Minnesota's Greatest Generation Oral History Project: Part I: Interview with Dr. Harold H. Brown

Titles: Minnesota's Greatest Generation Oral History Project: Part I: Interview with Dr. Harold H. Brown (Supplied title)

Description: BIOGRAPHICAL INFORMATION: Harold H. Brown was born in 1924 in Minnesota. He volunteered for the Army Air Corps in 1943 and passed air cadet qualifying tests. Brown was shipped overseas to be part of a segregated fighter group, the Red Tailed Angels, stationed in Italy. In 1945, Brown's plane was shot down in Austria. He was captured by the Germans and later liberated by advancing Allied forces. Brown remained in the Air Corps (after 1947, the Air Force) after World War II, served in Korea, and retired with the rank of Lieutenant Colonel. SUBJECTS DISCUSSED: Decision to join the Army Air Corps; serving in a segregated unit; flying bomber escort missions in Europe; being shot down in a mission near Linz, Austria; experience of being taken a Prisoner of War in Germany; interactions with German civilians and soldiers; interrogation procedures he went through in prison camps; surviving in POW camp Stalag VII-A for two months; conditions in which the Allied POWs lived; first experience of integration in a POW camp; becoming free after American forces came; repatriation for POWs after being freed; returning home after the end of the war.

Dates

• 07/12/2003 (Creation)

Creation

• interviewee: Brown, Harold Ph.D.
• interviewer: Saylor, Thomas

Identifiers

• Library Call Number: OH 112
• Accession Number: AV2006.1.4

Holding Type: Oral History - Interview

Project

• Oral History - Project, MHS Collection, project: 'Minnesota's Greatest Generation Oral History Project: Part I' <OH 112>

Quantity: 3 hours sound cassette 56 pages transcript

Format

• Content Category: sound recordings
• Content Category: text

Measurements

• 161 minutes length

Subjects

How can we help?

• Help / About Collections Online
• Learn about the Collections
• Contact the Gale Family Library for help with research, orders, and use/licensing
• Have feedback or comments on the new Collections Online system? Please fill in the Collections Online Feedback Form.