One day way back when I was the dare devil kid from Lyle Ave, in Waco, Texas.
In those days way back in the late 1950s we kids loved to be out in the yard and in empty lots with lots of piled up stuff, the more the better. In fact, the only thing better than a pile of stuff in a vacant lot was a garage we could get on top of and jump off of, yea, that type of fun.
On one of those fun days out and about in the vacant lot next to my house a bunch of us were playing king of the hill on a pile of old lumber and after about an hour of fun tossing each other off the pile of lumber I slipped and stepped where I should not have stepped.
The pain was sharp and quick but did not deter me from the game for at least another hour, but after an hour my foot was in pain and I could feel blood so I took a break and headed home to check out the cause of the pain.
Once home I headed to the bathroom, removed my shoe, there was lots of blood, no big deal, I had a game to finish, turned on the cold water in the bath tub and removed my sock and stuck my bloody foot under the stream of cold water, the blood would not stop. After a few minutes I tried to put a band aid on the cut, but the blood kept making the band aid fall off.
About the time I was working on my foot my mother walked by the bath room door and saw what was going on, she checked the foot and said we had to go to the emergency room cause she could not stop the bleeding either. Apparently a nail had penetrated my shoe, sock and foot and may have punctured something in my foot it should not have.
Being no stranger to the emergency room at Hill Crest Hospital mother and I were on our way to get the puncture in my foot checked out. I bleed all over the house, the car and the hospital, but like magic as soon as I walked into the emergency room the bleeding stopped.
As we entered the emergency room the nurses and all who worked there all said Hey or Hi to Rob the little kid who made regular trips to the emergency room due to his love of wild kid games that seemed to lead me to the emergency room one way or another several times or more a month. Good thing mother had great medical insurance with the OI Glass Plant...smiles.
When I was being checked in to the emergency room my foot was still bleeding steadily and folks who saw me must have thought I was in real trouble cause they were all taking about the poor little guy who cut his foot real bad and was in the emergency room getting stitched up from his brush with Death!
The emergency room folks had my foot cleaned up in no time and several stitches were applied just for the fun of it, then out of no where in walked Roy Rogers and Dale Evans along with their side kick Pat Brady. Yep, they were on a publicity visit to Hill Crest Hospital on a nation wide hospital tour, they heard about the poor injured little boy who almost died and had to come see him and make sure he was ok.
Yep, I was the poor little boy who almost died, but not...smiles. Roy and Dale and Pat were happy to see I was ok and was not going to die, all three gave me their autographs, Roy and Dale with their horses and Pat with his jeep, it was a great day, but I had to get this over with and get back to the King of the Mountain game, we were burning day light...Smiles.
The autographs stayed with me for years, but they are lost in the kid stuff I obtained and kept over the years, so I still have the signatures and the pictures, just have no idea where in all that stuff they are.
Sunday, June 15, 2014
Thursday, June 12, 2014
Sleeping With Stuffed Toys
When my daughter Julie was 4 she was just as cute and smart as she is now at the still young age of 40.
Julie was not aware we were not in the United States and that we were living in Stuttgart Germany on a U.S. Army Military Facility named Robinson Barracks.
Julie just knew she was having fun and enjoying life. We lived in a Government Condo on the second floor, had two bed rooms, a kitchen, a living room, a dining room and a hall way, and the Army provided us with a house f...ull of furniture and we all loved it.
Julie was not aware we were not in the United States and that we were living in Stuttgart Germany on a U.S. Army Military Facility named Robinson Barracks.
Julie just knew she was having fun and enjoying life. We lived in a Government Condo on the second floor, had two bed rooms, a kitchen, a living room, a dining room and a hall way, and the Army provided us with a house f...ull of furniture and we all loved it.
During the time we lived in our Condo on the hill over looking Stuttgart, Germany, Julie learned the fine art of getting her way and making sure her parents felt good about her getting her way.
Little kids hate sleeping by them selves, even when they have their own room with lots of neat stuff. Julie had a great room but always wanted to sleep in the bed with us. We wanted Julie to get use to sleeping alone and tried every thing we knew to get her to sleep in her own bed. Julie on the other hand had different ideas and always managed to sneak into our room in the middle of the night with her stuffed animal friends and join us in bed.
Julie would gather up her stuffed animal collection, place them on a small wooden chair and then carry them to our room. Julie would then toss the chair with all the stuffed animals onto the bed and climb into bed with us. Lucky for us the stuffed animals hit first and then the chair. Julie would then climb into bed, toss the chair off the bed, and then get between us and lay down side ways with her head in my back and her feet in her mother’s back. We had such great fun in those days learning how to sleep in our own beds.
One night I was waiting for Julie and just as she entered the room I took a picture of her holding the chair full of stuffed animals.
Life is too short not to enjoy all the fun we have growing up.
Little kids hate sleeping by them selves, even when they have their own room with lots of neat stuff. Julie had a great room but always wanted to sleep in the bed with us. We wanted Julie to get use to sleeping alone and tried every thing we knew to get her to sleep in her own bed. Julie on the other hand had different ideas and always managed to sneak into our room in the middle of the night with her stuffed animal friends and join us in bed.
Julie would gather up her stuffed animal collection, place them on a small wooden chair and then carry them to our room. Julie would then toss the chair with all the stuffed animals onto the bed and climb into bed with us. Lucky for us the stuffed animals hit first and then the chair. Julie would then climb into bed, toss the chair off the bed, and then get between us and lay down side ways with her head in my back and her feet in her mother’s back. We had such great fun in those days learning how to sleep in our own beds.
One night I was waiting for Julie and just as she entered the room I took a picture of her holding the chair full of stuffed animals.
Life is too short not to enjoy all the fun we have growing up.
42nd MP Gp Customs
A long time ago (1970's) in Stuttgart, Germany I was a Staff Sergeant working with the U.S. Army 42nd Military Police Customs unit.
While working with the 42nd Military Police Customs, I ran across just about every type of customs scam you can think of. Our unit had Customs Inspectors and Customs Investigators. I was one of the Customs Investigators.
I did great things like checking ID cards and ration cards at the military facilities. I also investigated the illegal use of... those ration cards and ID cards and the giving and selling of US goods to local Nationals for profit.
While working with the 42nd Military Police Customs, I ran across just about every type of customs scam you can think of. Our unit had Customs Inspectors and Customs Investigators. I was one of the Customs Investigators.
I did great things like checking ID cards and ration cards at the military facilities. I also investigated the illegal use of... those ration cards and ID cards and the giving and selling of US goods to local Nationals for profit.
Yes, U.S. Soldiers paid their rent with booze and cigarettes. Go figure. Of course as it turned out US soldiers had been dealing on the black market in Germany since World War II.
I was assigned to accompany two German Customs Agents for days at a time while they followed up on complaints by jealous German neighbors about Germans who were receiving US goods without paying the German tax on them.
We would drive out into the German countryside near Stuttgart, Germany and check on these allegations. This was interesting since I did not speak that much German and the Germans did not speak that much English.
We would walk up to the door, the German Customs Police would show a German Customs madallion and we would be invited in. Once inside the Customs investigators would explain the allegation and then look through the house for US items.
Once they found US items they would asked me to verify the items were in fact US merchandise. Then the German would have to produce a sales receipt to prove they had paid the German tax on the item.
In most cases, the German had no receipt and would tell the Customs investigators they were receiving gifts or payment for rent from US soldiers.
The German could then pay the tax and they would have no problems from the German government. On the other hand, the German would then give me the names of the US soldiers who would be investigated for US Customs violations.
The soldiers would be arrested and in most cases, reduced in rank, and pay a fine, and even be discharged from the service. Not a very fair way of dealing with the situation, but that was the law.
See MoreI was assigned to accompany two German Customs Agents for days at a time while they followed up on complaints by jealous German neighbors about Germans who were receiving US goods without paying the German tax on them.
We would drive out into the German countryside near Stuttgart, Germany and check on these allegations. This was interesting since I did not speak that much German and the Germans did not speak that much English.
We would walk up to the door, the German Customs Police would show a German Customs madallion and we would be invited in. Once inside the Customs investigators would explain the allegation and then look through the house for US items.
Once they found US items they would asked me to verify the items were in fact US merchandise. Then the German would have to produce a sales receipt to prove they had paid the German tax on the item.
In most cases, the German had no receipt and would tell the Customs investigators they were receiving gifts or payment for rent from US soldiers.
The German could then pay the tax and they would have no problems from the German government. On the other hand, the German would then give me the names of the US soldiers who would be investigated for US Customs violations.
The soldiers would be arrested and in most cases, reduced in rank, and pay a fine, and even be discharged from the service. Not a very fair way of dealing with the situation, but that was the law.
Finding Lost Vehicles
This story is based on a real incident from my past with just a little fiction tossed in to keep y'all from falling asleep...see if you can sort the real from the fiction...Smiles
Back in the day (1970’s) I had a job finding lost vehicles for the Army. Yes, for some reason lots of vehicles were getting lost in and around the military post near Carmel California.Finding those lost vehicles could have gone something like this or not!
My job as a U.S. Army Military Police (MP) CID Special Agent was to help the individual who lost his or her vehicle fine his or her lost vehicle. The owner would park these vehicles in a public parking lot or private parking space and when the owner came back to where he or she left the vehicle, it would be gone. The owner still had the keys to the missing vehicle and there was nothing to indicate the vehicle had been broken into such as broken glass on the ground or other damaged parts from the vehicle left behind.
Developing information on the stolen and missing vehicles with information from sources and what I could find out from the owner along with surveillance of the area is how I use to find the missing and stolen vehicles.
Determining if the missing vehicles had been stolen, towed, repossessed, taken by a jealous or mad wife, husband, lover, friend or even wrecked by the owner was not an easy task. In some cases the missing vehicles would be parked in another location by the owner who for got they parked the vehicle in the other location or even destroyed by the owner for the insurance money.
One night while trying to locate one of the many missing vehicles I observed a pickup truck driving down the road with the head lights off. The bed of the pickup was loaded with motor cycles. As I watched the truck drive slowly down the street I saw two men picking parked motor cycles up and placing them into the bed of the truck. I saw only those two men and the man behind the wheel of the truck.
As required by MP procedures I called the situation into the MP and waited for assistance to arrive. After several minutes I was getting a little nervous that these possible thieves would finish and drive off before the MPs arrived.
None of us MPs ever liked making or attempting to make an arrest of anyone without assistance. After what seemed like an hour, but was only several minutes, the thieves who were picking up the motor cycles walked to the truck and got in.
I was out of time and the MPs were not there.
The men in the truck had not yet seen me sitting in my unmarked police vehicle just up the street from their location. While I was coming up with a plan on what to do my police radio came to life and the MP’s asked for further information on where I was located. This was a good thing since obviously my MP assistance was lost.
The radio noise was low but loud and traveled over the air waves down the street to the men in the truck. The lights on the truck came on and the truck lurched forward. The truck was headed directly at me and was gaining speed. It appeared these nuts were going to try and hit my vehicle so I could not follow them. The bad guys in the truck had the advantage since I did not have my engine on.
I had seen enough TV to know that I could get out of my vehicle and shoot out the tires of the approaching vehicle just like Mike Hammer on TV. Don’t try that since it only works on TV. So I plugged in my blue light which started flashing brightly and placed it on the dash so the bad guys would know I was a cop and not another bad guy.
As I got out of my vehicle, I pulled my issued 38 Caliber Smith & Wesson snub nose 2" revolver, aimed at the approaching truck and yelled as loud as I could "Halt Police". You know and I know that yelled statement was not going to make anyone stop, but it sounded good at the time and made me feel good.
My little Smith bucked six times with red, blue, and orange flame coming from the barrel each time. The rounds from the smith hit the engine and the front two tires. The truck, which was almost on top of me, seemed to just stop kind of suddenly. The truck was only ten or so yards from me when it stopped and spun side ways. The truck then tilted and fell on its side spilling the three men who were not wearing their seat belts onto the pavement.
As happy as I was at this moment my happy feeling changed when I saw several of the motor cycles from the rear of the truck go air born in my direction and just managed to jump out of the way as two of the motor cycles hit the pavement where I had been standing.
The pavement was hard and I found my self sliding across it like it was ice. I slid about ten yards to the curb, which stopped me. The slide across the pavement caused me to loose my pistol, which slid into the storm drain. I noticed right away that I had a terrible pain from my left shoulder all the way to my left wrist.
This was not turning out the way I had planed it, then I heard the approaching sirens and knew all was going to be ok, but just when you think something is going to be ok it can turn out not to be ok. As I looked up the three guys from the truck were walking towards me and they were not happy and they all had guns and their guns were larger than the gun I had just lost down the storm drain.
In the movies Mike Hammer would never have let himself get in this situation and the police would not have let old Mike down like this by arriving late but just like in the movies one of the motor cycles laying on the ground behind the three bad guys exploded and knocked them all down.
Not being crazy like they are in the movies I managed to move quickly away from the area just as the MP vehicles arrived and the MPs were able to get to the three quickly detained without further problems.
This entire situation and brush with serious injury could have been avoided if I had not been trying to act like a TV policeman and had acted like the U.S. Army MP CID Special Agent I was. This one incident taught me to always have a partner with me no matter what and have more people than the bad guys before I tried to arrest them.
The life and times of me in the shadows way back when or not - Can any of you sort the real from the fiction or was there any fiction ... Smiles
Back in the day (1970’s) I had a job finding lost vehicles for the Army. Yes, for some reason lots of vehicles were getting lost in and around the military post near Carmel California.Finding those lost vehicles could have gone something like this or not!
My job as a U.S. Army Military Police (MP) CID Special Agent was to help the individual who lost his or her vehicle fine his or her lost vehicle. The owner would park these vehicles in a public parking lot or private parking space and when the owner came back to where he or she left the vehicle, it would be gone. The owner still had the keys to the missing vehicle and there was nothing to indicate the vehicle had been broken into such as broken glass on the ground or other damaged parts from the vehicle left behind.
Developing information on the stolen and missing vehicles with information from sources and what I could find out from the owner along with surveillance of the area is how I use to find the missing and stolen vehicles.
Determining if the missing vehicles had been stolen, towed, repossessed, taken by a jealous or mad wife, husband, lover, friend or even wrecked by the owner was not an easy task. In some cases the missing vehicles would be parked in another location by the owner who for got they parked the vehicle in the other location or even destroyed by the owner for the insurance money.
One night while trying to locate one of the many missing vehicles I observed a pickup truck driving down the road with the head lights off. The bed of the pickup was loaded with motor cycles. As I watched the truck drive slowly down the street I saw two men picking parked motor cycles up and placing them into the bed of the truck. I saw only those two men and the man behind the wheel of the truck.
As required by MP procedures I called the situation into the MP and waited for assistance to arrive. After several minutes I was getting a little nervous that these possible thieves would finish and drive off before the MPs arrived.
None of us MPs ever liked making or attempting to make an arrest of anyone without assistance. After what seemed like an hour, but was only several minutes, the thieves who were picking up the motor cycles walked to the truck and got in.
I was out of time and the MPs were not there.
The men in the truck had not yet seen me sitting in my unmarked police vehicle just up the street from their location. While I was coming up with a plan on what to do my police radio came to life and the MP’s asked for further information on where I was located. This was a good thing since obviously my MP assistance was lost.
The radio noise was low but loud and traveled over the air waves down the street to the men in the truck. The lights on the truck came on and the truck lurched forward. The truck was headed directly at me and was gaining speed. It appeared these nuts were going to try and hit my vehicle so I could not follow them. The bad guys in the truck had the advantage since I did not have my engine on.
I had seen enough TV to know that I could get out of my vehicle and shoot out the tires of the approaching vehicle just like Mike Hammer on TV. Don’t try that since it only works on TV. So I plugged in my blue light which started flashing brightly and placed it on the dash so the bad guys would know I was a cop and not another bad guy.
As I got out of my vehicle, I pulled my issued 38 Caliber Smith & Wesson snub nose 2" revolver, aimed at the approaching truck and yelled as loud as I could "Halt Police". You know and I know that yelled statement was not going to make anyone stop, but it sounded good at the time and made me feel good.
My little Smith bucked six times with red, blue, and orange flame coming from the barrel each time. The rounds from the smith hit the engine and the front two tires. The truck, which was almost on top of me, seemed to just stop kind of suddenly. The truck was only ten or so yards from me when it stopped and spun side ways. The truck then tilted and fell on its side spilling the three men who were not wearing their seat belts onto the pavement.
As happy as I was at this moment my happy feeling changed when I saw several of the motor cycles from the rear of the truck go air born in my direction and just managed to jump out of the way as two of the motor cycles hit the pavement where I had been standing.
The pavement was hard and I found my self sliding across it like it was ice. I slid about ten yards to the curb, which stopped me. The slide across the pavement caused me to loose my pistol, which slid into the storm drain. I noticed right away that I had a terrible pain from my left shoulder all the way to my left wrist.
This was not turning out the way I had planed it, then I heard the approaching sirens and knew all was going to be ok, but just when you think something is going to be ok it can turn out not to be ok. As I looked up the three guys from the truck were walking towards me and they were not happy and they all had guns and their guns were larger than the gun I had just lost down the storm drain.
In the movies Mike Hammer would never have let himself get in this situation and the police would not have let old Mike down like this by arriving late but just like in the movies one of the motor cycles laying on the ground behind the three bad guys exploded and knocked them all down.
Not being crazy like they are in the movies I managed to move quickly away from the area just as the MP vehicles arrived and the MPs were able to get to the three quickly detained without further problems.
This entire situation and brush with serious injury could have been avoided if I had not been trying to act like a TV policeman and had acted like the U.S. Army MP CID Special Agent I was. This one incident taught me to always have a partner with me no matter what and have more people than the bad guys before I tried to arrest them.
The life and times of me in the shadows way back when or not - Can any of you sort the real from the fiction or was there any fiction ... Smiles
Crime Scenes
Does anyone remember crime scenes back in the day? Our crime scene vehicles in the MPs;MPI;CID consisted of a patrol car or unmarked car with lots of silver crime scene kits in the trunk...My active crime scene days with MPs were at Ft Gordon, GA; Nha Trang, VietNam; Can Tho, VietNam; Ft Hood, TX and Stuttgart, GE and my CID crime scenes were at Ft Gordon, GA; Stuttgart, GE; Ft Ord, CA; Hanau,GE; Ft Hood, TX; Würzburg, GE; Wertheim, GE; and Ft McClellan, AL. After my field assignment at Ft McClellan, AL finished out my 21 years with the US Army at the CID school developing and teaching of all things CID Combat Operations; Undercover Operations; and the History of CID!...Smiles
Poor Me Stories
If you do not like poor me stories skip this one.
Just the other day a doctor at the VA mentioned my ills were not sufficient enough to keep me from working, after all I had been walking, riding a bicycle and functioning rather well compared to others who are really disabled, just love folks who think because your ills can not be seen or come in unseen bouts, you are not really ill.
Have a 60% disability from the Army for all my body ills developed over my years of service.
Apparently folks need to know that my ills may not always show to others, but if they had to live with me or work with me the last two years of my work life, folks would realize my body has problems which are getting worse day by day.
Today was a good day and a bad day, I was sick to my stomach last night, horrible congestion this morning, terrible coughing spasms to the point I was not sure what was going to happen next. Just as always, as soon as the ills came on me, the ills left me and I was functional once again.
Cleaned myself up and went for a bike ride, skipped the walk this morning, had a great ride and felt better. The heart and general practitioner doctors have told me to stay as active as I can for as long as I can to help keep my body functioning properly.
Since about 2005 I have had some real rough times with congestion and body pain but have managed to keep those ills somewhat under control. The Army told me on my retirement in the early 1990s my problem was irritable bowel syndrome and angina, in the mid 2000's the Army mentioned heart problems, Agent Orange and precancerous skin problems on my scalp, neck, face and back. All of these physical ills have caused me to have weight gains and losses, bloating, and just plain down right horrible feelings in my chest, throat, and sinus areas. There are days I am fine and function like anyone else, then there are days I can not get out of bed or spend my time coughing so badly I have no voice or energy when the cough subsides.
Retirement in 2010 was not what I wanted to do, there were days I could not function, not fun realizing your body will not let you go to work on a regular basis, and my employer was not happy my ills were keeping me from doing what everyone else was doing, everyone else was also not happy I was not doing what they were doing, it was time to retire and relax and put my self back together again,Unfortunately the last two years have not been all fun, retirement has been fun and I have done lots of fun things but the ills have not gotten any better and at times my ills are worse.
Use to laugh about my parents and grand parents always talking about their ills, it was almost like they had nothing else to talk about, now I know they did not have anything else more important to talk about than their health which was failing right before their eyes.
We all need to remember we are not as healthy as we use to be and no amount of pills,exercise or changes in the way we eat and live are going to change that we are getting older and our bodies are changing and not always for the better. Some may look great but not be great and some of us just deal with the way we look the best we can...smiles and frowns.
These comments were brought on by those who think because I can walk, talk, ride a bicycle and look healthy some of the time, that I am ok and that my ills are not as bad as I say because of my ability to function normally much of the time.
Hate being negative but at times we have to let folks know we are not always FINE. Most of our working life we told everyone we were FINE so we could keep our jobs and we looked the other way when our bodies were trying to tell us we were not FINE, then the ills catch up to some of us and life changes and we can no longer deal with life the way we did all those previous years.
For me this is just a new chapter in life and will deal with the ills the best I can, how about y'all?
Just the other day a doctor at the VA mentioned my ills were not sufficient enough to keep me from working, after all I had been walking, riding a bicycle and functioning rather well compared to others who are really disabled, just love folks who think because your ills can not be seen or come in unseen bouts, you are not really ill.
Have a 60% disability from the Army for all my body ills developed over my years of service.
Apparently folks need to know that my ills may not always show to others, but if they had to live with me or work with me the last two years of my work life, folks would realize my body has problems which are getting worse day by day.
Today was a good day and a bad day, I was sick to my stomach last night, horrible congestion this morning, terrible coughing spasms to the point I was not sure what was going to happen next. Just as always, as soon as the ills came on me, the ills left me and I was functional once again.
Cleaned myself up and went for a bike ride, skipped the walk this morning, had a great ride and felt better. The heart and general practitioner doctors have told me to stay as active as I can for as long as I can to help keep my body functioning properly.
Since about 2005 I have had some real rough times with congestion and body pain but have managed to keep those ills somewhat under control. The Army told me on my retirement in the early 1990s my problem was irritable bowel syndrome and angina, in the mid 2000's the Army mentioned heart problems, Agent Orange and precancerous skin problems on my scalp, neck, face and back. All of these physical ills have caused me to have weight gains and losses, bloating, and just plain down right horrible feelings in my chest, throat, and sinus areas. There are days I am fine and function like anyone else, then there are days I can not get out of bed or spend my time coughing so badly I have no voice or energy when the cough subsides.
Retirement in 2010 was not what I wanted to do, there were days I could not function, not fun realizing your body will not let you go to work on a regular basis, and my employer was not happy my ills were keeping me from doing what everyone else was doing, everyone else was also not happy I was not doing what they were doing, it was time to retire and relax and put my self back together again,Unfortunately the last two years have not been all fun, retirement has been fun and I have done lots of fun things but the ills have not gotten any better and at times my ills are worse.
Use to laugh about my parents and grand parents always talking about their ills, it was almost like they had nothing else to talk about, now I know they did not have anything else more important to talk about than their health which was failing right before their eyes.
We all need to remember we are not as healthy as we use to be and no amount of pills,exercise or changes in the way we eat and live are going to change that we are getting older and our bodies are changing and not always for the better. Some may look great but not be great and some of us just deal with the way we look the best we can...smiles and frowns.
These comments were brought on by those who think because I can walk, talk, ride a bicycle and look healthy some of the time, that I am ok and that my ills are not as bad as I say because of my ability to function normally much of the time.
Hate being negative but at times we have to let folks know we are not always FINE. Most of our working life we told everyone we were FINE so we could keep our jobs and we looked the other way when our bodies were trying to tell us we were not FINE, then the ills catch up to some of us and life changes and we can no longer deal with life the way we did all those previous years.
For me this is just a new chapter in life and will deal with the ills the best I can, how about y'all?
Life Guard Moments
At the ripe old age of 14 I attended the junior life saving class at the Sun Pool in Waco, Texas . I was rather large for my age and was the largest and youngest guy taking the junior life saving certificate.
The class lasted four hours a day for ten days. We practiced the breast stroke, the American crawl, the side stroke, the back stroke, threading water with our feet only, hands only and then treading water with feet and hands!
Practiced doing the life guard entry into the pool from the life guard stand and the high and low diving boards. We had diving boards at all the pools in the 60’s.
Watched films on how to save a person drowning, how to swim out to them, how to get hold of them, how to hold them when saving them, how to swim with them, how to get them out of the pool, how to give them mouth-to-mouth and CPR as needed.
Practiced saving each other in the shallow and deep ends of the pool.
Learned to use the safety ring to save people as well as how to wade into the water to save people.
There was also a section in the training on how to enforce pool rules, eject people from the pool, and bar people from the pool who would not follow the rules on a daily basis.
Also had training on how to clean the pool, run the cash register, receipt for cash, make change, store cash, deposit the daily receipts at the bank, make duty rosters for work schedules, and of course check the chlorine levels.
At the end of the training 10 of the 22 who started the training completed the training. Once the training was completed all 10 of us tested to be a junior life guard and the test was not an easy test at all.
The water safety instructor (WSI) who was at least 20 and going to College at Baylor University would swim out to the middle of the deep end, turn his back to us, then yell go.
We were to swim out to him using the training we had received, take hold of him, swim back to the side of the pool with him, and then get him out of the pool! This was not an easy test but we had to do it. The WSI was six feet tall and in very good shape, so he was not going to be easy to save or pull out if he wanted to fight.
The first five junior life savers’s had no problem swimming out to the WSI, taking hold of him, swimming back with him or in getting him out of the pool. I figured he wanted to get this over with and was not going to fight or cause any of us a problem, little did I know!
When it was my turn, I used the correct entry jump into the pool, used the breast stroke out to the victim who was treading water and facing away from me, slowed, announced my presence while treading water and was just about place the victim into the life saving hold to tow him in from the pool.
You may have already figured out that this was not going to be an easy save like the others had.
The WSI turned as I was about to grab him and leaped out of the water and came down on my head and shoulders! Yep, I was going to be the example for the remaining few on what can happen when you are trying to save someone.
As the sun disappeared from view due to the WSI’s body blocking it from my vision as I was pushed down into the water, I was trying to remember what I was supposed to do in this situation. I could hear the gasp from my fellow life savers to be as they observed what was taking place.
The WSI and I were on the express route to the bottom of the deep end of the pool which was 11 feet deep! I got a good breath of air, ducked my head and face and turned into my chest so the WSI could not get his arms under my chin and pulled my arms in close to my body so the WSI could not get a good grip on me.
We were on our way to the bottom and I could hear him laughing and that did not make me a happy camper. As the seconds seemed like hours I hada flash back from one of the films we watched on how to get out of just this sort of situation. However, I did not like the results of that save and I did not like the way this WSI was taking his frustrations out on me in order to prove a point to the class.
Decided to devise my own escape and life saving maneuver and see if what I came up with would save the victim and get me my junior life saving badge.
Waited for a moment to see if the WSI would end this water prank, but he did not seem to want to let me up so just as we touched down on the bottom of the pool I reached up under both of his arm pits and grabbed two hands full of arm pit hair, twisted it, and pulled down as hard as I could.
Did I mention I was 5’11” tall, weighed 170 pounds, ran track and played football and my stomach was in my chest in those days?
I and those from my life saving class heard the blood curdling yell from the WSI who was 11 feet under water with me. I then pulled even harder on his under arm hair when we did not move and we shot to the surface a lot faster than we descended to the bottom of the pool.
Once on the surface I had no problems getting control of the WSI using the proper side stroke and neck and shoulder hold to pull him to the side of the pull. I never let go of one hand full of arm pit hair as we were moving to the side of the pool.
The next challenge was going to be getting the WSI onto the side of the pool. At that moment I let go of the arm pit hair and the WSI stated the test was over and that I passed!
The rest of the life savers completed their test but the WSI did not try anything funny with them and they all passed all ten of us passed.
It was at the end of the day when the WSI handed out the patches that I got a surprise when I got two patches, one Junior Life Saving patch and one Senior Life Saving patch!
I ask about this and was told by the WSI they were short of life guards and I was good at using the book rules for life saving and thinking quickly in order to save lives. He wanted me to work that summer as a Senior Life Saver so he gave me both patches.
Summer Job - 1969
Summer Job in Waco …
Way back in the year 1969 I just graduated from Richfield High School and had no idea what I wanted to do the rest of my life. College seemed the way to go, but I was not that great a student and had no illusions I would improve my academic skills in order to get a degree in anything, but even if I did, what would I do with the degree, still had no clue what direction my life would go in.
My Father Jack wanted me to work with him at the paint store he owned, but I had worked at the paint store off and on and did not care much for the paint business. Dad was good at his job and could sell paint to anyone and keep them coming back for more and he enjoyed the work and the people but for some reason I was just not a paint mixing and selling kind of guy.
My Mother Bea worked at the Owens-Illinois Glass Plant as a glass inspector, had been there 35 years and thought I should work there for the summer and make some extra money for college.
After graduation I turned in my football gear, track shoes, life guard whistle, furniture moving gloves, and paint stacking ability to work at the glass plant in Waco or Beverly Hills which was a suburb of Waco then, and work as a glass stacker for the summer.
Over the years I had made the trip from various places we lived in Waco out to the glass plant either to take mother to work or pick mother up from work, she worked a different shift every other month so I knew how to get to the plant and that working there was not going to be easy due to the shift changes.
I started work with very little excitement, everyone on the line I worked on in the warehouse knew my mother and had all sorts of comments to make about her and her ability, but when she came round they ran for the glass stacks, my mother apparently did not take any crap or off the wall comments from anyone and if they made any she gave as good as she got and usually won! That was another side of my mother I had not been exposed to and it was good to know she was a strong and respected woman in the work force.
Mother decided to let me deal with life on the line the best way I could so I could see if I really liked working there and hoped working there would scare me into staying in school, life at the Glass Plant was not easy, it was hard work and some of the folks who worked there were not nice people.
It was during my orientation I learned just how good a paying job the glass plaint was, even for a brand new kid just out of school. Apparently many of the guys I was working with came to the glass plant as a summer job but never left because the pay was so good.
Base pay for me for one hour was more than I made in a day at most of my other jobs and the plant added to that amount each day based on production and if you worked over time you got time and a half added, they always wanted you to work over time, and if it was a holiday you got triple time, it was a very good paying job.
My first week at the plant was busy, not hard to learn my job, but not easy to do repetitive work hour after hour for eight hours. We did get plenty of brakes and the line was not always that rough but there were times the line was hell and the devil was there to check on you if you were not pulling and stacking glass as fast as the line moved.
Most jobs as they called them took two folks, one on each side of the line, both folks pulling boxes of glass off the line and throwing the boxes onto a giant trailer with tow ten foot sides. Each person had a load plan on how to stack the boxes, when you pulled the box off the line you turned and tossed the box into the trailer a certain way, it had to be stacked that way or at about eight feet the stack would fall over and you did not want your stacks to fall over!
My first couple of jobs were easy, had another guy there to make sure I was doing it right and show me how to pull and toss the boxes so the stacks were right and I thought how easy is this and they pay me big bucks to do it. The line I worked on was a conveyer belt attached to an electronic crane of sorts that could sit at floor level or move up and down as high as twenty feet off the floor so you could get all your boxes stacked as tall as the trailer you were stacking.
The boxes full of glass, mostly soda bottles, twenty four to a box would slide down the conveyer belt onto my crane, I would pull a box at a time, turn to my right or left and toss the box onto the trailer into the stack pattern for that load.
Each job had a ticket, the ticket told you how fast the glass would come, how many folks were needed to accomplish the job, and provide you with a stack pattern and how long the job would last. Most of the jobs were four hours, but they could be eight hours.
When we needed a break, we yelled out and a replacement stacker would show up and do the job while I was on break. When I left he would step in and when I returned I would step in, the line never stopped until the job was over.
You can see how this could be a problem if you were not able to pull, toss and stack the glass as fast as you had to do it.
I found out that on occasion only one person pulled, tossed and stacked and had no help except the break person and then only during your break. After several days I was doing my job and doing it well, I was way ahead of my job plan, when as the load puller pulled one of my trailers out; the entire load fell on the cement floor! I was horrified, the load puller was yelling and pointing at me, and others came a running to see what happened, they all saw the look on my face, they had told me if I dropped any glass I had to pay for the damage out of my pay, I figured I had just lost a week’s pay and I had not gotten that pay yet!
Turned out this was all a joke to see how I would react and I reacted the right way apparently. I yelled at the load puller and the clean up guy to get the damaged items out of the way, pull in a new trailer so I could get the rest of the job done, that was the correct response, after all the line never stops till the job is done.
Turned out the load puller who pushes in the trailer and sets of the ropes at certain levels to hold the stacked glass in place had removed some of the ropes and or bands once I had attached them, that is also part of the job, at certain levels you had to attach a band to hold the boxes in place. The load puller cut them and when he pulled the load out the majority of the boxes fell over! Some test but one I never forgot.
It was during my first week on the line in the warehouse at the Glass Plant that I was on break having lunch and saw the NASA folks land on the Moon. Yes, we had TV back in those days and they had one in the break room, where you when the guys landed on the moon?
After several weeks I was getting very good at what I did at the glass plant and was making lots of money, but Mother was not happy I might stay at work and not go on to college, but she let me go my own way there and make my own decisions so I would know what it was going to be like working in this sort of environment.
One day I was on the line with no help and the glass was shooting down the line, I was losing a box every other ten boxes but got no help cause they were short of people that night, there was broken glass on my conveyer belt and stand and on the floor below me, the clean up guy was doing his best, but everyone was having a bad night and glass was all over the place, so much for you had to pay of broken glass.
Part of the job of a stacker was also to tie off some of the loads after they were stacked, on my conveyer I had a spool of twine and a razor sharp cutter edge to cut the twine with, this was usually not a problem, but with glass shooting down the line, this was an accident waiting to happen.
On one of my turns tossing the box of glass to the trailer I slipped on the broken glass on my stand and started to fall, so I tossed the box of glass, it fell to the floor below me some ten feet down and broke into jagged pieces, in order to keep from falling off the conveyer and onto the broken glass I grabbed the conveyer rail with my right hand but missed the rail with my left hand and caught the razor!
I pulled myself up to the conveyer stand and noticed I had a sharp pain just below my left thumb, looked down and saw blood all over the conveyer, the glass and me and that the blood was coming from my left hand. I yelled about the same time I grabbed my left hand with my right hand applying pressure to the cut just below my left thumb. I called for the break guy who was on his way, apparently the clean up guy who was below my conveyer saw me fall and saw I had cut myself and called for the backup guy.
Once the line was taken care of I headed to the first aid office to see how bad a cut I had, there was blood all over me and both my hands were bloody as I walked to the aid station. When I walked in, the nurse noticed the mess and told me to remove my hand so she could look at the cut, I told her I did not think that was a good idea, she pulled my right hand away and blood shot all over the place, she fainted and fell out on the floor in front of me.
Just about this time my mother came running in to see what had happened, apparently it was all over the plant I had cut myself and she was coming to see how bad. Mother helped the nurse up off the floor and into a chair as I applied pressure to the wound again. It was about this time that I was starting to feel the pain and loss of blood, the doctor arrived about that time and had me sit down while he worked on the laceration.
I received ten stitches just below the left thumb on what I would call the heel of my hand. I can still see those stitches today, well the scar where the stitches were, it was a bad cut, wound, laceration, the razor had gone all the way to the bone but they saved the thumb and all I got out of the ordeal was a scar and this story!
Needles to say a month later I left my summer job and drove off into the sun rise to college and the next stage of my life…smiles and frowns.
Way back in the year 1969 I just graduated from Richfield High School and had no idea what I wanted to do the rest of my life. College seemed the way to go, but I was not that great a student and had no illusions I would improve my academic skills in order to get a degree in anything, but even if I did, what would I do with the degree, still had no clue what direction my life would go in.
My Father Jack wanted me to work with him at the paint store he owned, but I had worked at the paint store off and on and did not care much for the paint business. Dad was good at his job and could sell paint to anyone and keep them coming back for more and he enjoyed the work and the people but for some reason I was just not a paint mixing and selling kind of guy.
My Mother Bea worked at the Owens-Illinois Glass Plant as a glass inspector, had been there 35 years and thought I should work there for the summer and make some extra money for college.
After graduation I turned in my football gear, track shoes, life guard whistle, furniture moving gloves, and paint stacking ability to work at the glass plant in Waco or Beverly Hills which was a suburb of Waco then, and work as a glass stacker for the summer.
Over the years I had made the trip from various places we lived in Waco out to the glass plant either to take mother to work or pick mother up from work, she worked a different shift every other month so I knew how to get to the plant and that working there was not going to be easy due to the shift changes.
I started work with very little excitement, everyone on the line I worked on in the warehouse knew my mother and had all sorts of comments to make about her and her ability, but when she came round they ran for the glass stacks, my mother apparently did not take any crap or off the wall comments from anyone and if they made any she gave as good as she got and usually won! That was another side of my mother I had not been exposed to and it was good to know she was a strong and respected woman in the work force.
Mother decided to let me deal with life on the line the best way I could so I could see if I really liked working there and hoped working there would scare me into staying in school, life at the Glass Plant was not easy, it was hard work and some of the folks who worked there were not nice people.
It was during my orientation I learned just how good a paying job the glass plaint was, even for a brand new kid just out of school. Apparently many of the guys I was working with came to the glass plant as a summer job but never left because the pay was so good.
Base pay for me for one hour was more than I made in a day at most of my other jobs and the plant added to that amount each day based on production and if you worked over time you got time and a half added, they always wanted you to work over time, and if it was a holiday you got triple time, it was a very good paying job.
My first week at the plant was busy, not hard to learn my job, but not easy to do repetitive work hour after hour for eight hours. We did get plenty of brakes and the line was not always that rough but there were times the line was hell and the devil was there to check on you if you were not pulling and stacking glass as fast as the line moved.
Most jobs as they called them took two folks, one on each side of the line, both folks pulling boxes of glass off the line and throwing the boxes onto a giant trailer with tow ten foot sides. Each person had a load plan on how to stack the boxes, when you pulled the box off the line you turned and tossed the box into the trailer a certain way, it had to be stacked that way or at about eight feet the stack would fall over and you did not want your stacks to fall over!
My first couple of jobs were easy, had another guy there to make sure I was doing it right and show me how to pull and toss the boxes so the stacks were right and I thought how easy is this and they pay me big bucks to do it. The line I worked on was a conveyer belt attached to an electronic crane of sorts that could sit at floor level or move up and down as high as twenty feet off the floor so you could get all your boxes stacked as tall as the trailer you were stacking.
The boxes full of glass, mostly soda bottles, twenty four to a box would slide down the conveyer belt onto my crane, I would pull a box at a time, turn to my right or left and toss the box onto the trailer into the stack pattern for that load.
Each job had a ticket, the ticket told you how fast the glass would come, how many folks were needed to accomplish the job, and provide you with a stack pattern and how long the job would last. Most of the jobs were four hours, but they could be eight hours.
When we needed a break, we yelled out and a replacement stacker would show up and do the job while I was on break. When I left he would step in and when I returned I would step in, the line never stopped until the job was over.
You can see how this could be a problem if you were not able to pull, toss and stack the glass as fast as you had to do it.
I found out that on occasion only one person pulled, tossed and stacked and had no help except the break person and then only during your break. After several days I was doing my job and doing it well, I was way ahead of my job plan, when as the load puller pulled one of my trailers out; the entire load fell on the cement floor! I was horrified, the load puller was yelling and pointing at me, and others came a running to see what happened, they all saw the look on my face, they had told me if I dropped any glass I had to pay for the damage out of my pay, I figured I had just lost a week’s pay and I had not gotten that pay yet!
Turned out this was all a joke to see how I would react and I reacted the right way apparently. I yelled at the load puller and the clean up guy to get the damaged items out of the way, pull in a new trailer so I could get the rest of the job done, that was the correct response, after all the line never stops till the job is done.
Turned out the load puller who pushes in the trailer and sets of the ropes at certain levels to hold the stacked glass in place had removed some of the ropes and or bands once I had attached them, that is also part of the job, at certain levels you had to attach a band to hold the boxes in place. The load puller cut them and when he pulled the load out the majority of the boxes fell over! Some test but one I never forgot.
It was during my first week on the line in the warehouse at the Glass Plant that I was on break having lunch and saw the NASA folks land on the Moon. Yes, we had TV back in those days and they had one in the break room, where you when the guys landed on the moon?
After several weeks I was getting very good at what I did at the glass plant and was making lots of money, but Mother was not happy I might stay at work and not go on to college, but she let me go my own way there and make my own decisions so I would know what it was going to be like working in this sort of environment.
One day I was on the line with no help and the glass was shooting down the line, I was losing a box every other ten boxes but got no help cause they were short of people that night, there was broken glass on my conveyer belt and stand and on the floor below me, the clean up guy was doing his best, but everyone was having a bad night and glass was all over the place, so much for you had to pay of broken glass.
Part of the job of a stacker was also to tie off some of the loads after they were stacked, on my conveyer I had a spool of twine and a razor sharp cutter edge to cut the twine with, this was usually not a problem, but with glass shooting down the line, this was an accident waiting to happen.
On one of my turns tossing the box of glass to the trailer I slipped on the broken glass on my stand and started to fall, so I tossed the box of glass, it fell to the floor below me some ten feet down and broke into jagged pieces, in order to keep from falling off the conveyer and onto the broken glass I grabbed the conveyer rail with my right hand but missed the rail with my left hand and caught the razor!
I pulled myself up to the conveyer stand and noticed I had a sharp pain just below my left thumb, looked down and saw blood all over the conveyer, the glass and me and that the blood was coming from my left hand. I yelled about the same time I grabbed my left hand with my right hand applying pressure to the cut just below my left thumb. I called for the break guy who was on his way, apparently the clean up guy who was below my conveyer saw me fall and saw I had cut myself and called for the backup guy.
Once the line was taken care of I headed to the first aid office to see how bad a cut I had, there was blood all over me and both my hands were bloody as I walked to the aid station. When I walked in, the nurse noticed the mess and told me to remove my hand so she could look at the cut, I told her I did not think that was a good idea, she pulled my right hand away and blood shot all over the place, she fainted and fell out on the floor in front of me.
Just about this time my mother came running in to see what had happened, apparently it was all over the plant I had cut myself and she was coming to see how bad. Mother helped the nurse up off the floor and into a chair as I applied pressure to the wound again. It was about this time that I was starting to feel the pain and loss of blood, the doctor arrived about that time and had me sit down while he worked on the laceration.
I received ten stitches just below the left thumb on what I would call the heel of my hand. I can still see those stitches today, well the scar where the stitches were, it was a bad cut, wound, laceration, the razor had gone all the way to the bone but they saved the thumb and all I got out of the ordeal was a scar and this story!
Needles to say a month later I left my summer job and drove off into the sun rise to college and the next stage of my life…smiles and frowns.
While in school in Texas I was rather large for my age at 6' tall weighing in at 175 pounds.
Being a large guy in good physical shape in school gets the attention of the Football coach quickly.
In Texas you need a guardian angel on your side if you play any sport. Folks took football very serious in my home town for many reasons.
At North Junior High School and Richfield High School was invited to join the football and track team. My mind was not on sports back then but due to my size folks just thought I should be on a sports team.
In football and track at North was good at knocking guys down, running, getting the football away from others and catching the football. On the track team I was fair at running the 100 yard and 440 yard dash and managed to Letter in both football and track at North.
Decided not to play football or run track in High School since I did not go to Waco High where all my North friends went, but ended up going to Richfield where all my former rivals went. Since I had a choice did not go out for sports. The second week of what we referred to as 10th grade in high school it was suggested I should go out for sports since had played at North.
My mind was made up, no more sports for me, but that was not to be. One day while getting my books out of my wall locker a large shadow loomed over me. Turned around to see a very tall man wearing a red RHS ball cap, red RHS polo type shirt with Head Coach over the pocket, and gray shorts. This guy was not scary but seemed to have this ability to get you to do what he wanted. Coach said he did not see me on the football field over the last two weeks, smiled, then suggested I be on the field that day. Was not quarter back material but did manage to play as an offensive guard and as a defensive end over the next three years at Richfield and managed to letter in football and track.
During my six years of football was not hurt that many times in practice or in games. The other teams did manage to stomp my hands, give me a scar on the chin and in general bang my body up, but nothing got broken.
Know I had an angel watching out for me with a sense of humor who liked football because I did not get hurt that much and was able to tackle people twice my size and weight, cause fumbles and even intercept a pass or two. We got a star for each fun tackle, fumble or interception made, my helment had lots of stars on it.
Heck, while playing for North intercepted a pass playing against LaVega at LaVega, while running for the touch down, my pants were tugged loose by the player trying to tackle me. Made the touch down with a smile, a jersey and a jock strap on!
Was not that good at sports folks but my guardian angel kept me safe and sound in those days of sweat and pain and must have been the reason for my lettering in football and track at North and Richfield.
As the years (1964-1969) sped by had a great time playing football and running track even though my teams did not win every game or every meet but we did ok.
Texas Football is a big deal and you better have fun playing and you hope you win. In the last game of the season our team played well and we all had fun knowing our time in high school sports was drawing to an end.
The only picture taken of me in that game was of me as a defensive end about to tackle an opposing player (he scored) as he was about to make a touchdown. It was a cold and damp that night, and there was a mist hanging low over the field. In the picture that made the Waco Tribune the next day, you could see how much fun both teams were having...smiles and frowns.
Who knew I would not get the football or track scholarship I wanted and that college football and track could be or seem to be life threatening causing me to go for an ROTC scholarship.
Based on information received my first year at Tarleton State College, left football, track, and ROTC for MCC in Waco for police science. The Viet Nam war was still on so after a year at MCC it was time for me to move on to other exciting times in other places around the world as a police officer in the U.S. Army, but that is another story. #42
Being a large guy in good physical shape in school gets the attention of the Football coach quickly.
In Texas you need a guardian angel on your side if you play any sport. Folks took football very serious in my home town for many reasons.
At North Junior High School and Richfield High School was invited to join the football and track team. My mind was not on sports back then but due to my size folks just thought I should be on a sports team.
In football and track at North was good at knocking guys down, running, getting the football away from others and catching the football. On the track team I was fair at running the 100 yard and 440 yard dash and managed to Letter in both football and track at North.
Decided not to play football or run track in High School since I did not go to Waco High where all my North friends went, but ended up going to Richfield where all my former rivals went. Since I had a choice did not go out for sports. The second week of what we referred to as 10th grade in high school it was suggested I should go out for sports since had played at North.
My mind was made up, no more sports for me, but that was not to be. One day while getting my books out of my wall locker a large shadow loomed over me. Turned around to see a very tall man wearing a red RHS ball cap, red RHS polo type shirt with Head Coach over the pocket, and gray shorts. This guy was not scary but seemed to have this ability to get you to do what he wanted. Coach said he did not see me on the football field over the last two weeks, smiled, then suggested I be on the field that day. Was not quarter back material but did manage to play as an offensive guard and as a defensive end over the next three years at Richfield and managed to letter in football and track.
During my six years of football was not hurt that many times in practice or in games. The other teams did manage to stomp my hands, give me a scar on the chin and in general bang my body up, but nothing got broken.
Know I had an angel watching out for me with a sense of humor who liked football because I did not get hurt that much and was able to tackle people twice my size and weight, cause fumbles and even intercept a pass or two. We got a star for each fun tackle, fumble or interception made, my helment had lots of stars on it.
Heck, while playing for North intercepted a pass playing against LaVega at LaVega, while running for the touch down, my pants were tugged loose by the player trying to tackle me. Made the touch down with a smile, a jersey and a jock strap on!
Was not that good at sports folks but my guardian angel kept me safe and sound in those days of sweat and pain and must have been the reason for my lettering in football and track at North and Richfield.
As the years (1964-1969) sped by had a great time playing football and running track even though my teams did not win every game or every meet but we did ok.
Texas Football is a big deal and you better have fun playing and you hope you win. In the last game of the season our team played well and we all had fun knowing our time in high school sports was drawing to an end.
The only picture taken of me in that game was of me as a defensive end about to tackle an opposing player (he scored) as he was about to make a touchdown. It was a cold and damp that night, and there was a mist hanging low over the field. In the picture that made the Waco Tribune the next day, you could see how much fun both teams were having...smiles and frowns.
Who knew I would not get the football or track scholarship I wanted and that college football and track could be or seem to be life threatening causing me to go for an ROTC scholarship.
Based on information received my first year at Tarleton State College, left football, track, and ROTC for MCC in Waco for police science. The Viet Nam war was still on so after a year at MCC it was time for me to move on to other exciting times in other places around the world as a police officer in the U.S. Army, but that is another story. #42
The day-to-day life of a law enforcement officer
The day-to-day life of a law enforcement officer may not be the life you imagine. After all a job is a job and everyone does the best they can at their job in order to get ahead and make money in order to pay the bills.
Most folks watch TV and movies and think they know all there is to know about police officers and detectives, but let me tell you, what you see on TV and in the movies is not the life I have lived or the life those I know have lived.
Started out as a police cadet in the 1970s, studied criminology, became a civilian police officer and then over the years changed from civilian law enforcement and moved to the military where I became a military policeman, military police investigator, military customs investigator, military drug investigator, military fraud investigator, semi-undercover agent, special agent criminal investigator.
The last half of my forty years of police work performed duties as a criminal intelligence analyst writing policy for Department of Defense criminal investigators and again dealing with Special Agent duties involved in the occasional criminal inquiry, evaluation, and internal affairs review, along with war crimes, life in the civilian police world and the military police world is not always lived the way you might think.
Graduated from high school with no idea what I wanted to do in life and had never given much thought to what kind of life I would have after high school. During my years in school my grades were not great, but I compensated by playing football and running track, not great but good. Once out of high school headed off to college once again to be involved in sports, but once in college realized college sports were dangerous and hazardous to one’s health so traded in my sports scholarship for a military scholarship.
Studying about life in the military was interesting but once again realized military life was more dangerous than sports, one could really get killed in the military, after all the Viet Nam war was still being fought.
Changed my work ideas once again and chose a police grant where the police paid for my college as long as I worked for the police. Little did I realize police work was more dangerous than college sports or the military!
Studied during the day and worked as a police cadet at night, then one fine day was drafted into the Army and spent time learning how to be a military policeman, then off to Viet Nam for fun in a foreign land, and then back to my home town and the National Guard and my home town police department.
I attended and graduated from the police academy and started full fledge police work in my home town.
Who knew my home town was more dangerous than Viet Nam? Worked for a year as a police patrol officer and had many close calls and realized military life as a police officer was safer than life as a civilian police officer!
Was torn between civilian or military police, then the path was chosen for me, my guard unit was called to active duty resulting in my going back in the military and back to being a military policeman.
The rest is history; one of these days will type more about the life and times of me as a civilian police officer and as a military policeman.
Most folks watch TV and movies and think they know all there is to know about police officers and detectives, but let me tell you, what you see on TV and in the movies is not the life I have lived or the life those I know have lived.
Started out as a police cadet in the 1970s, studied criminology, became a civilian police officer and then over the years changed from civilian law enforcement and moved to the military where I became a military policeman, military police investigator, military customs investigator, military drug investigator, military fraud investigator, semi-undercover agent, special agent criminal investigator.
The last half of my forty years of police work performed duties as a criminal intelligence analyst writing policy for Department of Defense criminal investigators and again dealing with Special Agent duties involved in the occasional criminal inquiry, evaluation, and internal affairs review, along with war crimes, life in the civilian police world and the military police world is not always lived the way you might think.
Graduated from high school with no idea what I wanted to do in life and had never given much thought to what kind of life I would have after high school. During my years in school my grades were not great, but I compensated by playing football and running track, not great but good. Once out of high school headed off to college once again to be involved in sports, but once in college realized college sports were dangerous and hazardous to one’s health so traded in my sports scholarship for a military scholarship.
Studying about life in the military was interesting but once again realized military life was more dangerous than sports, one could really get killed in the military, after all the Viet Nam war was still being fought.
Changed my work ideas once again and chose a police grant where the police paid for my college as long as I worked for the police. Little did I realize police work was more dangerous than college sports or the military!
Studied during the day and worked as a police cadet at night, then one fine day was drafted into the Army and spent time learning how to be a military policeman, then off to Viet Nam for fun in a foreign land, and then back to my home town and the National Guard and my home town police department.
I attended and graduated from the police academy and started full fledge police work in my home town.
Who knew my home town was more dangerous than Viet Nam? Worked for a year as a police patrol officer and had many close calls and realized military life as a police officer was safer than life as a civilian police officer!
Was torn between civilian or military police, then the path was chosen for me, my guard unit was called to active duty resulting in my going back in the military and back to being a military policeman.
The rest is history; one of these days will type more about the life and times of me as a civilian police officer and as a military policeman.
Flashes Of Army Moments
It seems like yesterday that I graduated from High School and headed off to Tarleton State College to play football. Once I determined that my 175 pounds was not going to stop those freight train ranch boys who weighed in at 300 pounds, I picked a safer way of paying for school, Army ROTC was the way for me until I leaned that most of the previous year’s graduating class had been killed in action! The life of an Army 2LT was not very long during the Viet Nam war.
Left Tarleton State College and returned home to Waco, Texas where my new job was working for a funeral home as a Hurst driver and Greeter, also lived over the funeral home next to the embalming room. While working decided to continue my education since the war was still on going and going to college might keep me from the war.
While working at the funeral home it was mentioned to me that there was a Police Grant Program offering free tuition and books if once your criminology education was completed you worked for a police department.
After much consideration I started taking criminology courses at McLennan Community College while working as a Police cadet (1969 - 1970) for the Waco police department in Waco, Texas. Yep, the life of a policeman seemed much better than life on the front line of a football team or in a WAR.
The U.S. was fighting a war in Viet Nam at that time and the Army decided it was time for me to serve a two-year hitch in the Army as a two year draftee. I on the other hand did not feel like going to war and had to be reminded by the U.S. Marshal Service that joining the Army to see the world was better than going to jail as a draft dodger! The Marshal Service did not care my draft number was a high one, the war was almost over, or that the Draft Board had not sent me an official letter.
No idea how those folks pressured me into two years in the Army?
Had never been anywhere outside the State of Texas other than a quick trip to Oklahoma which I considered part of Texas, never been on a commercial aircraft and thought Army life would be a great change for me instead of the Marines. Well I felt the change would be good since the Marshal Service and apparently the Draft office thought the change would be good for me.
The draft is no longer around and young people today have to join the military because they want to experience military life, not because the Marshal Service or the draft board wants them to join the military.
The thought of my being able to fly on a commercial aircraft and see places other than Texas excited me and made me want to be a part of this new experience called the U.S. Army.
Left Texas for Ft. Lewis, Washington to attend Basic Army Training in 1970.
After 8 weeks of learning how to be a soldier in the infantry, graduated from basic training and was a real live Army soldier. Basic training was hard physically and mentally but I was young and had no problems learning how to walk, talk and fight as a soldier.
Life as a soldier is not for everyone, but it can be fun depending on what you want out of it. I wanted to see far off places and meet new people, the Army provided me with all of those things. Washington State looked just like Texas to me with the exception of the mountain called Mount Rainier that dwarfed Fort Lewis and the entire area. It also seemed like it rained a lot while training. Did not get to see anything in Washington State except Fort Lewis because I in basic training you do not get any time off.
Was given a choice of Infantry training at Fort Lewis or Military Police training at Fort Gordon, GA. Decided to be an Army Military Policeman but had to increase my time in service from two year US draftee to three year regular Army, was flown from Fort Lewis to Fort Gordon, GA for 8 more weeks of Advanced Individual Military Police (MP) training.
While in basic and advanced training learned never to volunteer for anything but ended up volunteering all the time. Near the end of advanced training the Army told us that if we volunteered for duty as MP’s with the Army Security Agency (ASA) we would not be going to Viet Nam since ASA was not in Viet Nam. Should have known that was bull but when you are 19 you tend to hear and see what you want to hear and see. Liked the idea of the ASA because I would not be going to Viet Nam and was going to be assigned to Fort Hood, Texas.
Was a platoon leader in Basic Training and at MP Advanced Individual Training (AIT) and enjoyed those positions. I did so well in my Basic and AIT training was promoted to the rank of Private First Class (PFC). That was a big deal in the 1970’s. Living in Georgia and Washington was a real change since the people in those states talked very differently than we Texans did. They had accents. Being the outgoing type guy that I was managed to get along with all those non-Texans!
While home on leave in Waco, Texas received a telegram from the Army. Yep, telegrams were bad news in those days. Should have torn it up and tossed it without reading it but opened it and was notified selected for duty with the 509th Radio Research Group (ASA) and my orders to Fort Hood were canceled.
Flew out to Oakland, California from Texas in route to Viet Nam. Yep, the Army had lied to me and was sending me to an ASA unit or should say signals intelligence unit in Viet Nam.
While at Oakland Army Terminal was assigned to security duty the first hour and then to the local MP's for five weeks to assist in stopping the anti war riots. Yes, Oakland, CA was a hot bed of anti-war riots and Oakland Army terminal was a target.
Once the stomp drag riot duty was over provided a week of security at the terminal trying to keep the returning soldiers from getting into fights with the soldiers who were being assigned to go to Viet Nam. This was a real eye opener for a 19-year-old who had never been out side of the State of Texas.
From Oakland flew to Anchorage, Alaska were we stopped over for five hours or so. Very expensive place even in the 70s, a cup of coffee cost me $3.00 with no refills. While leaving Anchorage, the plane skidded off the run way and piled into a snow bank. We had to run across five football fields of runway to get back to the terminal. Several more hours later we boarded another plane and flew to Japan.
Landed in Japan at US Air Force Base, several hours later we headed out on our last leg of the trip and flew into Saigon, Viet Nam.
On landing all of us who were Private First Class (PFC) were promoted to SP4.
Stayed for five weeks at what was called MACV compound with the 509th Radio Research (RR) supporting the 709th MP's in riot control in Saigon before being assigned to my real unit at Nah Trang.
Flew to Nha Trang, Viet Nam from Saigon where I stayed for about six months pulling security duty (flight line and convoy security) for the 144th Avn Co MP's.
Got a month vacation to Australia but in route was diverted to the U.S. since Australia was off limits to U.S. soldiers for some reason. Ended up flying back to Waco, TX for a month. It was strange being back in Waco after being in Nha Trang but again when you are 19 you get over all these problems. The month was gone so quickly, flew back to Viet Nam.
Landed in Nha Trang the second time to find my unit was being moved to Can Tho, Viet Nam located in the southern most part of Viet Nam. Just made the last flight out of Nha Trang to Can Tho where spent my remaining time in Viet Nam doing convoy duty and guarding security bunkers.
Managed to get assigned to Ft. Hood, TX to get some real MP duty for about a month. My MP unit was then assigned to the Post Stockade where I was a Corrections MP. Riots followed me and there were many riots at the stockade, we had fires, escape attempts, assaults on guards, fights, and just wild times at the prison.
Left the active MP's at Fort Hood, Texas and was reassigned to the Army National Guard MP's in Waco, TX as a SGT.
My years with the Army were up but had to spend a year with the National Guard since I was trained as a policeman, which added an extra year to my draft status. Yep, the Army saw me coming and got plenty of time out of me for God and Country.
While serving with the National Guard at Waco also worked as a Waco Policeman and loved it.
Guess they are right when they say once you go off to see the world you have a hard time going back home. My National Guard MP unit was called to active duty and was headed for Viet Nam. Waco did not seem to be the big city it had been when I was drafted into the Army years earlier so I decided to make a change.
Decided to go back to the active Army and not go back to Viet Nam with my National Guard unit. I was out of Waco and working for the Army MP's at Ft Gordon, GA before I knew it.
Managed to go from a line MP CPL/SGT to a MP Desk Sergeant, then to an MP investigator SGT and the rest is history.
Left Ft Gordon, GA and arrived in Stuttgart, Germany and worked for the 42nd Customs MP Investigators and was promoted to SSG. These were hard days and lots of activity that kept me away from home and family a lot.
The stress of Army and police/investigator life caused me many problems in those days. Was out working with the Germany Customs Agents for weeks at a time and that caused lots of strain on my family and me.
Selected to be an Army Criminal Investigator in 1975 and worked very hard while assigned to the semi-undercover drug team as an overt and semi-covert agent. Life in the customs unit was hard but life in the CID was even harder.
Assigned to Ft. Ord, CA where continued working as an Army Criminal Investigator Special Agent with the semi-undercover drug teams.
Worked hard at living and playing while at Ft. Ord before being reassigned to Hanau, Germany working again in semi-undercover drug operations. Promoted to Sergeant First Class (SFC) and then later to Warrant Officer One (WO1).
My life in those early years with the Army was tough and my life was not fun all the time. Saw the world, lived life to the fullest, but my life was lived by playing so many rolls and parts, being other people, living as another person, not living as ME.
Moved to Ft. Hood, TX where I was assigned to the Fraud investigative team and was promoted to Chief Warrant Officer TWO (CW2). While at Ft. Hood became very ill and ended up in the hospital for two weeks, then a month of medical leave. Once out off medical leave was reassigned to Germany.
Wurzburg, Germany was my next fun assignment where I was an investigative team chief. While in Wurzburg had so much fun that I got to move out to the mountains and live and work in a German castle town called Wertheim. Living and working in the mountains was the way to enjoy life in those days.
Assigned to Ft. McClellan, AL as a drug team chief and then to the Military Police and CID school as an instructor for undercover drug operations for CID. Ended my 21-year career, which started as a two-year draftee as a Military Policeman and Criminal Investigator at Ft. McClellan, AL.
Reading over this, there was much more to my Army life but if I told you all of it, well you know, yep, IWHTKY and you would not be able to read the other stories of the life and times of ME - smiling
Photographs Bring Much To Stories
Over the last couple of years have seen many bicyclists and bicycle clubs riding in The Villages, Florida. One day while out and about on my Sun Trike took my trust point and shoot camera and documented some of the comings and goings of those bicyclists.
https://www.flickr.com/photos/101922711@N04/
https://www.flickr.com/photos/101922711@N04/
Wednesday, June 11, 2014
Saigon and Nah Trang
Viet Nam Trip
Remember being shocked that the passenger jet I was on was able to land at a real airport (Saigon Airport) when I arrived in Viet Nam.
The entire trip I kept thinking something was wrong. How was a civilian jet going to land in a war zone? How were we going to get off the jet without getting shot? Flying into Viet Nam on a civilian jet just did not seem to fit, then again I was 20 so what did I know.
Walked off the plane and down the passenger stairs to a waiting truck that took me to the 509th Radio Research (R&R) barracks.
Was all eyes as we drove out of the airport and onto the streets of Saigon. There was so much to see and so little time to see it. The entire area did not look real, not like I had pictured it. The local population was going on with life even though we were all right in the middle of a war. The people did not look like they did on TV. I had watched this war on TV for the last five years and the folks I was looking at were not the folks I had seen on the TV. The area was full of military vehicles and soldiers and everyone was in a hurry every where I looked. The city looked dirty compared to American city standards but somehow cleaner than I had expected for a war torn city.
Arrived at the compound where I was to live for the next week. Checked in with the duty sergeant who told me to go to the second floor where all the SP4’s (Specialist Forth Class – Corporal’s) lived. I pointed out the fact that at the time I was a Private First Class (PFC) and not a SP4. He laughed and said I became a SP4 the minute I landed in Viet Nam! Not a bad way to get promoted or so I thought at the time.
The barracks was a two-story building with lots of bunks for us to sleep in; we also each had a wall locker and a footlocker. At one end of each floor were a shower room for 30 and an area for us to watch TV and play cards or read a book. I was impressed, TV in war zone. There were not that many folks in the area, just about ten of us. Heard later that most of the others had shipped out that day for their assignments around the country.
This was a holding area where we would learn more about the 509th and what that unit did before being assigned to field units around the country.Spent a week in Saigon mostly on various military installations getting new clothes, new papers and watching a lot of TV. The TV shows were on the Armed Forces Television Network (AFTN) Viet Nam. The shows had no commercials and were regular American TV shows.
My week was very boring since I was not assigned to do any work while in Saigon. I celebrated December 25, 1971 in Saigon. The entire week there was nothing going on that even looked like war except for the fact there were lots of military folks out and about every where you looked.
The last day I was in Saigon I had to take a drive to a little town about ten miles from Saigon in order to get more combat clothing for my assignment to a yet unknown assignment. Arrived at the little settlement in the jungle, yep we were now in the jungle and these folks looked that the folks I had been watching on TV as I was growing up.
As we were leaving the supply area with all of our clothing the war decided to pay my little part of Viet Nam a visit. The truck I rode in on blew up, flew into the air, and landed about ten feet from where I had been standing. I moved pretty quickly when I was young. Mortars hit most of the open area and the open area was a mess of debri, fire and smoke. Most of us were in the ditches while all the explosions were taking place and then we were on our feet and moving to another truck to get out of the supply area.
No one seemed to upset about what had just happened so I learned quickly that you just did your job and moved on like nothing had happened. There were several injured during the attack but the medical folks were moving into the area to take care of them and the guys assigned to the area were putting out the fires as we loaded up and headed back to Saigon. Once back in Saigon I was told I was leaving for Nah Trang and would catch a jeep to the airfield and be in Nah Trang later that day. I was relieved and yet anxious about getting to my real war duty assignment. Arrived at the airfield and got the last seat on a very large black C-140 aircraft. The ride was noisy but only lasted about 45 minutes.
Over Nah Trang we were told we would be landing fast and when told we would be running out the back of the aircraft and should head for the terminal at a run! Not what I wanted to hear. The plane touched down, we were told to run, we ran, the plane never stopped, it just kept moving as we jumped out the rear and some how kept running. As luck would have it, Nah Trang looked like the TV reports of Viet Nam or at least it did the day I landed there.
Mortars were hitting the airfield and all hell was braking loose and things were blowing up all around us. Yep, this was what I expected in Saigon but did not see till I got to Nah Trang. Once in the terminal I noticed no one seemed too worried about the explosions so I calmed down on the out side but on the inside I was not calm.
As I looked about I saw a jeep with 509th on it and headed that way and got a ride the block and a half to my new home at the 144th R&R located right there on the Nah Trang Airfield.
Remember being shocked that the passenger jet I was on was able to land at a real airport (Saigon Airport) when I arrived in Viet Nam.
The entire trip I kept thinking something was wrong. How was a civilian jet going to land in a war zone? How were we going to get off the jet without getting shot? Flying into Viet Nam on a civilian jet just did not seem to fit, then again I was 20 so what did I know.
Walked off the plane and down the passenger stairs to a waiting truck that took me to the 509th Radio Research (R&R) barracks.
Was all eyes as we drove out of the airport and onto the streets of Saigon. There was so much to see and so little time to see it. The entire area did not look real, not like I had pictured it. The local population was going on with life even though we were all right in the middle of a war. The people did not look like they did on TV. I had watched this war on TV for the last five years and the folks I was looking at were not the folks I had seen on the TV. The area was full of military vehicles and soldiers and everyone was in a hurry every where I looked. The city looked dirty compared to American city standards but somehow cleaner than I had expected for a war torn city.
Arrived at the compound where I was to live for the next week. Checked in with the duty sergeant who told me to go to the second floor where all the SP4’s (Specialist Forth Class – Corporal’s) lived. I pointed out the fact that at the time I was a Private First Class (PFC) and not a SP4. He laughed and said I became a SP4 the minute I landed in Viet Nam! Not a bad way to get promoted or so I thought at the time.
The barracks was a two-story building with lots of bunks for us to sleep in; we also each had a wall locker and a footlocker. At one end of each floor were a shower room for 30 and an area for us to watch TV and play cards or read a book. I was impressed, TV in war zone. There were not that many folks in the area, just about ten of us. Heard later that most of the others had shipped out that day for their assignments around the country.
This was a holding area where we would learn more about the 509th and what that unit did before being assigned to field units around the country.Spent a week in Saigon mostly on various military installations getting new clothes, new papers and watching a lot of TV. The TV shows were on the Armed Forces Television Network (AFTN) Viet Nam. The shows had no commercials and were regular American TV shows.
My week was very boring since I was not assigned to do any work while in Saigon. I celebrated December 25, 1971 in Saigon. The entire week there was nothing going on that even looked like war except for the fact there were lots of military folks out and about every where you looked.
The last day I was in Saigon I had to take a drive to a little town about ten miles from Saigon in order to get more combat clothing for my assignment to a yet unknown assignment. Arrived at the little settlement in the jungle, yep we were now in the jungle and these folks looked that the folks I had been watching on TV as I was growing up.
As we were leaving the supply area with all of our clothing the war decided to pay my little part of Viet Nam a visit. The truck I rode in on blew up, flew into the air, and landed about ten feet from where I had been standing. I moved pretty quickly when I was young. Mortars hit most of the open area and the open area was a mess of debri, fire and smoke. Most of us were in the ditches while all the explosions were taking place and then we were on our feet and moving to another truck to get out of the supply area.
No one seemed to upset about what had just happened so I learned quickly that you just did your job and moved on like nothing had happened. There were several injured during the attack but the medical folks were moving into the area to take care of them and the guys assigned to the area were putting out the fires as we loaded up and headed back to Saigon. Once back in Saigon I was told I was leaving for Nah Trang and would catch a jeep to the airfield and be in Nah Trang later that day. I was relieved and yet anxious about getting to my real war duty assignment. Arrived at the airfield and got the last seat on a very large black C-140 aircraft. The ride was noisy but only lasted about 45 minutes.
Over Nah Trang we were told we would be landing fast and when told we would be running out the back of the aircraft and should head for the terminal at a run! Not what I wanted to hear. The plane touched down, we were told to run, we ran, the plane never stopped, it just kept moving as we jumped out the rear and some how kept running. As luck would have it, Nah Trang looked like the TV reports of Viet Nam or at least it did the day I landed there.
Mortars were hitting the airfield and all hell was braking loose and things were blowing up all around us. Yep, this was what I expected in Saigon but did not see till I got to Nah Trang. Once in the terminal I noticed no one seemed too worried about the explosions so I calmed down on the out side but on the inside I was not calm.
As I looked about I saw a jeep with 509th on it and headed that way and got a ride the block and a half to my new home at the 144th R&R located right there on the Nah Trang Airfield.
Hanau Drug Team
Hanau Drug Team
Way back I was on and later in charge of one of the Hanau CID Drug teams, most likely in the early 1980's. The Hanau Drug team was as large as the regular Hanau CID office. The Hanau CID office was comprised of about 15 Army CID agents at the time I was there.
Familiar names (all retired now) such as CW4 Gary Felgenhower, CW4 Charley Whitehead, CW4 Max Kingsley, CW4 Ismar Rubio, SGM Bernie Schmidt, CW4 Terry Sells, and many others whose names have long since faded or they would not want their names mentioned. I was just one of the gang assigned to have fun in the trenches while learning how to make all the in charge folks happy...smiles and frowns.
Drugs were being sold and purchased in such alarming rates by U.S. soldiers that large U.S. Army CID drug teams were popping up all over the place in an attempt to at least slow down the purchase and sale of drugs. Hanau selected Ismar Rubio as the Lead team chief, Bernie Schmidt as the Hanau area team, chief, and me as the outside the city of Hanau team chief...in other words I had the little team...smiles.
Bernie and I worked for Ismar who was always into working with the German police and net working with the folks down town, he worked all the time, so guess what, so did we. Bernie and I had about ten drug team members each made up of military police and we worked all the time all over the place. Life was never dull in Hanau and the area surrounding Hanau.
I managed to get selected for the drug team because I did not tell the Special Agent in Charge I had any drug team experience, they asked and I said nope, not me. So I managed to get on the General Crimes Team with some decent working hours. I guess I was at Hanau Resident Agency about three months before my medal showed up telling everyone what a great job I had done on the previous drug team at Ft. Ord, CA. It was down hill from there. I was on the Frankfurt Snow White Drug Operation for about six months, then on the local Hanau drug team.
Those were the days when your only safety alarm was throwing a chair out the window to let your back up agent know you needed help. I am not kidding, you would go in to purchase drugs with no help at all with the exception of your back up agent in the parking lot who was not much help until he or she knew you needed help and that was when shots were fired or windows broken or folks were seen running from your location.
We were making about five drug buys a week on each team in Hanau while Ismar was doing the big deals and getting the Intel we needed to resolve the big problems. We also did all the surveillance work for the regular CID office because we were the only ones who knew how to do it and how to work the surveillance equipment.
Our teams were also the only ones with a lot of sources (informants) who knew what was going on in the Hanau area, largely because Bernie and Ismar were connected with the German police and had lots of friends with the local folks.
One night Ismar called me and asked me to meet him in down town Hanau, when I arrived he was talking to a guy in front of one of the clubs, as I got to them, the guy got in a car parked at the curb, Ismar walked over to the driver side door and was leaning in talking to the guy. I came up on the passenger side of the car and the guy who was soldier knew me, I had arrested him several times previously, so he turned on the car and was getting ready to leave. Ismar pulled his gun and stuck it in the guys ear and said your busted, the guy laughed and drove off with Ismar half in and half out of the car.
I ran and caught up to the car, lunged in the passenger side of the car, Ismar and I were both reasoning with the guy to stop the car, but when that did not work I managed to get turn the key off and Ismar pulled the guy out the drivers side window and had him on the street in cuffs by the time I got to them.
Ismar and I took the guy and the car and left the area and had a long talk about his working for the CID...my memory fades at this point so I am not sure what happened after that...we had some fun and not so fun times dealing with drug dealers in Hanau, Germany in the 1980s.
The 1980’s in Hanau, Germany were tough but I made a lot of good friends in the days of Reach for the Sky we are CID.
Way back I was on and later in charge of one of the Hanau CID Drug teams, most likely in the early 1980's. The Hanau Drug team was as large as the regular Hanau CID office. The Hanau CID office was comprised of about 15 Army CID agents at the time I was there.
Familiar names (all retired now) such as CW4 Gary Felgenhower, CW4 Charley Whitehead, CW4 Max Kingsley, CW4 Ismar Rubio, SGM Bernie Schmidt, CW4 Terry Sells, and many others whose names have long since faded or they would not want their names mentioned. I was just one of the gang assigned to have fun in the trenches while learning how to make all the in charge folks happy...smiles and frowns.
Drugs were being sold and purchased in such alarming rates by U.S. soldiers that large U.S. Army CID drug teams were popping up all over the place in an attempt to at least slow down the purchase and sale of drugs. Hanau selected Ismar Rubio as the Lead team chief, Bernie Schmidt as the Hanau area team, chief, and me as the outside the city of Hanau team chief...in other words I had the little team...smiles.
Bernie and I worked for Ismar who was always into working with the German police and net working with the folks down town, he worked all the time, so guess what, so did we. Bernie and I had about ten drug team members each made up of military police and we worked all the time all over the place. Life was never dull in Hanau and the area surrounding Hanau.
I managed to get selected for the drug team because I did not tell the Special Agent in Charge I had any drug team experience, they asked and I said nope, not me. So I managed to get on the General Crimes Team with some decent working hours. I guess I was at Hanau Resident Agency about three months before my medal showed up telling everyone what a great job I had done on the previous drug team at Ft. Ord, CA. It was down hill from there. I was on the Frankfurt Snow White Drug Operation for about six months, then on the local Hanau drug team.
Those were the days when your only safety alarm was throwing a chair out the window to let your back up agent know you needed help. I am not kidding, you would go in to purchase drugs with no help at all with the exception of your back up agent in the parking lot who was not much help until he or she knew you needed help and that was when shots were fired or windows broken or folks were seen running from your location.
We were making about five drug buys a week on each team in Hanau while Ismar was doing the big deals and getting the Intel we needed to resolve the big problems. We also did all the surveillance work for the regular CID office because we were the only ones who knew how to do it and how to work the surveillance equipment.
Our teams were also the only ones with a lot of sources (informants) who knew what was going on in the Hanau area, largely because Bernie and Ismar were connected with the German police and had lots of friends with the local folks.
One night Ismar called me and asked me to meet him in down town Hanau, when I arrived he was talking to a guy in front of one of the clubs, as I got to them, the guy got in a car parked at the curb, Ismar walked over to the driver side door and was leaning in talking to the guy. I came up on the passenger side of the car and the guy who was soldier knew me, I had arrested him several times previously, so he turned on the car and was getting ready to leave. Ismar pulled his gun and stuck it in the guys ear and said your busted, the guy laughed and drove off with Ismar half in and half out of the car.
I ran and caught up to the car, lunged in the passenger side of the car, Ismar and I were both reasoning with the guy to stop the car, but when that did not work I managed to get turn the key off and Ismar pulled the guy out the drivers side window and had him on the street in cuffs by the time I got to them.
Ismar and I took the guy and the car and left the area and had a long talk about his working for the CID...my memory fades at this point so I am not sure what happened after that...we had some fun and not so fun times dealing with drug dealers in Hanau, Germany in the 1980s.
The 1980’s in Hanau, Germany were tough but I made a lot of good friends in the days of Reach for the Sky we are CID.
Criminal Intelligence Analyst
My last assignment with the US Army CID was as a civilan working as a criminal investigation analyst inspector GS 1801-11 with what was then called Washington District CID.
Now called The Washington CID Bn...currently provides timely and thorough criminal investigative support to U.S. Army Commanders within a thirteen state operational area and the District of Columbia. On order, deploys the 62nd, 68th, and the 75th MP Detachments in support of full spectrum operations.
The Battalion has nine subordinate units located at Fort Drum, New York; Fort Hamilton, New York; West Point, New York; Carlisle Barracks, Pennsylvania; Fort Dix, New Jersey; Fort Meade, Maryland; Fort Myer, Virginia; and Fort Belvoir, Virginia.
Now called The Washington CID Bn...currently provides timely and thorough criminal investigative support to U.S. Army Commanders within a thirteen state operational area and the District of Columbia. On order, deploys the 62nd, 68th, and the 75th MP Detachments in support of full spectrum operations.
The Battalion has nine subordinate units located at Fort Drum, New York; Fort Hamilton, New York; West Point, New York; Carlisle Barracks, Pennsylvania; Fort Dix, New Jersey; Fort Meade, Maryland; Fort Myer, Virginia; and Fort Belvoir, Virginia.
Among key supported units within the Battalion’s operational area are 10th Mountain Division (Light Infantry); United States Military Academy; Corps of Engineers (North Atlantic Division); U.S. Army War College; National Security Agency; U.S. Army Research Development and Engineer Command; U.S. Army Test and Evaluation Command; U.S. Army Ordnance Center & Schools; Walter Reed Army Medical Center; Armed Forces Institute of Pathology Research Center; Military District of Washington; National Defense University; and Dover AFB Port Mortuary Mission.
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Police Cadet
Police Cadet Waco Texas – 1970
Back in the day when I was trying to find myself received an all expenses paid grant to take criminology courses at McLennan Community College (MCC) in Waco Texas.
While attending MCC one of my criminology professors suggested becoming a Waco Police Cadet and obtain some practical experience while going to school.
Applied for a position as a police cadet in Waco and started working as a Police Cadet on March 2, 1970 at the Waco Police Department for a whopping $340.00 a month working in the jail, booking, fingerprinting, dispatch and teletype sections of the police department.
The Waco Police Department in 1970 was in the basement of the Waco City Hall located at 300 Austin Ave. This was the old Waco Police, we had some strange situations at the department that are best left untold here, but will talk about the funny and exciting moments of my time as a night shift (3-11 and 11-7) police cadet.
While growing up in Waco never thought much about the police or crime, in fact did not know about either since Waco was a quiet place where nothing ever happened!
My first 3-11 shift at the police department was an eye opener; we had folks being booked into the jail for assault, arson, failure to pay traffic fines, failure to appear at traffic court, and of all things out of state warrants for similar offenses. This first shift allowed me to practice and learn how to fingerprint, file, pull files, review files, send and receive on the teletype, observe dispatch and word processing for reports. By the end of my first shift my eyes were wide open to the fact my sleepy little town was not so sleepy after all. How was this possible, grew up in Waco and had no idea Waco had crimes of all sorts.
In my opinion the Powers That Be in Waco kept most of the crime out of the news so folks would feel safe in their homes.
Worked and learned about police work at night while taking police courses in the day time.
My four months as a cadet at the Waco Police Department made me aware of how much crime there was in Waco and how OUR Waco Police folks did a great job of keeping all of us safe even when we did not know we were in danger from gangs and criminals in our town as well as those passing through our town on Interstate 35!
On June 5, 1970 at the request of Uncle Sam (draft board) left my fun times with the Waco Police for the US Army Military Police with duty in Viet Nam.
The Waco Police Department in 1970 was in the basement of the Waco City Hall located at 300 Austin Ave. This was the old Waco Police, we had some strange situations at the department that are best left untold here, but will talk about the funny and exciting moments of my time as a night shift (3-11 and 11-7) police cadet.
While growing up in Waco never thought much about the police or crime, in fact did not know about either since Waco was a quiet place where nothing ever happened!
My first 3-11 shift at the police department was an eye opener; we had folks being booked into the jail for assault, arson, failure to pay traffic fines, failure to appear at traffic court, and of all things out of state warrants for similar offenses. This first shift allowed me to practice and learn how to fingerprint, file, pull files, review files, send and receive on the teletype, observe dispatch and word processing for reports. By the end of my first shift my eyes were wide open to the fact my sleepy little town was not so sleepy after all. How was this possible, grew up in Waco and had no idea Waco had crimes of all sorts.
In my opinion the Powers That Be in Waco kept most of the crime out of the news so folks would feel safe in their homes.
Worked and learned about police work at night while taking police courses in the day time.
My four months as a cadet at the Waco Police Department made me aware of how much crime there was in Waco and how OUR Waco Police folks did a great job of keeping all of us safe even when we did not know we were in danger from gangs and criminals in our town as well as those passing through our town on Interstate 35!
On June 5, 1970 at the request of Uncle Sam (draft board) left my fun times with the Waco Police for the US Army Military Police with duty in Viet Nam.
Fort Irwin visit
Fort Irwin visit…
Back in 1978 while working at Fort (Ft) Ord, California (CA) I was task to provide US Army Criminal Investigation Division (CID) support to a detachment of Military Police (MP) from Ft McArthur CA with duty at Ft Irwin, CA. Seems the Regular Army was using Irwin as a training area for its Armored Divisions even back in those days.
From 1972 to late 1980, Irwin was used primarily as a training area by the National Guard (NG) and Army Reserve components and was controlled by the CA NG. On my arrival at Barstow, CA determined Irwin was not going to be easy to get to or a fun place since the drive to Barstow took all day and I still had 37 miles on a lonely desolate road just to get to the Irwin front gate.
As I made my way off the main high desert highway into the streets of Barstow toward Irwin a sign caught my eye, "Last Chance for Gas for Gas for Next 37 Miles". Those 37 miles seem to take forever to drive and back in those days there was nothing on or near the road, it was not just gas that was not on the road, there was nothing on the road. The views from the road were breath taking if you like sand, blue sky and that desert look.
The road to Irwin was not level, not straight, in good condition, but the scenery and the road blended together to cause mirages on each and every horizon of the road and it was impossible to judge distances based on a glance. My luck held out and my drive to the Irwin front gate was easy even though it took forever, but at least the car and I handled the 109 degree heat, five large dust storms from hell, and the three herds of giant tumble weeds that came from nowhere relatively well.
Just as I thought the sign at Barstow pointing toward Irwin was wrong (my odometer showed 31 miles) the Irwin main gate seemed to rise out of a heat bubble in the middle of the road just ahead. The gate was not visible just moments before, so how was it the main gate to Irwin just appeared in the middle of the road when I should have been able to see the gate long before I got to it?
Time seemed to freeze as my car approached the Irwin gate which was in the middle of nowhere; there were no buildings, no sign of a military facility anywhere. My mind was spinning wondering what the desert had done with Irwin!
The MP at the entrance exit gate to Irwin appeared shocked to see a vehicle at that time of day. MP advised me the distance from Barstow to the Irwin Main Gate was 31 miles but the Irwin main post area where the buildings, people and equipment was another 6 miles down the road and he pointed in the direction of the desert.
All I could see when looking in the direction Irwin was supposed to be in was the road, the desert and the mountains in the distance. The gate MP saw the look on my face and said the military post was there, but the road dipped and the main post area was in a dip in the road!
The last 6 miles of my drive to Irwin should have been easy with no issues; then again nothing in the high desert is simple. Just as the Irwin main post area was appearing in the middle of the road and spilling out on all sides of the road life got stranger.
Heard a loud roar as two shadows moved over the car and the road moving fast off to the right into the desert. To my astonishment the two shadows were World War II (WWII) vintage fighter aircraft flying low over the road and bearing down on what appeared to be WWII era German Tanks!
Pulled over to the side of the road and watched as a WWII war movie was being made, or at least portions of a war movie…just weird.
My assignment at Irwin was for an entire month till another shocked SA would show up and take over, in those days, only one SA was task to Irwin and only when needed, we were supporting Irwin out of Ord due to multiple training exercises taking place for a three month time frame.
The life and times of an Army CID Special Agent was exciting and even strange at times back in the 1970s at Irwin.
Fort Irwin Diggs in 1978…
As mentioned previously Irwin was not an active Army Post when visited by me in 1978 but numerous Active Army units trained at Irwin along with the NG and Reserves using deactivated WWII, Korea, and Cold War facilities owned and operated by the California NG.
On arrival at Irwin about 1700 hrs on a Friday evening checked into the local MP station located on the main road into the Irwin post camp and station. MP Desk Sgt gave me a set of keys to an empty enlisted troop barracks where I would stay for a week while working out of the MP Station. After all at that time I was only a Specialist Sixth Class (SP6) Assistant Special Agent (ASA).
Yep, even though I was an SA on assignment with radios, guns, ammunition and very expensive crime scene gear, I was not authorized to stay in the Bachelors Officer Quarters (BAQ). Did not bother me, I would be spending most of my time in the MP Station and out and about investigating various felony crimes as they were reported and following up on felony crimes reported prior to my arrival.
Parked my low slung 1975 Ford, four-door sedan (just like the ones in the TV show “The FBI”) duty car at the barracks door near the wall of the building for safety, secured it and got ready for the night.
I settled into the one story enlisted barracks now occupied by me and my equipment, secured the high value items in safes and heavy duty wall lockers so I could get to the items but others could not.
During the night there was a storm of some sort, the barracks shook, dust and sand was coming in through the cracks in the building but all was ok, got some sleep and woke bright and early the next day.
Walked out to the duty car and got in not noticing any problems other than lots of sand piled up against the side of the car away from the building. Took a few minutes but was able to get the car moving and away from the building. Got out to check the exterior of the car and noticed there was no paint on the right side of the car! Never had that happen before and knew the CID Operations Officer at Ord was never going to believe a dust and sand storm too half the cars paint away.
Car was operational, had sand all over the interior, would keep the windows up next time I parked the car, then again it was already 98 at 7AM. Arrived at the MP Station for my first day to find five old felony aggravated assault investigations and three new aggravated assault reports on my desk, great welcome to Irwin and that was just walking into the office…Smiles.
Aggravate Assault With Soup Ladle…
The first aggravated assault case took place three days prior to my arrival and happened out in the desert at a food service area. Seems the server got upset at a soldier in line who made disparaging remarks about the soup being served, the server hit the soldier in the head with the soup ladle several times, jumped over the serving line knocking the soldier to the ground and continued to strike the soldier in the head with the ladle until several soldiers got tire of watching and pulled the server off the soldier who was unconscious and bleeding from the scalp, face, nose, ears and mouth.
The soldier who committed the assault was placed on extra duty but allowed to perform his normal duties with a weapon during the day, and serve food at night. The extra duty involved pulling kitchen duty for a week after serving food!
Unit personnel took the injured soldier from the field site to the Army aid station at the main post area where he was treated for lacerations requiring 75 stitches, bruises, broken nose, and a concussion. Injured soldier was still at aid station (Old Weed Army Hospital now in service as aid station) recovering from his injuries.
Determined the victim of the assault was not able to talk or write due to his injuries and was still in and out of consciousness and not lucid much of the time. MPs provided me with the location of the suspects unit still in the field on training exercises. Drove my duty vehicle out into the desert on paved, unpaved roads to helicopter pad, where a helicopter took me the rest of the way to the unit.
On arrival at the unit determined the unit had moved five times since the assault took place so the crime scene was not at the location the unit was currently in. Interviewed unit personnel about the assault, found the suspect on the food serving line still serving soup with the same ladle he used to assault the soldier with! Interviewed the suspect, got his statement, and seized the ladle as evidence.
Quick check of the ladle found it to still have skin, blood and what appeared to be bone fragments in the crevices of the ladle. Would not want to be the server suspect when the members of his unit learned he was serving them with the same contaminated ladle he used to commit an aggravate assault with.
Provided the information obtained to the unit Commander and First Sergeant who decided to leave the soldier in the field performing his duties and allow the punishment of extra duty to stand for the crime!
Hey, my job was to investigate and provide my results to the Commander and his job to take action. Most likely the punishment would change after the CID ROI was filed, but back then you just never knew.
Back in 1978 while working at Fort (Ft) Ord, California (CA) I was task to provide US Army Criminal Investigation Division (CID) support to a detachment of Military Police (MP) from Ft McArthur CA with duty at Ft Irwin, CA. Seems the Regular Army was using Irwin as a training area for its Armored Divisions even back in those days.
From 1972 to late 1980, Irwin was used primarily as a training area by the National Guard (NG) and Army Reserve components and was controlled by the CA NG. On my arrival at Barstow, CA determined Irwin was not going to be easy to get to or a fun place since the drive to Barstow took all day and I still had 37 miles on a lonely desolate road just to get to the Irwin front gate.
As I made my way off the main high desert highway into the streets of Barstow toward Irwin a sign caught my eye, "Last Chance for Gas for Gas for Next 37 Miles". Those 37 miles seem to take forever to drive and back in those days there was nothing on or near the road, it was not just gas that was not on the road, there was nothing on the road. The views from the road were breath taking if you like sand, blue sky and that desert look.
The road to Irwin was not level, not straight, in good condition, but the scenery and the road blended together to cause mirages on each and every horizon of the road and it was impossible to judge distances based on a glance. My luck held out and my drive to the Irwin front gate was easy even though it took forever, but at least the car and I handled the 109 degree heat, five large dust storms from hell, and the three herds of giant tumble weeds that came from nowhere relatively well.
Just as I thought the sign at Barstow pointing toward Irwin was wrong (my odometer showed 31 miles) the Irwin main gate seemed to rise out of a heat bubble in the middle of the road just ahead. The gate was not visible just moments before, so how was it the main gate to Irwin just appeared in the middle of the road when I should have been able to see the gate long before I got to it?
Time seemed to freeze as my car approached the Irwin gate which was in the middle of nowhere; there were no buildings, no sign of a military facility anywhere. My mind was spinning wondering what the desert had done with Irwin!
The MP at the entrance exit gate to Irwin appeared shocked to see a vehicle at that time of day. MP advised me the distance from Barstow to the Irwin Main Gate was 31 miles but the Irwin main post area where the buildings, people and equipment was another 6 miles down the road and he pointed in the direction of the desert.
All I could see when looking in the direction Irwin was supposed to be in was the road, the desert and the mountains in the distance. The gate MP saw the look on my face and said the military post was there, but the road dipped and the main post area was in a dip in the road!
The last 6 miles of my drive to Irwin should have been easy with no issues; then again nothing in the high desert is simple. Just as the Irwin main post area was appearing in the middle of the road and spilling out on all sides of the road life got stranger.
Heard a loud roar as two shadows moved over the car and the road moving fast off to the right into the desert. To my astonishment the two shadows were World War II (WWII) vintage fighter aircraft flying low over the road and bearing down on what appeared to be WWII era German Tanks!
Pulled over to the side of the road and watched as a WWII war movie was being made, or at least portions of a war movie…just weird.
My assignment at Irwin was for an entire month till another shocked SA would show up and take over, in those days, only one SA was task to Irwin and only when needed, we were supporting Irwin out of Ord due to multiple training exercises taking place for a three month time frame.
The life and times of an Army CID Special Agent was exciting and even strange at times back in the 1970s at Irwin.
Fort Irwin Diggs in 1978…
As mentioned previously Irwin was not an active Army Post when visited by me in 1978 but numerous Active Army units trained at Irwin along with the NG and Reserves using deactivated WWII, Korea, and Cold War facilities owned and operated by the California NG.
On arrival at Irwin about 1700 hrs on a Friday evening checked into the local MP station located on the main road into the Irwin post camp and station. MP Desk Sgt gave me a set of keys to an empty enlisted troop barracks where I would stay for a week while working out of the MP Station. After all at that time I was only a Specialist Sixth Class (SP6) Assistant Special Agent (ASA).
Yep, even though I was an SA on assignment with radios, guns, ammunition and very expensive crime scene gear, I was not authorized to stay in the Bachelors Officer Quarters (BAQ). Did not bother me, I would be spending most of my time in the MP Station and out and about investigating various felony crimes as they were reported and following up on felony crimes reported prior to my arrival.
Parked my low slung 1975 Ford, four-door sedan (just like the ones in the TV show “The FBI”) duty car at the barracks door near the wall of the building for safety, secured it and got ready for the night.
I settled into the one story enlisted barracks now occupied by me and my equipment, secured the high value items in safes and heavy duty wall lockers so I could get to the items but others could not.
During the night there was a storm of some sort, the barracks shook, dust and sand was coming in through the cracks in the building but all was ok, got some sleep and woke bright and early the next day.
Walked out to the duty car and got in not noticing any problems other than lots of sand piled up against the side of the car away from the building. Took a few minutes but was able to get the car moving and away from the building. Got out to check the exterior of the car and noticed there was no paint on the right side of the car! Never had that happen before and knew the CID Operations Officer at Ord was never going to believe a dust and sand storm too half the cars paint away.
Car was operational, had sand all over the interior, would keep the windows up next time I parked the car, then again it was already 98 at 7AM. Arrived at the MP Station for my first day to find five old felony aggravated assault investigations and three new aggravated assault reports on my desk, great welcome to Irwin and that was just walking into the office…Smiles.
Aggravate Assault With Soup Ladle…
The first aggravated assault case took place three days prior to my arrival and happened out in the desert at a food service area. Seems the server got upset at a soldier in line who made disparaging remarks about the soup being served, the server hit the soldier in the head with the soup ladle several times, jumped over the serving line knocking the soldier to the ground and continued to strike the soldier in the head with the ladle until several soldiers got tire of watching and pulled the server off the soldier who was unconscious and bleeding from the scalp, face, nose, ears and mouth.
The soldier who committed the assault was placed on extra duty but allowed to perform his normal duties with a weapon during the day, and serve food at night. The extra duty involved pulling kitchen duty for a week after serving food!
Unit personnel took the injured soldier from the field site to the Army aid station at the main post area where he was treated for lacerations requiring 75 stitches, bruises, broken nose, and a concussion. Injured soldier was still at aid station (Old Weed Army Hospital now in service as aid station) recovering from his injuries.
Determined the victim of the assault was not able to talk or write due to his injuries and was still in and out of consciousness and not lucid much of the time. MPs provided me with the location of the suspects unit still in the field on training exercises. Drove my duty vehicle out into the desert on paved, unpaved roads to helicopter pad, where a helicopter took me the rest of the way to the unit.
On arrival at the unit determined the unit had moved five times since the assault took place so the crime scene was not at the location the unit was currently in. Interviewed unit personnel about the assault, found the suspect on the food serving line still serving soup with the same ladle he used to assault the soldier with! Interviewed the suspect, got his statement, and seized the ladle as evidence.
Quick check of the ladle found it to still have skin, blood and what appeared to be bone fragments in the crevices of the ladle. Would not want to be the server suspect when the members of his unit learned he was serving them with the same contaminated ladle he used to commit an aggravate assault with.
Provided the information obtained to the unit Commander and First Sergeant who decided to leave the soldier in the field performing his duties and allow the punishment of extra duty to stand for the crime!
Hey, my job was to investigate and provide my results to the Commander and his job to take action. Most likely the punishment would change after the CID ROI was filed, but back then you just never knew.
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