Although members of the Class of 1943 were only at Harvard for two years of the United States' involvement the war, the impact it had on them greatly influenced their college remembrances, 1943 graduates say. The gravity of the war also influenced and perhaps shaded their once youthful outlook on life after Harvard.
"Within a period of 12 hours, I went from my home in Brooklyn to the midst of a ship And I said to myself, 'What am I doing here? I am a Harvard student?,'" says Shambroom, who had volunteered to serve with a friend from Dunster after seeing an advertisement in the New Yorker magazine.
But like his classmates, Shambroom, a retired advertising executive living in Teaneck, N.J., says he quickly adapted to fighting in the war, says that his Harvard education allowed him to continue his post-graduation plans.
And when he returned shortly after the United States dropped the atomic bomb that would end the war, he left active duty, married and entered factory and production management.
His college tuxedo?
He donated it to another clothing drive.