BAKERSFIELD, CA - The countdown continues to the Friday departure of the third Honor Flight from Kern County. Twenty-five World War II veterans will head to Washington D.C. to see their memorial. Peter Budy is one of them. And, he has quite the story to share with the other veterans he's traveling with. He was a P.O.W. and missing in action.
"It's been quite a while so, I've forgotten a lot of stuff," said 90-year-old Budy.
He was trying to recall his days in World War II, serving as a Tech 5 mechanic and reconnaissance soldier in the Army. He was 19 when drafted.
"I forget how many thousands that volunteered. The guy says man there's a bunch of suckers," Budy said laughing.
Stationed in Europe, he'd put his mechanical skills to work on jeeps and planes.
"Whatever they had that needs fixing, we'd fix it," said Budy.
And, his training as a mechanic would become invaluable later in the war.
Crossing over the Czechoslovakian border, freeing concentration camps, Budy was caught by the Germans. He was held and forced to work, loading ammunition being used to fire on Allies.
"You figure geez criminy, I'm helping fight the war against myself. Then here these guys are loading all of this ammunition and who's loading it? I was," said Budy.
Budy was held prisoner for 13 days, until Germany surrendered. Once free and looking for a way out, he and a couple other P.O.W.s happened to find a non-working Peugeot.
But, remember Budy knew his way around cars.
"So we got to fooling around and, finally, got it running and picked up a G.I. here and a G.I. there and by the time we got done, we had seven of us, you know," said Budy.
Seven G.I.'s were squished in the car. But, they made it to Ally territory, France. It was there that Budy spent a week before he was shipped back to the United States.
One of the first places he visited when he was back was Washington D.C. But, there was no World War II Memorial then, like there is now. It's something for him to see on this upcoming trip and jog his memories back to all of those years ago, honoring him on this Honor Flight.
"Heroic? No ma'am. I don't think what I did was heroic. I just did a job the draft board called and said, that's it. There's your job, do it. You know, so I don't feel heroic. I served my time and that's it," said Budy.
Budy and the other World War II veterans will leave Friday morning at 6:30 from Meadows Field. Organizers are hoping the community shows up to see them off.