Viet Nam Veteran's Ceremony

These pictures are actually in the wrong order, and try as I might, I don't know how to change them! The lower one was taken prior to the ceremony, the second one is Ken getting his award, and the upper one is him outside afterwards showing his awards.

Saturday, April 18, Ken and about 175 other Viet Nam veterans from our Jefferson county were honored at a ceremony arranged by our local state representative, Sam Smith. Ken and I have seen the Viet Nam wall in Washington, DC, another one in Altoona, PA, and numerous times we have gone to see a moving wall that travels around the country, but this was the first time in 39 years that we have been to an honors ceremony.

Some things I learned: The Viet Nam war was called the "living room war" because it was the first war to come into the living room of US on television. While we did not have television, I could read the daily reports of the war in the newspaper. One day I actually read about a helicopter accident in the paper that Ken witnessed. Fortunately he was not a part of it! He rode in lots of helicopters over there.

Another interesting point that a speaker brought out: He talked about soldiers being drafted, and receiving a notice that "you will report to such-and-such a place on such-and-such a date." And the speaker said there was no "please" on the notice, but he and others were at the ceremony to say "Thank you". A speaker also re-echoed something I had heard Ken say often about his military service--"I was just doing my duty."

The veterans sat in the center of the auditorium in alphabetical order, and they filled about the front 2/3 of that section. Family had to sit elsewhere. I was kinda disappointed to not be sitting with my dear husband, but after all, that aisle between us was not nearly as big as the Pacific Ocean when we were boyfriend and girlfriend!

I expected to see some gray-haired pony-tails on the men, since that seems to be a common thing amongst VN vets that we have seen at the walls. But there were only one of two! The rest of the guys just looked like 60-year old guys! Lots of them had a bubble in their middle!!

Ken spent June 1968 to April 1970 in the US army. He was in Texas for 5 months, then at Fort Campbell, KY another 5 months, and then about 11 months in Viet Nam, with leaves at home in between. He was trained as a medic, and often did the work of a doctor in treating people both in the military hospital in Kentucky and Viet Nam. In Viet Nam he worked in a forward aid station, which was where they brought wounded for first aid, and Ken and others would patch them up and send them on to a hospital. Most of it was by helicopter.

Back in those days, the 60's, every young man had a military obligation because of the draft. That's just the way it was, and boys grew up with that as being a part of their future. At times they increased the draft, and that was true at the time of the VN war. Many young men joined the other armed forces because they figured they would be drafted into the army if they did not. Joining up gave them greater options. Ken was a C.O. and he was drafted into the army. The other armed forces were not an option for him.

One thing that they did not talk much about in the ceremony, and it's okay that they didn't, was the people who waited back home. Unless you have been through it, you cannot understand the feeling of having someone you love "in harm's way" a term our former President Bush has used in regard to the Irag war. I was a senior in high school when Ken was over there, and we wrote nearly daily. On his envelopes he wrote the word FREE in the place where a stamp goes, since he did not have to pay for postal service. I think the letters came in about 5 or 6 days. Somedays I would get two! There were no phone calls, and of course, no email or webcams! Such a highlight to my day to come home from school and read letters from my beloved! We had already talked about marriage, so I guess I could say that we were secretly engaged at that time (we married in 1971, a year after his safe return).

The then-president Richard Nixon had begun to pull out troops from Viet Nam in the beginning of 1970 (thanks, Richard Nixon!) and Ken was part of an early withdrawal. They began sending guys home early, and he got to come home a month earlier than his ETS of early June. He didn't tell any of us, but kept writing letters just as if he were staying the whole time. It was the grandest surprise of my life, and probably his parents and family to have him show up on our doorsteps! Next week, on April 30, I will try to write the story of the day he came back.

I don't feel that Ken has any negative aspects in his personality because of being in the war. He was not injured in any way, although he got rather thin. As a medic, he was there to help people, and worked to save lives. He remembers the good times--going to convention there in February, 1970, and spending weekends with Fred Allen in Saigon in Fred's bach, and being with other professing service guys.

To be continued--