On August 25, 1972, we picked up our new seabags, which were full of the uniforms we had received after the first two days of recruit training and walked in company file from Camp Barry to Camp Moffit, the main area of Recruit Training Command at the Great Lakes Naval Training Center.
Most of us arrived two days earlier, on August 23, 1972. I’ll never forget setting on a little square in this wooden building, where I arrived via a bus from O’Hare Airport. I had that hollow feeling mixed with dread at what the future held for me. I saw this as a death sentence even though I had volunteered for the United States Naval Reserve just two months earlier. Late in the day, near dusk, we had our first Navy chow, and it was terrible. I think it was shit on a shingle or some other unpalatable meal selection. Then we were marched back to the processing center, and eventually, we got put to bed in an open bay barracks.
On the morning of the twenty-fourth of August, we got up early, probably 0700 or earlier. We stripped down to birthday suits and received our new Navy-issue underwear, blue denim trousers, and, later, long-sleeved blue shirts. We received our vaccinations, had medical and dental exams, and shipped our civilian clothes home in boxes provided by the Navy. I often think of the people who refuse vaccinations now. On that August in 1972, no one said, “Would you like a vaccination?” They said, “Next!” The guy ahead of me in the vaccine line got his arm lacerated by the vaccine gun because he flinched. By the end of the day on the twenty-fourth, we had dinner and then returned to our temporary barracks, but by this time, we were in uniform and meeting the other young men who made up Company 72-351. MMC William W. Boyd commanded our company. We were fortunate to have Chief Boyd. He took no crap, but he was very fair, and we came to love him over the next seven weeks of our journey from civilians to members of the United States Navy.
On Friday, August 25, we rose early and had breakfast. After packing our seabags, we marched as a company from the processing area of Camp Barry to Camp Moffet, home of the Recruit Training Command Great Lakes, Illinois. We had received our white hats, but we couldn’t wear them until they and all our gear were appropriately stenciled. We marched to our new barracks wearing our wool watch caps. We were called ‘raisins.’ There’s a pecking order in recruit training, and we were on the low end. It would be seven more weeks and after rigorous training in marching learning the uniform code of military justice (UCMJ). Nuclear biological and chemical warfare training, firefighting, and learning every aspect of life in the United States Navy would prepare us to serve the fleet’s needs.
We came to our new home in the new barracks, which seemed like Holiday Inn after our first two days of processing. We were assigned our bunks. My bunkmate was from Texas. His name was Chris Meador. One of our neighboring bunkmates was Jerry Horton, who was also from Texas. There was Tom Carlin from Philadelphia, who had graduated from Villanova University only a few months earlier. Our company comprised all United States Naval Reserve members, and we were at Great Lakes on ACDUTRA, which is “active duty for training.” Some of us were 2×6 reservists, which meant after our recruit training and ‘A’ schools, we would serve two years of active duty wherever the Navy assigned us, and then we would serve the balance of our six-year commitment as part of the active reserve attending monthly drills and then two weeks ACDUTRA in the summer. A few were 4×10 reservists who went to recruit training, ‘A’ school, and then returned to their home unit where they would serve the balance of their enlistment in the active reserve.
I remember that journey and the young men who became my shipmates every year. I remember Chief Boyd and his role in preparing us for naval service. The last time I saw us all together was the morning of October 13, 1972, when we were ready to march in review for our graduation from recruit training. I had been chosen to lead the battalion onto the drill field carrying the United States flag. I was the tallest and had an excellent military bearing, which was the criterion for the assignment. When I returned to the barracks after graduation to pick up my seabag and make my way across the street to the United States Navy Hospital Corps School at Great Lakes it was empty. There was a sense of loss amid the exhilaration of completing seven weeks of training.
A couple of the guys from our recruit company joined me at Hospital Corps school. I never saw the rest again. We planned to get together one day at a bar in Manhattan called McSorley’s Old Ale House. That never happened, but talk like that united us and gave us hope for a future after recruit training. Tom Carlin and I stayed in touch by occasional mail after Great Lakes, and many years later, we reconnected via phone call thanks to LinkedIn. Many of us are grandfathers and great-uncles now. I made it back to Great Lakes and Recruit Training Command sixteen years ago as I watched my nephew graduate in mid-August of 2008. That day, I bought a Navy baseball cap at the gift shop and napped under a tree near the drill field where we marched. I remembered the young men of Company 351, and sometimes, even now, I can hear their voices and remember our time together.
