Frank Richards, a Tolowa Tribe member raised in Smith River, served in the Army Air Corps as a ball-turret gunner aboard a B-24 “Liberator” bomber based in southern Italy.

“It was miserable, and you were down by yourself,” he said.

Yurok Tribe member Wally Scott, raised in Blue Lake, served in the Army Air Corps as the radio operator on a B-17 bomber based in England.

“I don’t know how the hell we made it,” he said. “The great spirit was on our side, I guess.”

Karuk Tribe member Lee Hover, raised in Arcata, served on the destroyer USS Dewey, which saw action at Guadalcanal, Midway and the Aleutian Islands, among other places.

“We were there to protect the carrier,” he said.

What unites these three men is their service during World War II. They are also featured in a new documentary, from which the above quotes were taken.

“We never talked about it until Chag (Lowry) came along,” Hover said on Wednesday at a news conference held at KEET-TV Channel 13 public television.

The occasion was to announce the world premiere of the one-hour documentary “Original Patriots: Northern California Indian Veterans of WWII.” The program will air on KEET on Sept. 30 at 7 p.m.

Lowry (Yurok/Maidu/Pit River) is author of a book by the same title, which was published earlier this year. He is also program officer for the Humboldt Area Foundation-based Native Cultures Fund.

The documentary is the beneficiary of one of 80 mini-grants given to local PBS stations to produce a companion documentary to producers Ken Burns and Lynn Novick’s “The War,” a seven-part World War II series that will air on KEET beginning Sunday at 8 p.m.

KEET received $10,000. It also received $5,000 from the Native Cultures Fund.

“What’s been very empowering and what’s unique, I think, about the project (is) it’s three Native vets,” Lowry said.

He said he isn’t aware of any other program nationwide that is exploring war experiences exclusively through American Indian recollections.

“There’s Native vets in every community. They are out there,” Lowry said. “It’s just a matter of an institution being respectful and bringing these stories into the mainstream.”

This documentary is a development of Lowry’s belief that American Indian war stories should be told. He posed some of the same questions to the same vets he interviewed for his book.

“Each time you get different information, different stories,” he said. “No interview can encompass their entire war history.”

KEET producer Sam Greene has partnered with Lowry for this endeavor.

Greene, with another KEET producer, Wes Fulton, helping with research, weeded through about 30 hours of World War II footage. It is interspersed throughout the film and helps to illustrate some of the places to which the three men refer.

“These three gentlemen, they’re sharing their stories,” Greene said. “We found out they haven’t really shared them with their family members.”

KEET Executive Director Ron Schoenherr said the station wants to continue to develop local and diverse programming and this program offers “an exemplary example of what we can do.”

“Original Patriots” will be made available to other PBS stations nationally by satellite uplink. It will also have a rebroadcast several times on KEET, as well as other local screenings.

For more information about the program and future screening dates, phone KEET at 707-445-0813.