COLTS WHO SERVED
IN THE MILITARY



Walt Abbey '68  -- LT Walter Abbey working as a physical therapist with patients at the Naval Hospital in San Diego.




Jerry Pease, Faculty -- My dad coached at Crawford from 1957 to 1962.  He was active duty Navy from 1939 to 1953, as a gunner's mate and was on the dock next to his ship on Dec 7, 1941.  He served in the war in the Pacific and the Korean war. He was an offensive lineman on the Navy Training Center football team in 1949 -- Ed Pease ’64




Ed Pease ‘64 5th battalion, 82nd Airborne Artillery
stationed in Wiesbaden, Germany, 1969



Gary Bright '66 -- U S Air Force • Southeast Asia 1969In this picture he's getting ready to repair battle damage to an F-4 Phantom.




Walt Hindenlang ’62 -- I served in the US Navy from 1967 to 1971 and finished as a Lieutenant. This photo was taken aboard the destroyer USS Benson in San Diego. 




Dan Burton '66  RVN 67-68  (Below)  C-Ration cookout with the officers of Charlie Company at LZ Shepherd, just around the corner from Khe Sanh on Route 9. My Seagrams was a prop, the warm Budweiser the Skipper has was not.







'62 classmates Joel Zane and
Dennis Aiken in Vietnam, 1969

Joel and Dennis at Crawford






James Miller ’67  I spent 21 years in the US Navy as a Communication Technician then had my rating changed to Cryptologic Technician years later.  I served on the USS Kitty Hawk off the coast of Vietnam, and many other stations around the world, and was home-based in San Diego.  Thanks to all my fellow classmates who served. 



Ron Cullins '60 was a crew chief and gunner with the 114th Assault Helicopter Company in Vihn Long, Vietnam from 1968-1969.  Click HERE to see some more photos.



James Dean Johnson ’67  My brother served in the Air Force from 1967 to 1971 and was stationed in Nha Trang, Vietnam.  He finished his service at Grand Forks AFB in North Dakota.  He passed away in 2003 -- Donna Johnson ’62


 


George Glover ’73  I served in the USCG from 1974 to 1979.  I was a Yeoman Second Class (E-5).  I was stationed at the CG Air Station on Harbor Drive, and onboard the Coast Guard Cutter Hamilton (WHEC 715) in Boston.  I am still serving in the USCG Auxiliary today.  I do Aids to Navigation inspection and verification.



Nick Watson ’64  US Army: 66-69; Vietnam Dec 67-Dec-68; USMC: 79-96; Counterintelligence, retired as a  CWO3; stationed at Cubi Point, Philippines during Mt Pinatubo '91; Somalia '93; 2003-2014; Branch Chief, Counterintelligence support to HUMINT Operations; Retired in 2014 (again)



Jerry Whiting ’64 served in in the Army from 1962-1965 in Field Communications with the 2nd Armored "Hell On Wheels" Division.  He attended Darnall, Horace Mann and Crawford.



William E Stephens Jr ’73  US Army 1974-1977 Active, 77-80 reserve duty.  Rank: Specialist 4.  Here is a side note: We are a proud military family: My father: William E Stephens retired US Navy -- 23 years service: Myself: US Army -- 7 years service; My son: William E Stephens III retired US Army -- 23 years service.



Eric Watkins '65  I was drafted in 1971 and served 17 months: Basic and Advanced Training up the coast in Fort Ord, then shipped overseas to South Korea for the rest of my time as part of the 8th Army. I trained as a radio operator and served with the 307th Signal Battalion at Camp Eiler in Kimpo, Korea.


CDR Richard Cloward ’60
views the USS Missouri and another ship in mothballs at Bremerton, Washington in 1981 from the bridge of the USS Barbour County.  Richard had a 30-year career in the Navy leading up to command of the USS Barbour County, USS Cleveland, Amphibious Squadron 9, and the Naval Amphibious School in Coronado -- now known as the Expeditionary Warfare Training Group.




The Clark Brothers -- Andy Clark '70: Marines, Jim Clark '72: Army, Jeff Clark '67: Air Force.  Sons of a veteran, nephews of veterans, grandsons of veterans and great grandsons of veterans.  Grandfather of an in-service grandson.



Steve Shockome '73 USAF Airman First Class Aircraft Maintenance Instructor




Steve Carlin ‘65, Frank Browning ‘63, “Marty” Gabriel ‘65, and Larry Leptich ‘65. Steve, Marty and Larry went to Vietnam.  Marty didn’t make it home.  I will always miss him.  Such a great guy -- Larry Leptich ’65





I just saw the photo of John Sullivan ’65 and Steve Sullivan ’69 holding their Air Force uniforms.  Steve and I are good friends and were stationed at Lowry AFB in Denver together for technical training in 1969.  Steve and I still hook up at reunions.  Noting the brothers photo, I thought it would be appropriate to share one with my brothers.  We all served in the Air Force at the same time.  The attached photo was taken in August 1975 when we were all home on leave for Corwyn’s wedding.  Pictured left to right are SSgt Gregory Thomas ’69, Sgt Randall Thomas ’70, Airman Jeffrey Thomas ’73, and Airman Corwyn Thomas ’75 -- Greg Thomas ‘69





Doug Houser '60 received his commission as a Marine Second Lieutenant in 1966 and was deployed to Vietnam in January 1967. He served as an infantry officer for thirteen months in places like the Rock Pile, Ca Lu, Khe Sanh, the Hai Lang Forest and The Artillery Plateau. He was discharged in 1969 with the rank of Captain. Using his combat experiences as background, he wrote a book, Jungle Warriors, Crime Fighters, that is available at BookBaby Bookshop.





USAF Staff Sergeant John Sullivan ’65 and brother Sergeant Steve Sullivan ’69 home on leave in 1970.  Mom wanted to see her boys in uniform.  Holding up their blouses was as far as they would go.


 

Jerry "Snoopy" Ellis '61 received his Naval Flight Officer wings in March 1968 and became an F-4 Radar Intercept Officer with VF-96 at NAS Miramar.  He made two deployments to Vietnam, flying 134 missions off the USS Enterprise (1968-1969) and USS America (1970-1971).  He was on the Enterprise January 14, 1969 when it suffered a devastating fire off the coast of Hawaii.  He escaped from one of the planes destroyed in the fire.




My husband Bill Wolf ’68 was a door gunner, then crew chief, with the 129th Assault Helicopter Company in Vietnam.  He’s pictured in his Huey in this shot -- Kathleen Lally Wolf ’68



David Clark ‘69  I served in the US Army as a Combat Infantryman from 1971 to 1974.  In 1971 I was assigned to the 501st Brigade of the 101st Airborne Division, headquartered in Phu Bai. Here is a photo of me “in the bush” somewhere in the coastal mountains north of Phu Bai, sometime in the Fall of 1971




Bill Ross '65 at home in San Diego after graduating from Jump School. 
He went on to Vietnam as part of the 101st Airborne




Larry Vansworth '64, outside of Pleiku, Vietnam in December of 1966




This portrait of me was taken in a studio on Pine Avenue in Long Beach in 1948.  Probably a "Liberty Weekend"  -- John Fry '62




Cousins Arthur Sasena (Navy) and Arthur Borden (Army), both ’68 grads, relax on a couch during a visit home



Mike Kennedy ’61 Fort Ord Basic Training 1965


Bill Riddle, '59 at Army Initial Entry Fixed-Wing Flight School at Wright Army Air Field, Ft Stewart, GA, 1970.  That looks like a T-41 Mescalero trainer in the background.  You may know it as a Cessna 172.



Rick Alexander '67 had an Air Force job in Hawaii that involved working with the Navy in San Diego, so he got to visit his mom on a regular basis.  She took this photo in the mid-1980s at the family home in Talmadge.  She was my typing teacher and, when I taught at Hale Junior High, the Girls' Vice Principal.  You may have had her as a teacher also -- Betty Alexander.


Mike Byrne '64 donned his Coast Guard whites for the 1970 funeral of his Commanding Officer.  I was unsuccessful in correcting the color.  It looks for all the world like a still shot from the movie The Sand Pebbles, about patrolling the Yangtze River in 1926.


Pat Soper '62 joined the Navy in 1963, went to boot camp in Bainbridge, MD, dental school at NTC in San Diego, then off to the dental clinic in Norfolk, VA


Susan Wilkerson McCasland '71 served in the Air Force and Air Force Reserve up until 2007, working in the fields of science and engineering.

1964 classmates Bob Mardon and Mike Nesbit pose for a photo at a Navy Reserve meeting in 1968.




Ron Layton '64 at Fort Ord army base in 1967



Chu Chi, Vietnam, 1969 -- Mike Shannon '64




This is early in 1969.  Our company was heading out for a couple days’ patrol.  There is a radio in that pack I took a lot of effort to hide. The NVA liked to take out radio operators as fast as they could. I was 20 years old -- Bill Grantham ’68


 
The first photo is me as a USAF Sergeant sitting on a 15,000 lb. BLU-82 Daisy Cutter bomb in May 1971 at Cam Ranh Bay Air Base, Vietnam.  We loaded these bombs up at the Bomb Dump (Munitions Storage Area) and also loaded them onto C-130 Hercules aircraft and completed the arming tasks before the plane left on its mission over Cambodia or Laos.

The second photo is me (on right) as a USAF Staff Sergeant sitting on a stack of 750 lb. M117 General Purpose Bombs at Anderson AFB, Guam in 1978.  The war was over by this time, but we still supported conventional B-52s, as well as four B-52s on 24-hour Nuclear Readiness -- Greg Thomas '69





Spec 5 Ron Morse ’64 -- (Huey crew chief) 1969, Camp Eagle, Vietnam, Alpha Troop, 2nd Squadron, 17th Cav (Air Mobile), 101st Airborne Divison, U.S. Army



(Left) Terry Hall ’64 -- Navy Air Support Unit, Chu Lai Airbase, Vietnam. Summer of 1968, with parts of 122mm Rocket that landed 20 feet from me the night before. • (Right) Ron Smith ’72 -- Aboard the USS Francis Hammond FF-1067 somewhere in the Pacific in 1975 or 1976


(Left) James Kraus ’65 -- US Navy "Special Operator" attached to National Security Agnecy1967-1971 posing with baby goats in Cuba • (Right) Joe Falcone ’64 -- USAF map-maker. Lackland AFB, Fort Belvoir, March AFB and varous TDYs.


(Left) John McMullen ’63 -- US Navy, December 1966, aboard the USS Wiltsie DD-716. “We were at sea for six straight weeks, so our Captain decided a beard-growing contest was in order.” • (Right) Les Bunnell ’67 -- USAF 483rd K-9 1971-1972 Cam Ranh Bay, Vietnam with patrol dog “Duke”


(Left) Ron Dixon ’64 -- US Army 1967 Basic Training, Fort Bragg, North Carolina • (Right) Billy Wood ’65 -- US Army 1968 Cu Chi, Viet Nam















Colts Who Died in Vietnam

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