World War 2 Stories

On March 24, 1945, more than 16,000 Allied paratroopers and glider troops descended over the Rhine in Operation Varsity, the largest single-day airborne assault of World War II. Dropping in broad daylight under intense German fire, American and British airborne forces seized key objectives and helped shatter Germany’s last major defensive line, opening the road into the heart of the Reich.

1st Lt. Suella V. Bernard was a World War II Army flight nurse who flew into Normandy days after D-Day and later volunteered for a dangerous glider evacuation mission near Remagen, Germany. Her story highlights the courage of the flight nurses who helped revolutionize military medicine during the war.

James Gavin (1907-1990) was raised adopted from an orphanage in Brooklyn by a struggling coal miner. Inspired by his school readings on the American Civil War, Gavin decided to seek a better future by joining the army. He was 17 when he enlisted as a private, lying about his age as he knew his adoptive

Don’t Be a Sucker (1947) is a powerful U.S. Army propaganda film that warns how hate, fear, and scapegoating can undermine democracy from within. Created just after World War II, the film uses an everyday café conversation to expose how fascist ideas take root and why vigilance, critical thinking, and civic responsibility are essential to preserving freedom.

On December 23, 1944, twenty-five German POWs tunneled out of Camp Papago Park near Phoenix, Arizona, in the largest Axis prisoner escape on U.S. soil during World War II.

Bill Mauldin was more than a wartime cartoonist—he was a frontline infantryman who captured the humor, hardship, and truth of the common soldier. Through his famous characters Willie and Joe, Mauldin gave voice to the mud-covered dogfaces of World War II and forever changed how the war was remembered.