Prathon Thornton joined the Army in 1943 and served as a radio maintenance sergeant during World War II.
At the time, the armed services were segregated. But Thornton, a black soldier, says he doesn’t recall being discriminated against.
“Really, there wasn’t anything that I wanted to do that I couldn’t do,” he says. “I was always in a field I really liked being in.”
Though he was deployed to hostile zones throughout Europe and Japan, Thornton never engaged in combat there.
On July 26, 1948, President Harry S. Truman signed Executive Order 9981 calling for “equality of treatment and opportunity for all persons in the armed services without regard to race, color, religion or national origin.”
Thornton remained in the Army, fighting in both Korea and Vietnam. He retired in 1970. He earned three bronze stars during his career.
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