A very busy sky and I was one of them!
A very busy sky and I was one of them!
While working in California in 1957, I was
drafted from Cherry County, Nebraska. On 10 March 1957, I was provided
with
railway
tickets on the Chicago North Western Transportation Lines to Omaha, Nebraska.
From this point about 300 of
us departed for Fort Lennard Wood, Missouri. After we arrived at our
destination, we were provided transportation to
the Fort and was processed in to the military system. My stay at this Fort
was about one week long as I remember. The
first assignment that I was given was working on KP duty (kitchen police) and
this last for the week. During this time
I was given the task of washing pots and pans and peeling potatoes (about 10 -
100 lbs sacks a day. Of course, several
other helped with this task. At the end of the week, we were called into a
building and at time were given our assignment.
Most were assigned to go to Germany but I was assigned to For Dix, New Jersey
for my 1st eight weeks of military
training. I am not sure the mode of transportation that I used but it was
either by aircraft or the train.
After arriving at Fort Dix, we commenced our eight week training cycle.
This life was certainly different from ranching
during my twenty four years. This eight weeks seemed liked a year to most
of us during our training period. The
barracks were old World War Two building and had one floor. Most of the
area had sleeping bunks (stacked) the
length of the building with two small cadre room one the end of the building.
On the other end of the sleeping area
was our shared restroom and shower area. An area was provided for a boiler
room for heating the building and
the water we used for showering.
At the ending of our eight week (basic) training course, we were given the
opportunity to make a selection of our next training site for our second eight
weeks training period. An Airborne
paratrooper came on stage and showed off his "high polish boots" and his
parachutes. After his small speech,
he ask for volunteers from the large group and ask for a show of hands who
wanted to volunteer. My hand shot
up and the next thing I new I was heading for Fort Campbell, Kentucky the 101st
Airborne Division. My assignment
was the 2nd Airborne Battle Group, 187th Infantry Company D. It was about
a week when we commenced our
2nd eight week training and our cadre was paratroopers that could run 10 miles
non stop. This was an experience
that I will never forget during my lifetime. I graduated number four (4)
in my class of about two hundred and fifty
military men. This was a great achievement for me and it gave me great
exciting pride in being at Fort Campbell.
After we graduated from our second eight weeks of training, it was several weeks
before we entered our "jump"
training. This was around November or December of 1957 and at that time
there was a shortage of planes for
our parachute jumps. Normally, jump school was three weeks long, but due
to the lack of aircraft, we were only
given 11 days schooling and had to complete five approved exits from the 34 foot
jump tower. This I accomplished
in twelve attempts. After completing the school we had to run three miles
in 18 minutes to qualify for this
type of training. This I did without any problems and soon we were heading for
the aircraft to make our qualifying
five jumps. As I remember, this was on a Wednesday and the picture below
was taken prior to boarding the
C123 aircraft. I made two jumps on Wednesday and that was almost a full
days work. On Thursday, I made
completed my last three jumps, of which the last two was with full equipment and
weapon strapped on our side.
I did complete my three jumps and was given my paratrooper wings which I wore
proudly from that time on
during my military career. As you can see my roster number was 330 for
this school training. My future parachute
jumps were made from a C119 and a C130. Many times during my assignment at
Fort Campbell, we were
placed on "Alert" and would chute up, put on our back pack and weapon and depart
in an aircraft for parts
unknown at the time. Much of the time we were heading for Cuba or Germany.
