Bonus Garand Picture of the Day

[Mark in Rochester]

John Banner, who achieved television immortality for his portrayal of the Luftwaffe prison-camp guard Sergeant Schultz in the TV series Hogan's Heroes (1965), was born on January 28, 1910 in Vienna, the capital of what was then the Austro-Hungarian Empire. The 28-year-old Banner, who was Jewish, was forced to abandon his homeland after the 1938 Anschluss (union) between Nazi Germany and Austria, which occurred while he was engaged in a tour of Switzerland with an acting company. Unable to return to Austria due to Hitler's anti-Semitic policies of persecution, he immigrated to the United States as a political refugee.

In 1942, he enlisted in the United States Army Air Corps, underwent basic training in Atlantic City and became a supply sergeant. He even posed for a recruiting poster He served until 1945