Sam Hermanstorfer October 10, 2003 Interviewed by Dave Miles at the home of Sam Hermanstorfer.

Transcription

1 Sam Hermanstorfer October 10, 2003 Interviewed by Dave Miles at the home of Sam Hermanstorfer. This is Dave Miles, and it s October 10, 2003, and I m in the home of Sam Hermanstorfer, and Sam has consented to talk about some of his experiences in the Vietnam era, and some of his life experiences. So Sam, maybe we ll just start with where you were born and raised. I was born in Minneapolis and raised in South Minneapolis. I started out living in the Projects on the North Side, and then my parents gradually got out of the Project area and moved over to another home in North Minneapolis, and we lived up in the attic area there. And from there, they finally got a home in South Minneapolis, and that s pretty much where I started school and was raised, and went into the military from there. What high school did you go to? I went to Roosevelt High School on a special transfer. I took vocational agriculture, so I had a special transfer to go to Roosevelt High, because that was the only place that gave that class. You mentioned to me earlier that both your parents were in the service. Would you talk a little about their experiences. Both of my parents were in the Army Air during World War II. Neither of my parents saw any overseas duty. They were both stateside their entire time. My father had one brother. He was in the Navy. My dad was in the Army Air. My mother had eleven brothers, and I think there were three sisters. All the brothers were in the military in some different branch or another. My mother was the only one of the sisters that went into the service. She was a teletype operator. My father was a crew chief on the flight line for the B17s and things of that nature. Were your parents married after they got out of the service? No. My parents were married in the service, and then my mother had to be discharged because she got married. Then she had an experience coming home from wherever it was she was discharged from. I don t know. But she was on a troop train coming home from wherever and went to Fort Des Moines. My dad was from Iowa, originally, and his family was there. While she was on the troop train, she got food poisoning. She had a real good experience coming home on the troop train.

2 What did your parents do after they got out of the service? Especially when your father got out of the service? Well, as far as I know, my dad was a press operator for as many years as I can recall. Like on Saturday nights, I can recall him working at the Star & Tribune putting the Sunday paper together. My mother worked as a matron at the Minneapolis School Board for I don t know how many years. But she was a lady janitor, or matron, as they called it at that time, for the Minneapolis School System. Do you have any brothers and sisters? I have one brother that s about 5 years younger than I am. He never served. When did you graduate from high school? I graduated from high school in What did you do after you graduated? After I graduated, I tried to enlist, and they told me I was not qualified for the military. They gave me a 4F status, which meant that I was not qualified to even be in the Reserve, or even during the absolute necessity of war, or something, that I d never be called up. So I had to go that route. I had a couple different operations. I had to have a hernia operation, and I had to have lung surgery repair, so that I could get into the military. Did the two surgeries result in your being able to join then? Yes. Finally, after three years of surgeries and recovery, etc., I finally was able to get 1A classification, which meant that I was eligible for service. And then I enlisted in the Army. What year was that? March of Why did you decide that you wanted to enlist? I guess it was pretty much that I figured my parents had done it, and I felt it was my duty to do the same. I don t know. I think it was just the fact that my parents had both been in, and I felt like I wanted to also do the same. You must have really wanted to do it to go through two surgeries to get in. Yeah.

3 Unusual. So, in March of 1968, you were able to join the Army, and where did you go for basics? I went to Fort Dix, New Jersey, and took basic and advanced training at Fort Dix. Then after my advanced training, four of us were selected for special duty in Cambodia not Cambodia. I forget where it was, but we were supposed to go to some other country for Civilian Component Duty, they called it. Anyway, we had to go get extra shots, and we had to get our birth certificates, and we had to have passports, and there was a bunch of other things to go through to get these positions. After we went through all this: to get all the shots, passports and birth certificates, the whole thing was cancelled. So, typical military! So then I ended up becoming permanent party at Fort Dix. Where you were stationed? I was stationed right at Fort Dix until I came down on what they called the levy. My name was called up for duty for Vietnam, which was in What were your duties while you were at Fort Dix? I was a mechanic on wheeled vehicles. So, 1969, were you shipped directly to Vietnam? No. I came home for 30 days leave prior to going overseas. After my 30 days, I went back to Fort Dix and was then shipped out from Fort Dix. We went right next door to the McGuire Airforce Base, and we flew out of McGuire, and left for Vietnam right out of McGuire, landing in Hawaii for refueling. Then when we left Hawaii, we had to land in Guam, because the air strip was being shelled in Vietnam, and they couldn t land. We had to spend a little bit of time in Guam, where we were told not to go to the liquor store because a plane load of guys going over there it was kind of a moot point to tell us not to go to the liquor store. Everybody hit the liquor store right away. We all were drunk when we got to Vietnam, and then they made us all file out when we got off the buses, which were air conditioned. Off the airplane, onto the air conditioned buses, and then transported to the area where they were going to do the talking telling us where we were going, etc. Where did you land in Vietnam? I m not sure. I really don t remember. Okay.

4 And, anyway, to make up for the fact that we were all drunk, then they had us all standing at formation. That s why you don t remember. Yeah. On the hot metal plating that they used for landing the aircraft, so they kind of made their point in a hurry. So what happens then? So then I was assigned to the 1 st Division; 1 st in the 26 th Infantry, and I was assigned to Company B in the motor pool, there. (Tape interrupted). Okay, we re back online. And you re in the motor pool. In the motor pool with the 1 st of the 26 th for just about half of my tour there. And then I was assigned to Battalion Maintenance, which was the 701 st Maintenance Battalion. When I first was assigned to Vietnam, I was 1 st in the 26 th in Lai Kay, and then 701 st was being transferred from Lai Kay to Dau-Tieng. Do you know how you spell Dau-Tieng? D-a-u (dash) T-i-e-n-g. And so I went with the unit when they were shipping out from Lai Kay to Dau-Tieng, and we were sent there to take care of that area. And I spent the rest of my tour, then, in Dau-Tieng. You were performing maintenance on what kind of vehicles. All kinds of wheeled vehicles. Anything with tires under it. Trucks, trailers, Jeeps that was pretty much all I ever handled. In fact, when we had to do maintenance on the tanks, it was up to the tank crew to take the motors out of the tanks. They d have to do all the work of disconnecting everything, and we d just sit on top of the tow truck and lift the motor out of the tank, and then we d take it back to the motor pool area. We had a big tent area - a Quonset type tent that they would put the motor down inside there and we d work on it inside there. Were you able to have parts and parts supplies there? Parts supply was pretty good. We used to order parts from the States. We had what they called the Red Ball order that would get the parts to you within a week of the order, and needless-to-say, being that it was in the military, the parts orders, or the parts that you would order, would be transferred from different places to accommodate your needs. There were many times when the parts were traded for items that you d want; we d trade parts that we d ordered, specially, and we d trade to the engineering units for a pallet of metal roofing so that we could make our, what they called a hooch - our living quarters. That was

5 pretty much common practice to do a little bargaining and trading as needed to accommodate your living quarters, or whatever, there. So it started out we lived in tents, in great big tents, with no mosquito netting, or anything, around the tent; the only mosquito netting we had was on your bed. So it was a pretty common practice for everybody to try and build their living quarters, or their hooch, as it was called. Usually two guys would get together and build something, so you d have to do a little trading to get the materials necessary to do all this. So you did that? It was a common practice. Yes, I did do that. And was there one other guy with you, then? Yes. The guy that I shared the hooch with was from Iowa, and both of us were sound sleepers, and we were always worried that we weren t going to hear the incoming artillery when we were sleeping. For some reason or another, one of us was always able to hear that whistle from that incoming artillery, and wake the other guy up, and so forth, just about the time the shells started coming in. Did you get shelled a lot? In Lai Kay, we did. Lai Kay was called Rocket City. It lived up to it s name. It was pretty much an area where they liked to shell the compound a lot. It was pretty common practice that at any time of the day or night to have to run to the bunker, or something, for protection. Did it cause a lot of damage? Yeah, sometimes. There was a lot of weird things that would happen, too, where a rocket would come in and land. One time, we had one that came right through the roof of one of the buildings that was the radio guys repair shop. A shell came right through the roof and never exploded. So, there were some weird instances with that that happened. We had house girls that would be fired for one reason or another, and it seemed like they knew exactly where the shells would be placed, and the enemy would be shelling the area right within the motor pool area. Did they call up our artillery to shell their artillery positions? No, because usually the artillery that they would use would be transported around various places like a rocket, now, would be fired somewhere else farther back, but a lot of the mortar shells that we would get would be just fired off in handheld units, and they could transport that thing pretty easily. So it was just common practice that we get the shelling, or something.

6 When I first was in Lai Kay, we had a problem with the North Vietnamese coming in to the wire, trying to get into the compound on the perimeter area when we were on guard duty, and that was a night that there was a lot of killing that happened. They tried to come through the wire and it was just almost in-frontof-you type of thing, where you re just blowing anti-personnel mines, which they called Claymores. We were blowing Claymores, and we were just shooting at point-blank range. The next morning, we had a lot of body count to deal with. Did you lose some friends then? I didn t know any of the people, per se, that I saw. I saw a lot of guys that got killed, or something, but I didn t know them personally. I d see guys that had been hit by a mortar, or something, that was maybe just a little ways away from me. I saw many guys get hit. Of course, I saw the bodies, and the body bags. About how long were you in Lai Kay? About 6 months. I had a weird experience one night on guard duty. It was still daylight, and it was pretty much a common practice to just sit on the back of bunkers until it got dark. There was 3 of us assigned to one bunker. We were sitting on the back of the bunker, there, and I was sitting in the middle between the two other guys. The Officer of the Guard had just driven by to check to make sure everything was okay, and so on. And he was up probably, oh, I don t know maybe 100 yards or so away at the next bunker, and all of a sudden, I started to scream very loud. I had gotten bitten by a scorpion right in the spine. I was right in between the other two guys, and I was the lucky recipient of the scorpion bite. The Officer of the Guard came driving back to see what was going on, and find out why all the noise. He found out that I d gotten bitten by a scorpion. He took me back to the Aid Station, and the medics gave me some kind of pills for the scorpion bite to help with the nerve thing, or something, and I spent the better part of the evening in the Aid Station. Then the Officer of the Guard came back to check on me, and he told me I could either go back on guard duty for the rest of the night, or go back to my quarters and then pull guard duty the next night, so I figured I ll go back on guard duty. I ve already got most of the night completed, so that s what I did. I went back on guard duty for the rest of the night, but word got around the whole bunker line that somebody had gotten bitten, and everybody was afraid to even go around the bunkers then for fear of a scorpion, or a snake, or something. How long did the infection of the scorpion bite last? S. H. Well, it lasted that night, and then I ve had a kind of nerve damage type thing ever since.

7 Maybe you could describe a little what it was like on guard duty. Depending on what the climate was; hot and dry, or if it was monsoon. If it hot and dry, it was just that. It was hot and dry. If it was monsoon season, then you re wearing a field jacket and you re soaking wet and got the chills. It didn t matter if you had poncho or not to cover you like a raincoat thing because you were soaking wet, anyway, regardless. There was just no way to stay dry during the monsoon unless you were inside of a building or something. But it was common to be cold and wet and shiver even though it was probably 70 degrees or so at night. During the daytime, of course, it would be over 100. Did you have to walk a post, or were these bunkers? No. These were bunkers that we were on. We had a bunker, and then on one side or the other of that bunker was a tower. There d be two guys assigned to that tower. And then the tower would have the night scope, where they could see movement at night. Maybe you could describe a little further the living conditions. You ve mentioned building a hooch and living in a tent. When we first got to the unit, we lived in a great big tent that had pallets for a floor. We were pretty lucky we had pallets. There was a lot of places, and a lot of guys, that didn t have a tent to sleep in. But our tent had a pallet that we could put our cots on. And then we had metal rods it had a T-shaped metal rod on each end of the post of the bed, and a mosquito netting was just hung over the top of that metal rod and draped over the top of your bed. That was your living quarters, then, until such time as you could build a hooch. And that tent was big enough to carry I don t remember exactly but I would guess somewhere around 10 guys were inside of each tent. It was a big tent. Did you have a mess hall? Yeah, we had a mess hall, and it was just that, too. A mess. The food was not exactly the most accommodating and, of course, being a GI, you learn to acquire the necessary items to keep yourself fed other than having to eat the food from the mess hall or eat the rations. Our rations were sea rations, or even K rations we were given, which were from World War II. When I say that we would acquire the food that was necessary, I mean they had a big supply area not far from where we were located, and they had big tents and big refrigerator areas that they would keep the food in. And they would have one guy walking guard duty around this whole big area (and it was a very big area), and they had one strand of wire around that whole area. Well, it was just like a bunch of ants going in there. The guy that was walking guard duty would go

8 around back, and he d just kind of take his time, and it was just a mad rush for everybody to charge in there and grab rations, or go into the refrigerated area and grab steaks, etc. We d acquire these items in a military fashion, and then we d bring them back to our quarters and cook the food up, ourselves, and then we had something that we could eat. So, I say that it was acquired in a military fashion; that meant that a normal GI would know you d go steal the food you needed. Well, when you went to Dau-Tieng, that wasn t quite as hot as far as artillery? Right. It was less artillery, but what they did for us there was: it had been previously held by the 25 th Division, and the 25 th had been overrun in that area, so when our unit came in there, they dug great big trenches. Then they built sides around inside the trench, and put wooden sides around it. Then they put screen at the dirt level right at the top of the trench area they put screen up there for probably 2 feet, and then they put a roof on this, and we lived inside of this trench, then, and we had bunk beds. And then they had taken sand bags and barrels, and put sand bags and barrels all round this trench that we were living in, so that if and when artillery would come in, we wouldn t have to run to the bunkers, anymore. We could just stay right where we were. And they said it would take a direct hit of a pretty good sized piece of artillery to do any harm to us. We just never even bothered to get out of our bunk beds, then, at night, if we didn t have guard duty or something. We just stayed right there. So it was a lot different from what it was at Lai Kay. Were you typically doing repairs on vehicles during the day, and then you have some rotation for guard duty at night? Correct. You d sleep in the morning, and then when you get back off of guard duty, you d get half the day off. Sleep in catch up on your sleep a little bit. What are some things that stick in your mind about that installation and your time there? In Dau-Tieng? Yeah. Dau-Tieng. We had more of an advanced maintenance deal there. We did more advanced maintenance than what we did in Lai Kay. It was a higher echelon unit, so the work was inside of the tents instead of right out in an open field area, working under the hood of a vehicle or something in 100 degree weather. We had a little more shaded area with the tents. So, if it was raining, or something, by chance, why we weren t out there working in the rain or whatever. And about how long were you there?

9 In Dau-Tieng? Yeah. Approximately 6 months. Did you complete your tour then? Yes. I rotated out of Vietnam then. I had a weird incident when I was in Lai Kay. During the daytime, we were sitting on the top of a bunker. There was probably half a dozen guys sitting around on a bunker and one of the house girls. We started getting shelled, and as the artillery started coming in, everybody jumps up and starts running for a bunker, and naturally, you put your hand down on the ground to push yourself off the bunker, or something, and that s what I did was put my hand down on the ground and just as I started to push off, somebody stepped on my hand, and I went flying back down to the ground. I had to get up, again, and run. What other experiences stick in your mind about Lai Kay? I remember when we were still living in the tent, I remember one of the guys taking his M16 and, in a playful manner, he was just joking around (Tape interrupted). No problem. Okay. When you were over there in either one of your places, did you get any news from the States? I guess the only thing I can remember would be that I d get a letter or something, and there d be something in the letter, and that would be it. Well, after you ve been there for awhile I just remembered we were talking about the incident where one of the guys was playing with his rifle Oh, that s right. Yeah. Do you want to continue it? Yeah, go ahead. Okay. One of the guys, when we were living in the tent, was playing with his M16, and he was probably, oh, 20 feet away from me, or something like that, and one of our house girls happened to be sitting on a bed right next to me, there, and

10 we were all just kind of sitting around 3 or 4 of us sitting around, talking, and he took his rifle, and he had a bi-pod on his rife, which is like a 2-legged stand that goes on the front of the rife, there, to balance it and help with your aim. He took that rifle and charged the magazine in other words, he loaded the rife, and put a shell in the chamber and, in just a fraction of a second, jokingly, he said, Mama San, I m going to shoot you! and he popped a round off, and shot the house girl right in the tent, there. It hit her right in the thigh, and blew a big hole in her thigh. And, of course, everybody came running, and they took her to the Aid Station, and did whatever was necessary to stop the bleeding, and of course, he was arrested for shooting the house girl. But it was just a freak accident. He was just goofing around with the rifle, when he shouldn t have been playing with it, and he shot our house girl. Do you ever hear what happened to him? No. We never did hear what happened to him. We heard that the Mama San we all decided that we were going to continue to give her the monthly pay even though she wasn t there working. She was unable to work. And everybody decided that she was still going to get the pay. She worked around the whole compound, and it wasn t just for a few guys. She worked for the whole compound. She d go around to all the different tents, and so forth, and sweep the tent out, or polish the boots, or take the laundry and have them wash the laundry. The house girls would do the laundry, also, which was taking it into the river and washing it in the river if you can call that a wash job but that s the way our uniforms used to get washed. But, anyway, to the best of my knowledge, until I left Lai Kay, she had never come back yet, but everybody just kept giving money every month to make sure that she received enough to keep living on. After you d been there for awhile, in Vietnam, what did you think about being in Vietnam? I was scared. I was rather ticked off with the way things were going on, because we had areas that they could ambush us from, and we weren t allowed to fire back at them. We d be on a convoy, and we d be going by a cemetery, or something, and we d start receiving small arms fire from within the cemetery area, and we weren t allowed to fire back into there. We d just have to duck down, or whatever, to try and get out of the way as fast as possible. What other kinds of restrictions were placed on you as far as combat? They had a lot of no fire zones, where we weren t allowed to fire into the area. We weren t allowed to shoot the buffalo, if there was a buffalo. We had a certain hour at night on the bunker line just before dusk that you weren t allowed to fire out there at all, because there was always civilians, per se, and we took them as civilians, anyway, that were commuting back to their homes, or something. That didn t apply to the Koreans, though.

11 There was a Korean outfit that had their bunker line not too far from ours, and from dusk until daylight, they continually were firing. The Koreans were feared by the Vietnamese, because the Koreans would go out from the compound that they were at, from the bunker lines, and they d go out looking for the enemy. They would do their body count by cutting off the ear, and that s how they proved their body count, by the number of ears that they had. Unlike us. We d just say, Well, we d seen this body or that body, and that was it. We never went out at night. They had guys out there on patrols, or something, but as far as the bunker line, we never left the bunker line like the guys that worked in the motor pool worked so long, but the Koreans they were some bad guys. You know, I never realized that there were Korean soldiers over there. There was Korean. There was Australians. I don t know what all else, but other different nationalities were over there. They had guys that came from Canada, even, to fight with the U.S., that fought under the U.S. flag, but they were actually Canadian citizens. And when they went back to Canada, of course, then they were not thought of very highly. What other experiences in Vietnam? The heat. The heat was horrendous. You could cook an egg on the hood of a truck, it would get so hot from the sun out there. You had to be careful touching the vehicle that dark green paint just seemed to draw the sun right into it, or something. I can remember working on a Jeep for some officer. They wanted it all painted up, which was not normal. They wanted the stars and all the details put on the vehicle, and we took and painted it up and put all the decal numbers and the stars on that vehicle (tape ended-part of story lost). your Jeep back all scratched up. So, we got the vehicle back. Of course, they weren t too happy with the fact that the vehicle was all messed up; all banged up dented, and so forth. I don t remember what ever happened on that. Another time, we had some of the guys that were drag racing, or just racing around inside the motor pool compound area, there, with a couple of Jeeps racing them, and then they took them outside of the motor pool, and started racing out in the compound. I guess they got in a little bit of trouble for that. So when your tour was up in Dau-Tieng, did you know ahead of time when your tour would be up? Well, you knew you had what they called a short timer s calendar. And you had your days marked off, so you knew pretty much when you were supposed to

12 be leaving, within a matter of a day, or some guys even knew down to the hours. My short timer calendar was strictly by the day, so I knew what day that I was supposed to leave. And then, I left Vietnam, and came home for 30 days. From where, and how did you leave Vietnam? I left Vietnam by plane. I think we left out of I can t even remember where we left from, anymore. Probably Tan Se Nute Air Base, or something, I imagine. I m not sure, anymore. But we left by what they called the Freedom Bird. We got on the Freedom Bird, which was a civilian airplane, and flew back to the States, and then landed in the States, at Washington. I can t remember what Army base we went to, but it was in Washington. Fort Lewis? Fort Lewis, Washington. Thank you. And we were processed there and given our new uniforms dress uniforms, again, and then we were supposed to pretty much throw away our fatigues, because they were all discolored, and so forth; anyway, our jungle fatigues. Before we left Vietnam, we had to go into a great big screened-in building where our bags we had to put our bags on top of a table, and they told us that if we had any contraband, or any paraphernalia, that it was illegal like weapons of some sort, or drugs, or whatever, but we had a 5-minute amnesty time, and we were supposed to dispose of anything up in the front of the building. They had duffel bags, and you just threw the stuff in the duffel bags during this amnesty time and nothing was said, then. And after that amnesty time was up, then we had to empty our duffel bags on top of the tables, and they had officers that walked around the different tables, and these were big long tables where everybody was just standing in front of. You had all your clothes, and so forth, all laid out there, and they d walk by and just stick their hands in your clothing and see if they could find anything. And, at the end of this checking, then you would pack your stuff up again, and get ready to leave, and that s when we were allowed to get on the Freedom Bird, then. You know, as you re telling about that, I guess my immediate thought is that s pretty extensive. You know! You guys had been spending a year over there, dodging artillery and everything else, and then they have to come around and check your clothes. They didn t want any weapons or drugs being brought back to the States, illegally. When that plane took off, what were your thoughts?

13 It was just a whole lot of whooping and hollering on board the airplane, and a whole lot of guys slapping hands you know, the High Five thing, and so forth, and slapping each other on the back and just a lot of yelling. I remember a lot of yelling, and so on. Especially once we got off the ground, and we were up in the air, there, and we knew that we were clear of being hit by artillery. So, were you given a leave then from Fort Lewis? Yup! We got another 30 days leave. I left in February from Vietnam, and came back to the States, and left Fort Lewis with my dress greens, which amounted to an overcoat and my dress hat and shoes and then a whole new issue of clothing. I remember coming back from Fort Lewis into the Minneapolis Airport, and I had just enough cash to take a taxi cab from the airport to the end of the freeway on 46 th Street the freeway exit at 46 th Street and I asked the cab driver if he would give me a ride the rest of the way, which was probably a half a mile from there maybe a little further and he refused to give me a ride from the end of the freeway to my home. So I walked from the freeway, carrying my duffel bag, in the middle of the winter, and just a pair of shoes and my winter coat. I just came from 100 and some degree weather, and now I m back in the 20 below weather. I walked with my duffel bag from the bottom of the freeway up to my parent s home, and then I went to a neighbor s house and got the key to enter my parent s home. That s what I did. I just walked from the freeway. That was the consideration that we received when we got home. Did you get any other consideration when you came back, because when you came back, you were in uniform? I didn t really receive any comments, per se. I d get a lot of looks from people, but my big thing was the cab ride. The cabby would not take me the rest of the way that little distance, a half a mile or so. I remember walking. There was a lot of snow on the ground that year, and I remember walking with that duffel bag on my shoulder; walking home from the bottom of the freeway. I want to ask you. You obviously knew the cab company s name. I never called. It never even occurred to me to call them. If they re still in business, you ought to call them today. I wouldn t know who they were, anymore. I don t think they d care, anyway. That was part of the consideration we got for being a Vietnam vet. So what did you do on leave? I came home. Of course, I was home, and there was nobody home at the time, and I came in the house, and I was sitting in the house, there, and my kid brother

14 was the first one to get home. He was surprised, because I didn t tell my folks or anybody that I d be home at a certain time. My kid brother took me in his car, and we drove over to where my mother was working at the time, at the school where she was at. We went into the school, and surprised her with my being home. It was pretty neat! I imagine it was. Did you see your father? I didn t see my dad until he got home from work. He was glad to see me. So, what did you guys do to celebrate? I really don t recall. I know they were all surprised that I was home because, like I said, I never told them what day I d be home, or anything. I didn t really know how long it would take, or anything, myself, but they were all very happy, and so on, to have me home, again, I m sure. Thirty days go pretty fast? The 30 days were gone, and then it was time to go play soldier, again. Then I got assigned to Germany, and I went to Germany and it was cold not as cold as Minnesota, but it was damp cold, there, and I remember going there and standing formation the first time with my new unit, and I was standing out there with a field jacket on and long underwear. I just remember standing there, shivering, where everybody else was acclimated to the climate we were in. It was no big deal; it was almost like a spring day to them. But for me, I remember standing there just shivering, I was so cold. It took awhile to get used to the weather, again. How long were you in Germany? I was there for a year. What were your duties there? I was a mechanic, there. My main job was working on semi-trailers. That was my main job, and I did do some work on the trucks, also. Mainly, it was the semi-trailers. What outfit was that? I don t recall. I couldn t tell you. I know where the base was. It was in Wachenheim, Germany, which is near Mainz, near the Rhine River area, somewhere, and they had a Nike missile unit that was assigned on that base and, therefore, we were not allowed to go near The Wall in Berlin. We weren t allowed anywhere near that area. We could travel to Frankfurt, or whatever, but

15 we weren t allowed to go anywhere near The Wall, just because there was a Nike unit on that base. We never saw anything of it. The only thing would be like if the fog would roll in, which Germany was good for a lot of fog there they would call a Red Alert, and everybody would have to report and go on guard duty at the Nike site. All we ever did was pull guard duty around the outside perimeter of the site. We never saw anything of the Nike missiles, or anything else. Other than the cold, what did you think of Germany? The beer was excellent. The food was excellent. There were some nice looking women there. There was a farmer I remember one weekend, there was a farmer that had a field right next to our base, and there was a bunch of us maybe 6 guys or something like that that were bored, and we went out and went over to this farmer s field, and we were watching him picking something off of the ground I don t even remember what it was if it was cabbage, or what. He was driving a tractor and having to get off the tractor and pick the crop off of the field, and he d throw it on this wagon. And then get back on the tractor and drive a little further. And we were so bored, that we went over to this farmer s field and actually helped this farmer pick the crop. He sat on the tractor while we walked the field, there, and threw the crop on the wagon for him. And we helped him pick whatever it was cabbage, or whatever it was. I don t recall, anymore, but he was so happy that he invited us to his home, and we sat around there and had beer and some other stuff I don t even remember what all, but I remember we had beer over there, and he was really grateful for our help, and to us, it was just fun just to get out and go do something else. But the food was excellent, when you could get away from the mess hall. You had to eat in the mess hall. It was the same story; it wasn t worth eating. But the guest house, like a restaurant thing, had excellent food, and the beer was just out of this world. There s nothing to compare it with. A good German beer there s just no comparison. So what happened after a year in Germany? Then I came home, and I got a job. Were you discharged? I was honorably discharged right after I came home from Germany. Okay. When was the discharge? March of Okay, so what did you do after you got discharged?

16 I started working for a trucking company. I worked there for maybe three months something like that. In Minneapolis. In Minneapolis, and then a job opened up at the Post Office, and I used my Veteran s Preference (I had a disability at the time, and I used my 10-point Veteran s Preference) and got a job working in the Post Office; in the garage at the Post Office. I worked there for 31 years. And then I retired from the Post Office, and now I m laid up. How did you meet your wife? I met my wife through one of the guys that I knew at the Post Office. Her father. I worked with her father at the Post Office. He was a truck driver, and then he became a dispatcher at the Post Office, in the garage there, where we all worked together. I got to be friends with him, and he didn t live too far from where my parents lived. I went to visit with him a couple different times on weekends. I had a motorcycle at the time, and his daughter asked me when I was going to take her out on the motorcycle for ride. So, the day that she asked me when I was going to take her for a ride, or whatever, I took her out on the bike, and we went for a ride around town for a little bit, and then she had to meet her sister some place, at some bar, somewhere. I remember stopping the bike, and holding the bike up, straddling the bike, and she tried to dismount the bike, and she fell off the bike, trying to get off. She never let me forget that. She wanted to know, always, after we were married, even, why I didn t help her off of the bike. I always told her that I had to hold the bike up. But anyway, we went out a few more times and went out on a bike ride a few different times. We went to Taylor s Falls one time on the bike, and she ended up getting wind burned. I brought her back to meet my parents, and my parents were having a party of some sort out in the back yard at the time. I remember catching hell from my mother because she got all wind burned and sunburned from being on the motorcycle. I caught hell from my mother for that. One thing lead to another, and the next thing, we got married. We were married for 22 years before she passed away. She passed away in September of From a long illness? Well, she had problems with depression. She was on a lot of medications for that, and then she also when they did the autopsy, they found that she had hepatitis. They had suspected hepatitis prior to that, at different times, but with all the medication she was on, they couldn t confirm it. I understand you have one daughter.

17 I have one daughter, who s a social worker bilingual. She s a Spanish social worker over in Minneapolis for a clinic for Spanish people in Minneapolis. How long have you lived here in Ramsey? Well, my daughter was about 7 years old when we moved out here, and she s 23 now. Is she married? No. She s still single and living here with me. Helping me. I know that you ve been very active in Veteran s organizations. Can you talk a little about those organizations and what you ve been doing? Okay. Well, when I was still living in Minneapolis, I became active in the VFW, and I became active in one post Ballantyne VFW, which was and still is, at this time, located in Minneapolis in the Hennepin and Lyndale area. Somewhere around in there. I m not sure, anymore. Just off of Lyndale, I believe it is about a block off of Hennepin. I m not quite sure of the address, anymore. But I became active there, and went through the various chairs, they call it different steps of becoming an officer in the chapter there, or in the post, as they call it. And I worked my way through, and became a Post Commander, there, for one year. And then became a Trustee for three years, thereafter, and then we moved out here to Anoka County area, and I pretty much quit going to the VFW, because it was just too far to drive into Minneapolis all the time. And then, I hooked up with VVA after (tape interrupted). Okay, we re back online, and Sam was just talking about the Vietnam Veteran s Association. Okay. When I got to the Anoka area, then I went to the Anoka Fair Grounds one year, and I happened to meet some of the guys from the VVA Chapter here in Anoka that had a booth over there at the fairgrounds during the County Fair. I met, at the time, Mike Clark, who is now the Rifle Squad leader. I met with him, and he invited me to come to a Chapter meeting. I went to a Chapter meeting and ended up continuing my membership with the Chapter for several years. Then later on, I became a life member of the VVA, and have been with Chapter 470, out of Anoka, ever since. And now I m active with the Rifle Squad the Honor Guard in the 470 Chapter, and we go around doing the honors for deceased veterans at various cemeteries. Sometimes you do several of those a week, don t you?

18 Yeah. Sometimes, it could be as many as 3 a day. And other days, there s nothing, and some weeks there s 1 or 2 a day. It really fluctuates. Mike s got his hands full trying to arrange for guys to go and do this because a lot of us are still either working full time, part time, or retired, or whatever, so he has to try and accommodate these funerals as much as possible, and arrange for a squad to be there. Sometimes, we have to split the squad up, and one group will go one place and another group somewhere else. And we just have to try and do it as best we can with what few guys we have to do it. And try and do as many funerals as possible, and get back home. That s a good and honorable thing you re doing. Very good. Do you think that your time in the service changed, or formed, how you thought about living or your time out of the service? How did the service affect you after you got out? Well, as far as my time in service, I think it put my head back where it belongs, I guess. Instead of being so carefree or careless about what I think of things and what I thought about my homeland, I think that the military helped me in that respect. Made me grow up, I think. I also ended up with medical problems because of the military, also, so it s been a two-edged sword in that respect. My time after service I think that the military s helped me as far as being able to take orders in my job, even though I didn t like the way things were, or even though I d comment about things being done in a lousy manner, or something, I always knew that I had to do the job, regardless. And I think the military taught me that. If you had a chance to talk to some young people today, what would you want to tell them? We ve got a country that s not perfect, but it s a hell of a lot better than most other countries. We don t realize the good things that we do have until after we ve experienced what it s like elsewhere. I don t believe that the young people are appreciative enough of our country especially our flag and our military but even if they don t respect the military, there s no reason not to respect the flag. That flag is something that a lot of people have given their lives for, and a lot of people have had to experience things that were not what they d hoped for when they were in the service. I just think that the young people, today, do not respect the flag. Even the adults I can t say just the young people, I think it s the adults the school teachers, the adults in general do not respect the flag; do not respect our anthem. Like the Pledge of Allegiance, now; there s no reason that that should not be done in the schools, and be taught in the schools. That s what this country s about, so for us not to have the Pledge of Allegiance to that flag is not right for us. There s too many people that fought for that flag, and too many things had to have been done

19 that weren t expected, like the giving of your life. And there s too many people adults and young people that don t respect the flag properly. I feel that that s something that needs to be resolved. Is there anything else you d like to say? You ve said a lot. Probably too much. I just am grateful for the chance to give my side of my time in service, and so on. I know that for myself, I feel that it was a necessity, because I feel that my parents were in, and so I felt obligated, myself, to follow my parents and the way they did their thing during World War II. I just felt it was something I had to do. Well, Sam, I want to thank you for sharing all your experiences, and your thoughts, but most of all I want to thank you for serving.