This presentation of In Their Own Words is dedicated to the brave men and women of the United States Armed Forces.

D-Day, 1944.

In the darkness over war-torn Germany, planes can be heard. A few men jump out and parachute into the dark abyss below.

These are the men who go into action before the paratroopers, before the landing troops.

They are the U.S. Army's pathfinders, responsible for establishing a towhold and marking the drop zones for the paratroopers.

Landing in the black of night, they set up radar beacons and lit the fires that would guide the men who would turn the tide of war.

Tom McCarthy was a sergeant in the American 82nd Airborne,

but the trail to his D-Day adventures took a long and winding path through the

greatest of world wars. It all started when he joined the army as a paratrooper.

I had had, my parents would not sign for me to join the army because I wasn't 21.

So when I turned 21, I decided that I was going into the service and I tried the various

branches and I wanted to get into the Marines, but I was a half an inch too short.

So I never had an inclination to join the air core.

They weren't my style.

But anyway, what I did was, well, I got dwelling on it.

I'm going in.

My mind was made up on that.

This is the story in itself. One day I was working, it was land up on that. So this is the story in itself.

One day I was working, I was laying brick at that time.

And I wasn't too far from the post office in Worcester.

Put my tools in my tool bag and I said to the boss,

Hey, Frank, I'll be back later.

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