William Bairan
Interviewee: William Bairan
Interviewer: Scott Thomas
Date of Interview: 24 April 2002
Length of Interview: 45 minutes
William Bairan grew up in Tampa, Florida during the Great Depression. His family was poor, but he describes his childhood as being wonderful. He and his friends played outside: football, baseball, hide and seek—they even made their own skateboards. His family lived in a small rented house without electricity. Most of the people that lived in his neighborhood were of Spanish descent and spoke Spanish except while they were in school. In this interview he describes what it was like growing up in Florida during the 1930s. When he was about seventeen years old he listened on the radio as news of the bombing of Pearl Harbor was broadcast. Mr. Bairan recalls that, at first, few joined the military, but when men began to be drafted, more joined willingly. In 1942, he joined the Navy and left Florida for training in Maryland and Washington, D.C. He gives a very detailed description of his training and also tells of how, because of an injury, he was overlooked several times and did not ship out for quite some time. When he eventually did ship out, he was on convoy duty from New York to Guantanimo Bay. He then took a convoy to England where he was anchored at Plymouth until the invasion force was formed. On D-Day, Mr. Bairan was on a control ship about one mile from the beach. He says that he has “never seen so many people die.” His ship took on many wounded and passed them on to hospital ships. His account of D-Day is riveting. After the invasion, he was stationed in England for a year and discusses what it was like there during and after the war. At the end of the interview he talks about the difficulties of finding a job once he returned home to the U.S. Mr. Bairan’s interview is very interesting and informative.