Junior McKinney's cousin, Raymond, joined the National Guard and tried his best to get Junior to join. "I almost did," Junior admits. "When war did come, his unit was called up. He was killed in the war."

Seizing an opportunity to earn 79 pennies an hour, Junior went to work in a steel mill in Keokuk. Each morning workers would line up at the gate, and the foreman come out and picked the number he wanted. Eventually, Junior worked his way into a full time job and established seniority. He states, "There was an older man behind me in seniority, and he had a problem with taking orders from a kid. He said, 'Why don't you go back to school where you belong!' I'd answer, 'Why don't you die so I don't have to listen to you!'"

As time passed in Keokuk, Junior spent his leisure hours at an A & W root beer drive-in where young, attractive girls were carhops. He soon set his sights on Evonne Pruitt. She would always wait on his car, and they were soon dating.

Grinning, McKinney admits, "I finally asked her to marry me. We slipped across the border to Kahoka, Mo., and a justice of the peace married us in 30 minutes. We rented a furnished apartment for $6 a week. I made $28 a week.  That was good money back then. We lived on ice cream and donuts for weeks."

When asked about his thoughts when Pearl Harbor was attacked, he replies, "I was too young to worry, but I knew Uncle Sam would come calling. Actually, when my time came, my cousin Mazel Paris offered to take my place, but the draft board said he couldn't. He was later drafted and was killed in the battle of Iwo Jima."

McKinney said goodbye to Evonne on Jan. 21, 1943 and caught a bus to Des Moines where he was officially inducted into the U. S. Army's Signal Corps. "It sounds crazy," McKinney says, "but we were sent to Clearwater, Fla., for basic training. We were put up in the best hotels in town and trained along the beautiful coast.  Evonne caught a train and came down. It was like a paradise. 

"After basic, I went to headquarters and asked for a transfer to the Air Corps and was told my chances weren't good. I was sent to Squaw Valley, Calif., by train. That whole valley was one huge tent city. Thousands of soldiers came and went. I was then ordered to Sioux Falls, S.D., for radio school. Evonne came to visit and Dad hitchhiked up." 

McKinney finally received his Air Corps wishes and was sent to Kingman, Ariz., to gunnery school to man .50 caliber machine guns on bombers. "We had stationary and moving targets, he explains. One day a big bird flew the full length of the range. Everyone shot at the bird, but he flew away. You can imagine what the instructors said."

Eventually, the gunners were put on bombers and fired their weapons at both ground and air targets. "I knew that machine gun inside and out," Junior offers. "We had a firing range in the desert, and no one was supposed to be on the ground. But one day we were flying real close to the ground and could shoot at anything. All at once the pilot yelled, 'Cease fire!' Some guy was driving a team of horses and wagon across the range. Sometimes we'd fly so close to the ground, and the pilot would joke that he didn't have room to lower the landing gear."

After a short leave in Iowa, McKinney headed for Florida and met the B-17 bomber crew he'd fly into combat with. "The pilot was Clinton Hammond from Baltimore, Maryland," McKinney explains. He was a rugged former ironworker who probably saved our lives several times. The co-pilot was Jewish and flying over Germany on missions gave him plenty of worry. Our bomber's name was Transit Belle."

While on a practice bombing mission over the Gulf of Mexico, the Transit Belle's navigation system was knocked out by a storm. Using a compass and dead reckoning, they headed east. Despite using the extra gasoline they'd stored in the bomb bay, they were preparing to ditch in the water. Fortunately, the pilot spotted land and came upon a landing strip being built. As soon as the wheels of the plane touched down, the pilot saw a bulldozer in his path and had to raise the wheels. Junior says, "We cleared the dozer, made a belly landing and slid to a stop. That was a close call."

In the early spring of 1944, McKinney's B-17 crew boarded a huge troop ship and headed for Liverpool, England, where an American armada was preparing to cross the English Channel and liberate Europe. The Army Air Corps was paving the way by bombing German targets. McKinney recalls, "I was a ball turret gunner, and our first mission was inland from Normandy before the invasion. Our second mission was on June 6, the day of the invasion. What a shock for an Iowa farm boy that was. Thousands of ships filled the waters off the Normandy beaches, and wave after wave of fighter and bomber aircraft were overhead."

On several missions over France and Germany, the fighter escorts for the heavy bombers had to turn back because they would run low on fuel. That's when the German fighter aircraft would attack the bombers. "One fighter flew so close to my turret that I could see the mask he was wearing," McKinney says. "I opened up, and he flew under our plane. The tail gunner told me he saw the fighter do down."

The tail gunner was Dwight Gryder from New Mexico. He and McKinney were more like brothers. While conducting a bombing mission over the Rhine River, the Transit Belle was hit by anti-aircraft fire. McKinney remembers the action and sadness, "The shrapnel just missed me. Everyone checked in by intercom except the tail gunner. I went back to check on him, and he was badly wounded. He could not move, and he was in great pain. I gave him a shot of morphine.

"Dwight later died from the wounds. Evonne was pregnant when I left for Europe. We named our son after my best friend. He would have done the same for me."

Sometimes the flak from ground fire was murderous. There were bombing missions over many German cities. From July 24 through Aug. 3, 1944, McKinney's plane flew four missions over Hamburg and caused tremendous destruction. "A fire tornado raged through the city," he remembers. "The Germans later described it as terrifying. Germany was exhausted and beaten, but Hitler wouldn't surrender. Many of our bombers were shot down. The crew members died or were captured. After some 20 missions, McKinney's crew flew on the first mission over Berlin. Six hundred bombers left England and 60 were shot down. Many were shot up so bad they couldn't return to England. The crippled bombers landed in Paris.

McKinney was awarded five bronze stars in his campaign medal for the missions at Normandy, northern France, the Rhineland, Central Europe and the Ardennes. He was also awarded the Air Medal with four oak leaf clusters. He speaks little about his medals, but he highly praises the crew of the Transit Belle.

Soon after Germany finally surrendered in 1945, Sgt. McKinney was told he had more than enough points for a discharge. "I was told to catch a plane for home the next morning," he says, "but I had so much to do that I couldn't make the flight. My superiors suggested I catch the next one. That flight I missed hit a mountain while landing in Newfoundland. Everyone was killed. I was very lucky."

Like thousands of veterans from World War II and other wars, Junior McKinney came home, adjusted to civilian life and raised a family. He has done many things; he is a self-made man. In addition to owning icehouses and running ice routes, he has farmed, worked in the Burlington ordnance plant and started a dairy. He and Evonne finally settled in Moulton, built a house, retired at 62 years of age, and they have spent the past 25 winters in McAllen, Texas, where many snowbirds migrate. With nine children and some 35 grandchildren, he and Evonne are kept very busy.

On Veterans Day, Nov. 11, 2009, all Americans should pause to honor those millions of veterans who have and continue to serve our great country. We should also never forget those who died or are still missing in action. Indeed, we enjoy the freedoms of America because of veterans like Junior McKinney who courageously walked in harm's way.