Famous Veterans Born June 28, 1926:

Mel Brooks – Actor, Comedian, Director – (Army 1944-1946)

Brooks was drafted into the United States Army in 1944. After scoring highly on the Army General Classification Test (a Stanford-Binet-type IQ test), he was sent to the elite Army Specialized Training Program (ASTP) at the Virginia Military Institute to be taught skills such as military engineering, foreign languages or medicine. Manpower shortages led the Army to disband the ASTP so Brooks returned to basic training at Fort Sill, Oklahoma in May 1944.

Brooks served as a corporal in the 1104 Engineer Combat Battalion, 78th Infantry Division, defusing land mines as the allies advanced into Nazi Germany. With the end of the war in Europe, Brooks took part in organizing shows for captured Germans and American forces.