My Military Daze

Schilling Manor

27 Comments

One of the great things about the military is that where ever you are assigned, there is a good chance that you will run into friends you have served with before and, also, you are guaranteed to meet new friends.  In the late Sixties, I was wrapping up three years in Germany and knew I would be going to school for a year. and then on to Vietnam.  The school was in Chicago and we decided we would live in Evanston, but Carole had to decide where she and the kids would live while I was in Vietnam.  She selected Schilling Manor.

Schilling Air Force Base in Salina, Kansas ceased operations in 1965.  There were over 700 family housing units and I believe it was about the same time that the 1st Infantry Division at Fort Riley, Kansas was getting ready to deploy to Vietnam.  If my facts are straight, many of the wives from Fort Riley moved 50 miles west and opened up Schilling Manor.  It became a waiting wives home.

Schilling Manor turned out to be an excellent choice.  Three years in Germany reading the Stars and Stripes Newspaper hadn’t prepared us for what we found in Chicago in 1969.  The Chicago Seven trial was in progress and there was a lot of ill feelings toward the military.  They (student & faculty) shut down Northwestern when the Army went into Cambodia.  Carole found a great group of like-minded wives at Schilling (Also, Salina is a little different from Chicago).

Schilling Manor was attached to Fort Riley for support and before you knew it, there was a commisary, PX and medical and dental support.  By the time Carole and the kids arrived in 1970, it had been running smoothly for a number of years.  They had figured out security for this large housing area void of husbands.  Each house had four or five outside lights and they were required to be turned on every night.  It looked like 10 o’clock in the morning.  Couple that with a civilian security force driving around and there weren’t many problems.  If a car showed up in the housing area with a Fort Riley decal, it was quickly checked out.  It the GIs were up to no good, their commander knew about it the next morning.

After completing my tour, I had about a month before I had to report to my next assignment.  This gave me a chance to meet some of Carole’s close friends.  One we will never forget was an Air Force wife named Ruth.  Ruth was going to join us on a shopping trip to Fort Riley.  We also planned on picking up some booze at the Class VI store.

At that time many of the Class VI stores were run by either the Officers Club or the NCO Club.  The Fort Riley Class VI store was operated by the O-Club.  Ruth kept insisting that she believed you had to be a member of the O-Club to buy liquor at the Class VI.  Each time Ruth mentioned that, I would tell her that they were not going to keep an officer, in transit (between assignment), returning from Vietnam from purchasing liquor.  She felt very uncomfortable about going to the Class VI.  This was a big Class VI where everyone used a shopping cart.  I told her that when it was time to check out, she could get right behind me and just do what I did.

When we were done shopping, we headed for the check out line.  It was a long counter with three cash registers spaced along the counter.  Only the last register was in operation, so we stood in line waiting our turn (Ruth close behind me).  Ruth was extremely nervous.  I was the next customer.  Just then a man came out of the office and went to the second cash register right in front of Ruth.  He looked at her and said, “Will it be cash or charge?”  Ruth immediately responded, “I’m not a member.”  I was so startled that it took me a minute to respond.  I said, “Cash” to an obviously confused clerk, who then, checked her out.

As soon as we got outside, I looked a Ruth and said, “I’m not a member?”  Ruth smiled and said, “Well, I’m not.”  You can see why we will never forget Ruth, nor the many other experiences at Schilling Manor.

 

Random Thoughts

Slug Lines – “Slugging” It In and Out of DC

In the Greater DC area, thousands of people use slug lines daily to get to work.  In order for a driver to use the HOV (High Occupancy Vehicle) lanes, he or she has to have at least three people in the vehicle.  If you have less that three, you find yourself a Slug or two waiting at the slug line.  It’s a
win-win situation.  Slugs get a free ride into (and out of) the city, and the driver escapes the snail lanes on I 395 and is permitted to zip along in the HOV lanes.

I live in Springfield, Virginia and have been picking up Slugs for years.  I don’t know where the name came from.  I always associated it with putting slugs in a juke box or a vending machine to make it work.  Slugs were the same size as coins.

No government agency or official administers the slug lines.  We are convinced that if the government got involved, the system would fail (they would also change the name to something more official sounding).  In Springfield, we used to pick up Slugs in the Long John Silver parking lot.  LJS closed their store, and put up an eight-foot chain-link fence to keep out the slug line (liability concerns?).  The next day the slug line had reassembled next door in the Circuit City parking lot. 

The Slugs form two lines, one for drivers going over the 14th Street Bridge and one going over the Memorial Bridge.  You drive up to the front of the queue and say something like “two for 14th and K.”  The message is passed down the line and two Slugs get into your car.  There is also extensive slug-line etiquette, but you will be pleased to know that I don’t intend to address it.  If there are more drivers than Slugs (it is a fluid process), then the drivers get out of their vehicles, form a queue, and wait for the Slug to appear.

We picked up a young woman who had been in the United States for only three months.  She told us that the slug line saved her a lot of money, but she wasn’t about to tell her parents in South Africa.  She said, “If I told my parents that I traveled to work by climbing into cars with people I do not know, they would demand that I come home.”

At the end of the workday the slug lines form in the District.  One of the more popular locations for Springfield is 14th and Constitution.  A few years back, a new Chief of Police arrived in DC and decided that picking up Slugs on 14th Street was delaying traffic (it probably was).  So he dispatched some of DC’s finest to disband the slug line.  The police waived cars on and disbanded the line.  That lasted for two days.  Tom Davis and other Northern Virginia Congressman threatened to hold hearings on the Hill to determine why the Chief was mistreating Slugs.  The Chief then acknowledged that there was justification for having a slug line, but he intended to find a better location.  I guess he is still looking, because we are still at 14th and Constitution.

We were coming home one night and there were just the two of us.  Terry worked with me and she would hitch a ride some evenings.  When we arrived at 14th and Constitution, there were no Slugs.  It is three lanes in each direction and so I put on my flashers and waited.  We then saw a woman working her way across 14th Street, obviously heading for the slug line.  Traffic was creeping and she crossed in front of a car that didn’t see her.  There was a screech of brakes and the woman jumped clear.  As she got into the car she said, “I thought he saw me.”  Then Terry said, “That was close, and if he had hit you, no telling how long we would have had to wait.”

My Military Daze

How Much Does a Light Bulb Cost the Army?

2 Comments

I  spent  most of my formative years in the Army.  I was a JAG Officer for about 28 years.  When I mention JAG, peoples’ eyes light up and I know they have seen the JAG TV program.  So, I have to explain to them that I never flew a jet, captured terrorists, nor disarmed a nuclear weapon.  And, if the TV show had followed the highlights of my career, it would have been cancelled after the second week.

I had two tours in Germany and my second tour was in Frankfurt.  My family was with me and we were assigned to military family quarters outside of Frankfurt in the little town of Bad Vibel.  Little US conclaves like ours were quite common throughout Germany.  All of the family quarters in Germany had a lot in common.  For example, every light had the same type of globe covering it.  I can still see them and I am sure you can too.  The globe screwed into the fixture.  When a light burned out, it took me 30 minutes to unscrew the globe.  Paint had run down into the threads and I had to scrape the paint out with a knife.  It took a lot of pressure to unscrew the globe.  The second time it happened, I went through the same drill.  I scraped and then wrapped the globe in a dish towel.  As I applied pressure, I heard the globe cracking.

Time to call housing maintenance.  I don’t do cracked globes.  I had visions of three hours in an emergency room, a large portion of which I would be spending explaining how it happened.  One call later and a German maintenance man showed up with a brown paper sack and a hammer.  He put the sack over the globe and smashed it with the hammer.  A new light and a new globe and we were back in business.

The next time a light burned out, I went through the same drill.  It probably only lasted 20 minutes this time.  I didn’t feel the need to hear glass cracking to call for help.  This time, a different German maintenance man, but it looked like the same sack and hammer.  I couldn’t believe it.  Every time a light burned out in family quarters, it cost Uncle Sam a new light and a new globe!

As a general rule, it is not good to be the hero of something you are writing, but I broke the rule here.  I concluded that each time the family quarters were painted (about every three to four years), all the globes were sealed.  If the painting contract required the painters to remove the globes before they painted, the globes would not be sealed by the fresh paint.

At that time the Army had what was called the Suggestion Awards Program where they would actually pay a soldier money for coming up with a suggestion that would save the Army money.  I figured out the number of family quarters in Germany and multiplied it by the number of globes in each unit and then multiplied that figure by the number of German maintenance men walking around with brown paper sacks and hammers.  I multiplied that by the cost of a globe and determined that we could save enough money to put another brigade in Europe.

The moral of this story is that you will never get rich submitting suggestions to the Army.  My suggestion was approved and I received a check for $83.72.  Why such a strange amount?  Because the Army withheld taxes from my hundred dollar prize.  The only thing I regret is not framing the check.

Poems

Marty

3 Comments

                                                                   
You’ll notice that I entitled this catogory “poems,” and not poetry.  This may be subtle, but I don’t think of myself as a poet.  A poet is “a creative artist of great imagination and expressive gifts and special sensitivity to his medium.”  I’m not sure I know what that means, but it ain’t me.  I make things rhyme.  I probably do better than country music, but that’s not saying much (I love country music and really don’t care when it doesn’t rhyme).  So let’s just call these things poems and be done with it.

Marty Beirne is the founding partner of Beirne, Maynard & Parsons in Houston, Texas.  This is a litigation firm that has been extremely successful under Marty’s leadership.

Well, a few years back (more that two and less than 15), Marty’s family decided to celebrate his 50th birthday with a Texas style party at Rio Ranch.  My wife and I were unable to attend, so I wrote the following poem for my dear friend.


                                                  ODE TO AN AGING BARRISTER

Happy be the man who has a friend, Marty,
A man much too wise to be only forty.
A man quite intense, who pushes to the limit,
A man who love life, cramming every last minute.

A half century’s gone, a substantial term,
But he’s witty and prosperous and has his own firm.
He’s loved by his friends and respected by his foes,
He flies like an eagle, and dumps on the crows.

But fifty is a milestone,
be hail and be hearty.
Let’s go to Rio Ranch,
for a Texas style party.

We’ll lift one for the guy,
for he’s a special friend,
who electrifies the air,
and hangs in there to the end.

Bespectacled and hair thinning,
but still oh, he’s so nifty.
I’m sorry I missed the party,
Let’s do it again in fifty!

Random Thoughts

Getting a Slow Start

1 Comment

I don’t know whether I am technologically challenged, or technically challenged or just challenged.  Probably, all of the above.   But, I knew I was in trouble when I couldn’t understand the tutorial.

I am determined, however, to have a blog and the fact that you are reading this indicates that I am making progress.

The blog site started me out with an authorization code that had 31 characters, and my first task was to convert the authorization code into a handy-dandy password.  It took me two days (with the help of support service) to accomplish the fete.  I kept getting a message that said,  “Authorization is denied because you have an incorrect customer number.”  They gave me the customer number.  I was looking at it in their email.  That customer number was the only thing I knew was right.  The next day, the support service technician told me to ignore the message.  Not a warm fuzzy, but when I resubmitted the password, it went through.

I think many of us have a love/hate relationship with our computers.  The more frustrating the computer becomes, the greater the joy when it does what you want it to, even if it is just changing the password.  I think I am going to get to know many of the support service technicians on a first name basis.

BOO! I saw you smile!