text: After graduating from high school, Carson had his first encounter with Hollywood.He had hitchhiked to Hollywood, where he was arrested and fined $50 for impersonating a midshipman, a story often regarded as apocryphal. Military service
  Carson joined the United States Navy on June 8, 1943, and received V-12 Navy College Training Program officer training at Columbia University and Millsaps College. Commissioned an ensign late in the war, Carson was assigned to the  in the Pacific. While in the Navy, Carson posted a 15–0-1 amateur boxing record, with most of his bouts fought on board the Pennsylvania. He was en route to the combat zone aboard a troop ship when the war ended. Carson served as a communications officer in charge of decoding encrypted messages. He said that the high point of his military career was performing a magic trick for United States Secretary of the Navy James V. Forrestal. In a conversation with Forrestal, the Secretary asked Carson if he planned to stay in the Navy after the war. In response, Carson said no and told him he wanted to be a magician. Forrestal asked him to perform, and Carson responded with a card trick. 