Regional Accents

For ten years, beginning with the day I entered the Army, I was part of a tossed salad of men of different backgrounds. Among those in their first - perhaps only - hitch there were enlistees and draftees, the latter being older as a class, and sometimes already established in their chosen professions. There were hustlers and slackers, guys who were friendly or remote, rednecks, hillbillies, optimists and pessimists, fast learners and slow learners, cowboys and city slickers, whites, blacks, Hispanics, and even a handful of Asians.

Prior to enlisting I had only set foot in Maine, New Hampshire, and Massachusetts. New Jersey, where I was sent for basic training, had existed only in books, movies, and geography classes. At seventeen I was provided with a whole new view of the population. In some cases differences in speech were much more striking than differences in appearance due to race.

For me the most difficult accents to understand were those of the Hispanics. The problem went away, but was fairly severe initially. (Here I might mention that my platoon sergeant in basic training was Puerto Rican, career infantry. He soon learned that I had enlisted for "Armor, Europe," and every morning greeted me with "Hendricks, djoo gonna *die* in a tank.")

I had a broad New England accent, which presented others with problems. The first time we were provided with an uncheduled period and were free to do whatever we desired (within the barracks), a number of guys broke out decks of cards and played poker, pinochle, spades, and other games. I asked several men whether they wanted to play hahts. Despite asking me about the game, none knew what I was talking about until I said "You know, the game where you try to avoid taking hahts or the queen of spades."

"Ohhhh, hearts."

*****

In Vilseck, Germany, we had a Brooklynite, nicknamed Smitty. He was occasionally teased about his accent, which he accepted with good humor. One friend, Vernon, used to quote an imaginary conversation with Smitty:

"Listen to da boids."

"Those aren't boids, Smitty, those are birds."

"Chee, dey coitainly choip like boids."

*****

Thrown in with a large group of strangers, most of us are chameleons to one extent or another. During ten years in the Army I lost most of my Boston accent. Most. When I got home my mother told me I sounded like a stranger, but every once in a while I say something with a hint of the old accent, and I can actually hear myself doing it.

GI's and German Women

Okay, now I can imagine stepping on some toes with this one, so I want to be crystal clear about this: I am not trashing Germany or German women. I spent four and a half years in Germany, and loved it. I've had several German girlfriends - in Germany - and was even engaged to one. And my best friend in Germany married a German girl nearly forty-five years ago and they are still happily married.

This post is about certain types of soldiers I knew, and their attraction to a particular subset of German women - women who wanted to marry an American for whatever material benefits might come of it. Many German women have married American soldiers, have raised families with them, and have maintained good and lasting marriages. This post is not about them.

Okay? Okay.

Although I have known a few, I'll list only a couple of the GI's I knew who married German women for the wrong reasons. The primary reason in both cases - this is going to be difficult to believe for those of you who have not been in the military and stationed overseas - was to get out of the barracks. Yes. It. Was.

And they are not the only ones to have felt that way. I knew others who often said that if they could find the "right" woman they would get married to get out of the barracks. Either they had criteria at least slightly more stringent or they just got lucky, for they did not marry while I knew them.

This is pretty shallow, right? You prefer "stupid?" Okay, this is pretty stupid, right? So why did (does?) it happen?

Well, the first thing you have to know is that for the most part these were young GI's, say ages eighteen to twenty-two. In many cases this was the first time they had left home for any significant period of time and the first time they had not been subjected daily to the guidance of parents. They were all (in my experience) volunteers, not draftees. I don't know what they thought life in the Army was going to be like, but suspect that the thought of discipline was no part of their daydreams. If they enlisted in order to be "on their own," well, they weren't. They were no longer subject to parental discipline but they were not one hundred percent free, either.

Objectively, barracks life in the two companies I experienced in Germany was not at all bad, but there were definite rules. There was a time by which you had to be out of bed, six days a week. There was a time you had to be in bed, seven days a week, unless you were on some kind of authorized absence. Beds had to be made, rooms kept clean and neat, floors waxed and buffed, rooms inspected - in one case daily, in another case weekly - and rooms, personal gear, and field gear inspected monthly. You might be in a four or six man room, possibly with one or more people you didn't care for, but a minimum of courtesy made this a trivial matter.

But there were a small number of soldiers on whom this life positively grated, and a few were determined to avoid it at all costs. For an enlisted man there were only three non-criminal alternatives:

1. Serve your time and get out of the Army. Alas, this did not solve the problem for the time you still had to serve.
   
   
2. Earn enough promotions so that you were entitled to a private room. This was very difficult to do in one hitch of three years, and would solve the problem only at the very end of its duration.
   
   
3. Get married, thus earning authorization to move out of the barracks and in with your new wife.

As you already know, this post is about those who chose option 3.

The pool of women willing to marry such misfits was generally limited to women who worked in bars not too far from American posts. They worked there largely because it gave them access to the kind of man they were looking for. That was not true for all women who worked in these bars, but we're honing in on the ones for whom it was true.

• The first case was actually a second enlistment GI, a not very well educated country boy who was on his first foreign tour. He openly bragged that he was going to find a woman and marry her and not have to live in the barracks any longer. He found one in a little town called Schlicht, quickly put a ring on her finger and even more quickly reached the point where he should have regretted it, but didn't. He was not the sharpest knife in the drawer, and would smile ruefully about catching her in bed with another man the night before their wedding, and asking her, "Now, Honey, you're not going to do this any more after we get married, right?"
  
  Soon after he got married and moved off post I lost track of him, as I transferred from Vilseck to Grafenwoehr.
  
  But, still in Grafenwoehr a couple of years later, I ran into him again. He had rotated back to the US, spent a year or so there, and was back in Germany. The first thing he said to me was, "Have you saw my wife?" He then explained that after she got her first Army allotment check - at that time it was mandatory for enlisted men to send various amounts of money to their spouses unless they were living in government housing - she abandoned him, sent the Army a change of address, and simply kept receiving and cashing the allotment checks, the only reason she had married him in the first place. Ironically, the Army would not provide him with her address.
  
  
• The second case was a young man, perhaps 21 - a critical age, because if you were under 21 the Army required parental approval prior to your marriage. He too bragged that he would find a girl and "get out of the barracks." He found one, proposed and was accepted, bought rings and had them fitted, but before they married he too caught her cheating. He managed to get the engagement ring back, kept the set, and went looking for a girl with the same ring size!
  
  He found one within a couple of weeks and married her. I have no idea how it worked out as my tour of Germany came to an end soon thereafter. Anything can happen, but I am rather skeptical about his long term happiness with her.

I do not provide these as examples of a large problem -it wasn't. Nor do I have solutions for the small problem it actually was. I suspect there are no solutions that are not unjustifiably burdensome on those who are "real" adults and wish to marry for more conventional reasons. I posted this because I thought it was interesting and because I'd bet a lot of money that many of you never dreamed that people could be so irrational for such a reason.

Stealing From the Slots

While I was stationed in Vilseck, Germany, a scandal broke. Several NCO's who supplemented their income by working part time at the Enlisted Men's Club were adding to those supplements by stealing. I believe the position title each held was "Master at Arms" and I'll call them MA's, but in any case their duties included keeping order in the club and paying slot machine winners.

In order to collect a jackpot you had to complete a form which listed your name, rank, service number and organization, and some information about the machine involved and the jackpot amount. The stealing was accomplished by forging such slips and taking the money from the EM Club funds. I don't know what triggered an investigation by the CID (the Army's Criminal Investigation Division), and can only speculate that someone noticed that the profits from the club's slot machines were not what they should have been. I did hear that the investigation revealed some name and service number combinations that didn't exist.

I was interviewed by two CID members in civilian clothing, a Warrant Officer named Smith - I was told that he was the ranking Warrant Officer in the Army - and an enlisted man whose name I do not recall. He played the heavy, sort of, while Mr. Smith mostly just sat back and listened. The interview occurred because during the time the NCO's were stealing I had won three $37.50 jackpots on the same machine in perhaps fifteen minutes. Naturally, this raised a red flag during the CID's investigation of jackpot payouts.

During the interview it was easy for me to recall the details of that night, as I virtually never went to the EM Club. But one of my friends had suggested a group of us go and six or seven of us did. One of them lost ten or fifteen dollars on a machine and gave up. I stepped in and he watched as I hit it several times. I remember his sarcastically humorous remark to me regarding how lucky he was to be watching me win.

The CID EM brought up the matter of the three jackpots and suggested rather ominously that the slot machines "just don't hit like that." I disagreed. He asked for the names of any witnesses and I was pleased that I could give him a half dozen.

The MA who processed all three of my jackpots was named Kohser (real name here, as it's all a matter of public record somewhere) and being a little annoyed with the EM interviewer I added Kohser's name as a witness to my wins. The EM was not amused.

He asked me how many $37.50 jackpots I had won at the club in all the times I had been there and I told him there were only those three. He then asked how many $75.00 jackpots I had won and I said, "I've never won a $75.00 jackpot in my life."

Mr. Smith came to life: "What did you say?" I repeated my statement.

Presumably, the CID checked with my witnesses, and I was never contacted about the matter again. Kohser was granted immunity in return for testimony against the others (ironic because it was my understanding that he had conceived the scheme and was the ringleader, but that is definitely second hand information), the others were court-martialed and reduced one grade in rank.

From the time they were charged I never again saw any of the NCO's. After the courts-martial they were all transferred.

End of story? Not quite. Years later - I don't know how many, but certainly twenty or more - the situation popped into my mind along with the memory of going to the EM club one afternoon while searching for someone. I was probably only there ten minutes, nine of them because I was approached by SFC Rogers (yup, one of them) with a sob story about how he had been fooling around on a slot machine and had hit a $75.00 jackpot that he couldn't collect because the MA's weren't supposed to play them. Would I sign a claim for the money?

I felt sorry for him (I was that naive at age twenty) and agreed. He tried to give me ten dollars but I thanked him and told him "It's your money" and that I didn't want it. He insisted to the point where it would have been rude to continue to refuse and I took the money and promptly forgot about the whole thing.

The CID certainly had seen the claim slip with my signature, as evidenced by Mr. Smith's attentiveness when I said I had never won a $75.00 jackpot. I can only surmise that they must have grilled the NCO's under investigation, with particular attention to SFC Rogers (who had approved the claim), been told the truth, and believed it. Even so, I could have been busted for the clearly illegal act of signing a false claim, but they were after bigger fish.

Close call, that.

Meeting Elvis

I met Elvis Presley early in 1960. I would not have been able to place the date so precisely, but I recall that he was already a buck sergeant, and he was discharged from the Army a couple of months after that promotion (thank you, Google).

I had been a tank crewman, had come down with pneumonia three times in a little over a year, and as a result got kicked indoors. I was now a company clerk in Vilseck, Germany, at the 7th Army Training Center.

One day I took a call from the NCO in charge of our 2nd echelon maintenance - an area that did vehicle repairs that were more than just basic stuff. He said that Elvis Presley and a staff sergeant were there. They'd arrived with a jeep that had a problem and asked for some help. The repairs would take a couple of hours and Elvis had asked if they might take a shower somewhere, as they'd been in the field several weeks.

I talked to the First Sergeant who told me to direct them to building 301, a barracks building, and to meet them there. (Building 301 was one of four such buildings in a quadrangle, each cleaned by a putzfrau five days a week. These were middle-aged German women hired by the soldiers, who kicked in a couple of dollars apiece each month in order to avoid doing the cleaning themselves.)

I grabbed a sheet of typing paper and told the 1st Sergeant that I was going to get Elvis' autograph for my girlfriend. He laughed, but as I reached the Orderly Room door he said, "Better get me a couple for my granddaughters." I grabbed two more sheets and walked over to 301 to hunt down Gisele, the putzfrau for that building.

Donnie: "Gisele, guess who's going to take a shower upstairs."

Gisele: "Better nobody, Donnie. I just finished cleaning."

Donnie: "Elvis Presley."

Gisele: "Ja, ja."

Donnie: "No, really."

Gisele: "Ja, ja, Donnie."

Donnie: "OK." I turned to go to the entrance to await our celebrity's
arrival.

Gisele: "Donnie?"

Donnie: "Yes?"

Gisele: "Ja?"

Donnie: "Ja."

Lifting up her skirts, she practically flew across the quadrangle to find and tell Annemarie, who was cleaning building 303. At just about that time, Elvis and the staff sergeant arrived, accompanied by a half dozen or so guys from our company.

I led them to the upstairs shower room and they thanked me and entered it. We all hung around, waiting for them to finish. All of a sudden Gisele and Annemarie came running up the stairs, breezed right by us, and crashed into the shower room.

Several of us went in and dragged them out, and they left, giggling. A moment later the staff sergeant, towel around his waist, came out to stand guard at the door. Elvis finished, then he came out in tee shirt and trousers, and stood guard while his companion showered. A nice touch, I thought.

Our little group grew to perhaps eight or ten people. While the two of them shaved, we stood around chatting with them. Well, OK, chatting with Elvis. He was patient and polite, even when our company Recruiting NCO started trying to talk him into reenlisting. The rest of us rolled our eyes, but Elvis just said, "You know, it's not a bad life, Sarge. If I didn't have plans I probably would reenlist. But you gotta understand, I have a lot going for me on the outside."

When they finished shaving and were ready to leave, Elvis autographed whatever anyone handed him. He chatted with each person while he signed his name, and today I marvel at his patience. He must have been faced with this situation a great many times.

They finished up, thanked us all, and left.

He was a nice man, and I'm glad I got to meet him.

Forget Our Training, Did We?

My outfit in Vilseck, Germany, was on one of three posts making up what was then (and may still be, for all I know) the 7th Army Training Center, the other two locations being Grafenwoehr and Hohenfels. NATO troops trained there year-round, and once a year a huge exercise, "Operation Wintershield," involving tens of thousands of opposing forces, took place. When this occurred, our company gymnasium was converted into a lounge for General Officers. No kidding, just generals, and there were dozens of them.

One of the sections dealt with chemical, biological and radiological warfare (CBR). Among other things, this section had the use of a helicopter which was especially fitted for CBR - more specifically, for dispersing CS, or what we called CS gas. Exposure to this (chlorine and sulfur) would cause your eyes to burn and cause you to have coughing fits until your lungs were cleared. And for a while after that, too. If you got a good lungful you weren't going to smoke cigarettes for a day or two.

One day during an Operation Wintershield period, a friend who worked in CBR called me and said that one of the opposing armies had requested CBR support and the section had agreed to provide it. Did I want to go along for the ride?

I'd never been in a helicopter and thought it would be interesting. I asked for and received permission from the First Sergeant to leave my job and make the trip.

My friend (who was a Specialist Fifth Class, so we'll just refer to him as SP5) and I got into the helicopter and strapped ourselves into seats. One whole side of the helicopter was open, and the trip to Hohenfels was cold. SP5's seat was right at the edge of the opening and mine was directly opposite. Much of the center was taken up by a large white tank containing CS. At some point a lone soldier in a jeep, top down and entirely in the open, was spotted and it was determined that he was one of those who for the moment were our "enemies."

We put our gas masks on and as the helicopter swooped down on the jeep SP5 grabbed a hose with some special kind of nozzle affair. The helicopter tilted, leaving me looking almost straight down on the jeep, and SP5 soon sprayed the moving jeep with CS. The driver panicked.

We were close enough to him to see that he was carrying a gas mask and I am certain that he had been trained, as were we all, to put that mask on and clear it in a few seconds, no inhaling required during the process, but his instincts were wrong and he decided he would outrun the helicopter, ho ho ho.

His goal was the woods, perhaps a half mile of bumpy dirt road (or bumpy off-road if he chose) away. He dodged, sped up, and slowed down, but about once a minute he was rewarded with another cloud of CS. Eventually he reached the woods. He slowed the jeep down and jumped out, leaving the jeep to roll where it would.

Our last view of him sticks in my mind - he was standing at the tree line, looking up at us and giving us a one finger salute.

Hey, GI, they taught you about that gas mask for a reason.

Still More Confusion

Richardson and I were in the same squad, a squad responsible for the maintenance of a number of tanks. One of the maintenance functions was seasonal - the oil changes: thinner oil in winter, heavier oil in summer.

I do not recall how many quarts of oil those M48s required. Twenty? Thirty? In any event, the way we changed the oil was:

· Shovel a couple of feet of sawdust into a concrete trench which was perhaps a dozen feet long and about two thirds the width of the tank.

· Drive the tank over the trench.

· Put on class "X" fatigues and boots. These were items that were otherwise unusable, and it didn't matter that they were about to be saturated with dirty oil.

· Get into the trench, reach up, twist off the cap, and let the oil come pouring out - down your arm initially, into the sawdust eventually.

· Exit the trench and wait for the oil to empty completely.

· Get back into the trench, wade over and twist the cap back on.

· Exit the trench and fill 'er up with new oil.

· Back the tank away from the trench.

· Get into the trench with a bucket and shovel out the sawdust and oil.

One day Richardson was to change the oil in a tank, and he forgot one step. Yep, that's right, that step. When the oil had drained he didn't screw the cap back on. The fresh oil went in the top and flowed out the bottom for who knows how long. Eventually, someone noticed that he had been at it a long time and used a lot of oil, walked over, examined the situation, and discovered that the sawdust was awash in a veritable ocean of oil.

Richardson had to wade hip deep in oil and sawdust to put the cap back on. After the oil was replaced the entire squad donned class X fatigues, grabbed buckets and shovels, and emptied the trench, alternately laughing and cursing.

Time passed and Richardson was transferred to 2nd Echelon Maintenance, where he didn't do a great job. He was to be given one more chance, and was sent for training on the new M60 tanks we were to receive.

He returned, full of knowledge and proud of it, and we got our first M60. It was driven by someone to the middle of the concrete between the tank sheds, and the NCO in charge ordered Richardson into the tank.

"Turn the turret to the right." Whirrrrrr, and the turret turned to the right at a pretty good clip, it being hydraulic.

"Turn the turret to the front." Whirrrrrrr, the turret turned to the front.

"Raise the gun." Mmmmmmmmm, the gun,already pointed front, was raised.

"Lower the gun." Mmmmmmmmm, the gun was lowered, almost touching the ground in front of the driver's hatch.

"Raise the gun." Mmmmmppphmpppphmpppph. The gun bucked and quivered, but stayed put.

"Raise the gun." Mmmmmppphmpppphmpppph. No dice.

"RAISE THE GUN!" Mmmmmppphmpppphmpppph. Not today, Sarge.

Gun and tank were too long for any of the sheds, so there they sat, covered with canvas, for a couple of weeks. Eventually, an armored division familiar with the M60 came through our area, and one of the NCOs fixed the problem.

Richardson was transferred to the company mailroom.

Not long thereafter, I got my third bout of pneumonia, got kicked out of the Armored Corps, and was sent to the orderly room to be the company clerk.

One night several months later, in the Casino, a gasthaus in Vilseck, I was approached by a burly gentleman about 20 years older than I, dressed in civilian clothes.

"Are you with Headquarters Company?"

"I am."

"I oughta punch you right in the mouth."

(Whaaaaa?) "Why? Who are you?"

He was, in fact, the First Sergeant of the 663rd Ordinance Company, a neighboring outfit. "You almost killed my wife. You threw a fifty pound sack of mail out of the second floor window of the EM (Enlisted Men's) Club and just missed her."

I called one of my friends over and said, "This is six-six-three's First Sergeant. Would you tell him my name?"

"Donnie Richards."

"And our mail clerk's name?"

"Mike Richardson."

"Thanks."

The First Sergeant's mouth opened and closed a couple of times, he began to look sheepish, and he said, "I'm sorry. Let me buy you a beer."

I speculate that he had come to the Casino and asked one of the German waitresses about "Richardson," and that she confused it with "Richards" and pointed me out to him when I arrived. But the confusion may have started earlier. I don't know what led him to the Casino, as I never saw Richardson in Vilseck.

Oh well, all's well etc.

More Confusion

A couple of months after the petroleum dump incident, Richardson and I were on guard duty again. This time the Sergeant of the Guard took the precaution of assigning Richardson a well lighted station - the post's gate on the road which led to the town of Vilseck.

The precise protocol for leaving the post required a pedestrian, cyclist, or automobile driver to stop and present identification for verification by the gate guard. If someone did not stop, protocol required the guard to shout "Halt!" three times before taking any action.

However, hundreds of German men and women from Vilseck and other nearby towns worked on post, and at quitting time many of them exited by bicycle. The gate was at the bottom of a hill, and not wanting to lose the bikes' momentum, the civilians would glide by, simply holding up their IDs in the hand nearest the gate.

Richardson's first shift included quitting time for most Germans. The first cyclist through was a middle aged putzfrau who sped down the hill, held up her ID, and sailed right by Richardson, smiling.

"HALT!HALT!HALT!" BANG BANG BANG . . . . Richardson emptied his whole magazine of .45 caliber rounds, aiming at the putzfrau but hitting nothing within sight. The putzfrau redoubled her pedaling efforts and when she got home had quite a story to tell her friends and family. After she changed her underwear.

Once again the Sergeant of the Guard was disgusted. Another incident report to file, this one to account for an entire magazine of rounds fired at an unsuspecting civilian bicyclist.

From that day on, all guards were issued blank rounds.

Richardson just was not good at anything job related, although Lord knows he tried. He was a good soldier in the spit and polish sense, but his job related thoughts were from some other universe.

Toward the end of my time as a tank crewman, Richardson (who was also a tank crewman), managed several blunders which I'll tell you about in the near future. I want to finish this post by relating the story of my victimization in an incident staged by my good and faithful friend, squad mate, and constant companion, Johnny.

Truthfully, I was a fish out of water as a tank crewman. I am not handy, I have little common sense regarding the physical world, and frequently things that are obvious to other people are not obvious to me.

The tanks that we had were M48 A1s and M48 A2s, 48 ton tanks with 90 mm guns, all the same size externally. The day came when we received our first M60, 12 tons heavier, a few inches wider, a foot or two longer, carrying a 105 mm gun.

Now when you take a tank out into the field and drive through mud and dirt, perhaps knock down trees or whatever, a lot of junk gets stuck in the treads, and the first thing you do when you get back is clean the tank. We would get a head start on this by driving the tank through the "birdbath," a concrete trench with a washboard bottom, sloping ramps at each end, maybe five feet high and containing perhaps three or four feet of water. Driving a tank through this would knock out most of the clumps of dirt and mud, although not the branches or bushes that fouled the tread.

Any time you drive a tank on post, you have a "ground guide," a person who walks in front of you (although off to the side a little) and signals you to go faster, slower, turn left, etc. I was to be the first driver through the birdbath with the new M60. Being a little wider than the M48s, this tank was a tighter fit with the birdbath, leaving only a couple of inches between tank and concrete on each side, so I kept my eyes riveted on my ground guide, who was my good and faithful friend, squad mate, and constant companion, Johnny.

I reached the ramp I would enter, the tank tilted a little and I stopped. Johnny took a look, was satisfied that the tank would not hit the concrete on either side, and gave me the signal to proceed. As soon as I began, he pumped his arm, signalling me to go faster. I did so, and about halfway to the bottom of the birdbath I noticed that the tank had created a wave larger than usual, due to the additional size of the tank. Oh well, who cares; it's going the other way.

As the tank leveled out, Johnny kept pumping for me to go faster. Now going faster gave the tank a little more of a bounce on the washboard bottom and knocked out more of the crud, but it seemed to me I was going pretty fast. Still, I obeyed. All of a sudden, Johnny lost it. He collapsed in laughter. I looked up and that wave was coming back, its top about a foot above my head.

Goddamnit, I'm gonna kill that SOB. I reached under the seat and pulled the lever that allowed the seat to drop and to take me below the level of the hatch, but as I reached for the lever to close the hatch, the wave struck.

I jumped up into the turret and stuck my head and shoulders out, looking like a drowned rat, I'm sure. My entire squad and most of the rest of the tank section was behind me, all laughing hysterically, some of them actually lying on the ground, and off to the side that was the case with my good and faithful friend, squad mate, and constant companion, Johnny.

Apparently, I had been the only one who didn't realize - and was not told in advance - what would happen.

NEXT: STILL MORE CONFUSION

From Pool Shooter to Private

I was seventeen, had flunked every subject in the eleventh grade, and was wondering about the rest of my life. I decided that my biggest problem - apart from the fact that I was just a natural born jerk - was that I was running with a bad crowd. Now I hasten to add that I don't mean an evil crowd, just a crowd consisting of guys my age and older who had no ambition, had no desire to learn or get ahead, and were content to hang around the pool room and drink beer when they could get it. And I liked these people. I enjoyed hanging around the pool room. But what was I going to do? Try to get a job at Parker Brothers for twenty dollars a week? No, I had to break loose somehow.

The "somehow" turned out to be the Army. I decided to enlist. For reasons still unknown to me, I had always wanted to go to Germany, and I visited the local Army recruiting office to explore that possibility. I was told that the only way I could be guaranteed an assignment in Germany was to enlist for "Armor, Europe," and I opted in, at least in my mind.

My mother had to give written consent and getting that was like pulling teeth. However, with some nudging from my father and my vow to enlist anyway four months later, when I would be eighteen and would not need her consent, she surrendered.

I went to Boston for the required physical and several days later got a phone call from the recruiting NCO. He said that in order to enter any of the combat arms for the first time, a "class A" physical profile was required.

"And you have a crooked spine, flat feet, bad lungs, and a heart murmur, and you wear glasses."

"So I can't enlist 'Armor, Europe?'"

"Right."

"Okay, draft me when I'm twenty-three."

After a moment's silence: "Let's not be hasty. Let me see what I can do."

"Great."

Now this was just a bluff on my part, but it had no downside. I would still join the Army, but I really wanted to go to Germany.

A day or two later he called me again and told me that I now had a class A physical profile.

So . . . at seventeen years of age, five feet seven inches in height, and weighing one hundred fifteen pounds, I entered the military. I was sent to Fort Dix, New Jersey for eight weeks of basic infantry training. When I completed that despite a stint in the hospital due to pneumonia, I was five feet eight and a half inches tall and weighed one hundred fifty five pounds. Except for the gradual addition of another ten pounds, that's pretty much where I stayed for the next ten years. We're not gonna talk about now.

I was sent to Fort Knox, Kentucky for eight weeks of training on tanks. It was November, cold, damp, and muddy. I got pneumonia again, spent too long in the hospital, and was recycled into a second training company because I had missed so much training.

Eventually, I completed my training and three of us from my company were sent to Fort Dix, to a "holding company," a company to billet and manage large numbers of transients awaiting orders and shipment to Europe. About two weeks later we got orders - Headquarters Company, Seventh Army Training Center, in Vilseck, Germany.

Came the big day and we boarded a large plane, type unknown to me now but a propeller driven plane - jets were not in use for passenger service yet. We flew up to Gander, Newfoundland, over to Shannon, Ireland, and from there to Frankfurt, Germany. During the trip across the Atlantic, I noticed that the wings were actually darkening. I asked the stewardess (for that's what they were called in those days) about it and she told me that the silver paint on the plane's exterior was rusting. I asked her what they did about that and she told me, "Oh, we'll repaint it before we go back."

The three of us caught another plane to Nuremburg, then a train to Vilseck or somewhere very close to it, and joined our new outfit.