TWENTY ONE MONTHS
By
Ron L. Carter
Copyright Ron L. Carter 2011
Published at Smashwords
Smashwords Editions, License Notes
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UNITED STATES ARMY
Active duty
April 19, 1967 to January 25, 1969
Vietnam Duty
September 24, 1967 to September 22, 1968
The Vietnam War was officially called the “Vietnam Conflict.” Congress never declared war on North Vietnam.
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BOOK DEDICATION
This book is dedicated to the men that lost their lives in The Republic of South Vietnam while assigned to Company A, 2nd Battalion, 3rd Infantry, 199th Light Infantry Brigade during my tour of duty in Vietnam.
I very painfully and regretfully wrote letters to their next of kin when they were killed in Action:
Lieutenant Thomas J. Cooney,
February 25, 1968
Sergeant Nathan L. Robinson,
February 25, 1968
Private First Class Harry M. Wopinski,
February 25, 1968
Spec. Fourth Class Richard J. Faulkner,
February 25, 1968
Specialist Fourth Class Arthur B. Smith,
March 19, 1968
Private First Class Jeffrey Jordan,
March 19, 1968
Spec. Fourth Class Billy D. McDougal,
March 1, 1968
Private First Class Andrew P. Corbin,
April 25, 1968
Private First Class William D. Noddin,
April 25, 1968
Private First Class Eric L. Stauff,
May 16, 1968
Private First Class Fredrick L. Rohen,
May 16, 1968
Specialist Fourth Class Charles A. Whitney,
May 25, 1968
Specialist Fourth Class Louis R. Lordi,
May 17, 1968
It is also dedicated to the friends of mine I went to Redwood High School with from Visalia, California that died in Vietnam:
Private Charles B. Height
Sergeant Lour LaDesma
C.W.O. Phillip Monhike
Specialist Fourth Class Roger Ledbetter
Cpl. Michael Montgomery
Sergeant Richard A. White
Sergeant Steven W. Maness
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I would like to say thank you to all the soldiers that served their time in or around Vietnam during the Vietnam War.
I would also like to give a huge special thank you to the soldiers that were wounded, both mentally and physically in Vietnam and the other wars the United States has been involved in. I would like to especially thank the ones that are still paying the price for their sacrifices. I know that words can never be enough to express my gratitude for you and your service to your country and what you have lost.
These words best describe the way I feel about my own personal experience in Vietnam.
TRY AS I MAY
SOME WOUNDS ARE YET TO HEAL
AND
OLD MEMORIES REFUSE TO FADE
SPECIAL THANKS
I would like to give special thanks to my daughter, Danielle Nicole Derby Carter, for helping with all the computer work on this book. She has been very patient with me when I needed her help. She also helped in the editing and made a lot of the technical entries possible for me. I truly would have been lost without her.
I also would like to give a huge thanks to my wife, Tami who did the editing on this book. Without her encouraging and pushing me to put my experiences down on paper, this book would never have been written. I want to give her special thanks for correcting all my many mistakes and spending hours of tedious work making sure this book was completed correctly.
I would like to give a special thanks to Susan (Sue) Derby Marshall for helping in editing this book.
CITED INFORMATION
Gary Roush - 242 ASHC Muleskinners - Statistics about the Vietnam War
Capt. Marshal Hanson USNR (ret)
Vietnam Facts -Capt. Scott Beaton, Statistical Source
Quotes and information from Wikipedia –
The free Encyclopedia
Draft Dodger from Wikipedia - the free
Encyclopedia
Joel P. Rhodes – The voice of violence:
Performance violence as a protest of the
Vietnam War era New York, Praeger
Publishers 2001
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Table of Contents
Selective Service Conscription (the draft)
Chapter 2 - My Official Notice
Chapter 3 - I’m In The Army Now
Chapter 4 - Fort Polk Louisiana
Chapter 5 - Me! A Weather Forecaster
Chapter 6 - Nine Weeks Of Hell Training (Boot Camp) Fort Benning Georgia
Chapter 8 - Why Didn’t Someone Stop This?
Chapter 10 - Myrtle Beach, Here I Come
Chapter 12 - Get Out Of Our Way
Chapter 13 - Sweet Georgia Peaches
Chapter 14 - Fort Jackson, South Carolina (Advanced Training)
Chapter 16 - Training (Being Programmed)
Chapter 17 - Thank God For Willis
Chapter 19 - Who Cares Where The Stupid Bridge Is?
Chapter 20 - Poem (The Circle Of Life)
Chapter 21 - This Is Real Southern Music
Chapter 22 - Almost Done With Training
Map of Southeast Asia and Vietnam is in between chapter 24 and 25
Chapter 25 - A Brief History Of The Vietnam War
Chapter 26 - My New Home For 363 Days
Chapter 28 - My New Duty Assignment
Chapter 29 - Tudo (Freedom) Street, Saigon
Chapter 30 - Please Don’t Kill Us
Chapter 31 - This Place Should Have Been Called Grassville
Chapter 32 - He Would Never Forget
Chapter 33 - I Hate Guard Duty
Chapter 34 - Can You Identify Him?
Chapter 35 - We Will Cover For You
Chapter 36 - It’s Time To Join Your Company
Chapter 38 - I Hate Wrist Watches
Chapter 39 - Three U.S. Soldiers Kill Over 200 V.C.
Chapter 41 - “It Was Battle Fatigue”
Chapter 42 - It Was Just A Little Viper Snake
Chapter 43 - Long Binh Post, Here I Come
Chapter 44 - Just Like A Dried Up “Christmas Tree”
Chapter 45 - I Called Her Baby-San
Chapter 46 - He Was Just Sergeant Numnuts To Me
Chapter 47 - I Believe It Was A Short Fuse
Chapter 48 - We Are Getting V.C. Activity
Chapter 50 - Welcome To “The Tet Offensive”
Chapter 51 - Sure, I Will Volunteer
Chapter 52 - The V.C. Got The Ammunition Depot
Chapter 53 - Do You Want To Watch?
Chapter 54 - Thank You, Sergeant Dooley
Chapter 55 - Actual Letter Regarding The “Tet Offensive”
Chapter 56 - Put Down Your White Flags
Chapter 57 - Puff, The Magic Dragon (AC-47)
Chapter 58 - They’re Still Out There
Chapter 59 - Just Keep Your Head Down
Chapter 60 - Good Bye, Smittie Poem – Confused
Chapter 61 - This Guy Was A True American Hero
Chapter 62 - I Told Him Not To Go Home
Chapter 63 - What Is He Doing Here? This Guy’s A Communist
Chapter 64 - Please Help Me, I Can’t Fire My Weapon
Chapter 65 - “You’re Dead And Can Never Go Home”
Chapter 66 -The Only One To Survive
Chapter 67 - “We Are Already Dead So Just Do It”
Chapter 68 - “They Were Skinned Alive”
Chapter 69 - Who Wants A Ten Thousand Dollar Reward?
Chapter 70 - Everyone’s Favorite Sergeant
Chapter 71 - You Can’t Have The Field Commission
Chapter 72 - Kill “Pepper For Us”
Chapter 73 - See If You Can Fly
Chapter 74 - Where Did All The Ghosts Go?
Chapter 75 - “He Was Right In My Face”
Chapter 76 - Anything But, Please, Not That
Chapter 77 - Too Long In The Jungle
Chapter 78 - The Scary, ---B52 Bombers
Chapter 79 - No More Swimming For Me
Chapter 80 - My New Replacement
Chapter 81 - My R & R Time Has Arrived
Chapter 82 - Our Link To The Rest Of The World
Chapter 83 - The Bob Hope Special
Chapter 84 - The Anti- War Activists And Protestors
Chapter 85 - He Was Cassius Clay To Me
Chapter 86 - Politician John Kerry
Chapter 87 - Good Old “Hanoi Jane”
Chapter 88 - You Might Have Rabies
Chapter 89 - It Was Shock That Killed Him?
Chapter 90 - “This Isn’t My War”
Chapter 93 - Don’t Come Back Here
Chapter 94 - It Was Just My Job
Chapter 95 - Angry And Disappointed
Chapter 96 - “The My Lai Massacre”
Chapter 98 - I’m Out Of This Place
Chapter 99 - Thankful And Grateful
Chapter 100 - My Easy Duty Station
Chapter 101 - I’m Back Home For Good
Statistics About The Vietnam War
Poem – Love Me Now, Don’t Wait
Photo taken of me in Vietnam in 1968
Picture of medals and badges I wore on my dress uniform.
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INTRODUCTION
On April 19, 1967, I went from being a student at the College Of Sequoias to the hostile land of Vietnam in a very short period of time. It is one place I would never have envisioned myself being. I could have chosen a million other places I would rather have been at 19 years of age. Yet, there I was, serving my tour of duty as a private in the Unites States Army.
It was a time in our history when the United States activated the draft. If you were drafted, you had no choice in the matter. You became part of the Unites States Military, (unless you had the connections to keep you out of the military or you refused to go).
When I first arrived in Vietnam, my M.O.S. (military status) was 11b, which is infantry. I was very fortunate to be given a job in Vietnam as a company clerk, 71h20, stationed at company headquarters. This book was written from my opinions and experiences as a company clerk and not as an infantryman. I would never try to tell anyone that I know what it was like to be in a firefight and only a few yards away from a Viet Cong Soldier, and him shooting at me. I don’t believe there is any real way a person could know what that’s like unless you were unfortunate enough to be in that position.
Although a lot of this book is about Vietnam, it was not written to be a history of the Vietnam War. I wanted the people reading this book to have an idea of what it was like when I was in the service. This book is a collection of true events, leading up to, and during my time in Vietnam and shortly after I got home.
It’s been a long time since I was in the military and Vietnam, and I can’t remember the names of everyone that I was stationed with. Because of that I changed some of the soldiers’ names I referred to in the book. These are my memories of the places and events as they occurred, and, according to the best of my memory and recollection. Any reference to any person, place, or thing, that is not correct, I truly apologize.
I wrote this book to give my children, James Ray Carter, Tiffanie LeeAnn Carter Porterfield and her husband Kevin Porterfield, Danielle Nicole Derby Carter, my grandchildren Christian Michael Soto Carter, Kadynn Brooks Porterfield and future grandchildren, an idea of what things were like for me during that period of my life. Although I very seldom talk about my experiences in Vietnam with family, I hope they find this book informative.
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SELECTIVE SERVICE CONSCRIPTION
The United States has enacted conscription or “the draft” several times in the past, but usually during a time of war. During the Vietnam War, if you were drafted, the period of active duty was a mandatory two year term. The drawing for the draft was supposed to be a fair process for everyone, but it was a complicated process of using birthdates and numbers. When you turned 18, you had to register and you were assigned a status of 1A if you were eligible for the draft. They also had 1Y and 4F for people that didn’t qualify. The penalty for avoiding the draft was 5 years in prison and a $250,000.00 fine. “There was a steep increase in the number of exemption and deferments during the Vietnam War, especially with college students. This caused a lot of resentment among the poor and blue-collar young men. A large number of the ground troops in Vietnam were working class so it reinforced the perception of the Vietnam War being a “rich man’s war, poor man’s fight.”*
Some men avoided the draft by becoming “draft dodgers” and burned their draft cards or their draft letters. Some men avoided the draft because of the dangers of combat, while others had a political or moral objection to war. Some chose to defect to other countries and some just chose to go to prison instead of being drafted. It is believed that 100,000 men became draft dodgers during that period. Because Canada didn’t consider draft dodging a criminal offense, between 30,000 to 60,000 men fled to Canada. Many just hid out somewhere until the Nixon era was over. Some churches also provided sanctuary to the draft dodgers. In 1977, President Jimmy Carter gave an unconditional amnesty, in the terms of a pardon, to all draft dodgers.*
Bill Clinton, George W. Bush, Joe Biden, Howard Dean, Dan Quayle and Dick Cheney are just a few politicians that never saw combat in Vietnam even though they were in the correct age group. Was it money, power or just plain luck that kept them out of Vietnam? I don’t believe it was luck. I have found that things in this life aren’t always fair but there’s nothing we can do about them. It is just the way our world is.
Take a look at George W. Bush during the Vietnam War. Some say his father used his influence to keep him out of Vietnam. George W. Bush spent 2 years stateside, in the Texas Air National Guard, as a F102 pilot during the Vietnam War. He was in a unit assigned to the defense of the continental United States and unlikely to be deployed overseas, especially, Vietnam. When his father was running for president of the United States and asked about his son’s status during the Vietnam War, he said his son “Protected Texas airspace from invasion by the Vietnamese.” * Who was he trying to kid? -- Come on, the Vietnamese!
*Quote from Wikipedia -Draft Dodger
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CHAPTER 1 - YOU’RE DRAFTED
As soon as I turned 18 and registered for the draft, I knew I was going to be drafted into the military and I knew EXACTLY where I was going: Vietnam. Come on, my last name started with a “C”. I forget exactly what my number was, but I know it was a low one on the military draft list and I was 1A. It was low enough to get drafted in the first round of the draft.
It was February 1967, and I was in my fourth semester of junior college, in my small home town of Visalia, CA. My prospects didn’t look good. Visalia only had about 11,000 people in the entire town, at that time. The shopping mall on Mooney Boulevard and Walnut Avenue was considered the outskirts of the town. When I received the draft notice, I was carrying 16 ½ units per semester, at the College of the Sequoias AND working full time at the shoe store. I already had 49 ½ units of the required 60 units to graduate. I was going to graduate that June. My routine was get up at seven, get my little brothers ready for school, and get to school by 8:00 am. I had classes from 8:00 am to 3:50 pm and worked at the shoe store from 4:00 pm to 9:00 pm every day. I also worked every weekend (Saturday and Sunday) at the shoe store from 9:00 am to 6:00 pm. My life was pretty much work and school. I was making about $100.00 per week at the shoe store and that paid my bills and kept food on the table. There wasn’t much time left in the day for the fun things in life.
I worked my way up from picking grapes, picking peaches, chopping cotton and milking cows, to selling shoes. I even de-beaked turkeys my sophomore year in high school for several months. I would ride and sleep in the back of the pick-up truck with a camper shell, for 3 to 4 hours and then work all night. I would sleep on the way home, take a shower and go to school. I was glad to be getting out of the physical labor when I started selling shoes. I was milking cows on the weekends ever since I was in the 6th grade and I wasn’t getting paid for it. My dad always said I was helping the family out by working on the dairy. I never understood his logic. If I wasn’t getting paid to work, how was I helping the family out? I really think the owner of the dairy was taking advantage of both me and my dad by having me and my brother Jim, work for free.
If I went anywhere on Friday nights, I had to be home by midnight to milk cows from 12:00 a.m. to 6:30 a.m. After work I would go home, sleep for a few hours and then go back to milking cows at 12 noon until around 6:30 p.m., every weekend. I was supposed to switch every other weekend with my older brother Jim, as he got older he somehow, usually found a way to get me to work in his place!!
When I was 15 years old I had a close call with a cow. She had her head in a stall, eating grain, while being milked. For some reason, she decided to take a kick at me as I walked behind her. This wasn’t just an ordinary kick. She kicked at me with both of her back feet! Her hooves missed my head by inches. If I hadn’t been young, with quick reflexes, that could have been the end of me. At that point, I had enough of milking cows. That night after work, we were walking down this 300 yard one lane dirt road to home. I told my dad that I would not milk another cow the rest of my life. (A promise that I was hoping I could keep). My dad became very angry with me and wouldn’t talk to me the rest of the way home. I understood his anger, but I was tired of working for free and I hated milking cows. His anger just made me more determined to do exactly what I said I was going to do. It may not have been the right thing for him, but I felt it was the right thing for me. Sometimes you have to do what your heart tells you to do, even if it hurts someone’s feelings. I had to figure things out for myself and I knew it didn’t involve milking cows the rest of my life.
The following week, I started looking for work. I went to packing houses, restaurants, and all types of stores looking for a job. It’s wasn’t easy to find a job at 15 years old and still in school. There weren’t many options available. I remember going into Reeves shoe store on Main Street and asking the manager of the store, Mick Rigelhooth, for a job. I must have looked really stupid. Here I was, a skinny kid, only 5foot 4inches tall, asking him for work. The funny part was, I didn’t know a thing about selling shoes, but I knew anything had to be better than milking cows. When I asked him for the job, he smiled at me, with a sneaky little grin, and said if I would stock the shelves for a week, without getting paid, and he liked my work, he would hire me. Not getting paid for a week? Well hell! I was used to that, so it was no big deal. I wasn’t really sure if he would live up to his end of the bargain, but what did I have to lose? After all, what could I do if he didn’t? I would have already done the work. I took a chance. I stocked shoes until I was “blue in the face”. Sometimes I even took them down and stocked them again, just to kill time. After a week of stocking shoes, I started seeing shoe boxes in my dreams! Thankfully, he gave me the job as promised. After that, he liked me, took me under his wing, and taught me everything he knew about selling shoes. I guess you could say he became my mentor.
On some of our days off, he taught me how to hunt pheasant and quail with a shotgun. I got pretty good at it after a while. He told me that if I really wanted to get good at hunting quail, we should hunt them in the Orange Groves near the foothills. This was extremely hard to do because you had just a few seconds to shoot them before they flew behind another tree. It was a real challenging. Mick was a great guy and I liked and respected him very much. I worked with him for a couple of years, while paying my way through high school. We remained friends until his death.
By the time I was in college, I worked my way up from selling shoes at Reeve’s shoe store, to selling shoes at the mall for Don McWilliams’ clothing store. At the time, it was one of the most well- known and well-established clothing stores in Visalia. I worked in their shoe department after school and on the weekends. My manager was Jerry Youngblood. He wasn’t much older than me, around 24 or 25. He was married to a beautiful young lady and she was always very friendly, not to mention, sexy. He was a good looking guy and smooth as silk when it came to selling shoes to the women. He could sell shoes that I couldn’t even give away. We had these ugly shoes that wouldn’t sell. They would have a letter on the shoe box and if we sold them we would make a bonus of a quarter or fifty cents. He would bring them out when the young or married women came into the store. I was always amazed at how many pairs of those hideous shoes he sold.
The young women loved to come in the store just to try on shoes when he was there. I also enjoyed that, when we weren’t really busy. There are some real stories I could tell about some of the young ladies that came into the store. They wouldn’t be wearing panties with their short skirts. They would cross and uncross their legs, as they tried on the shoes….. Well, you get the picture! It was quite entertaining! I think some of them were just trying to get a good discount on a pair of shoes. Sometimes it was the married ones that were the worst, but, that is yet another story. I got my first glimpse of how women, that were unhappy in their marriage, or just lonely, reacted to a good looking guy. I really enjoyed working there and yes, I did learn how to sell the shoes with the letters on them. One Saturday, I made $26.00 in bonuses just from selling those ugly shoes. Working in the shoe stores definitely helped to bring me out of my shell.
For most of my life, I didn’t have much contact with other people, except immediate family and friends at school. There were eight kids in our family, five boys and three girls and I was third from the oldest. There was my older sister Nancy, older brother Jimmie (Jim), younger sisters Linda and Sharon (Kay) and younger brothers Dennis, Harold (Hal), and Tommie (Tom). There was two years age difference between most of us. We spent almost all of our time with each other unless we were at school. We were all pretty backwards about the outside world, probably because we never got out much. Our only friends, outside of school, were the relatives we might see occasionally.
I guess you could have called us “hicks” or “Okies” or whatever they called poor white people back in those days. Those words never offended me because I knew who I was. My parents found those words offensive because they had different meanings to them when they were younger. They were considered derogatory terms to a lot of people.
Working at the shoe stores taught me how to be a good salesman and how to make friends with all types of people. I’ve never been a prejudice person and I like people, regardless of race or religion.
We were always moving from place to place because my dad was a farm laborer. He did a lot of manual farm labor but ended up milking cows to support our family, the last 10 to 15 years that he worked. We moved around a lot to follow my dad’s work. Later in life, I would joke about living in over 50 houses while growing up. I don’t know if we really lived in that many houses, but I know it was a lot. It seemed like we were always moving.
At the time I was drafted, I was helping take care of my three younger brothers and my dad. Dennis was 11, Harold was 8 and Tommie was 5 years old. My dad and mom divorced a few years before, when I was about 16 years old. I chose not to live with either one of them and decided to live on my own, taking care of myself. I moved into a little house with my brother, Jim and one of his friends. They soon moved out and left me by myself. I paid my own rent and my own way through school, working at the shoe store.
After my parents split up, my dad started drinking heavily, and was clearly becoming an alcoholic. His whole life had revolved around my mother, and she did everything for him. She drove the car wherever they needed to go; she paid the bills, and took care of us kids. When they divorced, he couldn’t deal with losing her or taking care of himself. He was never the same after she left. Before that, he was a hard- working man who rarely took a day off work. He was one of the hardest working, most devoted husbands and father you could have ever wanted. I remember, during one stretch, he worked 4 years straight, without a single day off. I don’t know how he did it! I don’t think I could’ve done that. Together, they raised eight kids on meager wages.
After the divorce, my friends from school would tell me they saw my dad drunk, walking along the street, lying on the side of the road or against a building somewhere. I was really embarrassed of him at that time of my life, because of his drinking. It was frustrating for me to have my friends tell me those things. I remember getting on my knees several times, just begging him to quit drinking, so he could take care of himself and my brothers. I pleaded with him and tried to bargain with him to quit drinking, but nothing ever worked. I didn’t realize it at the time, but alcoholism is considered a disease and it was almost impossible for him to stop. I guess I became, what they now call, a co-dependent. He was always a proud, hard- working guy, all of his life, and it was very sad to see him in that condition. When he couldn’t work anymore because of his drinking problem, my older sister, Nancy and I, help share some of the responsibility of my younger brothers.
I rented a little house, behind what is now, Red Lobster on Mooney Boulevard. I let my dad and brothers come and live with me during my last year in college. I assumed the role of the parent and I made sure everyone had food to eat, clothes to wear, and lunch money every day for school. I was playing the mom AND dad role for my brothers. Things were pretty tough for everyone during that period of our lives. Sometimes dad would take off and we wouldn’t know where he went or where he was, for several days. We didn’t know if he was dead or alive and then he would just show up out of nowhere. God only knows where he had been and what he had been doing while he was gone.
Mom was another story. She was trying to start a new life with her new, soon to be, husband Jerry, in Idaho. Dennis, Hal and Tom didn’t want to move to Idaho so they refused to go with her. They didn’t want to leave their friends, so they decided they were going to live with Dad in Visalia (that is why Nancy and I helped out).
We tried our best to have fun and make life a little more bearable for each other. I will never forget the story Dennis and Tom told me, about what they did to Hal (Harold). Hal had a Boy Scout meeting and the bus was coming to pick him up. All the other scouts were already on the bus. Dennis and Tom decided to strip Hal naked, shove him out the front door, and lock all the doors and windows, just before the bus got there. They thought it was real funny when the bus showed up with all the kids pointing and laughing at Hal. They said poor Hal looked like “a deer in the head lights.” I thought he would be scarred for life, but I guess it just made him tough. When he got older, he actually ended up becoming a United States Marine. They played pranks on each other all the time and that made life fun and interesting. My biggest concern, was trying to make sure everyone made it to school on time, and making sure I kept enough food on the table for everyone.
* * *
CHAPTER 2 - MY OFFICIAL NOTICE
When I received the official notice it said, “You have been drafted into the United States Army.” It also said I had to report to the induction center in Fresno, California on April 19, 1967. At first, I was angry that my number was so low on the list, and that they had picked me and not someone else. After all, I only had six weeks to go in Junior College, and I would have my AA degree and then heading to Fresno State University. No one in my family had ever completed college and I was determined to get my degree.
My dad was from a little town called Caddo-gap located in the mountains of Arkansas. He barely completed 3rd grade before his dad pulled him out of school and made him go to work. In the hills of Arkansas, where he came from, they didn’t have electricity, running water o indoor bathrooms. They used coal-oil lamps for light. They used outhouses for bathrooms and a well to draw water. They didn’t have television in those days and they didn’t have a radio. He couldn’t read, write or even sign his name. He always signed his name with an X. That never seemed to matter to anyone; he was a pretty smart guy.
Sometime around 1990, I ran into an old man from Tulare, California that used to own a grocery store in Linelle Camp (a community for farm workers) near Farmersville, California. When I was a kid, there were times that we would have to get groceries at his store on credit. He said my dad still owed him $185.00 for groceries from back then that was never paid. He brought out a bill that was about 35 years old and I knew immediately it was my dad’s signature. It was signed with an X so I didn’t even have to question the bill. Although my dad died in June 1972, I pulled out my check book and paid the old man what we owed him.
My mom was also from a small town, called Holdenville, in Oklahoma. She was able to stay in school until about the 8th grade. It was really hard to go to school in those days, when you were needed at home to help out with the family. I tried to explain all of this to my own kids when they were older but it’s hard for them to understand, (like most kids today), how hard life was back in the 1930’s and 1940’s.
Just because my parents never received a full formal education, it didn’t mean they were stupid. There was a lot I learned from both of them. They instilled in me the will and determination to be successful and taught me how to get ahead in life. It was lucky for me that I didn’t even know how hard life was for them when they were growing up, except through the stories they used to tell me. My dad would tell me about how they would run out of food and didn’t have anything to eat. They couldn’t afford ammunition for their guns and instead, would go out and knock gray squirrels out of trees with rocks, just to have something to eat. Sometimes, they would chase a wild pig through the woods for miles, with their dogs. When the pig got tired, they would corner the pig with the dogs, and then kill it with big rocks and carry it back home.
They would hunt raccoons with their red tick hounds all night and come home with 3 or 4 unlucky critters. They would skin them and lay the skins out to dry for 2 to 3 weeks. They would then take the dried skins to town and trade them for food and other supplies they needed. Their life consisted of mostly just trying to survive. I never wanted to be like that. I knew if I received an education, I wouldn’t have to milk cows, or sell shoes for the rest of my life. I do have to admit that their simple life, even as hard as it was at times, had quite a measure of appeal to me. It especially appealed to me when I used to get stressed out so much from my work.
One thing that was very interesting about my dad and a few of his brothers was that when they were younger, they played music and had their own band. One brother played the guitar, the other one played the fiddle or some other instrument and they would sing. I was told that my dad could play them all but most often the guitar and fiddle. They would travel for miles through the hills by foot or on horseback and in better times they drove around in an old beat up car from town to town to sing and play for people. That is how my dad actually met my mom. My dad and his brothers traveled to Oklahoma to play for some country “folks” there. My dad’s brother, John ended up marrying my mom’s sister, Ruth. I have a lot of double cousins that still live in Arkansas. It was really sad that during the entire time I was growing up with my dad I never heard him play the guitar or the fiddle. I think he must have given up music when he married my mom.
My brothers, Hal and Dennis must have gotten their music abilities from him because they carried on the family tradition and had their own band for years called “Oakwood”. Dennis played lead guitar and Hal played the guitar and sang. Hal also wrote a lot of the songs they played. I have to admit they were very good songs and everyone that heard them loved them. Hal and Dennis’s band was like our dad and his brothers. They played throughout the Central Valley of California for weddings, special occasions and at the local nightclubs. Dennis passed away in 1997 at the young age of 44 from a heart attack. Hal still plays music for people from time to time. Now my son James (Jamie) plays the guitar in a band.
I’ve always felt like you should follow your instincts. For some reason, I was getting real strong vibes to go with my instincts and not fight the draft. My mind kept telling me to just get it over with, be done with it and everything will be ok. Fight it or get a school deferment, was my big dilemma. I could’ve filed for, and gotten a school deferment but I felt like it would have only postponed the inevitable. I also had my brothers and dad that I was worried about. What were they going to do when I left?
My girlfriend, of three years, and I split up a few months before I got the notice. She and her family had given me the stability I needed during those years after my parent’s separation and divorce. Now, I didn’t have that emotional support and I was on my own.
I also knew that I couldn’t go on taking care of my brothers and my dad forever, plus, I didn’t really want to. I had school and other goals in life that I wanted to accomplish. After much thought, I made up my mind to just not fight the draft. I dropped all my classes at College of Sequoias. I told my brothers and dad about my decision and then made arrangements with my sister, Nancy, to help with my brothers while I was gone.
I called one of my best friends, Larry Guinn, who also was being drafted. We took a ride out to Ivanhoe, where there are two hills (about 300’ high) the locals call Twin Buttes. They are near the foothills and stand out by themselves. We hiked up to the top of one of the hills and we stayed up there for several hours just talking about our families and friends. We talked about our fears of the unknown, of Vietnam, and what we would do if one of us had one of our limbs blown off, or was killed in Vietnam. While we were there, we made a pact with each other that, if one of us was killed in Vietnam, the other one would visit our family and friends and tell them how much we loved them. It was a bond that I will never forget. Larry and I are still friends. He and his wife Norma still live in Visalia.
On April 19th 1967, I gave up the civilian life and headed for Fresno. I remember feeling very guilty about leaving everyone but, honestly, I was somewhat relieved that I didn’t have all the responsibilities anymore. Now, for the first time, since I was around fifteen years old, I was no longer in control of my life. I had someone that would be making ALL my decisions for me (Uncle Sam). I didn’t have to worry about taking care of my brothers and dad and didn’t have to worry about getting them to school on time. I didn’t have to worry about making enough money or making sure we had enough food on the table. I hate to admit it but it was actually a huge relief for me to get away from it all.
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CHAPTER 3 - I’M IN THE ARMY NOW
The first thing they did with us “greenhorns” when we arrived in Fresno, was rush us into a room and start giving us orientation and medical exams. After the exams, they swore us in. One minute I was a civilian and the next I was a private E-1in the United States Army. I have to admit, the moment they swore me in, I felt very patriotic. I thought it may be a good thing to be serving my country.
There were guys from all over the valley; Fresno, Tulare, Exeter, Madera and Visalia that were being drafted, just like me. I felt a little better just knowing I wasn’t alone. We spent most of the day going through physical exams. You know the ones where they say “bend over and cough.” You get so embarrassed it makes you feel ridiculous until you look over at the guy next to you. Then the two of you see each other, with that wrinkled up face, and burst into laughter. At that moment, you realize, you’re okay because everyone is going through the exact same thing. They asked us if we had flat feet, if we were taking any medication or if we had any type of physical problems.
If you had any type of physical problem they would reclassify you to 4F and send you back home. I thought about telling them about my bad “trick” knee. When I was a freshman in high school I had screwed up my right knee in wrestling and had to have surgery on it. It still gave me some problems from time to time. Sometimes when I stepped the wrong way it would pop out of joint. Something in the back of my head kept saying forget it, “don’t tell them”, so I decided I wouldn’t let them know about it. It might have kept me out of the service. I had already made up my mind what I was going to do. This entire experience was a little embarrassing and frustrating and I was glad to get it over with.
There were a lot of thoughts going through my mind all at the same time like: “Where are they going to send us?” “What will it be like and when will I see my family again?” “Are they going to give us a gun and send us straight to Vietnam?” I knew I wasn’t alone. There were about 35 other, doe eyed, scared looking guys, just like me, thinking the same thing. I could tell some of them had never been away from their mommies before. If I hadn’t been shaking in my new Army issued boots, it would have been funny watching them, but at that moment, I could relate to their fear and anguish.
After several hours, we received our first orders and we were heading to Fort Polk, Louisiana. What the hell and where the hell was Fort Polk, Louisiana? I studied it in school and knew where it was on the map but now I was going there. All I knew about Louisiana is that they had alligators and swamps and the Mardi Gras is held there every year.
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CHAPTER 4 - FORT POLK, LOUISIANA
They put us on a bus and drove us to the Los Angeles airport. From there, they put us on a plane and away we went. There were no phone calls to home (we didn’t have cell phones back in those days) just “I’ll see you later.” I remember landing at the airport in Louisiana and thinking how beautiful this area looked. We were put on buses again, and then we were on our way to the base at Fort Polk. We passed the swamps, lots of trees and thick brush. I remember saying, “I hope they don’t send us out in this crap. This stuff is thick as hair on a dogs back!” I could tell that the hard work had just begun. That was the best way to describe what lay ahead for me. Something that stuck in my head, while driving down those swampy tree lined roads, was seeing the signs that said “Beware of Alligator Crossing.” I had never seen anything like that before and it was bizarre. I had seen signs that said “beware, cattle crossing” and “deer crossing” but never “alligator crossing.”
When we arrived at the base I heard sergeants yelling and screaming and was wondering what was going on! I soon found out that this warm welcome and commotion was all for us. As we stepped off the bus, all hell broke loose. These guys, in their little “Canadian Mounted Police” look alike hats, with their pressed uniforms and spit shined boots were shouting orders for us to “LINE UP and STAND AT ATTENTION.” If you can imagine, we were ‘long haired’ and shaggy looking dudes that didn’t have a clue where to start. What did they mean by “stand at attention” and “how close to each other did they want us?” Some guys were laughing and kidding, as they tried to follow the orders. It was a complete circus. It’s really hard to follow orders when you have 8 to 10 guys yelling at you at the same time, and all and shouting contradicting orders. After, we had to drop and give Louisiana 20 push-ups (about 50 times because we had been laughing and not doing things the way they wanted) we finally settled down and tried our best to look like we knew what we were doing. The first thing I heard out of one Sergeants mouth, as he stood shouting, at the top of his lungs, was, “I only know two things that come from California! One is steers and the other is queers. Which one are you?” It seemed like he was waiting for an answer but all I could do was snicker, (wrong thing to do) I had to drop and give Louisiana 20 more! When he got within 2”of my nose, I grinned, and, you guessed it, that was the wrong thing to do, again. You know the drill by now, “give Louisiana 20.” This went on for hours. I think I must have done 1,000 push-ups that night. All I know is that, it was a lot more in one day than I had ever done in my life.
I always thought I was pretty tough in high school. No one would ever tell me what to do, or give me any trouble. I got into 4 fights my first month of my freshman year. I earned the reputation that I would fight if anyone gave me any trouble. When I think about it now, I believe I probably had a chip on my shoulder, because I came from a poor family. Maybe I was a little embarrassed by that, and I wasn’t going to take any crap from some “city slickers,” with “fancy clothes,” and “tough guy” attitudes. But yet, here I was, with this young guy in my face, screaming obscenities at me, belittling me, making fun of me, and making me do push-ups. Isn’t it ironic how things sometimes work out? There was nothing I could do about it. I just had to stand there and take it like a man. I would’ve never taken that crap from anyone when I was home. He had the control and he knew it. I also realized that I wasn’t quite as tough as I thought I was. If I had tried anything, all they would have done was throw me in the post stockade. Some of the sergeants weren’t much older than me, but you had to give them respect because they had already been to Vietnam and came home alive. That was a real big deal to me, because I hadn’t been there yet. I figured I could take their crap because I could probably learn something from them, like “how to stay alive in Vietnam
After several hours of what I considered mental and verbal abuse, we were assigned to a barracks. It was a large two story building, with rows of bunks on each side of the room, and lockers at the back of the bunk. Each floor had a big bathroom at the end. I was assigned to the bottom floor. I think I finally got to sleep around 3:30 in the morning, after listening to men sobbing, as they lay in their bunks. I know they were thinking: “why am I here, why didn’t I do something different?” It was a pretty lonely feeling and one that I had experienced many times before, while living alone. I was alone (until my father and brothers moved in with me) since I left home around 4 years before I was drafted. Believe it or not, at that very moment and listening to those guys, I actually felt like crying too. This was a long way away from home and it seemed like these military people didn’t even like us.
Our sleep didn’t last long. I found myself awake again at 5:00 a.m., thanks to the sergeants yelling at us to “drop your cocks and grab your socks.” We had to get out of our bunks, get dressed and make our beds. Then we had to line up, outside in 5 minutes or they were going to have us run laps around a dirt track. Of course, some of the guys didn’t make it in time, so we spent about an hour, running around the track and giving Louisiana push-ups the entire time. After an hour or so, we were finally released and marched back to our barracks.
That day, we were assigned a chow hall, where we had to eat all our meals, every day. I didn’t really mind the military food. It was a lot better than going without meals, like I had done at home from time to time. A lot of the guys complained about the chow, but not me. I thought the best part of the meals was that they were free!
The next morning, and right after breakfast, we were marched down to the barbers for “the famous haircut” that stripped you bald. All the long, wavy, brown hair of mine was gone in less than ten seconds. I always hated that look on me. I thought I looked like a plucked chicken. It happened so fast, it seemed like we were outside laughing at each other, before our hair even hit the ground. This was ridiculous! Why couldn’t we just keep a little bit of it? It brought back a memory of mine, when my dad took my brother, Jim and I, into to the barbershop in Caruthers, California. I was around eight years old and in the third or fourth grade. We thought we were going to just get our hair “trimmed.” Without knowing it, Dad told the barber to cut it all off in a military cut. I was so pissed off at my dad, I wouldn’t talk to him on the way home and I avoided him for an entire week! Every time I would look at myself in the mirror I would get angry. Since I was already pissed off at him that triggered another memory of mine when dad and mom bought Jim and me overalls to wear. I think I was in the first or second grade. They were the type of overalls where the two straps came over your shoulders. For some reason mom and dad wanted us to wear those ugly things. They made us look like hillbilly kids and I refused to wear them. I could just see my dad introducing me to someone saying, in a strong southern accent, “Hi neighbor, have you met my hillbilly son, Ronnie?” No thank you! I wasn’t having any part of that. When I was little, those kinds of things really embarrassed me. I didn’t talk to my mom or dad for a week because of that one, as well. I swore, I would never get my hair cut that short again, and I would never, ever, wear overalls. Well, I was wrong about the hair cut.
What could the Army possibly have planned for us next? Well, you guessed it, (no, not overalls) the next stop was the famous pictures. I was thinking to myself, why couldn’t they just take the darn pictures before I got scalped? It was the most terrible picture I’d ever taken, and I hear people complain about the ones on their driver’s license. At least you still have your hair when the D.M.V. takes your picture. From there, we received more uniforms, boots and other things we needed.
During the first week, we spent time taking tests, learning CPR, learning first aid, getting shots, and a lot of marching and physical training. I will never forget the shots. That is all we heard the first few days we were there, “wait until you get your shots, some of you babies will pass out”. By the time we got them, the guys were scared to death and I was a little nervous as well. It was an air gun that resembled a .45 pistol with a lot of holes at the end of the barrel. It was attached to several cords with different medications in each one. They had us roll up our sleeve and stuck the barrel to our shoulder and pulled the trigger. We received about 10 inoculations, all at the same time, from the air gun. It was like getting hit in the shoulder with a clenched fist, by one of your buddies, as hard as he could hit you. A few guys did pass out when they saw the gun, before they even received the shots. We also had a few of them fall to their knees after they received them. It was funny to watch and we were all laughing and joking as we watched those big strong guys, falling to their knees! I think a lot of it was just nerves from all the hype. It hurt like hell but it wasn’t anything like the rumors said it would be. I still was very happy I didn’t pass out in front of all those guys.
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CHAPTER 5 - ME! A WEATHER FORECASTER?
Later in the week, I was called into the company headquarters. I thought, “oh, no what did I do now?” I was worried that I was in big trouble for something, but I just didn’t know what. They had me report to the captain’s office. I stood at attention and gave him a salute. He told me “at ease Private”. I was very much relieved when he told me to have a seat. He proceeded to tell me, that I had scored high on the military I.Q. test. He said they wanted to offer me a chance to give up infantry and become a meteorologist. They were going to remove me from infantry training and send me to weather forecasting training school for 16 weeks. I would then receive another 16 weeks of advanced technical and additional training to become a meteorologist for the U.S. Army. The only catch was I would have to sign up for another 2 years of active duty. This would be in addition to the 2 years I was already facing from the draft. I didn’t have to think about it too long. I knew I wasn’t going to stay in the military for 4 years! I could tell I already hated it. I thanked the captain for the offer and graciously declined. I still felt I wanted to take my chances with the 2 years I had been dealt, even if it was in the infantry.
The rest of that week was spent getting used to not being home and having someone tell you what to do and when to do it. There was a lot of outdoor classroom training and tons of physical training for the remainder of my short time in Fort Polk. At the end of the week, I received my orders for my next duty station. I was going to Fort Benning, Georgia for my nine weeks of basic, infantry training (boot camp). I didn’t realize it at the time, but my little picnic at Fort Polk, Louisiana was over and now, the real stuff was about to begin
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CHAPTER 6 - NINE WEEKS OF HELL TRAINING:
BOOT CAMP AT FORT BENNING, GEORGIA