"I'm proud of the fact that ... I was running the show and ... nobody was killed or injured." (Video interview, 24:24)

Jacob M. Younginer

Jacob Younginer, 1990 War: Vietnam War, 1961-1975; Persian Gulf War, 1991 Branch: Air Force Unit: Surveillance Airplane Company, Air Defense Command Service Location: McGuire Air Force Base, New Jersey; Little Rock Air Force Base, Arkansas; Hickman Air Force Base, Hawaii; Hanscom Air Force Base, Massachusetts; Whiteman Air Force Base, Missouri; Wright-Patterson Air Force Base, Ohio; Vietnam Rank: Lieutenant Colonel Place of Birth: Lexington, SC

As a high school student in small-town South Carolina, Jacob Younginer dreamed of flying planes for the Air Force. In 1964 he enlisted, but instead of taking to the air, he stayed earthbound for a 28-year career. Among his duties: disarming land mines in Vietnam, developing a computer system that changed the way the Air Force maintained its hospital records, and working on high-tech weaponry for NATO.