The Alhambra Theatre in Sacramento.

Source: Sacramento Archives and Museum Collection Center (2001/ x-03/ 007)

Barbara Covington was born on February 16, 1924 in Sacramento. Her mother's family came to Oroville, California in the 1870s. Her father James William Covington had been president of the NAACP in Sacramento in the 1920s, but died when Covington was 3-1/2 years old. Covington moved with . . .

Infantrymen grab sleep where they can. Normandy, France, July 1944.

Source: National Archives (111-SC-191444)

Bill Mauldin worked for Stars and Stripes during the war. His cartoons were viewed by GIs serving in Europe.

Source: Copyright 1945 by Bill Mauldin. Displayed courtesy of the William Mauldin Estate.

Japanese-American evacuees, under the watchful eye of U.S. soldiers, wait outside trains at Santa Anita Assembly Center. April 5, 1942.

Source: National Archives (WC-0780)

Under the watchful eye of the U.S. Army, Japanese-Americans are evacuated from Salinas, California. May 1942.

Source: Library of Congress (LC-USF34-072513-D)

Aerial of downtown Sacramento, including the Capitol building, ca. 1940.

Source: Sacramento Archives and Museum Collection Center (83-01-111)

Sacramento Memorial Auditorium, ca. 1940.

Source: Sacramento Archives and Museum Collection Center (83/01/7288)

The dome of the State Capitol rises above a tree lined street in Sacramento.

Source: Sacramento Archives and Museum Collection Center (83-01-10,436)

A boy delivers the Sacramento Bee by bicycle. Burt Wilson served as a Bee carrier during the early 40s.

Source: Sacramento Archives and Museum Collection Center (83-01-10446)

Women workers stream out of the Southern Pacific Lines railroad shop in Sacramento.

Source: Sacramento Archives and Museum Collection Center (83/01/11,180)

Euguene Sledge and Sid Phillips at home in Mobile after the war. 1946.

Source: The Sledge Family

Group photograph of the 4909th Special Service Section. William Perkins, who would marry Barbara Covington, and Walter Thompson, who would marry Jeroline Green, performed with the band.

Source: William Perkins

The Flora Dora Coras at McClellan Air Force Base. Sacramento's Barbara Covington and Jeroline Green performed with the dance group.

Source: William Perkins

Sacramento's Walter Thompson, on trombone, performs with the 4909th band. Thompson would marry Jeroline Green.

Source: Walter Thompson

William Perkins, age 16, at Camp Tripoli in N. Woodstock, N.H. on a snowy day.

Source: Barbara Perkins

William Perkins was born on July 27, 1920 and grew up at 4 Pearl Street in Newport, Rhode Island. In 1943, Perkins was married with four children when he received his draft notice. In April of 1944, he was assigned to McClellan Air Force Base in Sacramento . . .

William Perkins describes the "greetings" the US government sent him to tell him he had been drafted.

As a newcomer, he quckly made friends and eventually met his wife Jeroline Green.

Delivering lumber on Guam, William Perkins couldn't believe the racist attitude of fellow Marines.