CANTON, Mass. — Age only seems to be a number for Al Benjamin.
At 18, he left Dorchester and joined the US Army Air Forces, where he soon flew missions over Germany in World War II.
Now 100 years old, he’s staging a play he wrote about those experiences.
The play is called “In the Dark of the Night.”
“The story is basically about what happened to me in the service. I was a volunteer at 18 and I went to navigation school at 19 and I was commissioned a 2nd Lieutenant,” he said.
The play takes pieces of Benjamin’s 31 missions flying over Germany to weave a story of what life was like in the US Army Air Forces.
His 6th mission is highlighted in the play. “The 6th mission was a difficult mission that we were on, and we didn’t know if we were going to make it home or not.”
After the mission, Benjamin wrote a poem about it.
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More than 70 years later, he came across it and his wife said he should expand it into a play.
He hopes the play makes an impression on the audience.
“We were just 19 and 20 and we were the backbone of the 8th air force, and the 8th is the one that actually defeated Germany. We bombed every factory that made tanks. We bombed every factory they made guns in.
Despite the role his unit played in the Allied victory, he remains humble.
“I always tell people they say you’re a hero, I said I am not a hero. A hero is a firefighter who runs into a burning building to save a child. That’s a hero. He knows what he’s doing. He goes in there. We weren’t heroes. We were just told, “This is your job today. You’re going to go bomb Leipzig.’”
The cast is made up of residents of the Orchard Cove Senior Community where Benjamin lives.
Just practicing lines is an emotional experience for actors like Jay Ball.
He choked up reading “Many went and served, and many never returned. They fought for America and the world. Their mission was to win a war. So, our mission is never to forget.”
We asked Benjamin if he has any plans to take his show to Broadway.
He said no, and that he had them put “A Far of Broadway Production” on the top of the playbill.
The show will be performed for 150 members of the Orchard Cove Senior Community and some guests on Monday afternoon.
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