Sigmund G. Zawacki enlisted in the US Army while he was a medical student during World War 2. After receiving his medical degree in 1945, he was based in San Francisco and was assigned to a troop transport ship which was bringing soldiers home from Japan. Although the war had officially ended, he served from 1946 to 1948 on the USS Benson, as the ship's physician. He told the story of doing his first surgery onboard the rolling ship in the middle of the Pacific. The surgery was a success and the young private thanked him profusely, not knowing that his "surgeon" was fresh out of medical school.