Tom Aitchison
20-year US Coast Guard Career.
Service in Vietnam and Europe.
Deceased 7/11/2001.
James (Jim) Blewitt
US Air Force January 1966 to March 1987
Lt. Colonel
Earned two distinguished flying crosses with oak leaf clusters, 2nd highest military medal.
Srved in Special Forces Green Hornets (helicopters). The squadron conducts day or night low-level penetration into hostile enemy territory to accomplish clandestine infiltration and exfiltration, aerial gunnery support and resupply of special operations forces throughout the world.
In summer of 1968, flew 42 bombing missions in Southeast Asia.
From November 1969 to October 1970, flew helicopter combat rescue missions out of Udorn, Thailand.
Continued flying until assigned a desk job as Executive Officer to Hurlburt Field Base Commander in 1985.
Picked up space capsules and astronauts and was part of NRO.
Retired to Fort Walton Beach, Florida.
Deceased 1995.
Ronald R. Browne
US Army November 5, 1965 to July 27, 1970
Captain US Army, Corp of Engineers
Earned a Parachutist badge, a Vietnam Service medal, a Vietnam Campaign medal with
3 clusters, and a Bronze Star.Accepted in Engineering Officers Candidate School at Fort Belvoir, Virginia. After graduation, I was sent to Fort Benning, Georgia for Paratrooper Training and then to Fort Campbell, Kentucky with the 101st Airborne. Later, I was serving as Company Commander for a Basic Training Company when I was sent to Vietnam.
In Vietnam, I helped to command a Combined Tactical Operation Center located on a
South Korean, White Horse Division, compound near Cam Rahm Bay, South Vietnam. While there I was promoted to First Lieutenant and after extending my tour, I was
promoted to Captain. I served in Vietnam from July 27, 1968 to March 2, 1970 and completed my active service on July 27, 1970 at Fort Leonard Wood, Missouri.During
my service, I had eight different ranks.
Larry Bryan
US Air Force Five Years
Captain
Duty was as Base Communications Officer which entailed the base comm. center, land line systems (telephone system), non-tactical radio systems, and security codes for air missions. Stationed at Luke Air Force Base, Phoenix.AZ and then went to SEA on a joint operations base as communications officer.
Charles (Charlie) Bullock
US Army May 1964 through May 1966
E4 Medic
I don’t have many photos, but here is one
that was taken at the end of basic training
at Ft. Leonard Wood, Missouri.
Final Army post Fort Sill, Oklahoma.
Dean Busby
National Guard
Basic Training Fort Bliss, TX and AIT at Fort Sill, OK
Discharged 1972.
Douglas Wayne Freeman
(aka Wayne Egan)
US Navy June 6, 1961 to February 12, 1973
Torpedoman's Mate
In July 1962 I transferred to the Advanced Underwater Weapons shop at Submarine Base Pearl Harbor. After my first enlistment I attended submarine school and Polaris’s launcher system school. January 1965, I received orders to report to the USS Kamehameha SSBN 642 in new construction at Mare Island Naval Shipyard Vallejo, California. After New construction, the ship was home ported in Hawaii. Upkeep and patrols were made from Guam. I was transferred to shore duty early 1968 to the Guided Missile School Dam Neck Virginia to teach Polaris’s launcher systems. After my shore duty tour was complete, I was transferred to the USS Patrick Henry SSBN 599 home ported in New London Connecticut, making patrols from Rota Spain.
Robert E. (Bob) Gray
US Navy 1965-1969
LTJG
Graduated from Naval Officer Candidate School.
Served in “Operation Game Warden” Mekong Delta, South Vietnam.
Larry Harvey
Army Ordnance Corps September 1966 -September 1968
1st LT
Korea, Mechanical Maintenance Officer
William (Bill) Huber
US Army 3-1/2 Years
Spent six months in the states between Fort Leonard Wood, Missouri and Fort Belvoir just outside of Washington D.C. Went to Paris, France for one year and then to Wurzburg, Germany for two years.
Eldon Kern
US Navy
Pilot
Served in the Navy in Vietnam as a pilot and flew several missions.
Deceased.
Nolan Larson
US Army 1964 to 1966
Probably an E4.
Deceased.
Tom Meacham
US Army Military Police Corps January 1967 – June 1969
First Lieutenant
Yuma Proving Ground, Arizona; Ft. Richardson, Alaska
Company Commander, Deputy Post Provost Marshal
(Attached is a photo of Tom in his tropical uniform for Yuma
Proving Ground, Arizona).
Ronald Miller
US Air Force 1967 to 1971
Captain
Attended Officer Training School and was commissioned 2nd Lt. on March 16, 1967
Went on active duty in the Missile field.
Served with Strategic Air Command 381st Strategic Missile Wing at McConnell AFB, Wichita, Kansas.
Served as Deputy Combat Crew Commander and Sector Maintenance Officer, attaining
the rank of Captain.
David Morris
Army National Guard
1964 to 1970
Cook and Baker’s School Fort Polk, LA
Basic Training Fort Leonard Wood, Missouri
Jim Nelson
US Army 1963 – 1966
5th Special Forces (Green Berets) as a Medic
Promoted to Sergeant
Earned a Bronze Star with V for Valor
The importance of Jim's Special Forces service in Vietnam is in the fact that it was quite early in the war when the Special Forces were just “advisors” to the South Vietnam
Army (a very dangerous assignment), and several years before the big build-up of US
forces in Vietnam in 1964-65 and later.
Deceased
Michael W. Paul
US Air Force 1/27/62 to 12/23/65
Sergeant E4, Air Police Squadron
Two years Kadina AFB K-9 Flight
One and one-half years Operations Sergeant Francis E. Warren AFB, Cheyenne
Wyoming
John Seidel
US Navy from September 1967 to August 1972
E4 3rd Class Petty Officer
Earned the Vietnam Service Medal (one bronze star)
National Defense Service Medal.
Spent from 9/67-12/68 in Vietnam onboard the USS Renshaw DD499. Ran the ships
store and worked in the CIC (combat information center) while we were on the gun line
off the east coast of No and So Vietnam conducting shore bombardment missions and worked as “Lifeguard” for planes that went down in the Gulf of Tonkin.
Honorable discharge 8/72.
Stationed at Pearl Harbor when not at sea.
David Larry Smith
US Air Force September 1963 to September 1967
AIRMAN FIRST CLASS
STRATIGIC AIR COMMAND
VANDENBERG AIR FORCE BASE ---CALIFORNIA
Pete Anthony Valasquez
US Army
E6 Staff Sergeant
Killed in Vietnam 12/14/65.
Thomas (Tom) Winegarden
US Navy June 1961 to April 1970
Rank CS 1 (Ship’s Cook)
Last duty station was the USS Enterprise CVN 65. Served there from summer of 1965 through spring of 1970. During this time, we supported the troops with air support and whatever else help we could supply.
