VIRGINIA BEACH, Va. — Clay Beasley can still remember the day in November 1942 he enlisted in the Army to serve in World War II.
He was 18 years old.
“It was a bad day for the draft board it was a legal holiday. They were closed," Beasley recalled.
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He wanted to be a pilot.
“I found out later in order to become a pilot you absolutely had to have a college education. I had only been going to high school. But, they took me into the Army Air Corps it was at the time," Beasley said.
After the war, he met and married his first wife. They were married for 49 years until she passed away. He eventually got re-married after running into his childhood sweetheart at a high school reunion.
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“We met when we were seven years old. I remember writing her a letter. I said, ‘Dear Marybeth, I love you.’ That’s the only thing I wrote on this piece of paper. I mailed it to her, and she remembered getting it and she remembers where she was when she got it," Beasley said.
When asked what he would tell young people today, he said he would tell them the military "offers a lot."
“I was a young man and I felt it was my duty. I read a lot about the history of my country and I was proud of it. So, I enlisted," Beasley said.
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Beasley is one of the many veterans who receives care from the Jones & Cabacoy Veterans Care Center in Virginia Beach.
News 3 is teaming up with D-BAT, a baseball and softball training facility in Virginia Beach, to raise money for a sensory room at the care center for veterans.
