Thurston Macon transcript

Thurston Macon was born on December 18, 1924, in Zebulon, North Carolina. Macon recalls his last year of formal education was the fourth grade at a local grade school. He left school to help his father with farm work. At fourteen Macons' family moved to Henderson, North Carolina about an hour away from his hometown of Zebulon. Macon then moved by himself to Washington D.C. at the age of seventeen. On December 7, 1941, he was sitting in a jail cell in Tampa, Florida for jumping into freight trains with his cousin when he heard of the bombing of Pearl Harbor. Although he was too young to volunteer for the military that did not stop him from trying. After being rejected for his age, Macon went to work for The Guthrie Boys, a local printer in Washington D.C.

However two years later he was drafted into World War II on April 8, 1943. He was inducted into the United States Army at Fort Bragg in North Carolina. Macon then completed basic training at Fort Custer in Battle Creek, Michigan, after thirteen weeks of training. He then shipped to Australia aboard the USAT Willard A. Holbrook. Macon docked in Brisbane where he was detailed to guard General Douglas MacArthur during MacArthurs' six-month stay.

After Macon finished his eighteen-month deployment in Brisbane, he was then shipped to Manila, the Philippines to guard General MacArthur again. Later Macon was selected as an honor guard for Tomoyuki Yamashita while he was on trial for war crimes, late in 1945. After the trial, Macon was sent home and discharged from the Army. Macon received two Bronze Stars and a Medal of Liberation of the Philippines for his service. Upon returning to the United States on January 26, 1946, Macon was discharged and returned to the printing business in Washington D.C. for thirty-two years until his retirement. Macon passed away on March 28, 2002, in Greenville, Pitt County, NC.