Introduction
I was attending my first Viet Nam Veterans reunion at Fort Eustis, Virginia in June 2003. This was The Gathering, a reunion of transportation corps veterans of Viet Nam. We had been encouraged to bring items for display and among the war souvenirs and equipment were pictures. I had made up a booklet with pictures and a short narrative. Several people took a strong interest in it, as the Army’s navy is not well publicized. Two of the people were the Fort Eustis Museum curator, James Atwater and the Fort Eustis historian, Mr. Richard Killblane.
Richard asked me if I had ever thought of writing a book.
“Well, it just so happens…”
In 1965 the US Army was a warrior culture. Alcohol played a big role, we “partied hard and we worked hard.” Our primary mission was to kill people and destroy things. The Army was a totally male culture. Women weren’t in the Army but in the Women’s Army Corps. They were nurses, chauffeurs and clerks. By the 1980s everything had changed. Women had become integrated into nearly all fields of the Army. Appearance became more important than substance and soldiers were expected to be peacemakers, not warriors. Alcohol became the “Big Sin.” No longer were soldiers a separate part of society. No longer were we expected to stay on base and be separate and uncontaminated by civilians. We were expected – ordered – to be a microcosm of the changing civilian world.
This is a chronicle of those changing times.
The apprenticeship program was beginning to lose its appeal and the thought of being stuck working in the same building for years on end was repugnant. I tried my best for four months, did well but knew I couldn't handle it as a career.
I volunteered for the draft.
It wasn’t a difficult decision. My father was a veteran of WWII, serving aboard an LST in the Navy and had seen action at Guadalcanal and other places. All my uncles had served. Every male in the family had served from as far back as the early colonial Indian Wars. The family cemetery had markers denoting veterans of every war the USA or the Colonies had ever fought. It was in our blood.
I reported for induction on October 26, 1965, after a week vacation in Canada. The draft served two purposes - it got me away from a job I would have been unhappy with and my family would not blame me, they would blame my “friends and neighbors” at the draft board.
Leaving home would be no great traumatic experience. I made friends easily thanks to frequent family moves and while I would miss my parents I was of the age to be out on my own. Parental controls were becoming a suffocating factor in my life. It was time for me to fly from the nest and this was an ideal way to do it.
