Archive for the Biographies Category

I was born in North Carolina, moved to Missouri at 6 where I grew up on dairy farm and attended a one room country school thru grade 8. I went to high school in Lebanon MO (class size ~200). All in all I lived in a very small world for my first 18 years. All that changed with a visit to the school guidance counselor during my senior year to ask about college options. She handed me a small booklet on NROTC. Little did I realize at the time the impact that booklet would have on my life.

During the next five years I attended the University of Missouri, graduating with a degree in Mechanical Engineering and a regular commission as Second Lieutenant, USMC. I enjoyed college and kept my nose to the grindstone until the last year when I let my hair down a bit (after all, I knew what was in store for me in the near future). Then it was TBS followed by Artillery school and then off to war.

I arrived in Vietnam 14Apr68 with orders to report to the 11th Marines and was further assigned to Hotel Battery, 3rd Battalion and then placed with Golf Co. 2/7 as an F.O. I stayed with 2/7 when they were directed to form a battalion landing team and acted as the battalion liaison officer for artillery. Our first and only amphibious landing was on the Marine Corps Birthday. I finished my tour standing HQ watches, first with Task Force Yankee and later for 3/11 FDC.

I was scheduled to leave Vietnam on 1 May with orders to proceed to Sangley Point, Republic of the Philippines with 30 days stateside leave. My departure was temporarily delayed when I was evacuated from the temporary quarters for all Marines entering and leaving DaNang because the Freedom Hill ammo dump caught fire and exploded for 24 hours laying waste to everything within 1/2 mile. What a sendoff!

I met my wife, Leslie Herrington my first day back in Missouri. My plan was to stop off in Columbia (home of MU) to visit friends before continuing to Lebanon. I invited Leslie to an afternoon picnic for the next day. There was instant rapport leading to two weeks where we were together every day for hours. After a short visit with my family I hurried back to Columbia to see Leslie and after another week, brought her home to meet my parents before proceeding to Sangley Point. We corresponded for a few months when I invited Leslie to visit me. I popped the question after she arrived and we were married on Oct 10, 1969. Sangley was great duty for newlyweds with day trips around Luzon and vacations to Bangkok and Hong Kong. Our son, Paul arrived in November of 1970 and we rotated back to the states the next June.

I arrived in Camp Lejeune and reported to Force Troops. I was offered a choice of joining the artillery officer stable or a position in Motor Transport as a Company Commander. Would any Captain turn down Company Commander? Besides, MT is a good secondary MOS for an artillery officer. I enjoyed the duty as C.O. of T Company (Tractor Trailers) but ultimately wanted to follow my engineering degree.

Finding civilian employment was a challenge. I attended career weekends sponsored by Lendman Associates. One memorable interview occurred in Atlanta. I managed to schedule two interviews during the meet and greet Friday evening. Showing up just prior to the 9:00 A.M. appointment I could hear muted voices inside the interview room. Figuring it would be better to interrupt rather than risk being thought late I knocked on the door. Soon the door opened and the interviewer extended his hand while saying he was completing an interview and would be with me soon. We all know that Marine Officers are very prompt to return any salute, common courtesy, right? Given that a handshake is a bit like the civilian equivalent of a salute I immediately extended my hand. Well, the hand movement turned out to be a gesture, not an offer to shake hands and I caught the gentleman’s index finger which I commenced to shake. He then closed the door leaving me to realize that I was about to have an interview with a man whose finger I just shook. It took courage but being a Marine Officer, I persevered and went on with the interview. As it happens I wasn’t offered a job with that company which was a blessing when I later learned more about the company’s reputation but was offered a job with the General Tire and Rubber Company as Quality Control Engineer which I accepted. On the way home I thought about the finger shake and cracked up. I arrived home in the middle of the night, shook Leslie awake and recounted the day’s event and she cracked up.

After leaving active duty I joined the active reserves for another five years attaining a final rank of Major. Along with work I went to night school to get an MBA at UNC Charlotte. Our daughter Vanessa was born in Charlotte while I was with General Tire. In 1974 I accepted a position with General Electric as Process Control Engineer at their Asheboro NC housewares plant. Later l was offered a position as Quality Manager of Purchased Products. That job required foreign travel to the Far East and Europe. From that point on travel became a part of all my work, mostly in the U.S. but also Europe. Fortunately Leslie was able to accompany me once the kids left home.

During 1978 I accepted a Manufacturing Engineering job with the Lexan Sheet Products Dept. of GE Plastics, Mt Vernon, IN. Later I was promoted to Quality Manager. It was during a problem solving trip involving Lexan blanks for the inside window pane in Boeing airplanes that I visited General Plastics Manufacturing Company in Tacoma WA, my final employer. So, as it happens, I have always worked for a General in one way or another since gaining my commission.

I retired from General Plastics in January 2010 after 24 years of very interesting and rewarding work. Over time I held a variety of jobs in engineering and management, rising to President.
The experience of being a Marine Officer has been an asset to me all my adult life. It taught me to have the confidence to persevere when things got tough and have the self-confidence to know I could solve whatever challenges came my way. Working for General Plastics really brought all my Marine training to the fore since I found myself wearing many hats and had to be self-reliant.

Outside of work I have enjoyed hiking and camping having summited eight of the west coast’s highest mountains. Now that I am retired I alternate my time between Washington and Arizona. Playing golf, spending time with family (two terrific grandsons), and reading a lot of Napoleonic War sailing fiction.

Undergraduate at University of Notre Dame. Source of commissioning was NROTC.

After TBS attended Tank School at Delmar. Was yanked in the middle of the course and sent to Nam as part of the Tet ’68 reaction. Served as a rifle platoon leader for eight months ( D/1/7 ), then spent five months in G 5 shop, 1st Mar Div.  Upon return to CONUS commanded platoon 2nd ATs, then OIC Ontos crewman school. Subsequently XO, C Co., 2nd Tanks, then CO, C Co. until completion active duty.

As a civilian, obtained MBA from Univ. of Florida and went straight to work for one of the predecessor banks of JPMorgan Chase and remained with that firm for thirty years. Mostly involved with lending money to, and recovering it from, large corporate customers. Assignments included Hong Kong, Taipei, Stockholm and Boston, as well as the head office in New York. // Retired as a Managing Director in 2003. Have travelled extensively since then, but still spend most time in and around New York City.

Over the years have hooked up briefly with Igoe, W.A.Jones, Lovely, Kapchus, Renaghan, Koury and Keefe.

I came to the USMC through my decision to accept an NROTC scholarship in order to attend Brown University after High School. My father had polio as a youth and was not able to join any branch of the services in WW ll, but was trained and served as an aircraft spotter—I remember playing with the training cards and being able to identify WW ll aircraft from silhouettes by age 5 or 6. We visited airports frequently throughout my youth and I wanted to become a pilot for as long as I can remember. At Brown I was most impressed by the USMC instructors and after my first summer cruise to the North Atlantic on a destroyer It was clear that shipboard life was not for me. At that point the “Marine Corps Option” and flight school became my track. At about the same time I switched my major from economics to psychology and took all the psychology courses I could fit in with hopes for some sort of a clinical career after Brown and the USMC. I recall vividly that Major Webster and Major Whalen, the USMC instructors at Brown, were superior lecturers and scholars—comparable to the best professors that I had for my non-ROTC courses. USMC was a no-brainer for me.

By the time I moved from Providence to TBS Quantico I had had about 30 hours of flight training at a small airport north of Providence. During the ROTC summer cruise after my sophomore year in Texas I had cemented my intention to “fly jets”. At TBS my primary goal there was to learn as much as I could about the Corps and to be selected for flight training. I remember some great parties in DC, meeting fellow young lieutenants and experiencing stimulating instruction by some excellent junior and senior officer/instructors. In the fall of 1967 my “high school sweetheart “and I planned our wedding in January just as I entered flight school in Pensacola. Within less than 18 months we moved from Pensacola to Meridian, MS; to Pensacola again; to Beeville, TX; and then to MCAS Cherry Point. After a brief introduction to the A6 Intruder in VMAT202 in the summer of1969, I was then transferred from the training squadron to VMA(AW)331 until March 1970 after receiving West Pac orders. The orders indicated a split tour between Vietnam and Japan and after some time waiting in the Monsoons in Okinawa I learned I was headed first to VMA(AW)533 in Iwakuni.

At VMA(AW)533 I bought my first motorcycle, enjoyed deployments to Cubi Point, made frequent visits area around Iwakuni, including to Hiroshima, and spent lots of ready room time waiting for the weather to break or an “up” bird to fly. Mandatory Friday happy hours were SOP in 533 at Iwakuni. I remember the dice/drinking games, but not much after. In August 1970 I was transferred to MABS 12 where I became Base Services Officer. It was an interesting assignment and I also began teaching spoken English to Japanese adults at the Peace Park at ground zero in Hiroshima on Saturday nights with a friend/fraternity brother. Bill was a hospital corpsman who was transferred to Iwakuni from Vietnam during the summer of 1970. We both improved our Japanese and learned a lot about local culture and attractions. Bill married a Japanese woman is and is living in Tokyo. From Iwakuni I was transferred to MABS 14 at Cherry Point and Bogue Field. I finished my final, uneventful year and a half as Base Service Officer while living in New Bern, NC. I bought a second (and last) motorcycle for my commute to MCAS Cherry Point and Bogue Field.

I saved up my leave and departed New Bern in 8/72 looking for graduate programs in Psychology in New England. I ended up in Worcester MA at Assumption College where I entered the Psychology and Counseling program in January 1973 finishing in May, 1974. I was very fortunate to find a full time job in July 1974 as a psychologist at the Templeton Colony campus of Fernald State School. As a result of a class action suit, the Commonwealth of Massachusetts was required to improve conditions to meet the Medicaid care standards. While there I worked with other “professional” staff to improve programming and treatment and to assist those who wanted to leave “the Colony” to do so. I was also very fortunate to meet my current wife of 36+ years. She was an occupational therapist on the team and we both had had been divorced after our first marriages. We placed over 100 men into community based programs and several instances reunited them with their families after years of separation. In May 1978 we left ”the Colony” and settled in Pittsfield, MA approximately halfway between each of our parents. I continued working with people with developmental disabilities and their families in the Berkshires and Janet worked in school and home care settings. After 2 years working for a local service provider I became the clinical director for the Berkshire Area Office of the Department of Mental Retardation. In 1990 I became the Area Director and by 1992 all individuals from the Berkshire Area who wanted to live in the community had been returned to their home communities from nursing homes, state schools and state hospitals. We continued to expand community based supports to individuals with developmental disabilities and their families and the name of the agency was changed to the Department of Developmental Disabilities shortly after I retired in 2008.

Our daughter was born on May Day, 1980 and our son was born 3 years later in a birthing center in Pittsfield. Our daughter received her BA from U. Mass Amherst in 2002, her MSW from U. of South Carolina in 2006 and is a school adjustment counter in W. Massachusetts. Our son received his BS from Hamilton College in 2005, his MD from Mount Sinai in 2009 and completed his internal medicine residency at Vanderbilt in 2012 and is completing his Hematology/Oncology fellowship at U. Penn this May. He starts his clinical practice and research at Yale in July.

We’ve been fortunate to make our home in an area with great natural beauty and abundant cultural opportunities. It has been ideal for raising our family, gardening, hiking, skiing, snow-shoeing, and staying in touch with each of our families. After I retired in 2008 I continued working part time at the Area Office and consulting with agencies until last April. Janet retired 2 years ago and continues to consult in local schools. We’re enjoying traveling within the country and internationally. We’ve also engaged in some very fulfilling volunteer activities associated with our church and other local organizations.