Displayed in this account are the photographic works of 4th Battalion 503rd Airborne Infantry Regiment veteran, Mr. Gene Paladina. Our hope is to provide a window into the lives of this units paratroopers, many of whom were very young and served with distinction in the Army of the United States of America.

From June 1966 to May 1967, Mr. Paladina was a member of 4th Battalion, 503rd Airborne Infantry Regiment, 173rd Airborne Brigade. Stationed in the Republic of Vietnam, Mr. Paladina, then a Staff Sergeant (then promoted to Sergeant First Class), was designated as one of the battalion's official photographers. During that time Mr. Paladina took thousands of black and white, (and hundreds of color), photographs of his fellow soldiers and US Marines. Mr. Paladina took part in and documented several air assault, search and destroy, and humanitarian missions that his unit conducted. He also captured the everyday mundane camp life of US Army Paratroopers deployed in Southeast Asia during the Vietnam War.

Mr. Paladina also did a second tour of Vietnam with the 173rd ABN BDE in 1969. His photographic record from that time period is limited to scenes of the countryside, as he appears to have been assigned to the BDE's HQ S-5 (Civil Affairs) group and was no longer assigned to a front-line combat unit. Those pictures are not on display here.

Mr. Paladina retired from the US Army after ~25 years of service which began in November 1945 and ended in 1969.

Gene Paladina passed away in April 2018 in Clarksville, Tennessee.