HE LIVES IN A COMMUNITY OF VETERANS

I was attending Purdue University when I got my lottery number 53.

Knowing that Uncle Sam wanted me and was coming to get me, I left college and waited and not long after I was drafted in 1971. I served a total of nineteen months with the Army as an MP. After surviving a two-minute firefight, I realized how quickly a soldier becomes hardened to war. I was in Vietnam as part of a Secret security clearance operation. I finished out my service in Korea and then returned to the States in October 1972. This picture shows me on the left and my high school friend, Larry Meier at basic training in Fort Lewis, Washington. His lottery number was in the 150’s. We are both from Portage, Indiana.

My paternal Great, Great Grandpa Gibbons served in the Civil War. I have his wartime diary. His brother was in the same outfit and he got killed. His diary entry simply states, “Gibbons died”. Great Uncle Leo also served in the Spanish American war in Cuba and the Philippines as a Rough Rider with Teddy Roosevelt. I have the bayonet from his rifle. My grandpa served in WWI and my dad, William G. Stanley was with the Army Air Corps and stationed in Grottaglie, Italy in 1944. I have a list of his missions. He has written an abbreviated account of his experiences. Dad was a bombardier in a B-24. He’s still alive and at the age of 93 has finally been able to talk about it. I knew he served but he never talked about it. But when I was about thirteen, I found his war diary. I read it and wondered why he hadn’t told us anything about it. I now have his war journal with his transcripts of his war experiences.

Dad started talking about the war in the last five years. He lives in a community of veterans and is talking more and more these days. He says it is nice to finally be able to talk about it. A B-17 Navigator also a resident of the same retirement community is always kidding Dad about it.

Uncle Russell, Dad’s brother was one of the earliest pilots of B-24. Their younger brother, Jim was a Captain during the Korean War. As brothers they never talked about it with each other. Dad has had nightmares for over sixty, seventy years. There were times my mother would be awakened with Dad’s hands wrapped around her throat thinking she was a German. There was one mission that Dad recalled and on that trip there was a wingman with a group of guys that Dad had trained with. The entire group of men was taken out by fire. Dad has asked why it wasn’t him instead. He is on the bottom row and last man from the left.

I also have a video of an interview Dad. It was part of a program called the Voices of Freedom and was broadcast on Memorial Day in 2012. It always brings tears to my eyes, but at the end makes you smile!

I am going to fly in the only B-24 bomber still flying in a couple of weeks in Lafayette, Indiana.

~ Randy Stanley, Vietnam Veteran

Veteran Stories Collected by Jenny La Sala www.JennyLasala.com