Eugene Mitchell “Mitch” Beard was born on September 15, 1919, in Andrews, South Carolina. At the age of five, his family moved to Washington, D.C.
Upon graduation from Roosevelt High School, and after a year’s employment by General Motors Acceptance Corporation, he enlisted as a private in the 121st Observation Squadron, District of Columbia. The Air Guard unit was federalized on September 1, 1941, and was part of the Anti-Sub Command operation stationed at Langley Air Force Base, Virginia, which flew O-52 and O-47 aircraft searching the Atlantic for Nazi submarines. Mitch was the communications section NCO and performed some missions as radio operator.
He attended Air Corps Office Candidate School in Miami Beach, Florida, and received his second lieutenant bars in the spring of 1943. His first assignment after being commissioned was detachment commander of an Anti-Sub Command. He was also at First Bomber Command Bomber Crew Training radio facility in Bermuda for twenty months. Later he returned to the U.S. and was assigned to the First Bomber Command at Mitchel Field as a communications officer. He then became a communications officer, with the 319th Bomb Group serving on Okinawa until V-J Day.
Returning to Washington, D.C., he rejoined the Air National Guard and attended American University. He was then sent to the Air Force Communications School at Scott Field. He was recalled to active duty in 1948 and assigned as communications officer at Perrin AFB in Texas. He then attended the Airborne Radar Officers Course at Keesler AFB in Mississippi, where he was retained as an instructor at the school during the 1950-51 academic year.
From 1951 to 1955 he was assigned to the HQ USAF Inspector General Office at Norton AFB, California, as an electronics officer on inspections of Air Force units around the world. Taking time off for six months, he attended Syracuse University in New York under the “Bootstrap” Program.
In 1953, Mitch married Joyce Lenore Reeves, a former teacher and United Air Lines flight attendant from Salem, Oregon.
He was next assigned to the 16th Air Force and Joint U.S. Military Advisory Group in Spain, where he joined the Strategic Air Command (SAC) Team. His assignment was to help prepare the Air Force Spanish Bases for SAC’s “Operation Reflex” during 1955-59. Returning again to the U.S., he was the telecommunications officer for the 2nd Air Force (now designated the 8th Air Force) stationed at Barksdale AFB, Louisiana. The assignment included the supervision of SAC Communication Centers in mid-continent America with regard to the teletype and primary alert systems. He received the Air Force Commendation Medal for the period 1959-63 for directly enhancing the capability of the headquarters staff, unit leaders, and operational forces to react more rapidly.
Mitch and Joyce had two children; Diane Louise, born in Spain in 1958, and a son, Daniel Edward, born in Salem, Oregon in 1964. Upon retirement in 1963, he and his family moved to Corvallis, where he received his master’s degree at Oregon State University. His wife Joyce died of cancer in 1966. Mitch never remarried and raised both children on his own.
He was a newspaper columnist who edited and produced newsletters for Rotary, the Military Officers Club of Corvallis, and Toastmasters Club for more than seventeen years. He was also active as treasurer for Grant Avenue Baptist Church and served as one of its deacons. He was active in the Republican Party as precinct committeeman and was a candidate for county commissioner. He also spent a time as Judge Pro Tem in a small Oregon city.