The Fulton Recovery System

This will be a little bit out of sequence. I'm putting it here now because I haven't gotten my PI slides back yet and it's been a while since I've posted. In late 1970 I was asked if I wanted to participate in a Fulton recovery pick up. I had seen it twice before. One was another survival instructor, I can't recall his name at this time, the other was from the recovery unit. So I was familiar with what I was being asked to do and I said yes. The following slides I put together from personal photographs and information off the web. The ground pictures were taken by Butch Poe and the photos from the recovery aircraft were taken by Tim Batrell. This system was also know as the "Skyhook". This is the patch that the crews wore on their flight suits.

PI Poker

When I first got to the PI I didn’t play poker but maybe once a week on a Friday or Saturday night several of the guys would gather in one of the hooches and there would be a game of poker. There would be five players and several others standing around watching and as one player would drop out another took his place. I watched for quite a while. Then sat in one night and enjoyed myself quite a bit. We played nickel, dime, quarter stakes and had strict rules so someone didn’t get wiped out. We played payday stakes. Someone would keep track of who owed what and who won what. Then on payday everyone would either pay what they owed or receive what they won. I’ll talk about poker later when I start writing about the jungle trips.
I think I’ll stop writing in this blog until I get my PJSS (PACAF Jungle Survival School) slides back. I lent them to Jim Root. He and Tom Lutyens are writing a book on the history of survival and Jim was looking for any pictures and information to put in the book so I lent him all of my slides. I want to put some of the pictures in this blog. So bye until I get my slides back.

PI Dangers

About the first or second night there, I was going back to my hooch and there was this Philipino guard walking around the hooches, I think that there were nine hooches. He was armed with a shot gun and wearing an insulated coat. I didn’t think anything of the shot gun but I thought why in the heck is he wearing a coat on a warm night like this. I just wasn’t acclimated yet and a year later I would understand.
Let’s talk about the guards walking around our hooches at night. When I was in the Philippines it really wasn’t a very safe place. I’ll give you some examples. They won’t be in any sort of order because I can’t remember the order.
One night I was awakened by some small arms fire. It sounded like there was some automatic weapons. The next morning I heard that some armed Pilipinos had entered a Nigrito village at the back gate to the base and killed some Nigritoes. King Alfons,king of the Nigritos, his wife and a Col. Loxamana were at a small Nigrito village in the jungle. They had spent the night there and when they got up the next morning King Alfons and his wife went down to the river to bathe. While they were gone some Philipinos armed with automatic weapons came into the village to kill King Alfons and started shooting things up. They killed Col. Loxamana and a couple of others. I was in the PI during their election. What an experience. I think their political system at the time was simple. Kill your opponent and he can’t run against you. One guy running for police chief was killed in the police station. Another gut running for something else was killed in a church. So that is why there were guards walking around the hooches. There were Communist insurgents called Huks in a small town not terribly far from the base called Tarlac. It’s kind of funny because where I work now, Joe, Jack and I interviewed a Philipino sergeant from Fairchild that was about to retire. We hired him as a environmental and safety guy. His home town was Tarlac. There were student demonstrations in Manila trying to get the Americans to leave the PI. So I think that should give you a pretty good picture of the situation there.
More later.

Jungle Survival Panama & RPI

Sometime in1969 I received orders for the Philippines. Then they got cancelled, then I got them back, then they got cancelled then I got them back. In fact that happened so many time folks started calling me “On Again Off Again Everman”. I did finally get the orders and actually went there.
That summer I went TDY to the jungle school at Howard Air Force Base, Panama. It was a good school and I learned a lot there but I thought that if conditions were the same in the PI (Philippines), I didn’t want to go. Everything in the jungle cut or stabbed you. There was black palm that had spines that stabbed you and broke off causing and infection if you didn't get it out, there was broom palm that was similar to black palm. Then it seemed most of the vines were serrated. I’m getting ahead of myself, let’s back up. I flew in to Panama City Panama and was to take a cab to the base. Imagine this, I’m 19 years old, had never been out of the US and everyone looked different. I got my luggage and stepped outside the terminal in to the evening. Humid and hot, those were the two words that instantly came to mind. There were a long line of cabs along the curb and I use the word “cab” loosely. I selected a cab whose driver didn’t look too mean. Off we went after I told him where I wanted to go. Howard AFB was a fair distance from the air port and through the country. The road was lined on each side by tall grasses that looked like sugar cane. It was getting dark and I though “holy cow I’m dead”. He did in fact take me to Howard AFB and all was good.
Class started the next day and they taught us all the basic survival skills as they relate to the jungle. I don’t remember how many were in my class but after a couple of days we headed for the jungle.
We established a static camp, had demonstration performances by the instructor on shelters, fire craft, water procurement etc. When we went to bed that night and all the rest of the nights in the jungle we used mosquito nets to sleep under. When darkness fell the mosquitoes came out. They sounded like a squadron of B-17’s flying over head all night. I did get some sleep though. Sometime during the night my bare arm laid against the mosquito netting. I must have gotten a thousand mosquito bites.
I crawled out on a mango tree over the river and picked a mango. That was my first taste of green mango. It’s like eating a granny smith apple.
We also had ethnic familiarization in the jungle. We traveled a couple of miles through the jungle to a Choco Indian village. Their homes are four feet off the ground to keep wild animals and snakes from coming in. They are made of poles and the roofs are palm fronds. The women had made us a meal like they eat. I was pretty good, rice, palm heart and other wild jungle vegetables and iguana.
We went back to the base and spent the night. Then headed for the airport. Most of us got on one flight and the rest had to wait for the next flight. We got one the airplane and it taxied to the end of the runway and we sat there for a long time. No one ever told us why. I found out later that there was some sort of political problems and when we finally took off we were the last plane to leave for awhile.

I left Fairchild for Clark Air Base The Republic of the Philippines In October of 1969. My first stop after leaving Fairchild was Travis Air Force Base. That’s where military contract overseas flights originated from. The air terminal was bustling. Everyone on their way to South East Asia was going through there, Army, Marines, Air Force and some Navy. Military contract flights were civilian airlines that were contracted by the military. My flight stopped in Hawaii. We didn’t get off the plane. Our next stop was Wake Island. There was a big battle there in WWII. I looked out the window and thought “holy cow we’ll never be able to stop on that runway”. The island is just a corral island and the runway and associated buildings took up the whole island and there wasn’t much runway. From there we landed at Clark Air Base.
When I stepped off the plane I was pleasantly surprised. It was warm but not so humid like Panama. Someone from the survival school was there in a military Jeep. It had a canvas top like on the MASH tv show. Anyway he took me to the PACAF Jungle Survival School. PACAF means pacific air force. I did all the regular things that you do when you arrive at a new station, in processing, getting a place to live for the next 15 months and meeting new people and people that you already know.
My home was a “hooch”. It had plywood sides and a screen all the way around it about four feet high. It slept four people. My bed was on the left side of the door when you came in. Actually it was divided in half by a wall across the middle. I can’t remember who I shared the hooch with right now. All the hooches had a house boy. He shined our boots and shoes, took our dirty clothes to the laundry, made our beds and cleaned our hooch. Before I was to leave the PI I realized that he was more than a house boy, he was a friend. His name was Nick Padicio. More on him later. There was a dog that stayed at the school. She was nobody’s dog. She just stayed at the school and we fed her. More on her later if I remember. I’ll post more pictures later about my PI experiences.
More later.

After Graduating From the Instructor Training Class

When I got back to Fairchild I began certification training. This was training that taught me the lessons that I would be teaching the aircrew members. Once again a lot of research and writing lesson plans. I would observe a whole class first. Then start teaching a lesson or two and after six months be teaching the whole trip.
It was great. Our instructor training class was the second class at Fairchild so there had been only a year of aircrew classes using the woods. The woods were almost untouched. We could take our crews out across the creeks and mountains and not see any signs of people except to run across an old homestead or logging camp or another crew once in a while. At that time all the crews were at least 13 men. I say men because there were no women going through the training at that time. Women did not go into combat.
Let me tell you a thirteen man crew kept you jumping both on base and in the woods. What a responsibility. I was nineteen years old and I was responsible for the health and well being of thirteen men. At that time, 1968, the class leader was a full Colonel. Sometimes some of the element leaders were full Colonels, but most of the time they were Lt. Colonels. The crews were much tougher back then. The last few years of my career they were pretty pathetic. I think life was making them soft.
Anyway, I want to tell you about one Colonel I had for an element leader. He was an older man, I don’t know how old because I was a young man then and older men looked older. He impressed me so much I never forgot him. The training was pretty hard on him. For students, there was not much food, some abandon aircraft rations like we had when we were going through training, a rabbit and some beef, potatoes and onions. The beef was to be split. Most of it went into making jerky for the trail. The rest was used for cooking with the potatoes and onions. While in static camp I taught shelter site selection first then shelter construction since that was the most time consuming for the students to do and they had to have a place to sleep that night. I demonstrated two parachute shelters. Half the element built one kind and the other half built the other. Then the next day they would tear their shelter down and build the other. Imagine watching, critiquing and helping thirteen students.
Just hang on, I’ll get back to the Col.
While in static camp I also taught food procurement, water procurement, night navigation, signaling and vectoring, talking on a radio and directing and aircraft to your position. In those days we vectored a fixed wing aircraft, I think it was called a Beaver. Col. Mosier the commander was the pilot. He evaluated the ground to air signals the students put out and dropped a food packet to the element that had the best signal.
I’m still getting to the old Col. After two days in static camp we began mobile training. The students carried everything they had in their improvised packs. I don’t know how heavy their packs were but I imagine they were at least forty pounds. Once we started this Col. never stopped except when we took a long break for instructions. He was slow and when I went back to check on him he would say he was doing just fine. When I allowed the element to take a five minute break, the Col. wouldn’t be with us. When he reached us he would tell us to get off our ass and get moving. So we did.
While on the trail I taught walking techniques, terrain recognition, map and compass work and always taking the opportunity to teach anything as it presented its self. Our trek route was maybe 5 or 6 miles and when we got into camp that evening I taught how to make evasion shelters using a poncho that they carried and camouflaging them. The squad leaders would be at the point until all the crews got in to make sure everything was ok and none of the students needed medical attention. After that they went back to the command post and we didn’t see them again until the next evening.
After finishing with the students the instructors would make a camp together. We also carried everything that we would need while on the trail. Our packs averaged 50 to 60 pounds. Some of the best times of my life were spent in those camps. To be with good friends around a campfire at night, eating, laughing and just having a good time discussing the events of the day.
The next morning we began teaching evasion lessons, camouflage, travel techniques in a hostile environment, food and water procurement in a hostile environment etc. When the students were all camouflaged we hit the trail.
While traveling in an evasion mode there should be enough distance between students that they can just make out the student in front of them and if they were to turn around the student behind them. So my element of thirteen men could stretch out two or three hundred yards, depending on the terrain and vegetation. I had to keep an eye on all of them so I was constantly moving to the front, then the back, sometimes being off at a distance just watching them to critique them later. Instructors usually traveled almost twice as far as students during mobile and evasion.
During evasion training there were opening and closing times at the points so we had to be there when the window was open. Usually it opened at twelve o’clock and closed at one. Prior to the point opening and turning our students over to AEF we divided the crew into travel teams of two or three men. Usually paring one who was good at survival skills with one who we thought would have troubles.
After we had made contact and turned the students over to the assisted evasion forces the instructors went back to the command post and showered and ate.
We went back out at mid afternoon as aggressors hunting the students. As aggressors we had a twofold purpose. Capturing those students that were doing something wrong and giving them in roll hints as to what they were doing wrong and how they should do it right. They had Evasion cards with a list of infractions and we would mark each infraction they committed and send them on their way, but most importantly we were there for the safety of the students. They all carried whistles and if they got injured or in some sort of danger they were to use the whistle to attract attention and get help. After the student’s final point for the day had closed we would have to go out searching for those students who hadn’t made it yet. That usually wasn’t too difficult but occasionally a team or two would get totally lost and sometimes it would be almost dark before someone found them. I remember one time we had to call off the search because it did get dark and it was unsafe to have instructors in the woods searching. We didn’t have helicopters then. After we got them the search was easier. We resumed the search the next morning at light and eventually found them.
The final point for the students was usually a fun place to be. In the early days whoever was running the final point in the winter would get a big fire going and put on a garbage can of water to heat. It was a special garbage can that was only used for that purpose. When the water was hot we dumped a lot of coco mix in so the students could warm their insides and outsides. It was fun standing around listening to them talk about their experiences. Then as your students came in you could go over and talk to them and see how they did.
When everyone was in the buses were loaded and the instructors loaded up in their trucks and we all went back to the base.
Many times, back then, the students would ask you out to dinner that night. It was always a good time. I’m not sure that that happens now.

Later on I’ll reminisce about some things that occurred in the field and things that I thought about but for now let’s continue forward.

Teaching Tech/Desert Survival

I think that our next training phase was teaching techniques. I didn’t care much for that. It was pretty boring. On base we had to research a list of survival topics and write lesson plans. It took a long time because it seemed that the lesson plans were never good enough. Then we practice taught to our classmates then went to the woods with the regular survival students and taught some classes while in the woods. I think that the most memorable thing for me during teaching tech. occurred in the field. One of the lessons that I did was food procurement. I talked about plant foods, traps and snares and fishing techniques then showed the students some fishing techniques for small rivers and streams and told them to take two hours and go fishing. Then I sat around and talked with Pete Kummerfledt, the main instructor of the crew. One of the students came back and said he had caught a fish and he showed it to me. It was a pretty nice fish. He asked me what he should do with it now and I told him to clean it. He stood there for a short while then said “how”. That is when I realized that just because you know something because of your life experiences, doesn’t mean that everyone else knows the same thing. As it turned out he was a city kid and had never been fishing before. Thank goodness teaching tech. was finally over.
The last phase we had was desert survival. On base we had the academic portion where we learned the ins and outs of desert survival and made the improvised gear that we would need for the field. The field portion was conducted out around Moses Lake somewhere. This was the first part of June 1968. Weather conditions have changed quite a bit since then. It was hot out there. We built shade shelters, solar stills, did some navigation work and laid around a lot during the day. Most of the work was done at night.
Hurray, it was finally graduation day. We had guest speakers and all received diplomas and told what flight we were assigned to. Then it was over. Just about everyone took leave and went home. I went home for a week. It was very nice being home after six months of intense training.

Rivers and Rafting/Sea Shore

Rivers and rafting and coastal survival, what fun. We did the two weeks of academics before going to the river. We learned about river travel in one man rafts, seven man rafts and improvised rafts. They taught us food and water procurement in temperate zones and on coastal areas, shelters and fire craft.
We were loaded onto a commercial type bus. Our equipment packed away on a big truck. We went to the Nehalem River. Where we got off I haven’t a clue. The class was split in two. Half went to the Tillamook Spit for coastal and we went to the river. After a week we swapped. The river was so much fun. We did all the basic survival stuff so I won’t bore you with that. I’ll just tell you about some memorable times.
The weather on the river was rain off and on. There was very little sunshine, but it didn’t matter, we had a great time. The first day I was floating down the river in a one man raft. Laying on my back in an anti exposure suit with a light rain hitting me in the face. It was so nice and quiet. Some how some of the guys in my element met this older fellow, I think they went ashore and bumped into him. They explained what they were doing on the river and he said that he had wild meat in his freezer from the last season that he had to get rid of so he would have room in his freezer for the anticipated meat from the coming hunting season. If someone would come by his place he would put some of it in the mail box that evening. A couple of the guys went back that evening and he had put some meat, potatoes and bread in the mail box. While the guys were gone I fixed up a couple of spits for the meat. We cooked the meat and potatoes that night. Sure was good.
While on the river we got to do a little white water rafting in the one man raft and the four man raft. One of the elements had made a wilderness raft and went through the rapids with that. We also practiced river crossings by building bull boats and putting our equipment in it then pushing it ahead of us as we swam behind it.
After five days on the river we swapped places with the other group and went to the Tillamook Spit for coastal survival training. The first evening we were there we went out into the bay at low tide and gathered oysters. Let me tell you, I wasn’t looking forward to eating raw oysters. The only experience I had with raw oysters was in Chicago when I was a little kid. My Mom and Dad, sister and I went to my Uncle Duane’s house for a family gathering. He had some raw oysters on the half shell. He told me I should try one, I would really like it. So I did and I didn’t like that slimy little thing. Well while we were out in the bay gathering oysters the instructor gave us each an oyster. Then he demonstrated how to open it and loosen and slide it right out of the shell and into our mouths. Now it was our turn. I swear he gave me the biggest oyster in the world. I wasn’t about to be out done by the other guys, so I opened it, loosened it and slid it into my mouth. There was barely room in my mouth for the oyster. Thought I was going to choke. I chewed it up and swallowed it. It was pretty good. I’ve liked oysters since then.
While on the spit we dug beach wells for water, made shelters, practiced beach landings in the one man and four man rafts. We made crab rings and went crabbing, ate lots of oysters and clams, we were picked up out of the water by a helicopter and we had a tour and lecture of the Coast Guard facility in Tillamook.
We also spent an afternoon and night on a 20 man raft in the bay. We had the cover up so the wind didn’t cause us any problems but the floor of the raft just didn’t stop the cold from the water. We removed our LPU’s (PFD’s) and sat on them which was a big no no, and that helped keep our butts warmer. I wasn’t affected by the wave motion but some of the others were and they were up all night leaning over the edge of the raft giving the old heave ho.

On the way back to the base the bus stopped at a store so we could buy something to eat. Almost all of us wanted peanut butter and jelly sandwiches.

Escape and Evasion

Our next block of training was, I think, resistance and evasion training. We had academics on base where we recieved Code Of Conduct training. I don’t recall how long it was but it was at least a week, maybe longer. We were paired up in travel teams and we worked on getting our equipment prepared. Some of it was improvised equipment, pack straps, water bag carriers and some of the equipment we had made for familiarization. I was paired up with Scott Ernsberger. He was a tall slender guy similar to me. Later he married the daughter of Liz and Phillip Chapman, who we had met some time during training through another classmate. He was dating her. Scott and Barbara had a couple of children. I’m not sure how long they were married before Scott killed himself, several years though. Any way the class got on the bus and off to the field we went. We went to the LPO again. By the time we got to the field all the snow was gone. The first couple of days was spent learning about evasion camps. My element set one up and stayed in camp a couple of days learning such things as, evasion shelters, food and water procurement in a hostile environment, signaling in a hostile environment, map and compass work and evasion travel.
After a couple of days in a camp we headed out on evasion travel with the instructors. This went on for two days. We learned and practiced travel techniques, travel interval, being quite and keeping our eyes open. The evening of the second day we made a cold camp and evasion shelters. Our element was well spread out. I really can’t remember where the others in my element had placed their shelters or what they looked like. I was too preoccupied with making my own. It was just a tree that had fallen over, not quite on the ground. Tree limbs had fallen on top of the trunk and bushes were growing on each side. I just wove my poncho through the limbs to cover me and keep the cold and dampness off of me and rolled out my sleeping bag. By this time it was dark so I went to bed. I was very tired so I soon fell asleep.
I was awakened some time during the night, I don’t know what time, by a lot of shooting and explosions and people screaming. The aggressors had hit the camp. I could hear them screaming at my classmates whenever they found one. Boy, they sure found a lot of them. I stayed so still. I was afraid they would find me. I could hear them looking for me, saying “I know he’s here somewhere”. The raid lasted a long time. Eventually they went away and I was able to go back to sleep. I didn’t think it was safe to get out and see who was left so I waited until morning. I don’t know how Scott did it but he wasn’t captured either. We had the coordinates for the mid point so we took off. At the mid point we would get the coordinates for the point for that night and so it went for three days and nights. Later I would hear stories about those that were captured.
The night before the final point was at what we called the chimney. It was the chimney and foundation of a structure that had burned to the ground. We must have entered into an evasion net because we were allowed to have a fire and there were more of us present. Someone had killed a porcupine and we roasted it and ate it. It was the first time I had eaten porcupine. It sure was good.
The next morning Scott and I were off again, evading to the final point where the busses were to pick us up. When we got there about half of the class was already there. We all smoked and talked about out experiences while waiting for the rest of our classmates to come in.
Finally we were all gathered and the busses pulled up and we were loaded on and went back to the base. We were all in high spirits and talked a lot the first half of the trip back. By the time we arrived in Spokane we were all asleep I’m sure. We had all made it, we thought.
On Rambo road a truck pulled out in front of the bus and the bus driver had to slam on his brakes. Men with guns forced their way onto the bus screaming at us, telling us to put our heads down and shut up.
They threw cloth bags at each of us telling us to put them on our heads and to keep our heads down. Then we were driven to the resistance training camp where we spent the next three days.
Fast forward to repatriation three days later. We got back to our rooms and cleaned up. The hot shower felt wonderful. Then it was downtown to eat. We didn’t order quite as much food as the last time though.

My Recollections of Life After Granduation (Survival Training)

All too soon it was time to board a plane and fly up to Spokane. This was late December 1967. I remember getting into Spokane airport; it wasn’t an international airport at that time, late at night, 11 or 12 at night. I took a cab to the survival school. That year was a snowy winter and going through Airway Heights the snow had been piled up between the east and west lanes I swear eight feet or more. It stayed that way most of the winter. The cab pulled up in front of the headquarters building where the CQ was and I reported in to him. I don’t remember who it was. After all I was in a strange place, late at night and I didn’t know what to expect the future to be like. Anyway I was assigned to a room and away I went, carrying my duffel bag. That walk will remain in my memory until the end of my days. My barracks was on the opposite end of the quadrangle from the headquarters building. All was quiet, it was cold, and lots of snow on the ground the night sky was black as ink, the lights along the sidewalk were on and it was so quiet and still. It was wonderful. I remember getting to my room on the second floor and the lights were off. I could hear someone sleeping in one of the bunks. The upper bunk was empty so that was were I slept for the next six plus months. It was very warm in the room, perhaps, too warm which along with the noise of the heater blower coming on, made it difficult to get to sleep.
The next morning upon awakening, I discovered that I had two roommates, Ron Spaulding and Nick Tuttle. The CQ. hadn’t given any of us any instructions except that someone would come and get us. We didn’t go to the chow hall and were afraid to go to the bathroom for fear that we would not be there when someone came. Someone finally came late in the day and was upset. The CQ. should have told us to report to the First Sgt. Anyway, our class wouldn’t be starting until after the first of the year and it was now three or four days until Christmas so we were to report to the First Sgt. He would handle us until the class started. We did odd jobs around the school, cleaning, painting, shoveling the walks etc.
We found out that at the recreation center on base there would be a magic show on Christmas Eve, so we decided to attend. We had no trouble getting a ride to the base. You have to keep in mind that young folks just didn’t have cars like they do today. We had a nice time with snacks and the show. The show was over about 11:00 p.m. We got a ride from the rec. center to Rambo Road from someone going into town. From US-2 and Rambo Road there was no traffic. We walked all of the way to the survival school. We really weren’t dressed for it and it was cold but it was a nice walk. It gave us an opportunity to get to know each other better.
Class finally began the first week in January 1968. We had four weeks of academic classes. We were taught basic survival skills in preparation for two weeks of familiarization training, where we would put what we learned in the classroom to use. We went to the Little Pend Oreille game preserve. The static camp I was in was in a cold sump. Boy was it cold. We each built several different shelters in the two weeks. The first one was a parachute teepee. It was nice. There was two in each teepee, we each made a nice thick bough bed and there was plenty of room to stand up and get dressed if we wanted to but it was so cold in the mornings that we dressed in our sleeping bags. We practiced food and water procurement, food preservation, improvisation, signaling and vectoring and I’m sure there was a lot more thrown at us. One evening we all hiked to the game preserve rangers house Mr. Ted Hay and he gave a slide presentation on the wildlife and plant life found in the preserve. After the presentation we hiked back to camp. I should mention that there were 41 of us in the class. The night was cold and clear and we were in good spirits. We sang songs as we hiked along the snow covered road. We got back to camp and went to bed. About an hour later we were rudely awakened and told to assemble at the brown house where the instructors were staying. Something had happened while at the rangers house or along the way back that displeased the instructors. To this day I’m not sure what it was. Anyway we were made to chip ice off the road leading to the brown house. The only thing we had were entrenching tools. Picture this, forty one men bent over using entrenching tools to chip ice all night long. We broke several of those shovels. It was too cold to lay down for awhile and the next day we were to hike to the top of Black Tail Mountain to begin arctic training. The first day was spent cutting snow blocks and making one man shelters for the night. Believe it or not the snow was deep and in good condition for cutting the snow blocks. We put in bough beds and by that time it was time to eat and go to bed. The next morning after breakfast we began making a large shelter using parachute material and snow blocks. It was large in diameter, the same diameter as a parachute, with snow block walls and a center snow block pillar to support the center of the parachute. We put in a bough bed over the entire floor. We spent four days there, practicing signaling, fire craft etc. When we were done we hiked down the mountain, got on a bus and headed for the base.
We had been gone for almost three weeks. The food we were eating was called “abandon aircraft rations”. Here is a brief description of what they were like. I want you to know because we ate a lot of them in upcoming field training. It was a rather flat can that contained three pemmican bars. The pemmican bars were dehydrated ground beef packed in a rectangular shape and held together by some kind of grease. They were hard and most times we ate them just as they came out of the package. There were little packages of onion powder and some kind of other powder. I guess that was an attempt to make them palatable. Didn’t work, but when your hungry anything can taste good. There were also a couple of cereal bars. They were like corn flakes, crushed and compacted into a bar with sugar and held together who knows what. There was also a fruitcake bar. It wasn’t too bad. Coffee, tea, sugar and powdered cream rounded out the menu. We did have some rabbits and potatoes also. When we got back to the base we were some pretty hungry puppies.
I tell you all this so you’ll understand what I am about to say.
Coming back in the buses we drove down Division St. and there were all kinds of restaurants, although not as many as there are now, as we passed each one comments were made on the food that we could eat there.
As soon as we got our equipment and ourselves cleaned up we went downtown. There were five of us. Denny’s restaurant on Second was the place we chose to eat. We ordered so much food the waitress asked if we were expecting friends. It was a lot of food all right but we ate it all. We managed to get back to the survival school and fall into the bed exhausted. Some time during the night a few of us lost about all that we had eaten.

My Recollections of Life After Graduation (Cont).

The recruiter called me in early October. I was to be at the bus station the morning of the 16th of October. I was there at the appointed time along with a few other guys. We took U.S. 101 to Los Angles. We had to go over a little pass at Camarillo and the hillsides were on fire on both side of the interstate. No premonition there. The hills were just on fire.
When we got to the induction center in Los Angles there were some Marine guards there and they escorted us into the induction center. We had to step over war protestors that were lying on the sidewalks.
After we got done with all the poking and prodding, coughing bending over and raising our hand and getting sworn in, we were loaded on the bus again and taken to the Los Angles air port. I called home to tell my mother that I was on my way to Lackland AFB in Texas for boot camp. She told me that I had gotten a letter that day from the draft board. I told her not to open it and to send it back explaining that I had already been sworn into the Air Force.
We flew into San Antonio Texas, arriving there quite late. After deplaning we were herded to a waiting area where there were other young men from other parts of the nation. An Air Force sergeant then introduced himself and told us to get outside and get on the bus. He wasn’t screaming but he sure wasn’t talking quietly and being polite. It was our introduction to how we would be spoken to and treated for the next eight weeks. A lot of name calling, cussing and yelling, but we were all so terrified that we hardly noticed. It didn’t take us long to get on the bus. We didn’t have any luggage to wait for since Uncle Sam was going to provide us with everything that we would need, even haircuts. I couldn’t even begin to tell you what the trip from the airport to Lackland AFB was like because it was like being in a bad dream, only I didn’t wake up.
When we arrived at Lackland it was in the wee hours of the morning and there were three more sergeants waiting for us. They came on the bus like Tasmanian Wildcats, screaming cussing and calling us all manner of names and if we didn’t get our young asses of this bus in one minute we’d have hell to pay. We couldn’t get off that bus quick enough. With all the tripping over each other and trying to be the first off the bus it was a wonder there weren’t some serious injuries. The TI’s (training instructors) then took five minutes to try to whip us into some semblance of order and we were marched into a chow hall for an early breakfast. Let me tell you it wasn’t a leisurely breakfast either. After breakfast, it was down the street we went to our barracks and our home for the next eight weeks.
I think it was two or three o’clock in the morning when we got to the barracks and told to grab a bunk and get to sleep. Five o’clock came awfully early to us tired puppies but time keeps moving and five o’clock arrived whether we wanted it to or not. God what a rude awakening. Our TI came in screaming at us to get up and get dressed. We couldn’t move fast enough for him. He was in our faces screaming to move faster, belittling us, cussing at us, making us feel lower than low. We did manage to get outside without serious injury and into a formation that we remembered from the night before and off we went.
The TI was strutting beside the flight, chest out, Smoky the bear hat cocked slightly forward and yelling, cussing and feeling right with the world. I would have said standing tall also but he was a short man with a Napoleon complex. The first stop was the barbershop. I want you to remember that this was the “60s”, the decade of the longhair hippies, not me of course. We all stood in line and moved up five at a time, that’s how many chairs they had. Longhair hippies went in and bald boys came out. The process of making us all the same had begun.
After our haircuts we were marched to supply and I use the term marched loosely, after all we been at boot camp only a few hours, what the heck did we know? At supply we got our all the clothing we would need as far as Uncle Sam was concerned. We got three different kinds of footwear; we got boxer shorts and undershirts, three sets of fatigues, two sets of 1505’s and a set of dress blues. We also got the hats belts and accoutrements to go along with the uniforms. Oh, way back at the beginning of the line we receive a duffel bag to put it all in. We were flat loaded down.
As we marched back to the barracks to begin learning everything we ever wanted to know about Airforce life, we were passed by flights in various stages of boot camp. They were all singing while they marched “Here we go again marching down the avenue, here we go again six more weeks and we’ll be through”, or five weeks or three weeks. Whatever week or training they were in. I remember thinking, would I ever be singing that also. Didn’t seem like it. It seemed so far away.
Once back at the barracks we received so much information my head hurt and I didn’t think that I would ever remember it all. How to pack my footlocker, how to make my bed. The beds had to be made just so. There was no closet, just a rack to hang my uniforms on and by god they had better be hanging right or the you know what will hit the fan. There could be no inspection tags in the pockets. In later inspections those darned little tags kept showing up in our uniforms. We all suspected that the inspectors carried a hand full of them and put them in our uniforms. Latrines had to be cleaned every morning before breakfast. The floors, toilets, sinks, showers, everything had to be cleaned just so. No margin for error or the fan gets hit again. Everything from our civilian lives was put away in a locker in the TI’s room. Not to be used or seen for the next eight weeks.
In the next eight weeks we’d be inspected time and time again. Once the TI didn’t like the way one of the guys had packed his footlocker. He grabbed it up and gave it the old heave ho and down the aisle it went. The back door was open and lucky for it that it was. The footlocker slid down the aisle and out the door and into the street. The guy had five minutes to get it back where it belonged and packed correctly. It made a heck of a mess of the floor. As time passed things began to improve and we began to see that the TI’s were actually human after all. All flights had two TIs, the flight TI and the assistant flight TI. Our flight TI was a big man but he didn’t look as mean as he let on. Our assistant TI was the little guy that I mentioned earlier. One night he had CQ. He called the barracks and told whoever answered to go over to the chow hall and see this particular guy. Two guys went and came back with a whole big pan of peanut butter cookies. We were told to have the pan back before lights out. That was no problem, we made them disappear in a hurry. After that we started thinking that he was all right but he still rode us hard.
We had all manner of classes that are to boring to tell you about so I won’t. Every Sunday everyone had the opportunity to go to church. Everyone went even if they weren’t particularly religious because it got them away from the barracks and we could smoke after services.
We didn’t get any privileges at all for two weeks. Then we got a base pass. We could go anywhere on the base. As I look back on it now I don’t see how it is possible to spend as much time as we did in the Base Exchange. What the heck at least it wasn’t at the barracks.
The most memorable occasion was when we went to see about what AF jobs we could get. They went through all the jobs that the AF needed people for. Like avionics, electricians, motor pool stuff, administration and on and on. Oh, yes, there was also security police. The last people to get up were survival people. They gave a little talk and it sounded interesting. Anyone who was interested should see them after our group was dismissed. I went to see them as soon as we were dismissed and they gave me a pass to come back that night after chow.
That night they gave a slide presentation about the survival career field. Anyone, who was still interested, stick around the rest were to return to their barracks. Those of us who stayed were to give impromptu speeches about ourselves. When we were all done we were told to go back to our barracks and we would be notified in a week. A week seemed like a lifetime. We had heard that the security police were taking a lot of people because they were needed in Vietnam. Damn, I came into the AF to avoid to that place. I remember having dorm guard once when everyone else was gone. A week later I got notified that I had been accepted. By the way Paul Green was there that night, he was also accepted. I felt so good. I was guaranteed a shot at survival. I knew where I was going after boot camp. No one else did until a week later. There was a map of the U.S. hanging on the front wall and I would stand in front of it and stare at Spokane WA.
Seventy percent of my flight went to security police and most of them went in country. That’s Vietnam. We still had a lot of training to do. We went to the firing range and most of us qualified on the M-16 rifle. Some of those boys couldn’t hit their butts with both hands. Then off to the obstacle course. That was an all day affair. Swinging on ropes across water, climbing ropes on walls, crawling on our stomachs under barbed wire. We even put on gas masks and went through a building with tear gas in it. That was the hardest for me. You know how I am about things over my nose and mouth.
At any rate soon we found ourselves marching down the avenue on our way to the graduation ceremony singing “One more day and we’ll be through”. My Mom and Dad had come for the ceremony. We marched out onto the parade grounds with all the other flights. It was a glorious day. The sun was shining; the Air Force band was playing marches by John Philip Sousa. They played the Air Force Song as we all marched to position and halted. Then the National Anthem was played. I was so proud to be a part of the US military. I got very choked up. I still get choked up when the national anthem is played. What a glorious day it was.
After graduation was over we marched off the parade grounds and back to the barracks to prepare for departure the next day. Morning came and we got on buses, headed for the airport, got on respective airplanes and went on our way. I never saw any of my classmates again. I was on a plane headed home for two weeks.
For two weeks I relaxed and enjoyed myself. Visited with friends, although many of them had gone into the service and weren’t home. Spent some time at the beach and driving in the mountains.

Just recollections

I'll throw in a little something every once in a while, that pops into my mind, like:

I remember my Dad telling me that when he was dating my Mother they would go out for the evening dancing. This was in Chicago, he was born in Chicago, my Mother was born in Lone Rock Wisconsin. They would dance to the Big Bands, Glenn Miller, Woody Herman and a host of others. He was so fond of the big band music and classical music.

Believe it or not, my Grandmother Grace, my fathers mother dated Al Capone a couple of times. This was before he became notorious.

More later.

Goodnight

My recollection of life after graduation

I thought that I should write some things down and post them on this blog so all my children and grandchildren would have access to them. As I will write later, I did not have the foresight to really quiz my father about his life and when he passed away I lost the ability of getting answers to my questions. I want my loved ones to know a little about me, things that perhaps we have not talked about.

There will be many posts and each will be titled "My recollections of life after graduation". So keep coming back.

I graduated from Hueneme High School in June of “66”. At the time I was working at a Sears and Roebuck store in Ventura California.
I don’t remember exactly when I did what but at some point, I think in late summer of “66” I decided to quit work at Sears and go back east to work for my Uncle Ralph. My Uncle Ralph owned a Standard gas station in Richland Center Wisconsin. Richland center was a small farming community. I think it epitomized the small mid western town. There were a few cars but mostly farm trucks, fairly old farm trucks. Richland Center was not a rich community. There were old farmers with their old wives strolling around town on Saturdays and going to church on Sundays. They all had quite a few farmer kids to help with the chores. There was not very much music being played on the radios in town because the whole darned town was listening to high school baseball, major league baseball or something about politics. The streets were all lined with deciduous trees, milk cows were chewing their cud’s in the fields outside of town and the milk trucks were delivering milk from the farms to the processing plants in town. The whole feeling about the town was something very difficult to describe to someone who has never experienced it. It was a feeling of extreme peace; all was right with the world. I am so glad that I could experience it. I will never experience it again. A car full of girls would stop at the gas station and I would go out and they would say “ 25 cents worth of regular please”. I would pump it and they would be on their way. Probably couldn’t get a hundred yards down the street on 25 cents these days. There was a cheese factory in Richland Center and they made cheddar cheese there. My Aunt Dorothy brought back some cheese one day that she called “old cheese”. It was a very sharp cheddar. I doubt that you have ever tasted cheese as sharp as that.
Richland Center was a dry town. There were no bars in town and if you wanted to buy beer or wine you had to go outside the city limits. There were two or three bars just outside of town.
I went back to California in the late fall. Took a Grey Hound bus that’s how I got to Wisconsin also. What a trip. Somewhere in Nebraska six or seven Army grunts got on the bus, on their way to Travis Air Force Base where they would catch a military airplane to Vietnam. By the time we got to Salt Lake City Utah they were all gone. Went AWOL. That trip back to California was so memorable. There were several young folks on the bus and a couple of them had guitars. We all sat in the back of the bus and sang songs for hours. When we got to Salt Lake City we all split up. It seems no one was going to the same place. One to Pocatello Idaho, one to Reno Nevada, one to Seattle and me to Port Hueneme California.
When I got back home I went to work at a retail store called W.T. Grants. It was like a department store. It wasn’t open yet and I helped prepare it for its grand opening and stayed on after it opened and worked in the stockroom. I worked there through the winter and into the summer of “67”. I worked with a Spanish fellow there by the name of Tebercio Vasquez we called him Tip for short. He was a very nice fellow. We were about the same age. Towards the end of summer he quit and went back to his home in Topeka Kansas.
I began worrying about the draft. I had a friend named Mike Staggs. We discussed the draft and he decided to join the Army. I thought about it some and then decline and went instead to the Air Force recruiter. I did all the testing and paperwork. At that time there was a waiting list for the Air Force and they wouldn’t take me at that time. I explained that I was worried about the draft. He said that since my father had retired from the Air Force they would take care of me. If I got a letter from the draft board I was not to open it. I was to come right down to the recruiting office. My dad was a little disapointed that I chose the Air Force. He had started out in the Army and had been a machine gunner during WWII. He didn't get to see any action though. Maybe that was lucky for me, my children and my grand children.

I figured now was a good time to go to Chicago and visit some relatives that I didn’t see the summer before. Back to the Grey Hound bus station I went and bought a ticket to Chicago by way of Topeka Kansas I had gotten a letter from Tip inviting me to his wedding. His family was wonderful. A Spanish wedding is a wonderful event. There was good food, wonderful music, lots of dancing and everyone treated me as though they had known me for years. The trip to Chicago and back wasn’t nearly as memorable as the year before. I stayed with my Aunt Helen. Actually she was my great aunt. She was my mother’s aunt, my mother’s mother’s sister. She was who my mother was living with when my father met her. I don’t remember how long I stayed in Chicago but I was back in California by late September.

First day on the blog

It's late. Just wanted to post something to make an official presence.