For Les Cruise, Sunday morning, Dec. 7, 1941, started off like any other -- by attending church services with one of his trade school friends in Lancaster, Pennsylvania.

But then everything in their lives changed with the announcement from the pulpit something terrible had happened in Hawaii.

"There were a lot of rumors, a lot of information ... We had to decide what it meant for us," said Cruise to a rapt audience during a Pearl Harbor Remembrance Ceremony at Naval Surface Warfare Center, Philadelphia Division, 75 years later to the day.

"President [Franklin D.] Roosevelt held sway over the whole nation, and he told us what would be required," said Cruise. "And over the next few weeks, one by one, guys left for this service or that service."

At first, Cruise, whose father served in the Navy during World War I, tried to become a Navy flyer. But due to color blindness, the Navy, as well as the Army Air Corps turned him down. Later, once in the U.S. Army as a communications man, Cruise was able to volunteer to become a paratrooper.

"You said you wanted to fly, now here's your chance," Cruise quipped about what he was thinking then.

Cruise's campaign history is one such that it can be seen via cellulose.

After training and many practice jumps in the U.S. and Ireland, he got his first combat jump on another very historic day, June 6, 1944.

"One thing that seared in my memory was the constant droning of the planes warming up; there must have been hundreds of them," he recalled. "And over the channel, I looked out of the window of the C-47 and could make out silhouettes of ships, so many of them; you knew this 'was it.'"

"The Navy bombarded the fortifications -- you hoped no shells fell on us," remembered Cruise. "It did happen sadly, but there was a real unity of effort by all the troops. We can take pride in all those who served in capacities of support."

After landing firmly on European soil, as part of the 505th Parachute Infantry Regiment, 82nd Airborne Division, Les was among the men charged with taking and holding the cross-road town of St. Mere Eglise in Normandy, France -- highlighted within the film "The Longest Day." He recalled running across a road outside the town and taking cover with another 505th man, his "tent buddy" Richard Vargas. But just as they reached the other side, an enemy artillery shell landed and shrapnel hit Vargas. Cruise sent another Soldier for a medic while he treated Richard's wounds.

"I could not save him," said Cruise. "His body had taken the brunt of the shrapnel, shielding mine. I was not injured."

Three months later, in September of '44, Cruise participated in Operation Market Garden. This operation, intended to end the war early, involved the largest airborne operation up to that time. The mission of both ground and airborne forces was to capture key bridges and logistics routes 50 miles behind Nazi lines in Holland. Without enough heavy resources to fight back Nazi armor divisions, the mission ultimately failed -- as depicted in the 1977 film "A Bridge Too Far."

After being pulled back to Belgium, in November the 505th had to be re-deployed on a moment's notice to plug gaps in the line as the Battle of the Bulge raged -- depicted in 1965's "Battle of the Bulge."

"We were trucked in, so at that point we were just regular infantry," said Cruise.

It was during the reconstitution of the Allied line from the "Bulge," in January of 1945 when Cruise received what he said was referred to as "a million-dollar injury."

"It wasn't because of any money, of course," he said. "It was called 'a million dollar' because it was enough of an injury to that you couldn't stay and fight any longer, even if you wanted to -- it was an injury that would send you home, to your family."

His injury involved shrapnel severely mangling his left hand, evident to this day. After returning stateside and undergoing multiple surgeries, on September 27, 1945, Pfc. Cruise was discharged from the U.S. Army.

Cruise's talk was accompanied by many pictures from both training and from the front. Prominent were pictures of fellow Soldiers, some with a "KIA" (killed in action) annotation underneath the friend pictured.

"My tent buddy at the time, John Atchley, who bandaged me up after I was wounded," said Cruise. "He was KIA later that very same day."

Cruise has never forgotten those he served with. He has traveled to those battlefields in Europe, and always pays a visit to friends while there.

"I couldn't find Richard Vargas at the cemetery at Normandy; I wondered what had happened," said Cruise, "so I contacted his family and learned his resting place was moved to Belgium. His mother moved him so that he could lie beside his brother, who was lost there."

His presentation finished with pictures of the white marble crosses bearing friends' names, placed by those liberated, located at various fields of manicured grass across Europe.

The ceremony concluded with a minute of silence and reflection for the 2,403 lives lost Dec. 7, 1941, and for all those lost throughout the course of World War II. Some things should never be forgotten.

The Naval Surface Warfare Center Philadelphia Division (NSWCPD) provides the Navy's primary technical expertise for naval machinery research and development, and in-service engineering, as well as machinery cybersecurity and lifecycle engineering.

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