203 - D-Day & Battle Of The Bulge: The LUCKY Life Of A 102 Year Old Veteran! | Unsubscribe Podcast Ep 203
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I got in on the planning of the invasion. I got the Bronze Star for that. All these little stories tie you in your life to being the luckiest man ever. It's a beautiful story. We kicked Hitler's ass right out of Europe. I assume there was a statute of limitations to that. You can talk about it now. I don't care anyway. What can they do to me? That's my boy.

Say hi to Eli. He's racially ambiguous and random. His hair is fucking fabulous and donut. A dark, dope disposition. And there's a fat electrician. Welcome to Unsubscribe.

- Oh, hey everyone, quick update. These go on sale today. You can, they're up. Buh, Desert Night Camo in brown and green. Yay! - Okay, now I think we're finally caught up. And then are you ready to drink this?

Mr. Grandpa Jake? I don't want anything right now. No? Okay. Well, can we pop it on the camera for us on the count of three? You can pop it. Here. No, you got to pop it. I'll help you. You ready? Hold it right here. We're going to crack it on three. One, two, three. Yes. Thank you.

Cody started off. Hi, everyone. Welcome to the unsubscribe podcast. I'm joined today by Eli Double Tap, Papa Jake Larson, Brandon Herrera, myself, Don at Operator. Thank you so much for being here. This is a very special episode for us. We have Papa. We are so stoked for this. We have a real World War II veteran. You're a young 102.

It's crazy. My life is crazy. And it's crazy I'm down here with you guys, you former veterans. Thank you for your service. I thank all the veterans. I'm here today because of all those guys that paved the way for me. They died. They died. Think of it. I came through alive without a scratch.

Today, I'm the only one still alive of all the people I was in the service with. Well, you did. We are truly blessed to have you around. So is your family. Everyone on the Internet loves you. And it is an honor from all of us as veterans to say thank you for the path you paved for each one of us. And actually, this is one thing. Your family knew about this. We have a surprise for you.

Unless they told you and then they're in trouble. Is this an actual real surprise or did we get cheated here? So you were at D-Day. We have the Life magazine from D-Day and the people over at Vortec, RT from Vortec and Colorado Watch wanted you to have this, which is all yours to take home. This is from 1943.

So the actual Life magazine from 1943. So leading into the war. And then this. Open that up. Open it up, good sir. Is it unlocked? There it is. I'm not sure I know how to open that up. Whoa. Whoa.

take it out this is yours so Vortec watch RT and all of us here on sub and the entire community out there we want to give you a piece of history wow so this is that is an actual um Hamilton 1942 watch there's only 10 000 of those made that is a um was it a comparing watch so that was actually at D-Day that was used on the ships to tell time and seek everything up using I got happy tears

Thank you. No, thank you. Thank you, guys. They did all this for you. Listen, being my family forever, I'll tell you that. What an honor. What an honor. Look at the back. You got everything. Even this has the date of when it was made. So those were actual stop pocket watch. And they used to check with the ship's crew.

chromator whatever it's called to match all the times at that time so all the ships had same times but that was actually hamilton made ten thousand they were all sent to d-day and then uh vortec actually repurposed that watch for you to have as a gift is it just a thank you for you your family for coming out here and just wanted to give you a gift i wanted to tell you this i didn't come down here to receive a watch

Because I don't think I'm any different than any other soldier that was in the service, but I am luckier. That's the name of my book, The Luckiest Man in the World. You are true. I think I'm a little bit heavy on that, but my life is, it's, you read that book and you're going to say, yes, he is the luckiest man in the world.

So right now, I'm ready for some questions. As the luckiest man in the world, we have a lot of questions. So many. I'm glad you owe me a show. I'm going to be here until they're answered. Perfect. We have them for what? Seven, eight hours? It's the longest podcast ever. I'll stick it out.

God, I love that thing. Did you guys ever see this one? I have never seen it. Did you say something like it was a converted pocket watch? Mm-hmm. So it was turned into a pocket watch to an actual wrist watch. Beautiful. They bought Vortec. AJ bought a whole bunch of those and then just the remaining ones. And that was one of the few times Hamilton was US-based, so it was made in America for the entire war effort. That is genuinely beautiful. I'm very jealous of your watch. Ha ha ha.

you're not gonna get it off of me i wouldn't want to fight you for it i promise you that dude it was the second they heard you were actually at normandy that they were so fast on like hey can we send something for him it's like a hundred percent we would love that so we appreciate you coming out now for questions

We, you sent the book to us, your family did, and I was going to distribute it to everyone so we could all read it until I started reading your stories. And then I was like, oh no, I want the guys to have a genuine reaction on camera because again, you are very lucky as you will say, as we, when I walked in, I was like, how did you not get shot? And I did. First thing I said, I was like, this dude's way luckier than me. But, um, you were born in 1922.

Yes. In December 20th, 1922. And this is during the Depression? There was 11 days left of 1922. Now, that changed my life because when I told people I was born in 22, they always consider I'm a year older. I think myself as born in 23, see. But...

I started school at four years old. Grade school. - Grade school at four years old? - I graduated eighth grade out of grade school and went to high school at 12 years old. - What's crazy is you have, can you tell the story of like you lived on a farm a majority of your life before joining the military, correct sir? - I joined the National Guard

In 1938. And at what age? I was 15 years old. He was 15 when he joined. And that was, you lied about your age? Only three years. I love it.

Now, when you were a child, one of the stories you're telling, and you were nine years old for this, but you were selling a cow during a blizzard? Yes. A nine-year-old. We had a farm. I was born and raised on a farm. No electricity, no running water. Had to go to a pump by hand. And we milked 30 cows by hand every morning and night and carrying a lantern around.

to the barn and moving the lantern up and hanging it above as you milk the cows. Well, if a cow can't get with calf, she doesn't milk. So in the middle of December, when I was nine years old, this cow, we had it haul in a sleigh six miles. And the cattle buyer there weighed that cow.

She weighed 700 pounds. I don't know how it came out exactly 700, but it did. It did come out 700 pounds. I ask you, what do you think we got for that cow? We got $7.

That was depression. One dollar per 100 pounds? One cent a pound. Wow. One cent a pound. So when I got a chance to go to high school, after I graduated eighth grade, the teacher, Mrs. Jeffrey, stuck a little note in my pocket. She says, give this to your mother and dad. So of course I had to read that sucker before I got home. Yeah.

And it says, Mr. and Mrs. Larson, I suggest you give Jake a chance to go to high school. He's a fast learner. My dad read that. He says, be no high school for you. He says, I got you to do the chores. I'm from a family of eight. I'm number seven. There's four older boys than me. My oldest son.

brother, 16 years older than me, left home when he was 18. So I hardly knew him as a brother. Next is Earl, 14 years older than me. He's the horseman. We had 30 horses. He broke the horses. They were off to the prairie, wild horses. He broke them, shooed them,

train them to pull implements. So when my dad said, "There'll be no high school for you. You got chores to do." I forgot about high school all that summer. And then the high school sent out a notice, two weeks to register for high school. Earl, 14 years older than me, never entered the cow barn before. He always did the horses.

He stepped up and said, if you let Jake go to high school, I'll do his chores for him. I'm here courtesy of my brother, Earl. That's an amazing brother right there. He stepped up for you. Just so you could go to school. That's awesome. I got happy tears. I know he's here today. The amount of stories that you have throughout your life, which do...

Even from your wife. And we'll get into that. It is... It's those things where his brother did something. Or how you met your wife. All these little stories tie you in your life to being the luckiest man ever. It's a beautiful story. And then when you... What was one... When you were...

You had your family. You were doing high school. And then you were at 15 years old. What were you doing leading up to, like, hey, I want to join the National Guard or the military? I never told my folks about that. Holy man. I got to lead up to that. Lead away, sir. Anyway, I started driving 14 miles into Owatonna.

In the fall. And then winter came. And winter in Minnesota was snow. No wheel things got chewed. They took the box off the wagon and put it on sleigh runners. And that's how we'd get to Hope. It was two miles to Hope where our mailbox was. Were your mailboxes two miles away? And I had to stop driving because there weren't no snow plows at that time.

So my dad got together with a former neighbor that had moved into Owatonna and bartered for my room and board. When I say depression, it was depression. I was starting near high school and I made friends already. And my dad came to me and after two months, he says, you're going to have to quit high school. I can't afford to pay for your room and board.

I says, what are you paying for my room and board? He says, a dozen eggs and a pound of butter a month. Eggs were one cent a piece. Butter was 36 cents a pound. Guys, when you leave your dogs at home, do you ever worry that they might find your firearm? Ah!

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Discover a better way to balance security and readiness with Stopbox. Stopbox! Stopbox! Stopbox! Stopbox. Jake, I have a question for you during that time. What were you eating during that time? What was the meal that you would have every day? Oh, well, they fed us meals. We had cornbread and...

Home-baked bread. People were buying things from the store. Hell, a loaf of bread at that time cost 10 cents. That's 10 eggs. And then what was your... While I was going to high school, my dad was paying off the farm 160 acres, and he couldn't come up with the payment. And they were going to foreclose it.

President Roosevelt signed that Land Act. And Blooming Prairie, Minnesota, was 18 miles from my home. I remember my parents going there and getting a loan and paying off that loan. It was for $500. It was like $5 million now. He saved the farm, but my dad was a bootlegger.

He made his own whiskey. He'd sell a pint of whiskey, 86 proof, for $1 and a half a pint for 50 cents. We would have been good friends with your dad. He didn't make a tremendous amount of money, but it helped. Sounds like dad was really cool. And then one of his best friends turned him in because the feds offered him $5 to sell

to point out whoever was bootlegging. So my dad spent six months in Austin, Minnesota, jail. While he was in jail, my mother said, this is our 25th years of marriage. So she made an angel food cake. And my brother Leo, who's 10 years older than me, I was 18 at that time, he drove our Jewett,

sedan to Austin 35 miles and he was eight foot highways cement highways there between and he says look ma we're doing a mile a minute that was one of the highlights of my career man going that fast it's 60 miles an hour yeah

Did you ever help your dad out with the distilling the whiskey? Oh, he didn't allow anybody to mess with it. That was his own thing. My brother Leo put a cup under the drip of the alcohol in there. That's nearly 200 proof that comes out of there. And he...

He'd put it in his own bottle and hide it in a stump someplace. Good old stump whiskey. Your brother was ahead of the time. Tell the boys about the coffee punch you made. Was it coffee punch? Oh, oh. I was five years old. And my dad and mother went to town to get more sugar, I guess, for...

running through the still and some flour and stuff. Just necessities. We grew all the vegetables. My mother canned everything. That house only had heat from a wood stove. She did all the cooking on that. In the summertime, when the garden was producing, we

had 100 degree weather and humidity every day. How she managed to do these things is befounding. When my dad said I couldn't go to school anymore, it was taxing him too much for paying for my room and board, I told my friend Bob Myers the story. He says, "Jake," he says, "come home with me tonight."

"My mother is a widow. She runs a room and board house for eight people. I want you to meet her." So he took me home with her. She was a duplicate of my mother, kind, loving woman. So I agreed to help her. I couldn't go out for any sports when I did that. I had to rush home every noon to serve these eight people.

This Mrs. Myers was out helping others so she could make money on the side. Everything was so tightly held back, it didn't have any money. I'm going to go in until I'm 15 years old. I'm going to high school. And when I started the 15th year, the principal called me in and said,

you got room for another subject. I said, what are you talking about? She says, you could handle another subject. And she read off a list. And typing was one of them. So I took a typing class for a year. I was the only boy in the class of 30. Good for you. Laughter

At the end of one year, I could type 50 words a minute. Especially when you can't make mistakes. Now, that typing class is why I'm sitting here talking to you right now. Why is that? Why is that? The outfit I was with, the 34th, the 135th Infantry Regiment that I joined when I was 15 and...

We were put in the Federal Service before I was 18, and we landed up down in Louisiana, Camp Claiborne, Louisiana, and that's where I was when Pearl Harbor started. How many people do you know that was in the service before Pearl Harbor? You?

Don, well, before Don Graves was, was he in before Pearl Harbor? I'm trying to remember. Yeah, no, he enlisted afterwards. That was the reason he enlisted. I don't think we've ever met a single person that was enlisted before Pearl Harbor. So that was before the war. And most of them were drafted. And you see, I'm a National Guardsman. The difference between a National Guardsman and a regular infantryman is serial number.

And I'm not joking. I have eight digits in my serial number. A selectee or one that joined in that army has nine. I did not know that. When we got down to Camp Claiborne, the first thing they did was put us on maneuvers, division maneuvers. What were you doing for those maneuvers? Division maneuvers. We were out with the...

the poisonous snakes. They had poisonous snakes, poisonous spiders, and it's chiggers. My God, they eat you up. So in June, the manures were over. We got back to Camp Claiborne, and Amos Graham said, Jake, let's go into Alexandria and get something good for eating. So...

They got a pass. We went into Alexandria, Louisiana. 18 miles, I think it was. But they had the trucks haul us in. Those would pass us. So we got in and Amos says, "What do you want first?" I said, "Oh, I want to have a chocolate milkshake." So I got a chocolate milkshake and was just about finished with that. And I said, "Boy, Amos, I'm getting sick." He says, "You can't get sick on a milkshake."

I said, I am getting sick. I'm going to have to vomit. So I had to vomit, and I was still sick. So I said, Amos, I'm going back to the trucks. This is Saturday night. I said, and go back to camp. So I went back to camp and went to bed. At 5 o'clock in the morning, Joe Skłosnicka, Corporal Joe Skłosnicka, woke me up and says, Jake, you're on...

KP this morning, Joe, I've been sick all night. Don't give me that BS. He says, you get your fatigues on and get up to the mess hall. So I went up to the mess hall. Max Buntai, mess sergeant, says, Jake, aren't you feeling well? No, I told him the story about me drinking the milkshake and getting sick. He says, is that all you drank? Is that all you drank?

I said, honest to God, I says, that's all I drank. He says, you go back to that last table. We don't use that one there. And you lay down on the bench of the table. And when sick call comes around, you go to sick call. Sick call was just across the street from the mess hall. So I got over there at 8 o'clock. I sat there and waited until 10 o'clock before a doctor got to me.

There was quite a few guys didn't take those maneuvers too good, you know, and so they had repercussions from that. So I laid up on this table at 10 o'clock and he was pressing around on my stomach here and he's pushing down on my stomach and he says, "How does that feel?" I said, "Ah, that feels good." And then when he did like that, I just about flew off the table. Wow, he says, "Apanasitis."

I called an ambulance. Hospitals, five blocks away. I waited until 12 o'clock before the ambulance picked me up. Before I got into the hospital, my appendix broke. So I had to stay in. They had to put more operations on me. How old, sorry to interrupt, but how old were you roughly when this happened? I had just turned 18. Wow.

I just turned 18. So it wasn't the chocolate milk or the chocolate milkshake. You can't prove that. Do you take a shower and still smell bad? Do you suffer from thigh folds? Do you know how to play Magic the Gathering?

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Heals better than a mother. Nurses don't even compare to mothers. They have that feeling. So I went back to camp, Claiborne, after my sick leave, and I found out I'd been transferred to headquarters, headquarters company, 135th Infantry Regiment. Somebody was going through my records,

and saw that I could type. So they needed a company clerk over there. So I was transferred over there as a company clerk and I was given a corporal rating. For two months I was doing that all by myself. And headquarters company always gets additional stuff from other companies and they're on my payroll, see. So, man,

When you're typing payroll, you have five carbons in there. You pound that typewriter. And you don't want to make a mistake because half the time it's correcting everything. So I learned to type without mistakes.

We could not do that. I would be so bad without auto-correct. I'd be spending a lot of time correcting mistakes. Red lines everywhere. Yeah, yeah. That cuts down your efficiency quite bad. Well, the captain said, I want you to go to supplies and pick up a T.O. for our company. What's a T.O., sir? Tables of Organization, he says. All right.

I goes down and gets it. Of course, I have to read it. I'm astonished. As a company clerk, I should be a sergeant with a corporal helper. I'm a corporal with no helper. That's the military. I brought this up to Captain Erickson. You read the log. And he says...

I gave that sergeant writing to a friend of mine. He says, I can't just take that away from him. And he says, I'll get you a helper. So he got me a corporal helper that could not type. Wow. He made points with Corporal Larson. Japanese hit Pearl Harbor. Our commanding colonel.

for the 135th Infantry Regiment came out. He's right up there with the company clerks, his office is right up there. He comes out and he calls us to attention and he says, "You go back and tell your commanding officer that I am authorizing 15-day furloughs to Minnesota for all those who haven't had a furlough in the past year."

And a furlough is like a break, like you're two weeks off? Yeah, well, he says 15 days he was authorizing.

We're a thousand miles from Minnesota, middle of winter, you know. So five of those days are spent traveling both ways. Yeah, yeah. And just before freeways, you drove from town to town. Yeah. Oh, wow. Yeah. It'd take you three, four days to get up there and then you'd have to come back.

So I brought that up to Captain Erickson and he says, "Sgt. or Corporal, you do as you're told. I'm the commanding officer here." I says, "Yes, sir." So I went up, checked the records and there were 54 guys that hadn't had a furlough in the past year and Corporal Jake Larson was one of them. I had sick leave but

So everyone has to have a private individual copy of his. You don't make them all together. And the captain has to sign everyone individually. So I found 54 guys like that, and I made them out for that.

Something happened to my typewriter or something, and it kind of made a mistake on mine. It put me down for 15 days, and the captain signed it. Did you sneak it in there? When I got back from my 15-day furlough, he ripped off my corporal stripes.

and says, "You're a private from now on. You'll be climbing poles and stringing wire." I said, "Thank you, sir. Thank you, sir." He says, "I should court-martial you." I says, "I'd like to know the reason you could court-martial me, sir. You signed the papers that I made up." I says, "So?" He didn't have an answer, see? He didn't have an answer.

In the book you said... We were... Then the 34th Division went to New Jersey waiting for transport overseas, waiting for a ship to come in. So my two cousins and I traveled around New York in the wintertime, had our heavy overcoats on and everything. Went to...

Statue of Liberty up to the world's highest building and Radio City all-girl orchestra and we had a ball. And then we're coming down the street there and a pigeon came down and shit on my shoulder. I'm born and raised on a farm with pigeons and they don't shit on you.

But the French luxury liner Normandy was in the harbor in New York and laying at a 45 degree angle burning. I didn't know that was a thing. That was the fastest ship in the world at that time. I think it was 32 knots that it would make. But I saw that burn. Then we went overseas on the Aquitania ship.

and we got into submarines. I volunteer for working the galley. That's the kitchen. Those guys fed me steaks. I always had great food. Those English cooks, they loved to mess with fish. Everybody had fish, lots of fish or mutton.

I had my choice. See, little things like just volunteers or something like that changes your life. So you're working in that galley, you start sweating. So I went to take a shower and I got my soap. I could not make a suds of anything. I said, "What is the problem here?"

They've got a soap that works with salt water, and I didn't know that. Regular soap does not work with salt water. I didn't know that either. Did not know that. So they got some salt water soap, and then I could take a shower. But we had submarines that came into the convoy. I think there was 50 ships in the convoy.

I don't know where we stood in there because you look ahead, there's a ship. I think there were seven submarines got in there and one of them, the destroyer, was chasing it right down alongside of us. And when the destroyer came alongside of us and dropped that depth charge, it moved our ship over about a foot each time. Just swaying. We made it to North Ireland.

But we had to, they couldn't get into the harbor because there were so many ships being repaired that we landed in Glasgow, Scotland and we took little ships or whatever they were. But I slept in the broom closet there on the way over and when I woke up they were passing out sandwiches

And some of the guys were standing over to the rail feeding their sandwiches to the gulls. That's a no-no. Yeah, they tend to shit on your shoulder. Yes. They come sweeping in and pick up that piece of bread and leave out a stream like that right across your chest. And that is not pleasant smelling.

Papa Jake, you're amazing. So that was Ireland. What our co-host, or co-owner, Miss Show, she does a lot. She does producing and everything. She's actually from Ireland. She moved here three years ago. The blonde lady in the back, she's from Ireland. She has her accent and everything. And how long were you in Ireland for? Well, I got there and I came in

headquarters company and the first thing I knew there were three of us a staff sergeant Robert Jeffrey a corporal William R. Cray

And a private, Jake Larson. Former corporal. Yeah, well, you don't say that. You are what you are. You don't look back. So we were assigned, I don't know where that assignment came from,

But we were to transfer all Americans that joined the Canadian and the British forces before we got into the war and transfer them in at whatever rating they were in that Canadian or British forces. About 30 days we did that. I did all the insurance, GI insurance. I sold GI insurance to the people.

And that was my job. And after 30 days, that dried up and we went back to our company. And I'm thinking, I'm going to be climbing poles now and stringing wire. The next thing I knew, there came an order down from Fifth Corps. Fifth Corps. Fifth Corps. You guys know what a corps is?

Go on. Explain it to us. I actually don't know. Like, we have kind of a general idea with, like, battalions and stuff, but we don't have corps in the military. Think I'm from the infantry. There are two corps in a division, or in an army. Two corps. Each corps has two divisions under it. Okay. It came out...

that I'm in fifth corps in G3. That's the plans and training. I became an operations sergeant. I got in on the planning of the invasion. I got the Bronze Star for that. I was in charge of Omaha, the whole Omaha thing, every day from 7:30 at night to 7:30 in the morning.

I was a staff sergeant. In the daytime, the two officers that ran G3 was a full bird colonel who later became a general and a lieutenant colonel. You see? How did that happen? I probably am the only infantryman that ever made it into Corps headquarters. And I got... You see, I tell you, I'm lucky. That's wild.

And as Brandon was asking, it's like, how did that happen? Just because everything led to you getting into 5th Corps? Is that just how the chips fell? How did you end up being the person in that position? Other than, of course, being lucky. Because Colonel Hill wouldn't do anything without me. I was his right-hand man. When I did something, he knew it was right and fast.

I always recommend people that are in the service, whatever somebody tells you to do, do it. Do it and do it fast. Do it so that no one else can come and take your place. That's the key to getting ahead. I feel like that's true for pretty much any job. Wise words. Very wise words. Very. So we were right in a baloney with Eisenhower and his crew.

You were in a what now? A bologna. I'm not familiar with the term. A bologna is like a horseshoe, but it's a Quonset horseshoe. All different units inside that. Eisenhower was in one of those things, and I was in the same one. Every person that landed on Omaha Beach on D-Day came through these fingers.

I'm the only one who can say that. And I ran Omaha Beach every night from 7.30 at night to 7.30 in the morning. I had a corporal helper, Madison Rich. Did your corporal helper know how to type this time? Oh, he was an excellent typer. Good, good. You got an upgrade. He could take dictation. He had that...

What do you call it? He could, as you talked, he could write it out shorthand. Oh, scribes. Yeah, shorthand scribes. See, I could not take shorthand. Same. I'm bad at everything. No, I'll take some questions. What was D-Day like for you? Because you were leading up to that, and then you were part of D-Day as you were sent, like...

You beached and it was just running. One month before D-Day, there was a little thing called... The colonel said, I want you to go to... Slapped in Sands? I can't remember the name of it. Slapped in Sands? Slapped in Sands? I know we're going to get there, but the town in England where we loaded on these... Portsmouth. Landing ship tanks. Portsmouth?

Portsmouth? Portsmouth? No, that's where I came from. That's where I was in those bolognese at Portsmouth. Oh, okay. Good thinking. Good thinking. Plymouth. Plymouth. That's where we loaded on the LSTs. Men. Men.

400 men in each one of these LSTs and the British had a little operation going there at Slapton Sands so he wanted me because I'm from the infantry there see if every time you turn around because because you're from the infantry and you've been through this you get to go so

I'm on the first one. They have another one half a mile to my right and another one a half a mile further on. And we're in the front three and we're coming in to slap the sands. And the British are ready to open up fire. And behind us, there's a total of 11 of these landing craft, landing ships. They're following behind us.

And just when the British were ready to open fire over our heads, two Germans, German E-boats came out, torpedoed those two ships to my right and sunk them. And they opened fire on the guard on the top of us. They knock out our air. So there was 400 of us laying on the floor vomiting from diesel gas.

I don't know how we made it back to Plymouth, but we got back to Plymouth. A Fort Byrd Colonel came out and swore us to secrecy that all this didn't happen. We were threatened with court martial if we ever talked to anyone about it, even our commanding officers. I lived with that for 45 years. I assume there was a statute of limitations to that?

Or you can talk about it now. I don't care anyway. What can they do to me? That's my boy. Dude, the internet would be so mad. The internet would rally behind you. That's insane, though. I've been called a liar so many times. You can't make this up. You cannot even imagine it.

There's no way you could even think of that stuff. And in between times, I had to go down to Land's End and shoot .50 caliber machine gun, water-cooled machine guns at towed targets because I came from the infantry, see? Never used it afterwards.

But I've got all that memory in me. You can't get rid of that. No, the experience. Yeah. Papa Jake, I just want to ask Brandon real quick. What type of machine guns do you think they were shooting? So if you're talking about a water-cooled .50 caliber, that would be like the M2 Browning, but with the water-cooled shroud on it? Yeah, yeah, yeah.

it's the og one they weren't very popular later on because you know you really don't need them anymore but uh in the early prototypes uh and especially like a lot of the early issued guns were were water cooled all machine guns are almost at that time right or a majority well they started with the the maxim and i mean when the maxim was made in 1883 but they they followed through to the vickers that was a different machine gun than the other than the

Because you would have been talking about the M2 Browning, right? Yes. The M2 Browning. The Ma Deuce. The good old, the Ma Deuce. Yeah. But yeah, a lot of people don't know. It started as a water-cooled 50 Cal. And then it became, oh, I carried a BAR when I was in the infantry. It was too heavy, though. It was another Browning car. Yeah, Browning.

that's some big jake energy yeah that was heavy heavy though right yeah 16 pounds that sucker i came out of the infantry well i think like just yeah that was held down so when you i gotta ask real quick did you like the bar did you did you enjoy uh

Was it a chore for you to be the BAR operator or did you enjoy it? I loved it. I loved it. Jake, did you ever carry a Thompson when you were over? A Tommy gun? No, I never had one in my hands. What was your favorite part about the BAR? The BAR? Man, whatever you shot at.

It just seemed to explode. Because you'd get a burst of about three in there, right there. It just disrupted everybody at that time. Yeah, they were a danger. See, the Grand is eight shots. The British Enfield is ten shots.

I think the British outshot us. You think even though that theirs was bolt action? Yep. Really? Yep. But the BAR held 20. Makes that problem go away very quickly. Yeah. When you give a short burst like that, three, man...

Then there's 17 left, see? Pretty soon there's 15 left. Just a shot. Good God, good God. And there was a heavy load you carried all that ammunition besides the gun. How many magazines did you carry for the BAR? I don't really remember. I really don't.

I had all those things on my mind. Yeah. That makes sense. Fair enough. So what was D-Day itself like on that, when you got the word? Because reading your book, you said the times changed, weather changed, so you would have these missions. Or you were like, hey, D-Day's happening at this time, but then it keeps getting delayed and pushed back. And you're...

adrenaline trying to sleep during this 72 hours how long did that take before from time of mission supposed to happen to when actually D-Day happened? Well I'll start from scratch. Okay. There's something to I'm going to tell you the next thing I'm going to tell you you've never heard that before in my life that you could do that. How do you think Eisenhower got over there to D-Day?

I was on the same ship as Eisenhower. No doubt. That's wild. I came over on the command ship. Can you believe that? I have to ask, what was Eisenhower like? I never got to talk to him. But later in the war, in the Battle of the Bones, I'm going to jump up there for one reason. The Germans cut us off.

I was in on the start of the Battle of the Bulge. They cut us off. I was at Eupen, Belgium. Then there was the massacre at Malmedy. That's where the Germans had captured these hundred and some Americans that were observers, artillery observers or something, and had them in the ditch.

It was snowing, and when those tanks went by, this Lieutenant Colonel Pfeiffer ordered his tanks to use the machine guns on the guys as they rolled on by them. That was a massacre of Melvety. I have seen quite a bit, and I observed quite a bit, and I tell you, you never find somebody that has been through me what I've gone through.

I'm kind of proud of it now, but it always seemed like I was in on everything. And then you guys beached on D-Day. I got off the ship. I was the first one into the landing craft. So I sat by the pilot. That's the way to come down these rope ladders. They're carrying 74 pounds of

Plucked down alongside this boy. I don't think he was 17 years old yet. He was in the Navy. He was the Navy pilot. And he was supposed to take us in. So we'd stand about waist deep. He got a little scared. He let us off early. We were right up to our neck. And holding your rifle up above. And then you start...

going across an ocean that is loaded with land mines. We were told we'd be crossing land, about one million land mines that Hitler had planted there. Come to find out when they cleaned those up, there was a million and a half. We received a lot of small arms fires from the shore. It didn't bother me one bit.

I was afraid of stepping on a landmine. I went through six battles. I never got a scratch so I could get a Purple Heart. That's extra time off.

Our Eli Cuevas, the extra time off recipient. And I didn't get extra time off because I went to the wrong aid station. When I got shot, I went to the wrong aid station. So I was at work the next day. I had a mission the next day. I got shot in the leg. Oh, see what I mean?

So that's one thing in your book. You said you followed other people. You would follow the footprints up the shore. Oh, did I ever. Man, oh, man. That's smart. That's very smart. I'm in line from just one of those landing craft infantry. There are 30 of us on there.

Think how many of those guys are going in in lines. You look over there, there's a line. There's a screw of water shoots up in the air. Somebody stepped on a landmine. Is that something you thought about before you landed? You thought, I'm going to go up behind the guy who's already gone through? No, we had a rope to go. I was on easy red. I got off of the rope.

and went over to Easy Red Route. That's the killingest whole line. I'm going through there, and I come out without a scratch. More people were killed on Easy Red than any other landing. How come I didn't get killed? How come I didn't even get a scratch? I got down closer to shore, and I had two MG-42 machine guns there.

from opposite sides of the cliff. And they looked like they were trying to kill me. So I got the gun behind that six, eight inch stone burl that protected me. They bounced those bullets off of that thing. So I dug out a cigarette, put it in my mouth, reached for my matches. They were wet. Figures. So...

I sensed the soldier to my left, behind, and I hollered, "Hey buddy, have you got a match?" I got no answer. So I looked back there. There was no head under the helmet. And God, at that exact moment, it's like the soul of that soldier was saying, "Get up, get out of there right now!" And I did. You may think this is strange.

But those two machine guns shut off at just that time. I don't know whether to put in more bullets or change barrels or something. I got up and ran. And then they started again. I was 5'7". I weighed 120 pounds. And I thought, these soldiers aren't used to shooting at toothpicks. Yeah.

I really thought that. I got through to the cliff. I don't remember. My job was to set up the command post. I don't remember even touching it, but I must have done it. And Madison Rich, next thing I knew, it was 7:15. Madison Rich and I were digging our foxholes to go to sleep that night.

I had found a litter that hadn't been used. So I put that in the bottom of my foxhole so that I wouldn't be sleeping on that wet sand. Somebody said, Sergeant Larson, Colonel Hill wants to see you right now. So I goes to Colonel Hill. He says, Sergeant, he says, I just got word from First Army. They want me to keep G3 open 24 hours a day. You are going to run the night shift.

I said, starting when, sir? He said, starting right now. We were supposed to land on the 5th. The storm came in. So we loaded on the 4th. Do you think anybody sleeps? They don't. Everybody was running on adrenaline. You do. This was the night of the 6th.

and I'm on duty again. It's not that lucky sometimes. You have a lot of luck and then really bad luck. It's at midnight, the Germans sent over a reconnaissance plane. They wanted to know what we're doing on the beach, so they dropped all these small handkerchief-sized parachutes loaded with magnesium so they could light up the beach and take pictures.

Well, our anti-aircraft frowns on that. So they start shooting up pretty soon. Everything's quiet down. And I wake up again, and I'm being relieved. It's 7:30 in the morning. I goes back. Oh, I had told Madison Rich, "You could sleep in my foxhole because I got that litter in there." See? He laid his grand rifle on that litter.

So when I went back there that time, he was just getting dressed and he picked up his rifle and it fell in two. The rifle fell in two. A piece of shrapnel had come down and hit that rifle and broke it right in two. That's a heavy instrument. Yeah, you got lucky you didn't sleep. You got lucky for guard then. Holy shit.

So you were just saying he wasn't lucky. I know, and now I'm like, dang, never mind. I'm a liar. That shrapnel could have broke you in two. This is all in the book. I'm not telling you anything that isn't in the book. Real quick, while we're in the middle of this, so we don't wait until the end, where can people find this book? Is it on Amazon? Where is it at? It's on Amazon. Okay. So you can go read this book for yourself right now.

but it's it's honestly it's genuinely a a very serious pleasure to be able to hear these stories firsthand because you know anybody can read a book but i i feel i feel like i speak for all of us we feel very privileged to be able to hear it from you this book this book

And I'm not a writer. I'm not a writer. But I just told you the story of my life and that's the way I wrote it here. No big language. I don't know big words.

I mean, you had us on. It's like Furlong, it was interesting to listen, like even reading this, like Furlong, we call it, what do we call it? Leave. Yeah, leave. Furlong now we call leave. So like reading these, I was like, oh man, how terminology has changed and all that.

And then also a lot of stuff I, like when you were sick and they were doing, the military gave you to clean your sinuses out. What'd they give you? Those two for the sinus infection you had? Oh yeah. They finally gave me penicillin. I was the first, one of the first people to use penicillin in the world.

And it loves me. Well, they said you had two big sticks with like a brown goo and they put them in your noses. Yeah, yeah, yeah. You can shove that stick just like that right straight back there. I think you can reach over here and pull it through. Take

Tickling your memories of second grade. And that's how they got, that was for your sinus was just put big sticks in. Oh, I had bad sinus. I had ear infection because of that bad sinuses. And how did they get for eardrums? What would they do?

what's my ear oh for the eardrums like what for pilots and stuff they just rupture your eardrum to fix it they couldn't do anything on the outside because the infection is on the inside see so that's that's why they shoved those

that brown stuff in there the brown stuff was the penicillin no they no no that was some something else they put two brown sticks in his no like here in his sign straight up to your sinuses those sticks are that long too

And then for eardrums... I thought the COVID test was bad. I know, they're just like... And then for eardrums, apparently it would just rupture the eardrum or poke it. I'd hate to be in the... God, think of it. Think of rupturing your eardrum. Flyers, that's it, would not compensate when they got up high. Had to have their eardrums punctured.

by a doctor man i stay away from my ears but you're still like the brown just goop in your nose you're like oh no so you you did normandy or and you know never got shot no purple heart you made it all the way through and then after normandy it was battle of the bulge

Yes. And you were talking about that a little bit, but as you said, your unit was cut off as part of the unit's cut off? Yeah, I was in that unit. We were cut off from First Army, and we joined Field Marshal Montgomery's Army group. Field Marshal Montgomery. I saw him.

He'd come up and get a load of cigarettes. He didn't smoke himself, but he'd pass them out to his buddies. Good leader. Good leader right there. Yes. How many people do you know that served on their field? Marsha Montgomery. I did serve on their field, Marsha Montgomery. Even of individuals at Battle of the Bulge, you are now the only one or Normandy. That's why we were so excited. We've had...

We had Don at Iwo Jima. Iwo Jima. And then that's reaching out to your family. It was like a no-brainer for all of us. We're like 100%. We canceled plans. Yeah. Everything got moved around for this. We're like, nope, nope. But you were at the Battle of the Bulge. And that, like, even the temperature. Like, how cold was that? What were you wearing? What was that experience like?

At the Battle of the Balls? Yes, sir. Well, I'm going to start from scratch again. Get it. Perfect. Battle of the Balls starts on December 15. Marlene Dietrich was going to perform for the troops. I had to go to work at 730 at night. So I went to work 730 at night in G3, keeping G3 open. And Marlene Dietrich

entertain the troops. She was about 50. We all lived, we just loved her. She could put on a show, she had that voice with that European accent. God, we just loved listening to her. And she loved the troops. I never did get to see her because that's the night this just Corporal M.P. drove up at midnight and he came out of his jeep

and came walking toward me and while he was walking toward me he was saluting me and saying, "Sergeant, I'm from post number six." I was walking my post and I looked up and there were German parachutists looking down at me. I said, "What did you do?" He says, "I jumped in my jeep and came up here right now." I said, "Good thinking, good thinking." So I went and woke up Colonel Hill. I told him what the corporal had said.

He says, Sergeant, go wake up General Drou. So I woke up General Drou, told him, and people say to me, what did the general say to you, Jake? I said, I think he said, thank you, Sergeant. He says, what do you mean, thank you, after you tell him that?

I said, "Well, I don't think he's there to converse with a Staff Sergeant." But the Colonel wanted to see him, and that was the message I was giving. So we did alert all our units, and we saved quite a few lives. And that is one of the happy spots in my life.

Was it cold? Like, how cold was it during that time? Because you guys, like, army jackets had to be... It was wintertime, yeah, snowing. And then you're in military gear. Army gear, not the warmest. No, no, no. Military grade. Yes. And then how long were you... Like, so how long was that part of your... Well, to December 30th, that was...

Battle of the Bolts was working down. We had them on the run at that time. They were marching off the field. They ran out of petrol or gasoline, and they just dropped their rifles and walked off. Now, there's a strange thing. There's 10,000 missing Americans that they never accounted for.

They don't know what happened to those 10,000. They think they were captured by the Germans and executed. But we kicked Hitler's ass right out of Europe. We did that. Hell yeah. Well, if you think I'm not lucky, after the battle at San Lone, that was our first battle. You wake up at 2. You're sleeping in a ditch.

And there's the road right up here. It's hardly room enough to sleep in between, so I'm plugged into a side wall there of dirt. And I come out of there sleeping, from sleeping, to brush my teeth. And there's soldiers carrying something on the road. I'm not paying attention to them.

Somebody said, "What the hell are you doing down there?" I said, "I'm brushing my teeth." I said, "I'm going to shave here pretty soon." He said, "Get the hell out of here." He says, "We're sandbagging a 155 millimeter shell that did not explode coming over you. It's landed on the road and they're sandbagging it so they can explode it."

You can't make that kind of lockup. Not at all. Saying about the next day, we're going to move the command post again. The colonel asked me as a favor if I would, if he ordered a jeep, if I'd go up there and check it out. I said, anything, sir, for you, yes. So he gives me a little hand-drawn map.

So, got this driver and we come to a place that had trees about four foot, five foot high, just willowy trees. And we drive by there and I said, "Hey, I think there's a culvert there. I think that's the place where we gotta stop." So while he's turning around in the road,

The Jeep behind us turns in over that culvert and blows up. It's a landmine. Oh, man. See, you can't make this stuff up. How was it like with those type of memories for yourself as like a World War II veteran? What was getting back to the civilian life? You got out. You did the Broken Eagle thing.

thing but like as you're older and at this part of your life how do you reflect on those like it the sadness and then the the luck as you're saying how hard was it transitioning to the civilian life when you got back out because you've seen a lot you've seen everything a lot of people would never dream of or even like in the worst nightmares you got to experience like war war was it a hard transition when you got back i'll tell you the only explanation i have

There's somebody up there that liked me. I can't think of anything else. Even today. Think of it. I'm 102 years old. I don't have an ache or a pain in my body. How many of you can say that? I groaned when I tied my shoes this morning. I was like, oh. You're killing it, brother.

Main character. Yeah, main character. You can't make this stuff up. You can't make it up. But whatever I've done in life seems to work out for me. Man, I shouldn't be able to remember all this stuff that I've been telling you. This is unusual. You are sharp. That is... Yeah. It is how sharp and then you're retaining... It's...

You're just, it's sharp. And I think, Brandon had a really good question that was like, as a World War II veteran, what is one of, with the new movies that have came out, or any World War II movie, like Saving Private Ryan? Every one of those movies were re-looked at. They didn't make that stuff up.

It's all taken from what happened. And you can see just little old me, the things that happened just to me. Anything is possible. What's your favorite one? Is there one that stands out to you as something that you were like, that is exactly like how it was? Is there something that you watched and you're like, that was it? I've never run across anything that came close to what I did.

You could take a whole army. You could go down and get everybody's result of a battle that they won. You'd get a different answer from every person. I can see that. Now, on the last part, I wanted to waste four last. Your wife, Lola...

You had a beautiful story of a photo you took because you're actually a camera guy, right? You like cameras? Oh, my goodness. Turns as a back cover of the book. See that? Yeah. Tell that story because I love that story. That story was great. How old were you there? I'm 19. 19 there? That's a good looking man right there.

That's what his wife thought. Apparently. And judging by wife, I think it worked out. That picture was taken in North Ireland when I was up there in North Ireland and got assigned a G3. I met the medical doctor. He kind of liked me. And I had an Argus C2 35mm camera that I was messing with. And...

taking pictures with. He says, "If you ever go on a furrow," he says, "I've got an 8mm movie camera, crank, hand crank, and take it along, take some pictures for me." So I had a furrow to Edinburgh, Scotland. So I went to that, gave him back his camera. A month later, he pulls up to me on a Sunday. I'm around taking pictures of some swans.

that I wanted to send to my folks in Hope and Minnesota. And Major Ridgeway pulls up there and comes to a screech and he says, Hey, Jake, I got a bone to pick with you. What in the hell? I'm a sergeant here and he's a major. He's got a bone to pick with me? What in the world did I do now? Who did you piss off, Jake? He says...

My wife wants to know who those girls are. I took pictures with them. And somebody, what are you talking about? He says, when you went to Edinburgh, you borrowed my camera, movie camera. I sent that to my wife. I said, you sent the raw film there? Yeah.

You can't explain that. Bro, you got me in trouble. What were you filming, Jay? So, he was out of his Jeep. So I sat in his Jeep and handed him my Argosy 2. And he took that picture that's in the back of the book of me.

I developed it myself and I said, my God, that's a good picture. So I sent that to my mother and dad in Minnesota. My dad took it into the photo news in Otana and they put a little blurb in there about me being overseas and stuff. That exact one? A girl going to high school

She was in 10th grade. She cut that out and put it in her wallet. And her girlfriend said to her, who is that guy you got in there? She says, that's the guy I'm going to marry. Prescient. By God, they ended the war on December 30th. I got a 45-day furlough to go back home. I'm over there for three years already, seriously.

I was at the top of the list. I had more points than anybody else because you go for what service you did. And I joined in 1938. Nobody could pass me there. And by 22 years old, you'd already done seven years of service. It's crazy. It's crazy. So I...

I goes home. It takes me 51 days to get home. Then I got 45 days. Man, I never thought I'd see my mother alive. She had leakage in the heart and at that time nobody would touch a heart. They wouldn't open up a heart and look. She was just dying from it. The heart kept growing to try to take care of the blood situation.

It just compressed her lungs. So she died from pneumonia. But she lived to see my two oldest children. Karlin missed out on that. Karlin is my baby and Karlin has brought his baby, my granddaughter, Kayla. - Oh, they're gonna cut to it. We got them on camera right now. - I am so blessed to have them in my family.

They're my right hand. We're very blessed to have you here. We're very blessed that they brought you here. I was going to Hope to pick up the mail on Sunday. I had the family truck, cab over, engine forward. And when I went by the garage, I saw this friend of mine's car sitting there with the hood up.

Harley's got problems with the car and he's one of those guys that doesn't know a wrench or a plier or something. Talking shit. We were brought up mechanics of fixing cars so I could overhaul any car. That's the way you had to get by. You didn't have the money. At that time

You could get a rebuilt block from a Ford V8, whatever year it was. They rebuilt it for how much money would you say? New custom rings, bearings. This is 1945, 1946? What year, sir? No, these were 30s. Oh, 1930s. Up to 40s, yeah.

$30. $30. Yeah, I was going to say $30. $20? No, $40. You could buy a new head for $20. You get a whole rebuild. I think my Raptor motor was $12,000. See what I mean? Times are different. It's a different time. Yeah. But anyway, I picked up the mail and then...

When I drove back there, he came carrying the fan belt. Well, I knew very well then the fan belt broke. So I grabbed a crescent wrench, a 12-inch crescent, and a tire iron. The generator sits right up on top of the engine. The fan belt goes around that there, around the two water pumps, and then to the crankshaft. It's a 30-second operation.

Loosen that one nut, drop the generator down, slip the fan belt on there, take the tire iron, tighten up that generator up there. It's over. So I starts back to the truck to throw my tools in there. And he, Holly Hawk calls, Hey, Jake, he says, you want to meet my sister? Yeah, yeah, yeah.

I'm looking. There's nobody in the car. So I'm thinking they had moved in two farms away from my dad's place. So maybe he's going home and pick up his sister and bring over to my place. So I finished going to the thing. I started to open the truck door. And he said, well, come on then. And he opens the passenger door. I goes over there.

And there, his sister is down under the hood or under the... Dashboard. Dashboard. And she has a white dish towel. She had just washed her hair, wrapped around her head. No makeup on. She was red as a beet. But by God, I got a date for next Sunday. Laughter

I took her to Blooming Prairie Rodeo. She wouldn't even let me hold her hand there for a while. Well, we got that settled. This is your mother. Yes. He definitely got that settled.

I asked her to marry me. We got a marriage license. And we held it off for a while. I was going to Dunwoody Institute, taking up electricity and everything. I'm a journeyman lineman. I climb poles like a monkey. I work the hot stuff. But...

Anyway, come November 23rd, we got married. November 23rd coming up will be our 80th anniversary. 80 years ago. I'm remembering this stuff.

She sounds like an amazing woman. And you have a beautiful, amazing family too now from it. And that's in the book you told with that picture, she seen that picture, she cut it out and then you seen it in her wallet, right? Yes. Oh yeah. Oh yes. We were married for nearly three years and she was pregnant with our first boy.

And I have the service station. Your hands are always dirty at a service station, so. I goes home to get something to eat. So I goes in the bathroom, wash my hands. There's a...

All her stuff is, she's got a new wallet, and she took everything out of the old one. And there's that picture of me in the Jeep. You're like, who's this guy? Who is this? So I takes that picture. Lola, where did you get this? Well, I just was, when I was going to high school, that came out in the photo news, and I

I cut it out and put it in there. She has been fangirling for years. My girlfriend asked me, who is that guy? And I told her, that's the guy I'm going to marry. I said, you never told me anything like that. I thought I was chasing you. I have to ask, so of the photo set that that was taken from, that photo of you,

Does your wife, she obviously, I'm sure she knows the story now, did she ever know about the rest of the photos you took in spring break of 1944 that got your buddy in trouble? Oh, yes. Oh, well, she knew I wasn't pure. Oh, yeah.

I had to know. I had to know. When you got your Bronze Star and Miss Dairy Queen? Oh, my God, yes. My God, yes. She didn't like that fact that Dairy Queen came up and wanted to hug and a kiss from a

A soldier. Yeah, yeah. It was because you received the Bronze Star. They did an event for you. You see, I really was ashamed of getting that Bronze Star when I did. They had the families of three other recipients of the Bronze Star posthumously. Here I'm getting mine pinned on me.

that wakes you up that wakes you up but you do like i will always say it's like you it as my buddies like i the friends i've lost and same for you or the individuals that received those rewards after they passed it's still i guarantee they were so proud of you for every all your accomplishments especially you being alive and being able to receive that

Well, I don't think I'm any different than anybody else. And that's why they like you even more. You're humble about it. And that's like the most important thought. Like, is how humble you are about that. But because you show remorse, like a true soldier, you're a true soldier. You didn't want that reward as you just are award. As you said, I didn't deserve it. These guys did. And it wasn't a fun time for you. Right. But yeah,

But you still have that amazing story that came from it because you received a bronze star for the things you did, which again, amazing, amazing, amazing things and not easy things. You were putting other people's lives with these, your decisions in your hands. It's a lot that can weigh on people. But then after you got your bronze star, then you had to receive a kiss from

whom the Dairy Queen Miss Dairy Queen afterwards and it was going to be on a photo right you say had to like it was a punishment for him one or two other things I want to emphasize it that's something that isn't in the book it was it was after the book what was that I I got on TikTok

And I was talking about going to North Ireland. My goodness, people over there received TikTok. We got pictures of where I was stationed. Oh, wow. My God, yes. And my granddaughter started corresponding to one of these guys that controlled some of these places I was at. They got up a GoFundMe over there.

and brought us back to North Ireland exactly 80 years ago. That's awesome. That's really cool. And they had the ambassadors from five countries, France, Germany, Luxembourg, Belgium, and the United States, giving me accolades. Sitting at this big table with a sign, Cheek Larson here. And I'm thinking this is a farce.

In the first place, when we drove up to it, I said, "We're interrupting something here. Man, there's American soldiers out there marching, 48-star flag flying up above, jeeps driving around." So we sent my oldest grandson, Mike, said, "Mike, find out what's wrong because we were invited down here."

Come to find out the whole thing was for me. How'd that feel? They gave me these accolades, each ambassador. And then when it got down to the last one, the United States ambassador, he gave me the accolades and then he added, this day, March 18th, will forever be called Jake Larson Day. I have a day named for me. How'd that feel?

I told you it's crazy. It really is crazy. And we met a young couple up there, a little boy, and they invited us down to their place. And I met this girl's brothers, a couple of them anyway, and one or two of his sisters, his wife's sisters,

And the youngest boy that I hadn't met, he got my book from his mother and read it and wrote a song about my book. And you can get that on YouTube by asking for the song, Jake Larson, The Luckiest Man in the World, the story, the song about that book.

I'm glad to put that in a good copyright stroke for it. I'll be, I'll be honest. The two words I was not expecting to hear this entire podcast was YouTube and tick tock. Yeah. I was kind of shell shocked by that, but that's, that's, that's awesome though. That's, that's, that's a genuinely cool story. Thank you. So, so freaking much for this entire story. Like,

From all of us, this has been something we've looked forward to for a long, long time. Been planning it. Whatever reason, our phones can't talk. I have no idea why.

His, we cannot text each other a call and we both have iPhones. Well, it's probably because you blocked him. Yeah. Pass that. I was like, dang it, this isn't working. But once we, uh, it's just everything. It truly, thank you for your time. This amazing story that you just gave us. Uh, I didn't know it even lasted like the two hours.

Like didn't feel like this is supposed to be a shorter one. This has been an amazing two hours. So we're sorry for wasting your time. I think I'm the one that wasted your time, sir. I'm going to choke slam you right now. We are so lucky to have you here, brother. This is this again. I feel like I speak for all of us has been one of the biggest pleasures of

of this entire podcast is being able to speak with you was fantastic. Absolutely. I got one thing to say to you guys. Let's hear it. Thank you for having me. It's been an honor to be here. I'm a little old man from Hope, Minnesota, born and raised, and I love the veterans. I thank everybody for their help. Thank you for your help.

Do you know I was out of the service from World War II for over a year before I had anybody say, thank you for your service. Well, from all of us. This is an honor for me. This is really an honor. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you for your service. We thank you for your service. Truly, truly mean that. Actually, it's a legitimate pleasure, sir.

See, Brant, way more respectful. Dang it! I didn't stand. Son of a bitch. Thank you, sir. Now I've got to shake my hand again. I'm going to shake it one more time. You guys know how to put the grip on an old man. I'm not going to. But actually, what I will do, General Randy George, you gave me an extra coin, and I'm going to give it to you guys. I'll give it to you directly, but that's the Chief of Staff of the Army, so he's the bigwig out there. I have two of his coins in me.

Randy, if you get pissed for me for this, we fighting. But I'm going to give you one of his coins. Whoa. And this and that.

You guys have been amazing. I'm going to have Cody. Well, before we close out, where do we find you on social media? What's your, what's your Tik TOK? Tik TOK. Tik TOK. YouTube. YouTube. What else, Carla? Instagram. Instagram. No Facebook. Storytime with Papa Jake. Storytime with Papa Jake. That's what you say. That's the key to get in there. What do you, what do you do there?

What do I do there? I tell a story to my granddaughter, Kayla, there. And she does all the preparatory work, putting it in and everything. I got to tell you how this started. She dances on cruise ships. She dances and sings on cruise ships. When COVID started, cruise ships stopped. She came home. So she came over one day.

And says, Papa, I put you on my TikTok. What the hell is TikTok? Man, that's not talking jungle. We have to put that in the intro. The hell is TikTok? She says, it's just little stories. I said, she says, I put one of yours on. Where'd you get it? She says, when you were telling me, I just put it on my phone. So one week later...

She comes over. Papa, I'm taking you off of my TikTok. You really showed me up. What are you talking about? She says, it took me 10 months to get 10,000 viewers. You got that in a week. That's amazing. I think right now, what a way out now. 1 million, 1.2 million followers. 1.2 million followers.

now you get to tell a story to everyone everyone thank you oh my god thank you so much for coming out brother so i i know that our viewers are going to enjoy this story hopefully as much as we did because i know i i really i i hate to be a broken record we really did appreciate you having uh having you here and telling those stories if you want to see some of the stuff that i'm on

Google me, Jake Larson. Just say Jake Larson. You can't make this stuff up. You can't. And people say, were you afraid when you were in there? We're soldiers. We wanted to get in there before that. Man, we didn't want to stay over here for that long without getting results. We're trained soldiers.

You're trained to give your life. That is the truth. All you guys that were in the service, you know that. You're there expecting to do what is necessary to get things done. Yes, sir. But this is something that's so different. A little farm boy that joined the National Guard infantry and came up to be running

Omaha Beach on D-Day? This is crazy! How did he ever get there? Well, right now, I'm thinking, how did I ever get to have a million viewers? But to me, that is the biggest honor in the world. I've got 22 schools in the United States that are using that book as their history book. I've got a professor of history there.

from Delaware University that came out and interviewed me for four hours. He's using that interview to train his future professors. That interview is available to anybody at Eisenhower College in Kansas. It's on record. That's awesome. I've got two recordings in the congressional library where I greeted the soldiers for...

November 11th, Veterans Day. And that's the maximum they'll let me. I've been there three times. I talk to the students, the students that go to military colleges. They're the ones that really appreciate what I've done. I think we all do. Those kids are just wonderful. Before we...

Helen Patton is General Patton's granddaughter. I met her at the 75th anniversary of D-Day over in Belgium. She invited me personally to come out and be with her. Well, we went up to Boston, to Bunker Hill, and then the ship, the name of the ship... USS Constitution.

We went on that. And they dressed in their whites, and they rang me out. And that's supposed to be quite an honor for me. So I asked while they're up there listening, and I'm talking to them. And I said, has anyone got any questions? And it was just like dead silence. Right here real quick. So I just want to get a picture of all of us real quick, Jake.

I pointed to one little cellar girl there in white. I said, "You, what are you thinking right now?" She says, "I'm thinking I'm going to have to wash my whites tonight."

You old dog. Papaw Jake's good people. Before we close things out, is there anything that you have the opportunity to? Is there anything you'd like to say to the next generation of potential war fighters or just the next generation in general? My God, I'm glad I'm not in your shape, Boots. They got all this special stuff to kill you. How do you get by that stuff?

What in the hell is with Putin? The new war is crazy. That's the kind of thing that worries me. Guys like that are off-rocker. There's something to matter with people like that. We fight these wars, and then we have to rebuild everything that we knocked down. And taking so many of our loved ones and all my friends...

People say to me, "My God, you're a hundred years old? I want to live that long." I said, "Prepare to lose everybody you know."

Well, we are appreciative. I know it's a lot. I know it's hard, especially for being the last living of your entire unit. But we appreciate everything you've done for veteran community, for the United States, all these little things. You are part of that. And we are honored to have you here, sir. Honored to have you. And on top of that, still being willing to come out and talk about this stuff.

And come to, I mean, of all things, our podcast. But continue to go out and do things for the community. I'm sure it's very appreciated. Seriously, thank you from the bottom of all our hearts, brother. We truly mean that. One thing else I want to tell you here. I was born and raised on a farm. I didn't get a chance to go to church because our church burned down. The Danish Lutheran church burned down. I did get a Bible from the service. And...

I found out one thing. There is a God. I'm living proof for all that I've gone through. How is it possible I don't have aches or pains? I had a stroke. I couldn't move. I'm laying there in bed. My bladder is telling me, Jake, you better get me to the bathroom or you'll be sorry. And I can't move.

We live in the house with my two sons. When the alarm started playing music and I didn't shut it off, my oldest son came down and says, Dad, you got problems? I can't move, he says. So he got me to the hospital. I'm a little atrophied in that left hand, if you see the difference. How atrophied I am here. The thumb doesn't work right.

how how come i i i i got through all that stuff and i had cardiac arrest everybody know cardiac arrest yes sir heart attack or stroke they had to put some sense in me i got 11 stents in me how come i'm still alive and not just alive but somebody up there likes what i do

So they're not going to change it. Alive and walking around and being able to walk to your own seat. That's frankly incredible. Flying here. Yeah, flying across the country. I've been to Europe five times in the past six years. I've got a bunch of friends in North Ireland. I've got a young family in France. And they came over for my...

101st birthday, they came over here to me. You deserve that. It's hard for me to realize these things happening around me. And they keep happening. Even you guys, you wanting me to come down here and talk to you? You're in for really an interesting day because I'm different. I don't...

I just tell people, well, I am different. Everything about me is different. I'm a very positive person. No negativity. I don't go with that. To me, this is probably one of the joys of my life, sitting here talking to you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Cody, do your magic.

Guys, thanks for joining the Unsubscribe Podcast today. I was joined by Eli Doubletap, Papa Jake, Brandon Herrera, myself, Donald Operator. Thank you so much for being here. Guys, thank you so much. And thank you so much. If you want to tell everyone, thank you. Thanks, everybody. Papa Jake. Appreciate it. Truly a pleasure, brother. Truly, truly a pleasure. Holy moly. Holy moly.

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