Editor 's note : Below is an excerpt from Larry King 's autobiography , `` My Remarkable Journey , '' published by Weinstein books . Larry King anchors `` Larry King Live '' at 9 p.m . ET on CNN . Larry , left , at age 10 with his younger brother , Marty , shortly after their father died . I was walking home from the library carrying nine books . That 's the way my memory sees it . I ca n't know for sure if it was exactly nine books . Maybe I picture nine books because I was nine years old . I 'm certain that I was nine years old , because I 'm sure of the date -- June 9 , 1943 . There were a lot of books under my arm on that summer day because I loved books . I wonder what happened to those nine books ... There were three squad cars in front of my apartment building . Flivvers , we called them . I do n't remember exactly when I started to hear my mother 's screams . But as I hurried up the steps , a cop quickly came down , straight for me . He picked me up and the books went flying . Watch Larry on his `` Remarkable journey '' » . I 'm not sure if I knew the cop . But I may have . For years , before the war started and my father went to work in the defense plant , he 'd owned a little neighborhood bar and grill . He was friendly with all the cops . The cops loved my father the way they loved any bar owner who had a great sense of humor . I remember having my own police costume when I was very young . A badge and a little nightstick came with it . I 'd make like I was walking the beat . The cop put me in the squad car . He told me that my father had died . Heart attack . I did n't cry . I remember that . I did n't cry . I was more befuddled than anything else . It must have been difficult for the cop . He started the car and drove . We wound through the streets of Brownsville and ended up at a movie theater . I 'll never forget the movie , Bataan , starring Robert Taylor as Sergeant Bill Dane . It was about a bunch of American soldiers trying to stave off the Japanese invasion of the Philippines . Larry King 's life in pictures » . Sergeant Dane and his patrol are ordered to blow up a bridge to stop the advancing enemy . They 're cut down one by one until only Sergeant Dane and two others remain . The first is killed by a sniper . The second is stabbed by a Japanese soldier who 'd been playing dead . The movie ends with Sergeant Dane firing his machine gun straight into the camera at the Japanese soldiers coming at him in one last act of courage and defiance . I do n't remember what it was like when I got home that day . A lot about that day I 've blocked out . My younger brother Marty has blocked it out , too . He was only six at the time . But there are a few more memories attached . I did n't go to the funeral . I 'd been so close to my father -- yet I refused to go . I stayed at home . There must 've been somebody watching me , but I remember being alone . I remember bouncing a spaldeen -- the Spalding rubber ball we used to play stickball -- off the front stoop . Two other things I can tell you for sure . I never went back to that library again , and from that day on I was nervous if I saw a squad car in my neighborhood . If one parked by my apartment building , I 'd start running home , in fear that my mother had died .
Larry was 9 years old when his father died of a heart attack in 1943 . Larry says he has blocked much of that day from his memory . He recalls a police officer broke the news , then took him to see a movie . Larry refused to attend funeral though he and his father were extremely close .