The Day I Fired Alan Ladd and Other World War II Adventures

Front Cover
University of Missouri Press, 2002 - 131 pages
"All through his four-year military career, despite his efforts to get into combat, fate and the military bureaucracy thwarted him. The author skillfully recounts the events of those years, describing the encounters he had with many unforgettable characters, including a footsore and sentimental Clark Gable and an inept Alan Ladd - best known as the star of Shane. Ladd, then a GI, did such a poor job reading the narration for Hotchner's film Atlantic Mission that Hotchner had to fire him. The author also describes his encounters with other well-known people, notably Tennessee Williams, with whom he attended a playwriting class at Washington University, and a wistful, vulnerable Dorothy Parker."--Jacket.

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Contents

Section 1
1
Section 2
11
Section 3
23
Section 4
27
Section 5
35
Section 6
41
Section 7
48
Section 8
58
Section 11
84
Section 12
89
Section 13
96
Section 14
101
Section 15
105
Section 16
111
Section 17
118
Section 18
125

Section 9
72
Section 10
74
Section 19
129
Copyright

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Page 8 - I have said this before, but I shall say it again and again and again : Your boys are not going to be sent into any foreign wars.
Page 1 - The best laid schemes o' mice an' men Gang aft a-gley. — Robert Burns, "To a Mouse,
Page 11 - Hook, was ordered to report for induction into the Armed Forces of the United States on Thursday 3 October 1957 by Selective Service, Local Board No.
Page 73 - He told me about their first duck shoot, early in the morning, the fog too thick to see the ducks, although you could hear them. Carole asked what they could do about it. Just sit here in the blind until it clears, Clark told her. She said she had just thought of something they could do while they were waiting. "We made love," Clark said, "which ain't easy in a duck blind.
Page 7 - ... service. If you have no valid reason for failing to do so you are liable to arrest, and if convicted you may be sentenced to as much as five years in prison and fined $10,000.
Page 67 - We were kept in a constant state of nervous and physical exhaustion, the purpose being to crack us if they possibly could and wash us out as potential officers.
Page 124 - C-47 transport over Germany during an airborne attack and joined an infantry outfit to help take an enemy position.
Page 82 - ... East Asia: Beginnings of Allied Recovery, 1942-43. In 1942-43 the Allies thwarted Japanese efforts to expand farther southward and eastward and began their island-hopping campaign toward Japan. Doolittle Raid. A few weeks after Pearl harbor, Lt. Col. James H. Doolittle proposed an air attack on Tokyo. Although his superior officers were skeptical, Doolittle was given permission to attempt this seemingly foolhardy venture. With a group of enthusiastic volunteers, he secretly prepared for the special...
Page 71 - Other key targets were the factories of the Aluminum Company of America at Alcoa, Tennessee; Massena, New York; and East St.

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