„Papa Jake“ Larson, who survived German gunfire on Normandy’s bluffs on D-Day as a young man and garnered 1.2 million followers on TikTok late in life by sharing.
„Papa Jake“ Larson, who survived German gunfire on Normandy’s bluffs on D-Day as a young man and garnered 1.2 million followers on TikTok late in life by sharing stories about World War II and his fallen comrades, has died. He was 102. Larson died Thursday, his granddaughter posted on social media, the AP reports. An animated speaker who charmed strangers with his quick smile and generous hugs, Larson, who lived in Lafayette, California, was „cracking jokes til the end‘,‘ McKaela Larson wrote. Tributes quickly filled his „Story Time with Papa Jake“ TikTok account. Towns around Normandy, still expressing gratitude to Allied forces who helped defeat the occupying Nazis, paid him homage.
Born Dec. 20, 1922, in Owatonna, Minnesota, Larson enlisted in the National Guard in 1938, lying about his age since he was only 15.
