Gramp's Story Hour

[Frostbit]

Started in the hopes Gramps will tell us a story or two.

[scott]

Yeah Gramps, let's hear one.

[80zephyr]

I would like that as well.

Mark

[Gramps]

Coming soon

[Frostbit]

Coming soon

Whoopy!!

[Gramps]

Army




Or how Pauline Baird and Richard Nixon along with my friends and neighbors tried to get my name on The Black Wall.




Im going to put down some of my beliefs. I will not debate them. That's worn out..

Conscription is sometimes necessary. In Viet Nan it was caused by the escalation of a small scale action started by JFK. Johnson escalated it then made an exit. Nixon inherited it and gets all the blame by most.

This was our first engagement where the enemy wasn't easily identified and there was no

front. We lost and learned nothing. Afghanistan being the glaring example/




Back to the narrative.

As I've mentioned before I was born in Feb of '47, As a result I got 'THE LETTER' a few weeks later. It classified me as 1A and if I wanted to dispute that to make an appointment with my local draft board. which I did. I drove to Carthage Mo, found the office and sat across the desk from an overweight smug bitch who now had my entire life in her hands. I explained I was in high school, she asked which one (for Christs sake, she had my address and there was only one school in that town) so I told her and she said they would contact the school and ask for verification and then make a decision. Eventually my status was changed to 1HS.

I entered college and they notified Pauline and my status was change to IS.

Then I found out by mail from Pauline during my Junior year that I would be classified 1A at the end of the year. Shit. So here I was sitting in front of Pauline asking why. She explained very sarcastically, that only 4 deferments were granted and this was my 4^th

So I explained the High School thing and she said she would take it up with rhe board. Eventually I was granted Is status.




Got married Jan 68. Graduated Jan 69. Report for service Feb 17 1969. my birthday.

continued

[Frostbit]

Awesome boots on the ground story. Looking forward to more. THANKS

[Gramps]

all the males in my HS graduating class, except 2 who were classified 4F,served in the Viet Nam conflict. It took a toll well beyond those honored on The Black Wall.

[Newman]

all the males in my HS graduating class, except 2 who were classified 4F,served in the Viet Nam conflict. It took a toll well beyond those honored on The Black Wall.

My heart goes out to those families and your classmates.

[Newman]

Army




Or how Pauline Baird and Richard Nixon along with my friends and neighbors tried to get my name on The Black Wall.




Im going to put down some of my beliefs. I will not debate them. That's worn out..

Conscription is sometimes necessary. In Viet Nan it was caused by the escalation of a small scale action started by JFK. Johnson escalated it then made an exit. Nixon inherited it and gets all the blame by most.

This was our first engagement where the enemy wasn't easily identified and there was no

front. We lost and learned nothing. Afghanistan being the glaring example/




Back to the narrative.

As I've mentioned before I was born in Feb of '47, As a result I got 'THE LETTER' a few weeks later. It classified me as 1A and if I wanted to dispute that to make an appointment with my local draft board. which I did. I drove to Carthage Mo, found the office and sat across the desk from an overweight smug bitch who now had my entire life in her hands. I explained I was in high school, she asked which one (for Christs sake, she had my address and there was only one school in that town) so I told her and she said they would contact the school and ask for verification and then make a decision. Eventually my status was changed to 1HS.

I entered college and they notified Pauline and my status was change to IS.

Then I found out by mail from Pauline during my Junior year that I would be classified 1A at the end of the year. Shit. So here I was sitting in front of Pauline asking why. She explained very sarcastically, that only 4 deferments were granted and this was my 4^th

So I explained the High School thing and she said she would take it up with rhe board. Eventually I was granted Is status.




Got married Jan 68. Graduated Jan 69. Report for service Feb 17 1969. my birthday.

continued

You were '47. I was '51. We may be the ancients here, but oh what a difference those four years made.

[Gramps]

I had already received my notice of conscription prior to the lottery, so it was meaningless to me..

[Gramps]

Pre Basic

.Boarded a bus in Carthage 3am with my wife and mother crying detestation AFEES center Kc mo. Should have taken less than 3 hours but it was 5 .Offered breakfast but it looked nasty so I declined. Processed through and during the psych/personalty test was tempted to scrawl I WANT TO KIII KIII KIII but restrained the urge.. in the afternoon ended up in a room with a number of other lucky candidates for the Black Wall. A Marine sergeant came in and shouted for us to shut up and form 4 rows. He asked for 5 marines to volunteer. No one.. silence. He said he would give us 5 minutes then he would Selectric 5 and left. 5 minutes later he came back with a clipboard read 5 names and told them to follow him. Shit I was sweating bullets. Marines were taking a high mortality rate in Viet Nam. Eventually we were sworn in and in the evening we were loaded on a shitty bus bound for Ft Leonard Wood. There are 2 ways to get from KC to the fort. Straight west on I70 to St Louis then southwest on I44. The other was a scenic route on 2 lanes roads though the hills of the Ozarks. We took number 2. The driver was a maniac. He was on the wrong aside of the road on every curve. I had to use toilet but was afraid we would crash and I would die in a smelly small chemical toilet. It was sleeting and I was praying the whole way.

We got to the fort around 3 am and were herded into a building and told by a corporal to turn over any weapons. A quaintly of knives were confiscated, then we were taken to a barracks and allowed to go to bed. Sometime after dawn I woke up to see a colonel walking with his dog *ucker (all colonels had an attending staff officer walking a step behind and answering questions.. termed dog *uckers) walking through. Asking the Df why we were still in the rack.. and he was told what time we got to bed and were to sleep in. We were marched to another barracks and the corporal took us and we drew our fatigues and boots socks, boxers hats and coats. Then back to the barracks, strip and change, put our civvies in a box and put our address on it and a person to deliver them to. My wife told me she cried when she got the package.

[Celeste Chalfonte]

all the males in my HS graduating class, except 2 who were classified 4F,served in the Viet Nam conflict. It took a toll well beyond those honored on The Black Wall.

6 years for me ('53), but yeah. To the best of my knowledge, no one in the college-prep track of my graduating class (which, to be fair, had only about a dozen boys in it) served in the military at all. We sweated the draft all through college on behalf of those 10 or 12 guys, but it ended just before we graduated and their college deferments expired.

[Newman]

Pre Basic

[SIZE=20px]Processed through and during the psych/personalty test was tempted to scrawl I WANT TO KIII KIII KIII but restrained the urge..

Arlo Guthrie reference?

[Celeste Chalfonte]

Arlo Guthrie reference?

Which song?

At the time, there were coaches who would tell you how to answer those tests so as to be rejected for "homosexual tendencies." Toward the end of the war, that stopped working. Just ask Perry Watkins. Or maybe it never really did work. I'd suggest asking Leonard Matlovich, but it's too late for that. Actually, come to think of it, it's too late to ask either of them, but their stories ae instructive on the ways of the military.