Charlie grew up in a Marine family and enlisted as a private in the Marine Corps Reserve at the age of 17. He valiantly served in the U.S. Marine Corps for a combined 43 years in active and reserve service. After studying in Japan, he graduated in East Asian History from UC Berkeley. He was commissioned as a Second Lieutenant, and in 1965, received aviator wings and was deployed as an F-4B Phantom pilot with Marine Fighter Attack Squadron 531 to Puerto Rico near the end of the Dominican Civil War. During his subsequent deployment to Vietnam, Charlie flew 252 combat missions with Marine Fighter Attack Squadron 323 and rose to flight commander. After returning to the Reserve, Charlie served for six years as Colonel, commanded all the Corps’ field historians, and led detachments during the Bosnian War and operations Desert Shield and Desert Storm. He was recalled from retirement for Operation Iraqi Freedom at the age of 61. Charlie is the recipient of several military awards, including the Legion of Merit, 17 Air Medals, and two each of the Presidential Unit Citation and the Navy Presidential Unit Citation. He is a Life Member of the American Legion and Veterans of Foreign Wars and served many years as the president of the annual Laguna Beach Patriots Day Parade. In the 1980s, he was a founding board member of what became the Flying Leatherneck Historical Foundation. He is working to return the Flying Leatherneck Museum to a large, historic hangar at the site of former Marine Corps Air Station El Toro. He received his Doctor of History from UC Irvine. As a historian, Charlie has written a number of books on Marine Corps history. Charlie resides in Laguna Beach with his wife Ann.