Hal Bergen graduated from Roosevelt High School in Chicago’s Albany Park neighborhood just before World War II ended. He was finishing basic training, learning how to operate radios for the military, when he was sent to work at the Nazi war crimes tribunal in Nuremberg, Germany. There he helped operate the sound system for the trial.

In 2016, Bergen’s daughter Kathy wrote a story about her dad’s experiences, and brought him to the StoryCorps booth in the Chicago Cultural Center, where he told her about his front row seat to history.

Bill Healy produces StoryCorps Chicago for WBEZ and teaches journalism at Northwestern University. A podcast he produced was a finalist for the 2021 Pulitzer Prize in Audio Reporting. Follow him @chicagoan.