FORT ANN, N.Y. – A World War II paratrooper who took up skydiving at 75 is planning to celebrate his 90th birthday by parachuting out of an airplane.
The Saratogian reports reports that Leo Dean of Albany has made 161 jumps over the past 15 years and plans to make it 162 on Saturday, weather permitting. He's scheduled to jump with other skydivers that morning in the town of Fort Ann, in the southeastern Adirondacks.
Dean served in an Army paratrooper regiment during the war and made a night-time jump into Southern France in August 1944. He later fought in the Battle of the Bulge.
As he has for the past ten summers, Dean plans to return to France this August to mark the anniversary of his wartime jump.