a farmer 
‘Kartafel?’ means ‘Potatoes’ and you know, and so forth and you know I’d tell 
him ‘get it ready’ we’ll be back for a little while and get ready and then we’d 
come back and pick up stuff and feed them, in addition we had canned food, which 
we found, German canned food in that airport, so we fed them and unfortunately 
they drank some of their aviation that they found, and then some of them went 
blind you know, they wanted to celebrate these poor people, and they drank some 
of this aviation fluid went blind.  Terrible.  You know?  But they were, you know, 
they thought they were free and they wanted to celebrate.

Interviewer: Did you find any of the German civilians to be difficult, when you 
went to go get food for your DPs?

Rand: Well they must have hidden food from us you know, once we told them we’re 
going to come back, [?] they said ‘well we didn’t, well we don’t have this and 
we don’t have that’ and so forth, only in that sense. [?]

Interviewer: But they weren’t openly hostile?

Rand: No, no, no, no, they weren’t, most of them were, older men and women, you 
know, you know, they weren’t overly hostile.  Not at all.

Interviewer: So just try to turn back to after the crossing of the Rhine, where 
did you go after that?

Rand: Well we went on from village to village and so forth of course.

Interviewer: And what did you do in each village?

Rand: Well we took in over.  And it was as I said, we established ourselves.  
If it, if it were, depending on the situation, if we were out ahead of the 
infantry one situation or otherwise we took it over. It wasn’t heavy fighting 
from that point, after the Rhine River the fighting was not heavy, it was just 
spotty and, we would stop and use the artillery and so forth, and that’s more 
then there was fighting, until we got to the Elbe River and then we stopped.  
We didn’t know why, we stopped, but then I found out later, that Eisenhower 
said ‘We’re gonna stop here, now their gonna meet the Russians on land you see, 
that there could be an incident and that, and German Civilians egg this on, if 
there, when you meet the Germans you’re gonna fight them aren’t you? When you 
meet the Russians, you’re gonna fight them aren’t you?

Interviewer: What was the reason for it?

Rand: Well because they were afraid of the Russians, they weren’t afraid us it 
was only Russia. All the Russians-

Interviewer: Rumors?  There were rumors and?

Rand: Yeah they that we, the fact of the matter is that the Russians were tougher 
then we were, on Civilians, and they were afraid of the Russians, they weren’t 
afraid of us, Civilians weren’t afraid of us.

Interviewer: No?

Rand: No.

Interviewer: No?

Rand: They knew that, well that Lily Marlane with the chewing gum or chocolate, 
they were waiting for that.

Interviewer: And generally the American and British troops were kind? Or.

Rand: Oh yeah-

Interviewer: Generous?

Rand: Yes.  They were not difficult with civilians, mostly they were old women 
and old men children, older men, older women and children.  Towards the end of 
the war we ran into Germans troops that were teenage fifteen, sixteen years of 
age.  In uniform, they were scared stiff [?]

Interviewer: This is part of the Elbe River?

Rand: Some where between the Rhine and the Elbe.

Interviewer: And what did you do with them?

Rand: Well we would take them as prisoners of war.

Interviewer: And after that do you know or?

Rand: I don’t know what happened, we used to gather them, we ran into camps 
where they had prisoner of war they had them fenced in and so forth and so on, 
but I, we didn’t deal with prisoners of war.  It was the military police that 
dealt with that.

Interviewer: What kind of impression did  you get though just from seeing them.

Rand: Oh some of them were glad to be captured by Americans, they were glad not 
to be captured by the Russians.  They were glad to be-, I saw Prisoners of War 
in the United States, German prisoners of war before I went overseas they had.

Interviewer: Where did you see them?

Rand: I don’t remember which camp it was, because I was in basic training twice, 
so I don’t remember if it was in Virginia or Alabama, but they had, they had 
German Prisoners of war in the United States.  Loads of them.

Interviewer: What did they do with them?

Rand: After the war they sent them back to Germany I guess.  Yeah, I don’t know 
I’m just assuming, [?].  But that’s, that’s the way it [?]. And I was trying to 
think of something else that I’m reminded of can’t remember what it was.  Yeah 
so we, we set up this holding, set up this displaced persons camp on this 
airport which had airplanes on it which were jets, jet airplane.

Interviewer: German or American?

Rand: German Jets which they had Sabotaged the Germans had sabotaged them, they 
blew them up.  The Jets and there were numerous jet engines in the hangar and as 
soon as we found this here then we had all sorts of people coming to check it out 
because, we didn’t have any Jet Engines.  Germans had them.

Interviewer: Did they had engineers come and try and figure it out?

Rand: Whatever they were, they were high military people, [?]

Interviewer: What was your impression of them?

Rand: Well I didn’t know them personally but they came here to check out these 
engines and…Oh I know one of those things I wanted to tell you about, we had I 
tell you, the first Passover [?], they pulled us out.

Interviewer: Forty-Four or Forty-Five.

Rand: During the war, during, the war was on.  They pulled the Jewish kids out, 
it’s amazing how they knew which one is, pulled us out and took us into a city 
called Muchen-Gladbag, Muchen, Hyphen, Gladbag, and they set up we had long 
tables in some sort of a big building and paper table cloths like, oh my, paper 
tablecloths and we had basic stuff and then we went back to our units after the 
[?].

Interviewer: And the army provided this for, all the Jewish soldiers?

Rand: Yes.  They pulled us out of…

Interviewer: Wow.  So you got to meet all these different soldiers-

Rand: Yeah.
 
Interviewer: -from different companies-

Rand: Yeah.

Interviewer: -and divisions.

Rand: Yes.

Interviewer: Wow.

Rand: Isn’t that amazing?

Interviewer: And then they just sent you right back?

Rand: Yeah, they weren’t worried about that.

Interviewer: Wow.  That was in forty-four, forty-five?

Rand: Well that was in April of forty-five [?].  That was when Roosevelt died we 
got the, we heard it over the radio, that Roosevelt had died, April twelfth 
nineteen forty-five.  These dates stay in memory.  That’s important, everybody 
was very sad.

Interviewer: What was you reaction to that?

Rand: I was sad.  Very sad.  That poor man had been president through the war, 
three term, I think, or maybe he was on his fourth term whatever.  And, he was a 
little charming, [?], I’m sure you’ve seen plenty of things about him.

Interviewer: He was starting his fourth term.

Rand: Yeah, I think it was his fourth term, so that’s, that’s what, what happened.  
And they, then we went back [?], and yeah at the Elbe we just stayed, I don’t 
remember how long we were there but stayed there and then some of the units, some 
of the people some of the soldiers, not me but some of the soldiers from my unit, 
crossed the Elbe and met the Russians on the other side.  You’ve seen pictures of 
that.

Interviewer: Yeah.

Rand: [?] Well that was part of the hundred thirteenth, a hundred and twenty fifth 
cavalry reconnaissance squad.

Interviewer: The part of it-

Rand: That met the Russians yeah, on the other side.

Interviewer: You didn’t go?

Rand: No, I wasn’t asked I didn’t know about till it was over with.  I mean, you 
know, when you’re a soldier you don’t know what’s going on you just…

Interviewer: Do it and-

Rand: You just take orders and that’s it.  The only knowledge you had, was I said 
was on February twenty-eighth nineteen forty-five, on the Rohr River we were 
briefed and told we, we had a truce, allied truce, closest to Berlin. And we’re 
going to meet the Russians in Berlin.  We’re taking off now, we’re gonna meet the 
Russians in Berlin.

Interviewer: So you actually knew what you were doing at that point?

Rand: Yes, at that point we knew what we were supposed to be doing we weren’t 
prepared-

Interviewer: But until then?

Rand: Yeah, otherwise you just take orders, you know, ‘it’s not reason why, but to 
do or die’ Right?

Interviewer: Yeah.

Rand: You know poetry right?  You know poetry right?

Interviewer: No, no.  No [?].  So the whole time from England until February, when 
you landed in England in July, until February forty-four you had no idea what you 
were doing?

Rand: When I landed in England, oh you mean, well I knew what I was doing but we 
just followed orders.

Interviewer: Right but you had no idea.

Rand: Oh I knew we were going, we were waiting in England to be sent over to the 
continent.

Interviewer: But you didn’t know what you were doing once you got there?

Rand: Oh do I remember what we were doing?  We doing relatively nothing in 
England.

Interviewer: No I’m saying, from the time you landed in England until February 
twenty-eighth, where you got the orders to go to Berlin, you weren’t sure what 
you were supposed to be doing, you were just following orders.

Rand: Well that’s I, from the day you go into the service you’re just following 
orders, no it’s true, you didn’t ask why, you know the trap some people fell 
into, you had people in formation right, and then sergeant would ask for a 
volunteer, [?] ‘How many of you know how to type?’ and they raised their hand 
right?  They hand them a mop and say ‘Here mop up.’

Interviewer: [Laughs]  So you learn not to volunteer, you say?  Putting your 
skills to work huh?

Rand: Sure, so that’s, that’s the way it was, you see?  You were told what to 
do, the minute you entered the service.

Interviewer: Did you have any issue in your group with people who didn’t quite 
follow order?

Rand: No.

Interviewer: No?

Rand: Never saw anything like that.

Interviewer: People were generally disciplined?

Rand: Never saw that, some of them said ‘I’m gonna kill that sonofabitch’ you 
know, but they never followed through on things like that.

[END OF SIDE A]
[BEGINNING OF SIDE B]

Rand: Behind the lines in Belgium resting, and I felt isolated and depressed 
because they told me that I was replacing somebody else killed in action that 
they had thirty percent casualties from Normandy, to this point and that I was 
replacing one of them, thirty percent is a lot that’s Killed in action and 
injured and not killed, and it was very depressing and that was it, and I 
explained how I felt that, I felt like an outside because I was and then I got 
used to it and I filled in and I wouldn’t say I enjoyed myself but I was able 
to treat as I was supposed to as a soldier I was just a soldier, I did my job.

Interviewer: Did you find the other soldiers had same sentiments?

Rand: I think so they felt that they doing what they had to as soldiers.

Interviewer: Did you find them to be an impressive group or?

Rand: I found the non-commissioned officers to be an impressive group and they 
seemed to be very efficient and so forth.

Interviewer: What about the commissioned officers?

Rand: Commissioned officer we didn’t see a lot of them as I said I saw this one 
he was a second Lieutenant, he wasn’t even a first Lieutenant and he was no too, 
too smart or too swift as the saying goes.  And occasionally, a higher officer 
would come along and I was impressed by like for example, at one point I think I 
told this to Professor Wintermute, but I’ll repeat it, at one point in this town 
we found a [?] factory that had vests that were made of calf skin and they were 
vests, you know and, what do they call that stuff, they make coats out of, but 
they made-

Interviewer: Suede?

Rand: No fur, they had fur inside and a kind of-

Interviewer: Oh sheeling[?]!

Rand: Sheeling!  Yeah that’s it, sheeling vests you know so we put them on, and 
we take pictures of each other you know, with a handgun, which an enlisted man 
is not supposed to have a handgun just a carbine but I picked up, I picked up 
Lueger, just to, and we, we looked like real gangsters you know, we took off 
our helmets and had this, this sheeling vest on so well along came one of the 
top officer you know, one of the commissioned officers, colonel I guess, as I 
recall and he says ‘Get rid of those things, get into your uniform’ he was a 
very well disciplined officer and that’s one they, you know, I thought the 
officers were very, very-

Interviewer: Were they very strict about looting and stuff like that?

Rand: No.  There was looting, I did not loot, I would not open up a drawer in a 
house because, booby trapped sometimes.  Where, you know, I wasn’t interested.  
And as I told Professor Wintermute, when I came home my father wanted know why I 
didn’t have the loot, the other guys came home with loot. So I wasn’t interested 
in looting, I was interested in coming out of this place in one, one piece.  And 
I found many things that were interesting to me like propaganda and so forth, 
German propaganda, books and magazines and things like that, worked for me and I 
brought them home and these things were, they were stolen I had a whole full 
trunk fall of interesting stuff, and I lost it [?]

Interviewer: Did you read through this propaganda?

Rand: Yes, some of it yes, I mean they showed pictures of, of Jews looking with 
big noses and and some drew them fat with, you know, dollar signs on them and so 
forth they were Anti-Semitic stuff, and it also, and Roosevelt was Roosenfeld, 
and so things of that nature and you know, ‘Der [?] nicht [?]; The Enemy is 
Watching’ and posters. And in books, you know like we had poster that said ‘The 
Enemy is Listening’ we did.  But ‘Der [?]’ things of that nature.

Interviewer: Do you think it was effective on Germans?

Rand: Well eventually they lost the war didn’t they?

Interviewer: True yes, but I mean were there encounter, these Germans that you did 
come into contact with-

Rand: You mean civilians?

Interviewer: Civilians but also the military, did you feel that they really 
believed in their cause?

Rand: No doubt, I mean I didn’t have any conversations with military at all, 
except the ones that surrendered to us, and we just you know, conversation was 
‘Hinten Hoch!’  You know what that means?

Interviewer: Yeah.

Rand: Hands up.

Interviewer: Hands up.

Rand: Yeah.  And aside from that, we didn’t talk to each other so, we talked 
civilians especially on the Elbe, that’s where I heard this-

Interviewer: Oh the song.

Rand: -song about the Russians on the eastern front.  That was a very 
interesting thing I thought.  That they were, at least some German 
civilians who were very much against the war and very much against Hitler. 

Interviewer: Did you-

Rand: There was some, there was a small minority.

Interviewer: Did you find that just by the Elbe river or anywhere else?

Rand: No, not anywhere else because that’s where we spent a lot of time 
just doing nothing and we fraternized, which we weren’t supposed to do but 
we did.

Interviewer: Just over there or throughout your entire-

Rand: Oh we fraternized elsewhere also.  But there especially because we 
had plenty of time.

Interviewer: How long were you there for?

Rand: I think we were there a couple of weeks if I recall.  I don’t remember the 
exact date.

Interviewer: And then following that?

Rand: Well following that, see that territory was going to the Russians anyhow.  
That’s what people didn’t understand.  So that’s another reason why Eisenhower 
didn’t want to go on once the Russians were in Berlin.  They didn’t want to go 
on, because that area by treaty was going to Russia.  So as soon as the war was 
over, even before as I said, we moved south to this airport where we were on May 
the 7th.  It was south near Frankfurt.  I don’t know, I don’t remember the name 
of the airport, I think it’s something like Bernbourg.  I just can’t remember, 
and the whole unit moved south and then after that we broke up.  We were sent to 
various places, because these men were fought from Normandy on, some of them had 
in service since 1940-1941.  

Interviewer: Right.

Rand: See, as I explained you know the Ohio over the hill in October.  If you 
aren’t familiar I’ll repeat that, I told you.  That’s winter, the draft started 
in 1940, October of 1940.  Before we went to war, the draft started, but those 
men thought they were going to be in the service for one year.  So they used to 
say, Ohio over the hill in October.  That’s how it goes.  They were in service 
for five years and most them saw combat, so they were the ones who went home 
first.  So they split us up, they sent us, you know we went home by boat no one 
flew them home.  Went home by boat, and they had to enough room on the boat to 
send these guys.  The first ones, the ones that were in Europe longer went home 
first.  I was in Europe for a total of nineteen months.

Interviewer: So were you one of the last ones to go home?

Rand: Not one of the last, but I went home in January of 1946.  It was [?].  
Like for example, my closest friend came over just when the war ended.  So he 
was there for a good period of time, he was actually discharged in Germany and 
he became part of instead of going home became part of UNLA, United Nations 
Legal Association.  That’s the way it goes and Professor Wintermute may be 
interviewing him, but right now he’s not well.  So, he’s in the hospital in 
Queens today.  If he improves, maybe you will be able to interview him.  But 
that’s another whole different story.  

Interviewer: What did you do the entire time, from your end of combat until 
your discharge?

Rand: Well, that’s just it, they tried to keep us busy.

Interviewer: Doing what?

Rand: Well for example, in the Summer of 1945, they gave you a choice of going 
to two weeks to a summer resort on western…memory problems.  At any rate, 
summer resort on the western coast of France or three months in Paris.  Well, 
what did you think I took?

Interviewer: Paris.

Rand: Three months in Paris.  So I spent three months there, it was a wonderful 
experience.  So that took up time and then after the summer was over until 
January I was in a unit nothing to do with reconnaissance.  Everybody was…you 
know, they got the others to wait to ship home.

Interviewer: Had most of your unit had gone home already?

Rand: Pardon, I don’t know, I’d lost track of most of them already because they 
broke us up.  After the displaced persons’ camp, then they broke us up.  It was 
the men who were the longest went home, but I never..I didn’t know where they 
were at this point.  It was…put into outfits that came over the same time, but 
necessarily joined together during the war.  So that’s what we did and how they 
kept us busy.  Another way was…this would interest you, I already explained it 
to him, we had a small plane in this outfit I was in, I don’t know what it 
was…some sort of artillery note but they had a small plane for messenger circles 
and-

[Recording Stops]

[Recording Starts]

Rand: -oh they tried to keep us busy.  So we had this small plane and a pilot of 
course and he was…he took…he was a messenger.  He took messages from where we 
were stationed to Frankfurt between plane trips.  I don’t know how far we were 
from Frankfurt.  So everyday, one of us would go with him and sit in the seat 
behind him.  You know how noisy it was, small planes were, you sit behind him, 
you can’t hardly…you can’t converse with him or anything.  So I would, my turn 
when I went up with him and we were heading towards Frankfurt and then along the 
way all of a sudden he points to the wing and he yells to me ‘Ice!  Ice!’ [laughs]

Interviewer: Uh oh… [laughs]

Rand: [laughs] And we turned around and went back.  [laughs] ‘Ice!  Ice!’ [laughs]  
Oh, and subsequently, this is interesting…oh my gosh.  We were on the same boat 
going home with this guy, the pilot.  This time I went on a old cruise ship, 
tremendous cruise ship, thousands…I don’t know how many thousands were on board 
and everybody was seasick except this guy and myself and maybe a few others.  
There was vomit all over the steps, because sometimes they couldn’t reach the 
top to throw up overboard.  I don’t want to disgust you, it was a mess, a real 
terrible thing.  But I wasn’t seasick and he wasn’t, so we went into the officers’ 
which we weren’t supposed to do it and have you ever been on a boat when a storm-

Interviewer: No.

Rand: -well you know where the food slides off the table.  They put boards there 
that comes up like this so that-

Interviewer: So nothing slides off.

Rand: - so it doesn’t slide off and all they were serving were sandwiches because 
in the officers’.  So we start, he’s sitting like this and he and I are eating a 
sandwich.  All of a sudden he got sick, he went up top to throw up overboard.  
Yeah I wasn’t sick, one of the few.  So…and there were thousands, only a few 
wasn’t sick.  However,  subsequently a few years later when I went out on a 
party boat to fish for bluefish, I got sick on a party boat, threw up over the 
side.  Did you ever go deep sea fishing?

Interviewer: Not deep sea, no.

Rand: Deep sea fishing, we throw chum in…the crap I was throwing up.  Chum…and 
catching bluefish.  But I wasn’t sick on this cruise ship.

Interviewer; But everyone else was!

Rand: But subsequently I did get sick.

Interviewer: Were you responsible for cleaning up after them?

Rand: Oh no!

Interviewer; No?

Rand: Oh it was a mess and one of the things that you get into New York Harbor 
and the Statue of Liberty on the left and the whole ship…everybody was on the 
port side and the ship lists to the port side.

Interviewer: Everyone felt relieved?

Rand: Emotionally, yeah.

Interviewer: Were most of them from New York or just from…?

Rand: Oh well no, they were from all over the country.  But we had…if we wanted 
to get discharged, we had to go to Camp Kilmer and we were discharged from there.  
We landed in New York and went to Camp Kilmer in New Jersey.

Interviewer: How long does that take until you are actually discharged?

Rand: Just a matter of days, the only problem was for a short period of time I 
was…but that was an emotional thing coming to New York Harbor.  And impressive 
as it was permitted, the ship was listing to the side where everybody was on, 
to the port side.  That’s what happened.

Interviewer:  Did you feel that any of these soldiers were embittered by their 
experience?

Rand: No.  No, I didn’t get that impression at all. On the contrary, there was 
one soldier…you know, we were betting before we when overseas, we were betting 
on who would have gangplank fever.  And we designated this one guy and decided 
well I saw him at Camp Kilmer when we were being from the service.  He went 
through combat and all kinds of things, sharpshooting…that wasn’t anything he 
was fond of, and he was the one person who thought that would lose his sense 
of you know.

Interviewer: Did you see anyone who actually did?

Rand: No. 

Interviewer: No one was suffering from any shell-shock or trauma?

Rand: No, not like what they talk about, kind of, sort of.  Not like what they 
talk about in these subsequent wars.  In World War One, they had…a lot of them 
shell-shocked, World War One was different.

Interviewer: Why do you think that is?

Rand: Well, it’s a psychological thing, they were disturbed by the trauma.

Interviewer: But why not World War II?   It would be traumatic I assume.

Rand: Well, I didn’t see any.  As I said , I was in a very highly disciplined 
outfit.  I don’t know what went on in the infantry.  In a sense we were 
equivalent though.  We had vehicles, we moved…we went out.  You know it was 
different.  I was never in a foxhole, I was never you know…I just had that one 
episode where I thought…I was sure I was going to die.  Aside from that, I 
didn’t see anything like that anybody who had mental illness.  There was one 
soldier who was a little mentally retarded, he was very well protected.

Interviewer: They allowed them to serve?

Rand: Pardon me?

Interviewer: They allowed them to?

Rand: Yes, apparently yeah.  He wasn’t terribly mentally retarded, but he was 
a little.  One point a German woman, a civilian woman hugged him and he 
actually ejaculated.  He was really…he never expected anything, but they were 
very protective of him.  I mean [unintelligible]

Interviewer: This is an infantry unit?

Rand: Oh no, this was in our outfit.

Interviewer: Oh, in your outfit.

Rand: Yeah, yeah.  Everybody was laughing.

Interviewer: Mm, so embarrassing for him. 

Rand: Yep.

Interviewer: Do you have any other kinds of experiences with civilians like 
that?

Rand:  [Unintelligible] We fraternized with the women.

Interviewer: To a large degree or to…?

Rand: Not to a large degree, but we did fraternize.  After all there were 
villages where there were plenty of young women…

Interviewer: Young men…

Rand: The men were of advanced age.  So we…I won’t go into detail, okay?

Interviewer: You’re free to divulge whatever details.

Rand: Yeah, well at any rate, there was fraternization from time to time.  Even 
though we weren’t supposed to fraternize.

Interviewer:  Did the commanding officers look the other way?

Rand: Apparently.  Yeah.

Interviewer: They weren’t so concerned?

Rand: No, because after all the second…as I said after combat, the second worst 
thing is boredom.  Anything to reduce boredom was tolerated.

Interviewer: What else did you do to reduce boredom other than fraternization?

Rand: Well, what else did I do?  I read a little bit, we had the famous Stars 
and Stripes, read that.  I don’t remember reading any books.

Interviewer: Did they have any available around?

Rand: No, I don’t think so, no.  I don’t remember reading, I remember picking 
up German books that I told you about, propaganda books…but no…I can remember 
reading the Stars and Stripes, that’s about it.

Interviewer: Did you like it?

Rand: Stars and Stripes?  Oh yes, oh sure.

Interviewer: Did you feel there was any bias in it?

Rand: Bias?  It was too patriotic?

Interviewer: No

Rand: It wasn’t biased or anything.  I think there’s too much talk about bias.  
Like for example, on the subject about the New York Times.  I don’t read the 
editorials in the New York Times.  I read the news, it’s not…I don’t find it to 
be liberal or conservative.  I just read the news, I don’t read the editorials 
or the Op-Ed...very little, I read it but I don’t put much stock in it.  The 
newspaper’s a newspaper, it’s meant to be about news.  I read the Wall Street 
Journal too, but I don’t…I’m not interested in the editorial page.

Interviewer: You felt it was very clear?

Rand: Pardon me?

Interviewer: You felt it was very clear?

Rand: You mean the Stars and Stripes?  Yeah, well it wasn’t very…it was just 
a news magazine with some cartoons and features like that.  You know, nothing 
very serious.

Interviewer: So how did you find out about enemy positions and basically their
 statuses?  I mean, was it printed in the newspaper or did you get that from 
 your officers?

Rand: Oh you mean the status?  It was listed on the radio.

Interviewer: You had access to it?

Rand: Oh, sure we had access to radio and we could hear the German radio too.

Interviewer: Oh yeah?

Rand: Of course, [speaks in German] …with a very mellow voice.  [German phrase] 
Do you know what that meant?  “The airplanes were coming over.”  Things like 
that, we heard it on the radio.  “Ah keen radi Andorra” was most very powerful 
area around Earth?

Interviewer: No

Rand: It’s a little state between France and Spain it currently is.  Andorra, 
you never heard of it?  

Interviewer: No

Rand: Well, they had a very powerful radio station and you could hear it all 
over Europe.  A female voice known as “Ah keen radi Andorra” and then they 
would give us the news and stuff like that.  Some of it we couldn’t 
understand because it was in Spanish.  You know, we got the news the day that 
Roosevelt died, we heard about it on the radio.

Interviewer: You felt connected.

Rand: Oh yeah, there was connection in that sense.

Interviewer: You were connected with what was going on in the States, you were 
connected with what was going in Europe.

Rand: Yes.

Interviewer: So when you came back, did you find it easier to adjust because you 
didn’t feel as isolated while you were over there?

Rand: Well there was an adjustment which was very difficult for every soldier.  
Because you had to decide what you were going to do.  What your opportunities 
were.  Actually you did nothing, for a while you did nothing.  And if I heard 
the noise of an airplane it startled me, you know, you got the window open and 
you hear plane noises…it startled me for a while.

Interviewer: Because you had not been used to it?   Or because you thought it 
was fighter planes?

Rand: Well, because I thought they were fighter planes and so on and so forth.  
Or the V-1 or V-2,, I don’t remember…missile.  Did you know about those, the 
buzz-bomber?

Interviewer: Yes.

Rand; Oh, okay.  The buzz-bomber was a terrible thing, because as soon as you 
hear the motor, the/engine you immediately stopped, you ran for cover because 
when it ran out of fuel and it would fall.  But it had a specific sound, a 
deep “URRRRRRRRRH.”  Like a typical airplane sound, and you know it was a 
buzz-bomber and you ran for cover as soon as you could.

Interviewer: Did you ever have that experience?

Rand: Oh yeah, oh sure.  Even before it went around the planet, we had the 
buzz-bomber.  [Unintelligible]…Germany you know and Belgium and so forth.  
But even in France, you saw one in combat and it was frightening.  The other 
one, I don’t remember the sequence, but the other one was faster than sound 
and they sent those over to Great Britain and you couldn’t hear anything 
because they were faster than sound.  They went *Tshew*.  

Interviewer: Did you hear when you were in Liverpool at any point?

Rand: Oh no, no, no.  This was later on, when I was on the Continent.  No, 
the bombing…we know about the bombing of London, but that was early on.  But, 
I think the V-1 was the buzz-bomber and the V-2 was the one that travelled 
faster than sound.  You know, so that was a terrible thing.

Interviewer: So when you came home, you associated it with these things?

Rand: Yeah, these sort of noises bothered me.  You know, the window was open 
in the room and I was sleeping.  Bothered me, but I didn’t know what to do.  
That’s when I applied to medical school and I also decided that I was…now 
this is unusual but I decided I wanted to be a cab driver.  In those days it 
wasn’t easy to get a license to drive a cab.  You had to take a test, you 
had have pictures, you had to wear a cap in a certain way, and you had to 
know the city and so on and so forth, and you had to have pull to get that 
because it was run by the police department and taxis were like a branch of 
the police department.  There weren’t so many police cars in those days and 
if there was a policeman who wanted to chase somebody, they hailed a taxi 
cab and say “follow that car” because they any patrol cars in those days.  
So it was a responsible type of job, it wasn’t a gift.  I had an aunt who 
had some pull, you know she just…that’s another story at any rate.  I got a 
license as a cab driver, I was going to drive a cab.  Then I got my 
acceptance into medical school, so I never utilized it.  I have the license 
and everything if you want.  Isn’t that interesting?

Interviewer: That is interesting.  But if you didn’t get into medical school, 
you’d have driven a cab?

Rand: Well at least temporarily I would have.  If I didn’t get into medical 
school I wanted to be a teacher, I wanted to be a biologist.  So I would 
have to go back to another degree.  [Unintelligible] And here’s another one, 
a totally different aspect.  Before the war, I went to Queens College, I was 
involved with Gilbert and Sullivan.  I had these robes in Gilbert and 
Sullivan operettas.  Are you familiar with Gilbert and Sullivan, the 
Mikado…Pirates of Penzance?

Interviewer: Mmhmm.

Rand:  Okay, in Mikado I had the role of Ko-Ko.  In Pirates of Penzance, I 
had the role of Major-General.

Interviewer: Is that theatrical?

Rand: Yeah, it was…we were all Queens College students, most of us were.  
But we rehearsed off campus, there was not a campus space for us.  But 
most of us were from Queens College and we put up performances, we were 
semi-professional almost.  Sometimes we performed and got a meager salary 
out of it. But then of course, when the war came along we broke up the 
men and went off to war.  In the meantime, I was taking voice lessons 
and this teacher thought I had potential, you know.  He said, “Look, he’s 
going to give you a few lessons if you’re going off into service.”  This 
was in 1943.  So, he gave me a few lessons, I figured well maybe at that 
point, I thought I could have a career as a singer.  But after the war 
was over, I wanted to become a physician.

Interviewer: What turned you on to that?

Rand: I don’t know, you never know these things.

Interviewer: Just cause?

Rand: Yeah, I mean what turns you on to becoming a pilot?  You just want 
to do it right?

Interviewer: Certainly.

Rand: Same type of thing.  Same thing as people asking about my inventions.  
How come I thought up of such a thing?  Not an idea, it just came into my 
head.  This isn’t part of the interview, but did I show you my patents?

Interviewer: No.

Rand: You want to see them?

Interviewer: Sure

[Recording Stops]

[Recording Continues]

Interviewer: Let’s talk about your GI Bill.

Rand: The GI Bill was a great help to me.  Because I studied in Geneva, 
Switzerland where the dollar went farther than it would in this country.  
Though it was a great help, but I still had to borrow the money.

Interviewer: It applied to overseas also?

Rand: Oh yes sure, because it was a recognized medical school and I still 
had to borrow money in order to you know  I got married in the middle of 
the time I was there.  I.. [unintelligible].  But the GI Bill was great.

Interviewer: Did it cover half of your expenses or…

Rand: Maybe half…but it did help.

Interviewer:  Do you think that if you didn’t have the GI Bill you 
wouldn’t have been able to attend medical school?

Rand: Well, I would have to go into greater debt.  I borrowed money from 
two of my brothers and if I don’t know anybody who would finance me if I 
went into greater debt.  Something like that if I didn’t have the GI Bill.

Interviewer: Were your brothers in service also, or…?

Rand: No, one of my brothers was…you have to understand that I was the 
baby in the family.  So one of my brothers was too old to go into service 
and the other was a merchant marine in the merchant marines, which is 
like being in the service only in a civilian army.  So he was of course, 
ten years older than me and in his thirties and they hesitated to draft 
men in their thirties who had one child, but they did.  As a matter of 
fact, my brother-in-law, my sister’s husband was drafted and he was at 
the time 35 years of age which was pretty old, had one child but they 
drafted him, it happened.  I don’t know how old he was, but he just 
died a few years ago, I believe in 97.

Interviewer: Quite a long time.

Rand: So that was the way it was, so I would have to borrow money but I 
couldn’t get it from the bank or anything like today’s students.

Interviewer: No?

Rand: Yeah, it didn’t exist.  I went through that with my children’s 
college and professional schools.  [Laughs]  I was saddled with that, 
my children never paid a penny.

Interviewer: A different thing?

Rand: [Unintelligible]…I took out the loan, they didn’t.  But that GI 
Bill was great, a lot of people got their education through it.

Interviewer: Do you think most people would have not gone to college 
without it?

Rand: Yeah, well obviously there were relatively…I don’t know what 
the statistics are but when you compare the college graduates to 
college graduates today.  Many more college graduates today than in 
those days and even more in the two years before.  Those were the 
statistics of the day.

Interviewer: Did most of the soldiers express interest in actually 
pursuing a career or something in academia?

Rand: Many, many certainly did, they went back to school.  Even here in Queens 
College, many soldiers came back to finish up.  Some of them who had a year 
left go or two years; they came back to the campus and that happened throughout 
the country.  Some of them continued their education…you interrupted me, I 
forgot to ask the marine who came back []

Interviewer: So you were fortunate you got finish up.

Rand: Yes, I got to finish up.  I was fortunate.

Interviewer: You had what, one semester to graduate?

Rand: I had one semester but I had to enlist in the enlisted reserve corps.  
I was allowed to finish, I was in the army, but I was allowed to go to school 
six months and then I went on active duty.  So then I graduated, I was 
fortunate.

Interivewer: Did most students have the same opportunity?

Rand: Oh yeah, well I was working in the yearbook and I see that there were 
people that graduated in December

Interviewer; So what about friends or any of them taken into service during 
their schooling that had to get interrupted?

Rand: Well I can’t remember any specific people, but I’m sure some of the 
students were. Not necessarily friends of mine, but they were called.  There 
was Arnold Franco, you know about that?  Cause he studied at [unintelligible].  
You know he set up that monument?

Interviewer: Yeah, right outside of Jefferson.

Rand: Yeah, because there was a study with statistics on various interests 
about the students who went into service during the war.  I don’t know 
[unintelligible]…I don’t know, but they did a study and statistics on how 
many men went into the service and how many were told to not show, how 
many so forth.

Interviewer: Mmhmm, I think we have that on file.

Rand: There was a group from the History department.  Two or three years 
ago, [unintelligible].

Interviewer: Yeah, I remember it.

Rand: I don’t know maybe you should check who else knows about it.  

Interviewer: Okay.

Rand: You know anyhow , that’s the way it was.  So, I don’t know if you 
have any more questions?  You’re a great interviewer.

Interviewer: Oh!  Thank you.

[Tape Stops]

[Tape Starts]

Interviewer: When you found out about the bombings of Hiroshima and 
Nagasaki, what kind of reaction did you have?  Were you still in 
Europe at that point or had you come back?

Rand: Not yet no, I was in Paris as a matter of fact on August of 1945, 
I was in Paris.  My first reaction was I didn’t like it, the bombing of 
the city.  But years afterwards as I got older I realized how important 
it was.  It was important, in other words the first city was bombed, the 
Japanese did not surrender.  They were reputed to never surrender, they 
were reputed that they would never surrender.  That was their reputation.  
The second bomb made them surrender, and I think it was justified.  
Thankfully, the emperor wanted to surrender but the military did not 
want to surrender.  Finally, they did surrender and it was necessary 
because otherwise if we had to…if our soldiers had to invade the 
mainland of Japan there would have been terrible casualties.  
Terrible casualties, so that I believed it was justified.  In the 
beginning I didn’t believe it was justified.

Interviewer: Have you-

Rand: I said to myself, why didn’t they just as an example bomb an 
uninhabited island or something like that and then if they didn’t 
respond then, bomb a city.

Interviewer: Right.

Rand: But I think what they did was the right thing.  It took my years 
to realize that.

Interviewer: But at first you were kind of appalled?

Rand: At first, yes.  Still an appalling situation but a necessary 
situation.

Interviewer: Had you heard stories of soldiers in the Pacific, GIs and 
other forces in the Pacific?

Rand: Oh yes, of course we knew what was going on.  Matter of fact, we 
thought we were going to be sent over.

Interviewer: Were you more concerned about Europe or the Pacific?

Rand: There were some people who were sent there, they were on their way 
usually.

Interviewer: So Europe was like a stopover point for them?

Rand: Yes.  So it saved a lot of American lives, because the casualties in 
the Pacific were terrible taking those islands and so forth.  They were 
terrible and would have been worse if we had to attack the mainland of 
Japan.  I thought it was justified.  How do you feel about it?

Interviewer: Umm, I find it fascinating because it’s so disturbing.  But yet, 
when you think about the science of it, it’s amazing.  That we can construct 
something so horrible.  You can use it for different purposes.  I mean, the 
death is obviously horrible, unimaginable.  But I do agree it was necessary.

Rand: It was necessary, it took me a while to realize that.  That it was 
necessary and that is a storm that had nothing to do with…

[Recording Ends]



End of Tape 02 of 02

Jump To: Tape 01