Joe was born on November 2, 1927, in San Jose, California. At 16, inspired by John Wayne films and watching friends and family ship out, he doctored his birth certificate and enlisted in the Navy in January 1944. After boot camp in northern Idaho he shipped to the South Pacific aboard the USS Breckinridge and was assigned as a gunner on LST-117, a Landing Ship Tank his crewmates called a Large Slow Target.

During the invasion of Guam he shot down a Japanese torpedo bomber at close range, locking eyes with the radio gunner in the moment before the plane went down. He went on to fight in the liberation of the Philippines under General MacArthur and was en route to what he believed would be the invasion of Japan when word of the atomic bombs came over the intercom. In 1946 he witnessed both detonations of Operation Crossroads at Bikini Atoll.

He later served in the Army and then the Air Force for over two decades, guarding nuclear-armed fighter units in England with top secret clearance.