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HomeMy WebLinkAboutBill Stroman TranscriptionCity of College Station Heritage Programs Oral History Interviewee: Bill Stroman Interviewer: Tom Turbiville Place: College Station, Texas Project: Veterans of the Valley Transcriber: Brooke Linsenbardt 00:00:00: Bill Stroman (BS): We, we thought we might go down there and take care of five (mumble?). 00:00: 04: Tom Turbiville (TT): [chuckle] That’s right. They’ll let you swim in the pool, ‘cause there’s gotta be a pool back there. Right? 00:00:10: BS: No I don’t. I think all he’s got that lake. You know he’s, he may not know how to swim. TT: Yeah. And then the house across the street, that’s a little over a house. But another big mansion. 00:00:20: BS: Yeah. He’s got about, he’s got about three big ol’ fishing boats out there. TT: I saw two of them right there in the drive. 00:00:25: BS: I don’t know what his name is. 00:00:27: Nancy Stroman (NS): He’s a lawyer. TT: Well I bet he is. 00:00:29: BS: In town. What is his name? 00:00:30: Mrs. S: I don’t know Bill. TT: I’ll be darned. NS: I don’t know his name. 00:00:34: BS: All kinds of important people live out there, besides us. We moved here. Well we bought this land about 1988? NS: Probably. 00:00:47: BS: Something like that. TT: Yeah. 00:00:49: BS: And, we bought sixteen acres and our son bought the 44 acres next to it. And. Then. We’ve since given our sixteen acres to him and we just, we moved up here in 2001. He, we lived in Ganado. You know where that is? TT: Yes sir. Sure do. Right there off of, off of 59. NS: Right. 00:01:10: BS: That’s pretty good. Hardly anybody. TT: Well I, I, I’ve cheated a little bit, the reason I know where Ganado is is because we, we vacation in Port Aransas. 00:01:21: BS: Oh okay. NS: Okay. TT: And whenever we, and sometimes when I go down there, I have to stop by Houston to pick up grandchildren. 00:01:28: BS: Okay. TT: So when I go 5th, that’s where I cut over to Port Lavaca at Ganado. That’s where, that’s, that’s how I know, I know I’m in Ganado. ‘Cause that’s. Whatever road that is that goes to Port Lavaca that hits highway 35. And goes, goes down to, to Rockport and Cibolo and P.A. and all that. 00:01:37: BS: Right. That’s (79?). Yeah and then. Right. Yeah, we lived there. We, we moved there in 1982 from Humble. Of course we’d only lived in Humble for about three years. And that was all the city we needed. TT: Right. 00:01:57: BS: And. We were. I was coaching and Nancy was teaching and. TT: Where were you coaching? 00:02:06: BS: Where? TT: Yeah. 00:02:07: BS: Well. When I, when I left Humble I was coaching at Humble. I was the, I was head, head boys and girls track coach. Cross country and track coach there. Under, under Sam Mosley. TT: Right. 00:02:20: BS: Sam hired me down there. I almost came here. Well w-, we, we, we were in a little town south of San Antonio. Jourdanton. TT: Right. I grew up in San Antonio so I know all the, towns around there. Yeah. 00:02:32: BS: Oh okay. Wasn’t there a big motor company there at Turbin? TT: That’s my father. 00:02:38: BS: Is that right? TT: Turbiville Motors Lincoln Mercury. 00:02:40: BS: How bout that? TT: Yeah, that was my dad. 00:02:42: BS: Oh hey, I practically know you. TT: Yeah. [chuckle] We’re practically cousins. Yeah, that was my dad. He died in 1963. Quite, quite a while, while back. It stayed Turbiville Motors for about five years after he died. And then it became (Main?) Lincoln Mercury, in San Antonio, and that’s what it still is today. 00:02:58: BS: So you grew up and where’d you go to high school? Brackenridge? TT: T.M.I.—Texas Military Institute. 00:03:02: BS: Oh T.M.I. TT: Hmm-hmm. I was military boy. Yeah, yeah in San Antonio. 00:03:07: BS: And you graduated from T.M.I. when? TT: In 1966. I’m almost sixty. 00:03:11: BS: Oh. You’re just a kid then. TT: I’m just a kid. [chuckle] 00:03:14: BS: Right. I had a, I had a couple friends that, that went there, but that was back in the ‘40s. TT: Yeah, it’s an old school. 00:03:21: BS: Oh yeah. TT: Douglas MacArthur went to school back when it was called West Texas Military Academy. 00:03:23: BS: Is that right? I didn’t know that. TT: Yeah, he did. That’s right. He and Hoss Cartwright are our most, and me, are our most famous graduates of T.M.I. 00:03:31: BS: Everybody learns something every day. And today I throw my bet. Dr. Lloyd or here at Kirklin Clinic. We were talking about California falling off of the ocean and the Chinese and all of the things that are happening today. And I said, “You know I guess it’s kind of like the lemmings. And, aren’t they in the Great, the Great Britain. The British Isles. And he’d never heard of the lemmings. And I think. You know they’re the little rodents that, that ever so often when they’re calling, they get too big, they all get together and they have a meeting and then they all rush and drown in the ocean except for a few people that get lost, trying to go back get their backpack. Or forgot to ask their wife for something. TT: I’ve heard of those. 00:04:12: BS: Yes. TT: Not as much as you have. 00:04:14: Dr. Lloyd? (Dr. L): Dr. Lloyd had you ever heard of them. I said, “Never in my life.” And of course A&M so what the heck. TT: Right. 00:04:19: BS: Did you go to A&M? TT: No I didn’t. I actually went to Texas Tech. Yeah. I went out there in the, the sixties. But I’ve, I’ve been here since ’84. I came here. 00:04:28: BS: What in the world ever brought you to Bryan? TT: Uh. Jackie Sherrill hired me as a sports information’s director. 00:04:33: BS: Is that right. TT: And I did that for, five years and, left and went in private business. And then I got into radio and I’ve been on the radio since, 1990. I’ve been WTAW, with them. And, then I started, I started doing this daily show on the radio called Bravo Brazos Valley. And every once in a while, I would, I would feature a, a veteran from the area. And, the T.V. manager over at KAMU called me one day and said, “Well why don’t we take that and put, put that, same concept on television.” And I said, “Okay, let’s do it.” And we’ve been doing it ever since. A show a week for, for three years. And we, I repeat. 00:05:20: BS: I, I apologize for not having, not having seen it because I get up and turn it I. TT: Do you all get KAMU out here? That, that’s the public television station out, out of A&M. Yeah, I’m not sure whether you get it or not maybe. 00:05:28: BS: I’m sure we. Would that be a local? Or would that be on cable? TT: Well it’s on cable. Is, if, if it’s, it, I don’t know what cable. Do you have cable out here? 00:05:39: BS: We have direct. Direct T.V. NS: We get Bob French. TT: Okay, it’s not on, it’s not KBTX. This is KAMU. This is the P.B.S. public television station out of A&M, is what it is. 00:05:52: BS: Let me look here right quick. TT: Yeah. If you ever get any public television. Now there’s a public T.V. station out of the University of Houston. And that’s not it. This is the one that’s operated by A&M, KAMU T.V. It’s, it’s channel. If you have rabbit ears, it’d be channel 15. If you’re on Suddenlink cable, it’s channel 4. Now I don’t know what it would be with your, or whether you get it or not. 00:06:19: BS: Get the bottom where they’re, are local. NS: Look at. 00:06:23: BS: What am I doing? NS: Start at three coach. 00:06:27: BS: I’m not allowed to touch this thing very often. See with us having company now. TT: [chuckle] You’re showin’ off now. NS: Put on the. TT: You’ve got your favorite soap operas on there. 00:06:37: BS: Yes dear. TT: Ah, there you go. Okay let’s see if. I don’t, don’t. It’s a possibility you might not get, get on the, on the satellite out here. 00:06:47: BS: Okay, we start with three it looks like. TT: It would be. NS: I don’t guess we do. 00:06:54: BS: 10. 34. NS: 44. 00:06:58: BS: 44. 46. And 100. TT: Yeah, you might not, you might not, you might not. That’s why you haven’t seen it. You don’t have to apologize, you can’t get it. [chuckle] But what I’m gonna do is after we do the show, I’m gonna get you a DVD of it like this. I brought you one of. I don’t know if. Do you know a fellow named Ivo Junek? Junek? Do you know Ivo Junek by chance? 00:07:71: BS: Tell me, how do you spell that last name? TT: J-U-N-E-K. He’s one of those, fellows from Snook or Somerville. One of those Juneks out there. But anyway I just, I, I, I did him and. NS: Turn it off coach. TT: I, I brought that so you could sort of get an idea of what we do. But first, let, let me just, talk about your. What brought you to, to this area? I don’t, your, your son? Or, or what brought you out? 00:07:46: BS: (word? Name?) TT: Sure. 00:07:47: BS: You got a little bit of time? TT: You bet. That’s why (we’re recording?). 00:07:49: BS: Well we gotta go back, ‘cause it ties into our military. TT: Right. Okay good. And, we can start that way then. If you wanna start with. Where did, where did you grow up? 00:07:58: BS: I grew up in Eagle Pass, Texas. TT: In Eagle Pass. Okay. 00:08:00: BS: Right. And, had never been many places in my life. But then, I was at the tail end of World War II. And my brothers, all gone off to war. My brother-in-law was gone off. And they went to real war. And. TT: [chuckle] The real war. 00:08:18: BS: And, and I was in high school during that time so when I, when I. The, the, the war ended pretty much the beginning of my senior year. And so when I graduated my high school I went to. TT: In what ’45 or? 00:08:34: BS: ’46. TT: ’46. Okay. 00:08:36: BS: Right. I went to Texas Lutheran. TT: Hmm-hmm. In Seguine? Yeah. 00:08:39: BS: And I. I kinda, thought I wanted to be a geologist, but when I got there I played football and made the team so I said, “Heck this is what I really want to do.” And I told my mother that. And she said, “I think that’s an honorable profession.” And so I stayed I with it. And, but I moved around a lot because it’s pretty tough, paying for it you know? And I, I went there and one semester. And then I went to Sul Ross. I thought all my friends were having more fun out at Alpine so I got out on Highway 90 and hitchhiked to. This is how the wor-, world has changed you know? I just packed up my suitcase and went, got on the highway and hitchhiked to Alpine. And then I wrote my mother a letter and told her I had moved to, to Alpine. And she said, “That’s fine. As long as you stay in school.” And I went there for about a. I went there a spring semester and a fall semester and I ended up because I was a transfer, I wasn’t eligible to play. And then I kind of ran out of money. And I didn’t kinda, I did. So I had to lay out of school. But, it was out there that started me in my military thing. I, I saw this picture of this guy and, and this was a lieutenant, and he was a dressed (floozy? Bluesy?) and whatnot. It said that a recruiter was coming to, to sign up some people if they were interested in the platoon leaders class. And that sounded pretty good to me, you know pretty exciting. All of my friends told me I pretty dumb. And, but I went down there anyhow and, signed up for P.O.C. And I went. TT: Were you still at Sul Ross now or? 00:10:11: BS: I’m still at Sul Ross. So, that was in between my, my, my freshman year and the beginning of my sophomore year. And I went to P.O.C. in Quantico and, and came back and then I, I had to lay out of school and (were?) laid out of school. Well then I, I ended up not getting dropped out of the P.O.C. program because it wasn’t college. And so I’d signed up for four years of reserve. So you know that was just kind of in your pocket on an I.D. card that you could tell somebody, “I’m a pre-reserve.” And, we got married then in. I, I, I after, when I started back to school, I went to North Texas. Which I didn’t even know where it was, but a girl told me that it was a good school to go to. And so I got in the bus. And my mother is, usually said. TT: You’re, you’re quite a ways from Eagle Pass now aren’t you? Or Denton rather. 00:10:56: BS: Oh yeah. I had to get a map to find out where Denton was. TT: [laughs] Yeah. 00:11:00: BS: And. And when I went there, I, I met Nancy and, I graduated (from?) the (other?) summer of ’50. But we got married in June of ’50. And when we were coming back from, we got married in New Jersey. And how we got there, we, I borrowed $400 dollars from my brother, to get, go to New Jersey, get married and come home. Can you imagine that? TT: Is that where, and, and Nancy was from New Jersey? 00:11:26: BS: New Jersey, yes. And her dad worked in New York City. He was in a, in a, in a. TT: But how was she in Texas? 00:11:33: BS: On, on a music scholarship. NS: On a scholarship. TT: At North Texas for? 00:11:35: BS: Yes. TT: At North Texas? 00:11:36: BS: Yes. TT: Is that right? 00:11:37: BS: North Texas was known for its music stuff. TT: It still is. 00:11:39: BS: And her music teacher thought that, since she had such a great voice—and she does—that that’s where she outta go. So she had a, a scholarship to go. TT: My son lives in Denton and his fiancée is about to graduate in music from North Texas. NS: Oh really? TT: She plays the viola. NS: Oh. TT: Yes. NS: It’s a fine school. TT: Yes. Yes it is. Yeah, yeah. But anyway go ahead. 00:12:00: BS: Anyhow that’s where I, I met Nancy. So, we, got married and we came home. And. One, an interesting thing. We spent three days in New York City on our honeymoon and we stayed at Tutor City. It was a Tutor hotel there. And our bill when we checked out was like $26 dollars or $27. TT: How many days did you stay? 00:12:25: BS: I think it was three days. TT: Three days. 00:12:27: BS: Yeah. That’s unbelievable. I didn’t let anybody carry my bag. We couldn’t hardly eat. Hamburgers were, ridiculous. They were probably $.75 cents or a dollar you know? But anyhow, we’ve (word?) united for the rest of your life. We were coming home when the Korean thing started. So, I knew I was gonna get called up. And, there wasn’t many coachin’ jobs open. As a matter of fact, I think the only coachin’ job open that summer was at Marble Falls. And it was about 100,000 of us that, you know, that’s about the time that all those G.I. Bill people graduated. So there was a lot of competition for the jobs. So, I, we got married and stayed there in Eagle Pass waitin’ to be called up. And sure enough they did. They caught me and called me up. Looked at the thing. They said this guy hasn’t even been to boot camp so they sent me to boot camp. TT: Where? 00:13:18: BS: And. San Diego. I’m a west coast Marine. And. We. While I was there, I happened to be in the second battalion. Second recruit battalion. And. They came out with an (armoir?) that said anybody with a college degree, could be interviewed or s-, for possible commissioning. And I got interviewed there. And I never heard anymore about it. Finished up boot camp. Went to Camp Pendleton. Was up there. And. One day a bunch of guys filled out the things and, and. I’m always curious and asked ‘em where they were going, they were going to screening. And I said, “Oh man. I, I didn’t get any screening.” So I went and asked my first sergeant. And he said, “Well let me check.” He checks it, “Yeah. You were, you were supposed to go to that thing. We just. They had lost you, in this, in the shuffle.” So I went down there and was screened again by a lieutenant colonel and a major and then I. The end of that. And, our outfit went out to San Clemente Island on maneuvers and Nancy went up to, caught a bus and went up to Stockton, California to, to visit. Well it wasn’t Stockton, that, that’s the other. NS: Close enough. Close enough. 00:14:33: BS: Close enough. And. We were out on San Clemente Island. And one day the bell clerk come running over there and said, “Hey, Stroman you gotta catch a pl-, a mail plane back to mainside, you’re goin’ to Quantico. “ And so I got on the plane and flew back over to, to oceanside to Camp Pendleton. And, and, they said, “Yup, you’ve, we’ve got orders for you. You got to go to Quantico. You got to be there in certain number of days.” And so man I got on the phone and called Nancy and said, “You gotta get home.” And she caught the bus back down to Laguna Beach where we stayed in an apartment that was about the size of, our bedroom there. You can’t rent much when you’re on (carpal?). And, no car. What, forty miles from the base. But anyhow, she came down there and I, I went over to get my orders. And, I, I just didn’t know what I was gonna do because there I had my wife out there and, and no money. And, and I talked to a sergeant, that was going to training. And I told him my dilemma. And, and he said, “Oh, you’ve got no problem.” He says, “Why don’t you go by private conveyance.” And I said, “I don’t own a car.” And he said, “The Marine Corps don’t know you own a car.” He says, “Go by private conveyance and ask for advanced travel pay and they’ll give you money and buy you a ticket on the train to go.” And so I went in there and told them all that and sure enough they gave me the money. And, and that gave us enough money that we, were able to catch a bus to Los Angeles. Buy. NS: Two tickets. 00:16:04: BS: Two tickets to New York City and one for me from New York City on down to Quantico. And we had $10 dollars left over. And Nancy made a bag of, of, tuna fish sandwiches. And we crossed the United States on $10 dollars and a bag of tuna fish sandwiches. TT: So you went cross country on the train? 00:16:24: BS: On the train. Right. TT: And back then I guess, that was, did they have a sleeper car or were you going? NS: No, coach. 00:16:29: BS: Uh-uh. No we were in chairs. TT: You, you were, you were just in chairs. 00:16:31: BS: That’s coach isn’t it, what they call coach? TT: You just slept sitting up for. NS: Yeah. 00:16:34: BS: Oh yeah. Well. TT: How long a, how long a train is that? 00:16:38: BS: Do you remember? TT: A long. NS: It was a long train ride. TT: A few days. 00:16:42: BS: Well we, we, we stopped in, in, in Chicago. We had a little layover in Chicago, ‘cause we visited, a friend of ours. NS: Some friends. 00:16:52: BS: There. And then went on. I guess it must have been about three days. TT: Yeah, yeah. 00:16:56: BS: It was pretty good while (for us?). But I don’t, you know, that long ago, there’s so much water under the bridge since then. TT: Right. 00:17:04: BS: My mother’s. The thing I remember most about that trip, there was some gal there that was. Her husband was leaving on a ship. He was a sailor. And, boy they were just carrying on something terrible because he was leaving and, and she was going home. And. So the train pulled out. It must have not taken her ten minutes before she had her boyfriend. [chuckle] TT: [chuckle] Oh my. 00:17:32: BS: There you go. That’s the Navy for you. TT: [chuckle] 00:17:37: BS: We’ve talked about that many times. But then I went on down to Quantico. And there was about, there was about 500 of us. A little over 500 of us that had been selected from the entire Marine Corps. That had either had a college degree or had passed an equivalency test. Now how you pass that equivalency test for college I don’t know. But I guess then what they do is they just test you and, and based on upon your scores they say, “Hey this guy, can do it.” So of that 500 and something. We ranked all the way from, the top master sergeant, down to P.F.C.s. And some of the guys, a number of the people in our class had been, had been, enlisted people in the, in the Marine Corps in World War II and had combat experience. It was some, we had some great people in that class. And. Then there was some others like me that just was in the reserve and kind of got caught up in the whole thing. And, I did a lot of listenin’ to those people that knew stuff that was going on. And out of that 500 and something they, we spent about oh, a month and a half, going through a vigorous screening thing. Well we did all kinds of ridiculous things. Maybe they weren’t that ridiculous but. And then one morning we fell out and they started callin’ off names your name you know. And if they called your name, then you were supposed to go up to the, to, back to the barracks. So, everybody had packed their bag before we went down to this formation. And. So they’d call a name you know and they [claps hands]. Man, that, those, those people must be the ones that are gonna get commissioned ‘cause I know he, he seemed to be a pretty sharp character you know. And then, then all of a, then, you know that would go on. And then they would, pass up somebody that you knew and said, “Man that couldn’t have passed him up.” So you didn’t know. When they got through with that. What was left of us. 292 of us, were left. And they marched us over to a building and said, “You guess you know why you’re here, you’re now.” And everybody said, “No,” and I remember one of our lieutenants (Zutterberg?) said, “Yeah, beats us.” You know, “why are we here?” You know he’s an (upsalty? Insulting?) Marine. And they said, “Well you’re now, gonna be s-, sworn into second lieutenants United States Marine Corps.” And so sure enough we made it. 292 of us. And we were the 5th S.B.C.—Special Basic Class. And of that Special Basic Class, we still have reunion. There’s about. There’s approximately 160 of us left. TT: Wow. 00:20:17: BS: And. Al-, although we didn’t have that many killed in combat. I think we only lost, out of our group, we only lost, two, two guys. Bill (Baul?) and (Singer?). But, the rest of us, we, we had, we have reunions and, and, it’s kind of interesting. TT: Yeah. Where you have them? Just different places surrounding people, different people, go somewhere? 00:20:39: BS: Well we’ve had one in San Antonio. We had, we’ve had three now at Quantico. We can’t get the west coast people to do anything. I guess they’re out there probably trying to hold Earth together, fight out brushfires. Send the devil back to wherever. Uh. I, we get a little newsletter from ‘em every once and a while. And, on, on that thing. So we, we come together pretty good. We got. Couple of, several that live in the, in Texas area. And. So where am I going with this thing? So anyhow, when we got through, then we went to basic school. They made you a lieu-, in the Marine Corps, they make you a lieutenant and then they teach you how to be a lieutenant. And so we went through a, a shor-, a shortened vision of that because at that time the Marine Corps was pretty short on, on experienced Marine officers. Lieutenant type. And so we graduated, we were commissioned on 31, 30, 29 May. And, we were, we finished up our, the first of September. In basic. TT: What year is this now? 00:21:48: ’50. TT: ’50, still ’50 okay. 00:21:50: BS: No. No. ’51. TT: ‘’51 okay. NS: ’51. 00:21:52: BS: This is after the Reservoir. TT: Okay. 00:21:55: BS: Yeah. I didn’t go to the Reservoir. TT: Okay. 00:21:57: BS: And. TT: Now where was basic? Was that in? 00:22:02: BS: Quantico. All Marine officers go through Quantico, Virginia. So we got. I knew I came home with my orders and it said, Nancy loved the Marine Corps at that point because we finally had a little money, even had, we had managed to buy a car by then. And Nancy thought the, nothing beat the Marine Corps, well I came home with my orders and it said, “For duty beyond the seas.” NS: “For duty beyond the seas.” [chuckle] 00:22:25: BS: And she wasn’t really happy with the Marine Corps then. And so, we came back to Texas. I got delayed en route. And, there was. We had about, I guess a dozen or so, that volunteered, to go to Korea. They didn’t even take leave, they just left right straight there and flew ‘em straight to Korea. And then there was about ’48 of us and they put us in the 14th replacement draft which was the next draft going aboard ship. And so we had delay en route and we finally got to California and, we’d no sooner gotten the 14th replacement draft and we were already assigned our billets and everything aboard ship there in San Diego, ready to ship out. And they came down there and said, “Oops. Somebody discovered you guys haven’t been to cold weather training.” And so. They pulled us out, put us in the 15th replacement draft and sent us up to Pickle Meadows, California. And it was in the, it was in what? Late September I guess. Early October. We got up there, we were working out down in a, in a. I, I’m trying to think where we were. We were down near the coast. I know one thing, it’s hotter than hell down there. We were doing tank infantry, was working out tank infantry down there. They pulled us out that day and the next day they sent us to, up to Pickle Meadows. And we had to go draw cold weather gear. And, I went, went by the supply place and they said, “What size shoe packs.” And I told ‘em, “Eight and a half.” And so they threw eight and a half out there and I threw ‘em in the back of the car. And all that good stuff. Well got to Pickle Meadows. It was beautiful weather. And they said, we’re gonna have about, we’re gonna have a week up here in the mountains. It’s not really gonna be cold. Well the next day a blizzard hit us. And. I, when I put on those shoe packs I had one that was 8.5 and one was 11.5. And let me tell marchin’ and, and movin’ through the mountains with two boots that didn’t fit wasn’t very good. But the first night this blizzard came in. And man I tell you what, it was all over the place. And no-nobody could find it. And we bedded down you know and the snow came on top of us. And somebody had an attack of appendicitis. And. Am I boring you to death with this? TT: No! No, no, no, no not at all. 00:24:45: BS: [chuckle] So. Had an attack of appendicitis so they sent up some sort of vehicle to get him. Well when they came into the area where we were all at, you couldn’t see us because we were in, all you know, snowed under. And they ran, ran over one, one guy’s shoulder. One mas-, we had a bunch of master sergeants with us and they were all old and decrepit and out of shape. But, another hears the noise, raised up and he got hit in the head with the differential. But the next morning, as soon as the sun came up, I went over there and I saw where these guys had no longer were there. And I found me a pair of boots. [chuckle] And, that saved the day. I made it, made it through that, through cold weather training. And went, by the time we got back to Pendleton, the 14th replacement draft had left. And of course, we were all the lieutenants in it so they said, “We gotta get you all there.” So, they put us back in the four, they put us back in the 14th replacement draft which was at sea. But they said your, we’re gonna fly you all out of, San Francisco. So we all getting’ in a very. We still had, most of us our wives and whatnot with us, and so we drove up to San Francisco and, and we reported in 100 Harrison Street. And I still remember, ‘cause we went in there, here’s all these lieutenants you know. Nobody had seen that many lieutenants in the Marine Corps since, forever. And they said, “Where’d you guys come from.” And we said, “Well we have orders to come here.” And they said, “This is not where you go.” So they sent up to Treasure Island. And when we got there, guess what they said. “Where’d you guys come from?” So they said, “Go ahead and take the weekend off and we’ll see if we can find some kind of flight out of here.” So we came back to Treasure Island and they divided us in half. And half, half of the group flew out of (Mothit?). I think. And I flew out of Alamitos Naval Air Station, one in (Catalina Mars?) type things. TT: Hmm-hmm. 00:26:51: BS: Well, interesting thing happened there too. That, when we got over to, to Alamitos, they were having at the club, they were having Nickel Night. But they would send you a list and a five dollar book. Well Nickel Night on a five dollar book, man you realize that that’s about what? A hundred drinks. You know what I mean. And, and all of us pretty brilliant people, we all bought a book. You know instead of taking, well one book would’ve taken care of all of us ‘cause in our group we were left with oh, twenty-something. So, we, tried to eat up, or drink up our book and we got on that Catalina Mars somewhere in the middle of the night. And flew. And we went to. NS: [coughing] 00:27:34: BS: We flew to Honolulu. And we landed, we landed there in this Catalina Mars. And, and they put us on a bus and they sent us up to. NS: [whispering to TT] Would you like something to drink?] TT: No I’m fine, thank you. NS: [whispering to TT] Are you sure? TT: Yes ma’am. 00:27:47: BS: And they sent us up to some kind of, so-, to a, to a marine base at Barbers Point. They sent us to Barbers Point. And, so when we got there and they saw one look at these people, guess what they said? “Where’d you guys all come from?” [chuckle] TT: Yeah. [chuckle] 00:28:02: BS: And so they said, “Well,” said, “We’re gonna have to figure out what to do.” So they said, “Y’all go ahead and take we-, take leave, take a couple days and we’re gonna find out what to do.” Well I was. There was several of us that was slow getting ready to go somewhere, so by the time they got through with it, they’d already discovered that, to send us to, down to Pearl Harbor. And they was gonna fly us out at Hickam Field. So we went down there, and, I talked to this Corporal down there and I had a brother that had been called back with the C-Bs. And he was at Guam. So I says, “Hey, as long as I’m going to Japan or Korea.” I said, “You got any flights that go through Guam.” I said, “I got a brother there and I wouldn’t mind visiting him.” And they said, “No, we never go from here to Guam.” So I said, “Well get me on whatever you can out of here.” So I, I finally caught a flight over there and it flew. [Sigh] I can’t ever remember Tom whether we went to Midway or Wake. But it was a little bitty thing in, in water and we’d circle over that thing you know. I didn’t see how they could land that airplane on that little piece of land. And. We left there and land-, landed the next morning in, Tokyo? Tokyo Bay. Is there Tokyo Bay? TT: Yes. Yeah. 00:29:20: Yeah. We landed there. And again you know when we were reporting they said, “Where all you guys come from?” They said, “Well we’re gonna get you out of here.” So we had, we had about [sigh]. Maybe 20 hours there. And. So they, had us all, you had to have, Japanese money or yen or whatever. And so we spent more money, we spent more time getting, ready to go on about a six-hour leave down on Ginza. And, so in the middle of the night, they put us on a mail plane and flew us. We flew right over Mt. Fuji and landed in Busan. Guess what? “Where’d all you guys come from?” And, so they said, “Well, we’ll get you all out here to division tomorrow morning.” Our leader by that time was a guy by the name of (Soderberg?). Lieutenant (Soderberg?). He was a heck of a, he was a good marine. Salty old dog. And, and so. They said, “Y’all be up here tomorrow morning at six o’clock.” Well it ended up, we overslept. We got up there, we were late. And, the captain in charge up there was pretty unhappy with us and he says uh, “You guys were supposed to be here at six!” (Soderberg?) said, “Well nobody,” you know, “nobody woke us up.” So they guy said, he says, “I got a good mind to get you all. I got a good mind not to send you all out of here till tomorrow.” And old (Soderberg?) says, “That suits hell out of us.” TT” [laughs] 00:30:45: BS: And so we were on a plane in about thirty minutes. And we landed at a, at a, at a strip, up in North Korea. I think K-Force. I think, landed and there wasn’t a soul there. Man. There was nothing there. There wasn’t a truck. There wasn’t a. They just landed on this strip and told us to get out. We got out. And. I, I don’t know how many of us were left. There were somewhere around twenty of that forty-some odd. And we got out of there. And, and. There was sign up there on the side of the road said, M.S.R which means. I don’t know how familiar you are with military, but that’s Main Supply Route. To first wing division. So we got out there, pretty soon a six-by came by and we hitchhiked, on to division. And they, they still didn’t know where all we came from. Because we beat the fourteenth replacement craft over. Then they signed us all out. We went. I, I, we, they were on, just at the last of the, of the, of the move to the north as far as they went. We just got the very tail-end of it. And, I was sent over to the Korean Marine Corps. And I don’t what they thought a guy that had been in, actually been on active duty for less than a year and was now a leader of men, was gonna do over there with the Koreans. But anyhow, they sent me over there. And, and, I went to a, 4.2 mortar outfit. And, they were sittin’. They were just building up the first Marine regiment. They had the infantry and they had just added the four deuces to it. And they were sitting back in the middle of the punch bowl. And we were so damn far from the enemy that we couldn’t even reach the front lines at that stage, where the mortars were. And so. I got us, I knew we had to get closer than that if we was gonna fight anybody. And so we got moved up. I got ‘em all moved up. We moved up where we were pretty close. Behind, snuggled in behind the trenches, and, with the four deuces. And, and. I took a shower. That was, very late October. And I took a shower at division. And I got one shower between then and February. NS: Wow. 00:32:59: BS: Nancy sent me a washrag. And. I. That and my helmet, I managed to stay fairly clean. I guess. I probably smelled no worse than the Marines did. But I was by myself. I didn’t even have anybody that really spoke English with me. And. TT: Right. So you were a commander of Korean troops. 00:33:18: BS: Yes. TT: Of the. 00:33:19: BS: I was an advisor. TT: Attached to the Marines. 00:33:21: BS: Right. I was attached to the First Korean Marine Corps regiment. And, so I had a little houseboy, that was fourteen years old. A little boy that, that went with me. And he spoke fairly good English. And, to begin with, I had a Korean officer. But. [sigh] My boss would tell, now you tell them to do this, you know. And if my interpreter who was a Korean officer didn’t really like, or if he thought it might hurt somebody’s feelings, well you don’t know what he told ‘em. And so, some things didn’t happen. So I got little old Han, (could be Han Gi Son or Han Gi Sun?). And I paid him five dollars a month and clothed him and fed him sea rations like I ate. And he was my interpreter and we went on our way. And. TT: Yeah. Right. So this was a mortar outfit? 00:34:10: BS: Yeah. Four deuces. TT: Okay. And. So did you, eventually get up closer to the action? 00:34:16: BS: That was. Well we were pretty close to the action on that. TT: Yeah. 00:34:20: BS: And. We had our, our, (forward observers?) out of that and. It, to, to our, to our trenches, was, they were right up there. [chuckle] It’s pretty good. It took about thirty minutes to get there, and by the time you got up there to the trenches where F-Os were. And what we finally got all situated. And our, I can, the e-, I had some, good things happen to me then. We had a, we had a. We fired in our first mission. This is the first time the four deuces, the Korean four deuces got to shoot at the real guys. And, we were gonna run a raid that night out at a little, at a, at a place out in, an outpost, that was out in front of us across the, a, a creek and up there. And so we used that to, to, for their first fire mission to, to register in on out there. Now, man, this Korean would carries them in, they shooting up rounds 90 miles an hour. That night we sent out, a, patrol, a patrol went out there and, ambush. It not, wasn’t an ambush. It was. That was just combat patrol that went out there. And sure enough, we had, we, we, had, had pretty good success with our mission. And we had, we had caused quite a bit of causalities out there. And they captured a, a Korean officer. And that was the first thing that happened good to me. Well my boss thought, “Man Stroman’s pretty smart.” You know, sent some men on those, guys up. I didn’t get to talk to anybody or eat many hot meals, but at least I, I was respected by my, by my (mumble). We stayed there the winter, through the winter. TT: This is 1952 now? 00:36:09: BS: 1951. TT: Oh we’re still in ’51. 00:36:12: BS: Oh yeah. TT: In late ’51? Okay. 00:36:14: BS: We stayed there past Christmas. And, and I don’t remember now whether we moved in January of February. And. They decided to move the division from the east coast back down and through Han uh, through Seoul and back up into the uh perimeter. And so they put us, we ended up right behind Panmunjom then. We straddled that. And, when we got up there, my boss then moved me to intelligence. I guess ‘cause he, I don’t know because we were so lucky. I had some pretty good luck because I was able, through my boy, I was able to communicate. And we drugged lines and I was able to get information. It was awfully hard to get information to the Marine Corps of what the Koreans were doing. You know, they’d tell you one thing, be doing something else. So anyhow, I, I ended up then, I went to, I, I was at regiment right behind Freedom Bridge. You know that was a bridge that went across where all the talks were, up there. And I stayed there then till we came home in July, that thing. Not too terribly much exciting. There was, not a whole lot of, of. TT: Did you encounter much resistance in any of your? I mean get shot back at or? 00:37:48: BS: Yeah. They had not taken a Chinese pri-. They had never, not taken a Chinese prisoner. We, we had North Koreans in front of us over on the east coast. And we usually got enough people that just quit. Maybe a sixteen inch dude would land in their area. And when they saw the size of the bullets and somebody would come over and that would, that would give us an opportunity to, to, we were kind of stalemated type thing. That would give us an opportunity to, to, to determine what unit was in front of you. You’re supposed to have, every so often, you’re supposed to know definitely whose, who you’re fighting. And when we moved over the Chinese, they hadn’t had, they had not had a, contact. They, they just. The, the North Korean Army was over in front of ‘em. They just kind of had a, a truce. It was kind of one of those things “we won’t shoot at you, you don’t shoot at us. We’ll go fight with the Army over here.” And. I don’t know if that makes any sense. But. TT: Yeah. I understand. 00:38:48: BS: You know a lot of things happen then in those Oriental minds that. And, then when they moved us over there, we weren’t there but about, you know we weren’t there but about two days and all hell broke loose. The Chinese suddenly discovered that there was somebody over there that was, didn’t like ‘em. And. We, we were, we had a, a really big. They launched a pretty good size offense against us. And, and, which was pretty, pretty interesting. And. But it was repelled and. TT: Right. 00:39:25: BS: But I remember that you couldn’t count the rounds coming in. You know, they were coming so fast. They really expended a lot of in, in, of, artillery on us. TT: Yeah. 00:39:38: BS: And whatnot. And so, but it, that was kind of the last hurrah. TT: How were you protected? I mean were you just out in the open? Or were you? 00:39:45: BS: Oh no, we had bunkers. TT: In the bunkers. 00:39:47: BS: Yes. TT: But they were flying around you. 00:39:49: BS: Oh yeah. TT: Or over you. 00:39:51: BS: Oh yeah. Yeah they, they, we, we go-, we had, I had. I probably had more incoming on a daily basis over when we were on the eastern coast. Everybody was. You got incoming every time you turned around. TT: Yeah, were you frightened? 00:40:05: BS: Oh yeah. When you get incoming, I used to, I’ve always used the, the, you get down and you crawl into the toe of your boot. [chuckle] TT: Hmm-hmm. 00:40:16: BS: All (over?). And then, you know you, you get, mortar fire when you, went up. I went up. I spent a lot of time on the lines with the F-Os. And you know making sure the guys were still there. And making sure whatever, doing the things that I was supposed to do, which I didn’t know much about anyhow. But I learned pretty quick. And, I didn’t have any great big deals like some people. And you know I had a brother that was in the 36th infantry division that was in, made the landing at, Salerno and. What was the other one? Anzio. And southern France and all the way up in Ger-, there was you know, that was a, that was really something. TT: Sure. 00:41:00: BS: And the guys you know, particularly those in the reservoir. The, the, the guys that I’ve known before, since that were in the reservoir. They, you know, they really had some tough things. But I think that, in many cases, that you know, just your weather and your, you know, the situation you live under is not a, is a big thing. A. I, I, I, I remember a lot of the, kind of fun things. I remember we had, we had a, the guy up above me, Lieutenant Brooks, he had with him, corps men. Navy corps men. And this corps man, man all he could talk about was doughnuts. He was so hungry for doughnuts. He just couldn’t (handle it?). So, he, Brooks told him, says, “Okay,” says, “You go on off and see.” He found a cook, an Army cook. We tied in with the Army. And, as best you can tie in with the Army. Are you in the Army? TT: No. 00:42:05: BS: Oh good. And. And so he found a cook down there and this cook told him said, “I’ll cook all the doughnuts you want if you just get the sugar.” So he went somewhere, and Marines are pretty good, they can just about scrounge. You want something, they can find someplace to steal it. TT: Right. 00:42:21: BS: And so he came back. And when he came by my place he had a back, back board on. You know they didn’t have packs then like they have now. They had back boards. And you put a W.P. bag on you, that’s a water proof bag and he had that whole thing full of doughnuts. And I, he left me some doughnuts. And you, and he was in hog heaven with that. You think about things like that, they’re really kind of. TT: [laughs] 00:42: 45: BS: Kind of funny things and. TT: So you were there until July? 00:42:49: BS: I was there till July. TT: Of ’52? 00:42:51: BS: Until ’52. TT: And then, then what? 00:42: 54: BS: Came home on a ship and, we got to, to San Diego. And. We got out. We decided that we wanted, I still wanted to be a coach. And so we got out and came back to Texas. And, to. My, my first job was in Floresville. TT: I see. 00:43:17: BS: And. TT: So you were discharged in, in? 00:43: 18: BS: No I wasn’t discharged. TT: You weren’t discharged. You just. 00:43:21: I still had my, my commission. And Nancy and I talked it over and I told her I said, “You know, we’re gonna, we’re not gonna give up our reserve commission because it was, we were pretty lucky to get it.” And I said, “I know there’s gonna be another war and we’re gonna get called up again and, and I don’t wanna start back at the bottom.” And so we stayed in the reserve. And then I got a little ol’, I got a letter of commendation that came later, after I was released. And, they came down from San Antonio and presented it to me at the school assembly. Which was a pretty nifty thing for them. And the guy that, that presented it down there was a Captain (Bater?) and he was with the 14th infantry bat-, reserve battalion in San Antonio. And so he said, “You know, if you’re gonna be in the reserve, you might as well come up and get in the unit.” And, they didn’t pay teachers well anyhow so that was a chance to make a little extra money. And, so I went up and joined the 14th infantry battalion and, then I became a somewhat of a, I guess that I became somewhat of a professional reserve. Because I always managed to stay in the unit. We moved to, we quit coachin’ in ’58 ‘cause I couldn’t make a living. I had a wife and two kids. In those days, she, you know she took care of the kids. And, and in, in, those days if you were sick, you paid your own subs and you had no hospitalizations. And they didn’t you enough to live on anyhow. Between, between. Our teaching salary, what I made from Marine Corps reserve, and working all summer, doing something, I, measuring land, whatever I could do. We barely were scratching out a living. So in ’58, we’d had a pretty good season in ’58 and, I was offered a job and I left. Went to Amarillo for a short time and that didn’t pan out so we went to Dallas. And. We, stayed there. But I think that, I think that I knew that I had made a mistake quitting coaching, about, within six weeks after I quit. I really was miserable. I had good jobs. I did. We did well. TT: Where all did you coach? What’s your coaching resume? 00:45:56: BS: Okay, I coached from, I started out in ’52 in, in, I worked under (Gal Starn?). Coach there. I coached. NS: Floresville. 00:46:07: BS: In Floresville. For two years. Our oldest son was born there. TT: Right. NS: He said Fort Worth. TT: Yeah, Floresville. Okay. 00:46:13: BS: Right. And then we, then I got the head job, I was pretty young, but I got the head job over at Jourdanton in ’54. And we were there four years. In our fourth year there we were, we made it to state semifinals. And, that’s when I quit. And we were out seven years and it took seven years, seven long years to get back to coaching because she had to get the rest of her degree so that she could teach. And, and we had to get our minds set to live on less than what we were doing because when we had a real job, we made enough money to pay groceries and you know, have the insurance and all of those good things. But in ’65, the spring of ’65, I came home, I was selling electronic medical equipment, I travelled a lot. And I came home and I was really down in the dumps and I (brought?) my suitcase in. Told Nancy if I had a, if I had a job I’d quit this in nothing flat. And, and she said, “Well, Coach Harrison called from Jourdanton and said the head coach there had quit and why don’t I apply for the job.” So I called the superintendent who when I was there, was my assistant coach and so, they hired me back and I stayed there from. We stayed in Jourdanton and she went back and taught. And. TT: So you went seven years you after you left. You, you went back. 00:47:40: Seven years we went right back to where we came from. TT: Went back. As head coach. 00:47:43: BS: Right. Was still head coach. TT: Yeah. 00:47:45: BS: And, we, stayed there till, took ‘em till 1979 to find out that I didn’t know any how to coach. TT: [chuckle] So you were there for that long? 00:47:58: BS: Yes. We were there for that long. TT: For fourteen years? 00:47:59: BS: We were kind of a. TT: Yeah. So you coached there from ’65 to ’79. 00:48:04: BS: Right. Plus the four years before. So we had a pretty good tour there. I got lots of good kids from there. TT: (Hollins?) from Jourdanton. How far away is that from San Antonio? It’s not. 00:48:12: BS: Oh about. NS: 40 miles. TT: Yeah. 00:48:13: BS: Forty miles. It’s real close to Pleasanton. That’s better known. TT: Yeah, sure. 00:48:19: BS: I still have a lot of, I, I, I still call them my kids. I thought an interesting thing. What was it in February. We were invited to a golden wedding anniversary, and they were two kids that I had coached, in, in Floresville. A guy by the name of Wren Wright. How’s he related to ol’ John Connally? Is John Connally his first cousin? NS: I think so. TT: The former governor you mean? NS: Yeah. 00:48:46: BS: Yeah. And. TT: Yeah. 00:48:48: And. TT: Well mid-sixties, coaching around that area, that was. ‘Cause I can remember, back then, in San Antonio, that was when the, famous, Brackenridge and Robert E. Lee football game. 00:49:04: BS: Oh yeah. TT: Warren McVea and (Linus Bear?) and. 00:49:05: BS: Oh yeah. TT: That, that. Of course if all the people were at the game that claimed they were, they were at that game, there’d been about a hundred thousand there, but I wasn’t at the game, but I was in San Antonio and listened on the radio and all of that. And that was, that was, quite a, in San Antonio area anyway. Yeah. Yeah so fourteen years, wow, coaching. 00:49:28: BS: And so then I. Actually I guess they, they, they really didn’t fire me. NS: No they didn’t fire you. 00:49:38: BS: They just said I. NS: Reassigned. 00:49:40: BS: They just reassigned me. And, so I was pretty, I was having a lot of success with, with runners, with track people. I’d really, I loved track. And I’d never run, but I’d learned a lot about coaching it and, we were very successful at it so they sa-, I stayed on as the head track coach there. TT: I see. 00:50:03: BS: And, one, one year. But I just wasn’t really happy. It’s kind of not you know. It just. NS: (Hurt or hard?) feelings. 00:50:14: BS: Yeah it was a difficult thing so. TT: Sure. 00:50:18: BS: We, we applied. I didn’t think I wanted to be a head coach anymore. And we, went down to. Well first of all, Coach (Rean?) called me. TT: Merrill? NS: Merrill. 00:50:33: BS: From Merrill called me. And I came up here and I explained to him you know, what I was interested in. In middle school thing and, and. TT: How old are you at this time? In, 1980 or? When were you born? NS: ’28. 00:50:51: BS: ’28. I’m gonna be, I’m gonna be 80 in September. TT: Okay so you were only 52 years old in 1980. 00:50:57: BS: Oh yeah, I was only 52 but I thought I was pretty old. TT: Oh okay. 00:51:00:BS: Now my kids are that old and. TT: [laughs] 00:51:04: BS: I, I ex-, in Merrill. TT: Okay and your still a young man, you’re only 52. 00:51:07: BS: I’ll tell you how. TT: Prime of life. 00:50:09: BS: My son was working here and he was the, in concrete business, working for Brazos Valley Concrete. And they delivered some concrete out to a job where I guess it must have been a church that Merrill was involved with. His church, and they were building the church. And so they were talking to him. My son were talking and, and Merrill Green told him, said, “Well anybody that’s talks that well about their father, I’d like to interview him.” And so that’s how I got my interview with Merrill. In the meantime I had been interviewed in Humble, Katy, Spring Brach, Deer Park. I had a good friend down there by the name of (Cade? Cay? Kay? Graves?). Who was a, an Aggie. He has twin brother Ray Graves who was a pretty good football player here, one time. TT: Right uh-huh. 00:51:52: BS: I don’t know if you’re familiar. TT: Oh yeah, sure. I’ve heard the name certainly. 00:51:55: BS: Okay, Kay, Kay coached at, at La Porte. And, I had met him ‘cause I’d been on the South Star, off the South All-Star Selection Committee. And ’72 or ’73 and, and so, he kind of liked me and so, I guess so. When he found out I didn’t have a job, well, that I was looking. He had, he told me about the middle school thing. That maybe it’d be something that I liked. And so went there and interviewed all those places and one of them we inter-, we interviewed was Sam Mosley at, Mike Mosley’s dad, was a A.D. at Houston, at Humble. And so we interviewed there and we kind of liked it. And so, uh, we came home and, I picked up the phone and I called Sam and I told him I’d take the job. As a middle school athletic coordinator. And I hung up the phone and I didn’t walk from here to that plant there and the phone ring and it’s Merrill Green. He says, “I got it all set up for you.” He said, “I liked the idea and I convinced him and we’re, we’ll, you’re hired.” And I told him, I said, “You know, Merrill.” I said, “I’d love to go to Bryan but I’ve already told Sam I’d take that other job.” ‘Cause I’m sure that at the time if we’d had the choice, we had probably. We’d just got to Bryan a lot earlier. And. But, we made it here anyhow. The Lord always sends you the (other way?).You could’ve asked me earlier how. TT: So how long were you at Humble? 00:53:22: BS: I was only there three years. I was there two years as a middle school coordinator and then I, I really wasn’t happy at that and, Aldine. The A.D. over at Aldine called me and he offered me a job as a head, head track and, and cross country coach. At one of the high schools over in Aldine. And so I went over there and interviewed and that’s pretty good, all I’d had to do is coach track. I didn’t have to coach football. I didn’t have (mumble) anybody, any other sport. And so I came back and I told Sam. I said, “I’m, I’m, I’m gonna quit because I’m going over there to Aldine.” And Sam said, “Well what are you going over there for?” And I said, “Well all I got to do over there is coach track and cross country.” And he said, “Why don’t you do that here at Humble?” And I said, “We don’t do, have that kind of job here at Humble.” He said, “We do now.” TT: [laughs] 00:54:06: BS: And, so, I, I was here one year. But the guy I replaced as a, track coach, moved up to first assistant, first varsity assistant football coach. Guy by the name of Tom Jones. And Tom and I were pretty close friends and of course, you know he had coached track so he had a special. You get a special love for track people. You know they just. They’re, they’re just a. TT: Sure. Oh yeah. Special breed. 00:54:30: BS: Oh yeah. Because they, they, they got to run and they do all those things ‘cause they dearly love doin’ it. They like to beat people. TT: Oh yeah. 00:54:38: BS: They. You know when you get a good track team, they, they’re not happy unless they’re, unless somebody’s, knows they’ve just been whipped by somebody else. Very competitive. Great sport. So, so. TT: Oh yeah. Yeah. Based basic sport of all. Get from here to there quicker than you can. 00:54:53: BS: Our neighbor across the street, was a couple by the name of Olsen. And, he worked at a bank, at Fannin Bank, and Nancy talked with his wife. And we had become pretty close friends there at, at Humble. Well his brother was an attorney down at Ganado. And so he had met me. And so he called Ivan and told him that, that, their job, that they’d had a head job opening in Ganado, that maybe I’d be interested in it. And I told Ivan, I said, “You know, I’m not that. I don’t think I’m that wild about goin’ back to being a head coach.” And so I told Tom Jones about it. Well Tom had been trying to get a head job, but you can’t get a head job unless you’ve had head job teaching. You know, you know how do you get experience when nobody hires you? So anyhow, he went up there and, the principal was a guy by the name of, of, Gerald Win You know Gerald? TT: Yeah. NS: You know Gerald? TT: Sure do. 00:55:51: BS: Okay, and. TT: Yeah, yeah, he was up here in, in. NS: Right. TT: College Station for, for years. 00:55:55: BS: Oh yeah. He came from, he was our high school principal well. And so. TT: Exactly. He just retired about what, ten years ago. NS: Yeah. 00:56:00: BS: So you probably know Ivan Olsen also? He’s the president of First National Bank. TT: I know. I know Ivan very well. He gave me a loan for my business, when he was at, when was at First American Bank. NS: He. He. He and Candy are probably our best friends. TT: Is that right? Okay. 00:56:12: BS: Oh yeah. NS: We’re going on a cruise with them next month. TT: Are you really? 00:56:15: BS: Oh yeah. We, we, sa-, we, we, we vacation with them almost every summer. TT: Is that right? 00:56:20: BS: Oh yeah. NS: Yeah. TT: I’ll be darned. Well no, that it’s a small world. Oh I, I know Ivan really well. NS: Yeah. Yeah. 00:56:23: BS: Oh yeah. Oh yeah. They’re good. It’s great to go on a vacation with. TT: He’s a young guy though you know. NS: Yeah right. (Here we are?) 78. TT: [laughs] 00:56:31: BS: The, the nice part about going. We like to go with somebody young like that because I don’t have to do any thinking. NS: Right. Ivan does it all. 00:56:36: BS: You know he says. It’s time. He does all the thinking. He says, “It’s time to get a drink.” “Okay.” And. We were just out at. They have a place over here at North Zulch called (E-Z Money? Easy Money?). NS: We were just out there last Saturday. 00:56:50: BS: Little 34 acres. We were out there last Saturday night for steaks and. But we’re very, very close. TT: That’s wonderful. Yeah. 00:56:57: BS: I guess I, kind of his surrogate dad or something. TT: Yeah. 00:57:02: BS: I sometimes think he pays more attention to me than my own kids. TT: Yeah. Yeah, yeah. Well no, when he was at First, at when he was, working for Don. NS: American. American. TT: At First American. Yeah, he. I had a business. I told you I was in private business for a few years. NS: Right. TT: And he gave me my loan to do that so. NS: Yeah. TT: Yeah, so I know, I, I think a lot of him. NS: Yes, he’s a (???-2-3 words?). 00:57:24: BS: What kind of business were you in? TT: I. Th-, in College Station for many years, there was a putt-putt golf course in College Station. And I actually opened it. 00:57:33: BS: Was that right over there close to where, right across from that Chinese place? TT: Yes. Hmm-hmm. 00:57:38: BS: Okay. TT: I, I built that. 00:57:40: BS: Okay. TT: With the loan from First American Bank. And, and, then I sold it about four or five years later. But yeah, Ivan, helped me a lot with that. So. 00:57:50: BS: Yeah. Ivan’s a pretty decent, tough banker. TT: Oh yeah. Yeah, well he keeps. You know he’s been at a couple of places and keeps getting promoted so he must do a good job. 00:57:58: BS: Yeah. Yeah. NS: Yes, he does. TT: Yeah, he must do a good job. So you were in. Where’d we leave? In Ganado? 00:58:05: BS: I don’t, I don’t know when. NS: Oh. TT: Or you were thinking about going to Ganado for. 00:58:08: BS: Okay so we went to Humble. Then we, then, I’m, I told Tom about the job and he went there. And, and Gerald Win loved the shot. TT: Yeah Gerald Win, that’s right. 00:58:17: BS: Loved the shot and discus. TT: Yeah. 00:58:19: BS: And so Tom was a great shot and discus coach. He’s probably one of the top high school shot and discus coaches, maybe in the nation. TT: Right. 00:58:27: BS: And, he had, he had all kinds of good luck with that. Well Gerald was a shot and discus guy and his, had a son that was in school so I think that had a lot with them to do. That got through the non-experience you know? TT: Yeah. 00:58:39: BS: So when, when Tom went there he asked me, he said, “Well” he said, “If I go there will you and Nancy come with me?” And so I asked Nancy and she said, “Yeah, anything (can happen? Or to get out?). TT: [laughs] 00:58:49: BS: You know. Somebody asked me once, “Why did you move from Humble to Ganado?” You know. And I said, “Well, the best way I can explain is this. When I lived in Humble and I came home from school, I was surprised we hadn’t been robbed. And when I was in Ganado, if I had come home and been robbed, I’d a been surprised.” TT: Right. 00:59:05: BS: Right. So that was a big difference. And so we went there and I coached for two years. And then I taught one year and then I became a principal and we were principal till ’91 when we retired. TT: So you did coach in Ganado? 00:59:17: BS: Yes, I did coach there. TT: You coached football. 00:59:18: BS: I was assistant, I was assistant coach. TT: Okay. 00:59:22: BS: Matter of fact, you know Robert Orzabal? He owns, he’s the present C.E.O. of MicroAge. TT: Oh okay, okay. 00:59:30: BS: I taught him his first computer class. TT: Is that right? Okay. How ‘bout that. 00:59:33: BS: Yeah. I, matter of fact he just worked on my computer the other day. So, you asked how we ended up here. TT: So what did you teach? I mean you taught. What was your teaching? 00:59:41: BS: I, I taught almost anything that nobody else could teach. TT: Anything that. 00:59:44: BS: That. TT: They said let a coach teach it. 00:59:46: BS: Especially if they had discipline problems and whatnot. TT: Taught history? Taught. 00:59:49: BS: I’ve taught math and science and, and, and social studies. Any one of those. I, I grandfathered under where I could, where I could stay ahead of the kids and teach. TT: Right, right. 00:59:59: BS: And that’s how I happened to get into computers because when I went up to the, the, the head track coach job at Humble I, the only teaching job they had was math. And I needed three more hours of math and so I took it in computer math. And that’s how I got started in math. TT: Yeah. 01:00:16: BS: And, we introduced, Tom and I went there and we introduced Ganado to, to computers. Which is kind of interesting too because the, the superintendent there was really great guy by the name of Frank Hafernick. And, and we weren’t there very long and I went in there one time and talked to him and I told him and I said you know, “Frank,” I said, “We gotta get computers in school.” And he says, he says, only (mumble), “Oh hell coach,” he says, “I already bought ‘em overhead projectors.” [laugh] TT: [laugh] NS: That’s how, that’s how far behind Ganado was. TT: Yeah. [laughs] 01:00:52: BS: [laughing] I share that. I almost dropped dead you know. I’ve told that story many times. TT: I already bought ‘em overhead. 01:00:58: BS: Already bought ‘em overhead projectors. TT: [laughs] Yeah. 01:01:02: BS: He says, “The trouble.” He says. I say, “But, but Frank if we get computers just look at the things that your, your secretaries can do.” He said, “They already got more time on their hands and they spend all their time talking.” [laughs] TT: [laughs] That sounds (funny?). 01:01:16: BS: But we introduced computers there at, at. TT: Brought Ganado to the computer age. So how did you get here? 01:01:23: BS: Well. When I was, my, my last duty assignment in the Marine Corps reserve. You know we kind of got off the Marine Corps because. Was, I was a battalion commander of the, of the 4th Recon battalion in San Antonio. And, my oldest son was gonna graduate from high school in ’73. And, you know that’s when everybody’s growing hair down to their belt and everything else. And I was sitting around there talking to some of my officers. And, said, “You know, I just don’t know where in the world Bill needs to go to school.” I said, “You know, it’s a, things such a big mess. I, I’d like to see him just going in the Marine Corps and get some maturity and whatnot.” And so. What was their name? What was that guy’s name? His wife had the, had the, paraphernalia. Sold all the Aggie crap over there at, at Northgate. NS: Oh. (Plant?). (Clamp?). Uh. 01:02:28: BS: Got to forgive us sometime. TT: No. NS: They, they owned, the, was it the University Bookstore there on the corner at Northgate? BS: Not (Lupos?)? NS: No. No. 01:02:38: BS: No, not (Lupos?) but right across from it. She had a big (building?) there and she opened up some more. Ernie Camp. NS: Ernie Camp. TT: Okay. 01:02:43: BS: Do you know Ernie Camp? TT: I know the name, sure. 01:02:45: BS: Okay. And his wife. NS: Oh. 01:02:48: BS: But anyhow, Ernie was one of my officers. And he was an Aggie. NS: That’s a long time ago. TT: Right. 01:02:52: BS: And so he said, “Well,” he said, “Well colonel.” He said, “Why don’t you send him to A&M?” And I said, “No, we’re a Marine family.” I said, “You know, I don’t, he didn’t need, I don’t need any Marine officers.” And he said, “Well he just started the regiment, up there. Marine regiment.” So I called the, the, the colonel up and, and talked to him and he said, “Well bring him on up.” And so we came up and I brought Bill up here and, and he got, got in the Corps. Tears ran down his eyes. You know, “I did.” He had all the military he needed. And, so he got in the Corps. And, he took to it like nobody’s business. He loved the, A&M. And then his little brother had always been a big “tea-sipper” fan and, once he started coming up here with him. We would come up here after football games and, go to the football games up here and cook out and do all of that great stuff and. NS: In fact, we were Aggie parents of the year. 01:03:49: BS: 1980. NS: In 1980. TT: Is that right? 01:03:51: BS: Oh yeah. TT: So now Billy’s your, your oldest? Is that right? NS: Yes. 01:03:54: BS: Yes, he’s our oldest son. He has a business here in Bryan. TT: And how many kids do you have? 01:03:57: BS: Two. Just two. NS: Two. TT: Two, two boys? 01:03:59: BS: Two boys. TT: And what’s the youngest name? NS: Mark. 01:04:01: BS: Mark. TT: Mark. And he went to A&M? 01:04:03: BS: Oh yeah. TT: Okay. 01:04:04: BS: And then, but he really followed. TT: He went from being a “tea-sipper” to. 01:04:07: BS: Yeah he was out. He was pretty good. He was outstanding unit commander in Corps of Cadets his senior year and, and. TT: So now did they go to school in Humble or in Ganado or where did they? 01:04:15: BS: They went to school in Jourdanton. TT: In Jourdanton. Okay. 01:04:17: BS: Right. TT: Okay. Okay. 01:04:19: BS: And. Then after I, when I left, when I left Jourdanton when they decided to part companies with me, and we moved to Humble, when Mark was a senior and marched around, they introduced him as Mark Stroman, Cadet Commander and Mark Stroman from Humble, Texas. TT: I see. 01:04:34: Oh he was really pissed off. TT: Yeah. [laughs] 01:04:36: BS: So. So he went in the Marine Corps. He spent 23 years in the Marine Corps. TT: Did he? 01:04:40: BS: And he’s retired now. And he’s been teaching five years over at Midway in Waco and he’s just now taking, making a change from that and he’s gonna be a regional director for the Marine N.R.O.T.C. High school N.R.O.T.C. program in the United States. One of the regional directors. He has 42 units in Texas, Oklahoma, Louisiana, Arkansas, Mississippi, and Tennessee. He’s taking that over in next month. TT: So you all came up here in what year? 01:05:09: BS: Oh, I never got around to it. TT: That’s okay. 01:05:10: BS: So, so. NS: 201. TT: 2001. 01:05:12: BS: That brought us to A&M. That started us coming to A&M and we’ve been to almost every home game since. And we became really Aggie fans and all of that. And, and, then in 2001 Bill had, lived out here on this place. And, and he thought that we needed to move up here where he could get a close, keep a closer eye on us if need be. He said we needed to be close enough that he could find us alive, find us before we started smelling. TT: [laughs] 01:05:39: BS: And, so we moved up here and bought a, this double-wide and moved again. And we’ve been here since. We’ve been here seven years now. TT: Since 2001. 01:05:47: BS: Right. TT: And he’s in, in Midway now? Is that right? 01:05:50: BS: No, no that’s Bill. That’s the one up here. That’s the one that has the business in Bryan. TT: Okay, okay, okay. 01:05:55: BS: He’s got a company called F.D.R. and they, they do underground. NS: Monitoring. 01:06:01: BS: Monitoring. TT: Okay. 01:06:03: BS: (That?) fuel tank monitoring and, cathodic protection and all types of things that have to do with fuel storage and whatnot. TT: I know one thing I was gonna ask you is I, I, if I’m figuring right, you were, only in your forties I guess during Vietnam but you didn’t, you didn’t go to Vietnam? 01:06:21: BS: We didn’t called up. We thought we were gonna get called up. We were. I was in the Dallas unit at that time. And. We thought we were, we thought we were going and we, we didn’t get to go. TT: I see. 01:06:33: BS: And. So. We missed it. Of course the, the big problem that happened is when they called up all the reserves that you know, that people had stayed in the reserve and you know, and they really weren’t planning to go to war again that quick after ’45 you know. And then they got called up and they had the units that a lot of people had gone to and they sucked them up and, and a lot of these units went into combat and it was a lot of people that were lost, from, as I understand it, from some of the units, some of the units suffered high casualties, let’s say for instance San Antonio did. Had a lot of that, was an infantry outfit and they lost a lot of, a lot of, folks there in, in, so the, the reserve program was having a tough time recruiting back in about that time and so that, they had, they had made the decision to call us up and then they turned around and decided not to. I don’t. I. You know it’s easy to say, I, was, I, I don’t think I was disappointed not being called up, but I was a little disappointed that we weren’t called up. TT: Right. 01:07:42: BS: I think the, the only, the only reason that I would have worried about being called up was I didn’t, didn’t particularly want to be away from my family but as far as just going. TT: You weren’t disappointed that they weren’t called up. [laughs] 01:07:55: BS: I. I, I, I had, I didn’t have any fear you know, people today fear a lot of things you know. But. TT: Yeah. 01:08:03: BS: It’s pretty dangerous in certain things and you get to certain positions but there’s a lots of. TT: Yeah. 01:08:09: BS: You know, you’re gonna die sometime. TT: Now you said, you had four brothers that all served in World War II, did I hear you right? 01:08:15: BS: I had two brothers. One was in the infant-, 36th infantry division, the other was in the C.V.s. And then I had a brother-in-law that was in the Air Force and they were all over seas when I was in high school. TT: I see. I see. 01:08:29: BS: And. Now. In, my, my brother in the C.V.s stayed in till fourteenth, till he’d been in fourteen years and then he kind of got a run-around and, in the reserve program the backup. Who else did the fourteenth years when you get, that’s the breaking point. Because there’s two things happened to him. One, it’s, if you’re an officer it’s getting, it starts to get very difficult to get a billet. There’s all kind of billets for lieutenants and first lieutenants and captains. Once you get to be a major then, there’s fewer billets and when you get to be a lieutenant colonel there’s fewer and colonel there’s even fewer. And, and to be a general you better be a politician. And, that’s one thing that happens and it’s hard to get, to stay in some kind of a paid billet, you know, stay in a billet where, where they’re doing something. And the other one is that wives start putting a lot of pressure on ‘em. Because if they’ve been in fourteen years, they’ve probably have got a family by that time that maybe ten. The kids are eight, ten, twelve years old. They’re gone on weekends, they’re gone. Their vacations sometimes, the job only gives you two weeks vacation, and that’s a family vacation. So there’s a lot of pressure from wives and so a lot of people that, that would otherwise stay in the reserve, probably get out because of those things. TT: Right, right. 01:09:47: BS: But in being a teacher, I was a, I was able to stay in and, and I never really, carried that thing to the, to the end in it because you know, I was in the San Antonio unit and then when we went to Dallas I, that was artillery and I was infantry so I had to relearn the whole thing there. And, so I ended up, in that unit and, I stayed in that unit till ’65 when we moved and when we went back, I went back. By that time we were recon battalion in San Antonio. And that really was good because there’s a lot of things that you can do in a recon battalion in the reserve program. You know, we had, almost every drill we went to, to Camp Bullis where you could really, your troops could really do things that were, that were exciting and that were fun and, and you felt like you were doing something you know? TT: Yeah, yeah. 01:10:37: BS: As opposed that when you’re just a, let’s say you’re just an infantry outfit and everybody goes out there and you have a, a war games and everybody’s going “bang, bang, bang” and nobody drops dead so everybody thinks they win and, and there’s no real winners. TT: Yeah. 01:10:51: BS: And so we also, in the, during the Vietnam thing. I, was fortunate I had learned enough in artillery that we went to Quantico, what, I spent four summers at Quantico in, in command and staff and I did, I wrote for ‘em, I wrote program texts for ‘em and I taught, I taught some artillery and I, (time swimming meets?). And [chuckle]. But we went there in the summers. Most of that during the, during the. TT: This is in the sixties? 01:11:30: BS: Yes. TT: Summers in the sixties. 01:11:30: BS: You’re, yes, you’re in the sixties. TT: Right. You’re in the late sixties. 01:11:34: BS: Right. TT: Yeah. 01:11:35: BS: That was pretty too good ‘cause. TT: So this was when you were in Jourdanton, right? 01:11:37: BS: I, you know I made, I made as much money in two months in the Marine Corps. Even then, in the sixties, I’d make almost as much money, two months in the Marine Corps as I could make teaching school almost all year. TT: Yeah. Yeah. 01:11:49: BS: So it would really helped. It, besides that and the family got to live really like white folks. TT: Right. [chuckle] NS: It was fun! 01:11:56: BS: We. I should be careful of what I’m saying I guess, but. NS: I enjoyed it. 01:12:01: BS: Well you know, we tried to do things when we were up there, we went to battle grounds and we went to all the places in Washington and our kids, I think it enhanced their education. TT: Right, yeah. 01:12:11: BS: And then we got out, in, it well we went off there, when I I finished up the battalion I, I didn’t stay, I didn’t much like the V.T.U. type things. They had the little ol’ units where you go out up there and you just kind of piddle around and, and I didn’t particular, although I had some good friends in, in that. There was that. The Ag teacher at Divine was, was a full colonel. And, Landon Martin in San Antonio was a full colonel and Otha Grisham from Seguin is a full colonel. He was a newspaper man from, from Seguin. TT: What’s his name? 01:12:51: BS: Otha Grisham. TT: Okay. 01:12:53: BS: And, he was a lieutenant on Peleliu. TT: Wow. 01:12:56: BS: Now there’s a guy that, and you know those guys, man they got, they. NS: They’re the real heroes. 01:13:01: BS: They’re heroes. I mean they’re really heroes. I mean you know they, they’re. Most of ‘em of dead though. But, and, James Cooper down at Pleasanton, that also, that taught over at Jourdanton with me was a full colonel. It was about six of us that were full colonel. And then when Henry Moss died, (at town name?), when Henry Moss over at Divine died I think there was five of us there. Five Marine reserve colonels. But I was gonna say something else too, that, they, our class of 292 of the 161 of us. Out of that group of enlisted people, we’ve got three generals. We’ve got maybe 15 or 20 full bird colonels (maybe?). And a whole pot full of lieutenant colonels and, the most of them got out. We have one of our classmate was a (name of honor?) of Pennsylvania. You know and. TT: Wow. [chuckles] 01:14:07: BS: And they just, they, it, they ended up, when you go, they’ve ended up really (were?) professors and doctorates and everything and just for a bunch of enlisted people that were commissioned, we claimed fame to, to that that was an exceptional groups of people. TT: How often do you have your reunions? 01:14:24: BS: Well. We’re getting so old now, it’s pretty hard to communicate with ‘em but we, we had our last one a year ago. We had one a year ago last May. NS: Were we up there a year ago? 01:14:37: BS: Hmm? NS: Was it a year ago? 01:14:39: BS: It was longer ago than yesterday. TT: Yeah. [chuckles] So you try like what? Every other year or something like that? NS: Yeah. 01:14:45: BS: Well we’ve been trying to have them every other year as, but we’re deteriorating so rapidly because the oldest ones in our class are now 80-, or about 84. TT: Huh-huh. 01:14:56; BS: And for me, I’m not long a tooth. TT: Right. 01:14:59: BS: And our youngest ones are probably about. How old was I babe? 22? So the youngest ones were, had to be. Two or three years younger, so they’re in their 78s. You know so they’re getting, everybody’s getting up. And it gets pretty hard to put ‘em on too because they’re, they’re not an easy thing and it falls, it falls on the shoulders of what we call our hindquarters. We have a group that, that stayed in the Marine Corps that, live in the Quantico area and they, it falls on their shoulders to put on a lot. And with us down here, there’s only, about five of us that can put on the things like at San Antonio. But it’s a lot of fun. TT: Right. Oh, oh, I bet it is. 01:15:48: BS: It’s a lot of fun, especially when you get back and you get to talking with those. Half of ‘em can’t remember facts, like I can. TT: Right. [chuckle] 01:15:56: BS: So I don’t. TT: You. 01:15:58: BS: Now I don’t know, I don’t (know?) that, in covering all of this and doing all of this talking and whatnot for, man we’ve been talking for probably half. I don’t know. TT: No it’s fascinating. 01:16:07: BS: I don’t know if I’ve got anything. TT: Well no it’s a fascinating story. And you, you’ll know that my, the shows that I do, I don’t you know, I don’t, everybody that’s on my show, and not even the, the majority of the people on my show are people that have served just like you. You know did their service in foreign country and, and stayed in and, and with the reserves and, and had other fascinating lives outside of the military and all that so you’re, you’re a prime example of what, of, of what I do on the show and I really, I really look forward to, to, to having on it. I brought, like I said, I brought this and I’ll leave this with you, if y’all can play this so you can get an idea of just, you know sort of what the show is. You can see a, a copy of the show. It’s a thirty minute show so we’re gonna sort of boil everything down. 01:16:49: BS: Well if you get me to shut up, you can do it. TT: And yeah, I’ll just sort of lead the conversation is what I’ll do. And it’s at. You know the A&M campus? Fairly well I guess. 01:16:59: BS: Yes. TT: You’re parents of the year. [chuckle] It’s at KAMU studios. You know where that is? It’s right off of. 01:17:06: BS: No I don’t. TT: If you. I’ll, I’ll draw you a map. That’s probably the best way to draw. 01:17:10: BS: Is it on George Bush? TT: Well it’s right off of George Bush. Right. You, you know the street that goes into campus off of George Bush is Houston Street, right between the Former Student’s Building and the Foundation Building. 01:17:20: BS: Right. Are you all right there on the left? TT: The Former Student’s Building is being all redone now and everything like that. That’s called Houston Street that goes into campus, right off of George Bush. It’s the first street from Wellborn. Into campus. 01:17:30: BS: Right, right. I’m familiar. TT: Okay. Well KAMU is the one-story building immediately to your left. Just about. 01:17:36: BS: Where, kind of where the old police station was? TT: Exactly. Exactly, just, just beyond that, it’s a one-story old, brown, brick building. And it says Broadcast Educational Services on the side of it. It’s a one-story building. Right there on your left as you’re going in there on Houston Street. That’s where it is. And we tape the show at, on Thursdays at, at 2:30. So I’d like you to be there around 2:15, if you could. 01:17:59: BS: Okay. TT: And, you can dress however you want to dress. Most people don’t wear a tie or coat. They just you know, like put a c-. NS: Slacks and a shirt. TT: Yeah, slacks and a regular shirt. Something like that. 01:18:08: BS: I, I have one, I have one good pair of pants. TT: Oh that’s good. You can wear those. You can, you can, you can wear those. Do you, I was gonna ask you, do you have any photographs by chance of? I mean, I don’t want you to have to go rummage through the attic or anything like that, but do you have anything hanging on the wall or anything like that of, of, during your service or, anything like that? 01:18:27: BS: I’ve got some, I’ve got some, I’ve got some. NS: Mark has a picture up in his house. 01:18:32: BS: What picture does he have? NS: One of you in your uniform. 01:18:36: BS: Oh yeah, but I was thinking more, I, I need to get that box down. I got one that I really like and it’s, I’ve got a moustache and, uh. On it I’ve got, I’ve got some pretty slides of. I never have, got ‘em put into. I had a Konica camera and I (broke?). We had an interesting thing of, of, of one night, there was this terrible noise we heard. And so somebody came rushing into my bunker and was talking in Korean you know. And so (Son? Or Sun?) said, “There’s something going on in the skies.” So we stepped out, we got out of the bunker, went out and you know, the sky. There’s this huge, bright streak up there. My first thought was, “Oh my god, the Russians are entered this thing and then we’re getting some kind of, we’re kind of some kind of incoming from them.” About that time it blew up and you could see the little white parachutes falling out of it. And it was a B-29 that was on its way north on a bomb run. And it caught on fire some way or another and it exploded right over our position. And the guys came down on both sides. TT: Wow. 01:19:40: BS: And so my people, my Koreans captured a guy from. I believe he was from, he was either from St. Louis or Kansas City and I don’t remember his first name ‘cause I only saw him for a few hours. But his name was Ford. And he was a, one of the, he was a gunner aboard the 29. And he had landed in front of my, my four deuces. And we were firing H. and I. fire. That’s Harassing and Interdiction fire. And so he thought he was getting in, he thought he had landed in, in Indian country and that he was getting incoming. But it was outgoing you know. He, he didn’t know the difference. Of course what would they know in the Air Force whether it’s coming in or going out. TT: Right, right. NS: It’d be nice. TT: [laughs] 01:20:23: BS: And. So they, they, found him then and they brought him in my bunker you know. Well, every, every, everybody he had seen up this point, nobody spoke English. They were all speaking Korean. So, then we walked in there and I spoke to him and he just, I guess he thought I was dang Russian, advisor you know or something. “No, No I’m friendly” you know. And I made him a cup of hot chocolate and, and so I was gonna take him back. It was pretty late at night, I was gonna take him back to regiment. So he had .40-, I remember he had a .45. I should have told him he can leave that with me and then I had a .45 would have been. But anyhow I told him, I said “Is that pistol loaded.” And he didn’t know. And, I said, “Well, we’re going back to regiment. When we go back to regiment.” I said “When we go into regiment in the middle of compound, you can’t carry a loaded weapon into there because we’ve had so much trouble.” Our troops had been, like I said, quick drawing and shooting one another that the colonel got mad and taken all away, taken all the pistols away from all the, the guys in the radio shack and whatnot down there. So you’d have to, you’d have to be a Marine to understand. TT: [Right. [laughs] 01:21:30: BS: And so. He, he got out that pistol out. He was trying to figure it out and it was obvious he didn’t know much about pistols. So I told him, well it be unloaded. Hell, he didn’t even have a round in it. You know if I think, by golly if I jumped out of that airplane on my way down to Indian Country, I’d have got a round in that .45 or else, if, if nothing else to shoot myself with it. TT: [laughs] Oh wow. 01:21:50: BS: But. That was. But. I, I. TT: Well if, if you got some pictures that you can bring with you on, on Thursday. And not too many. Bring, you know three or four. Pick out some like the one you’re talking about that maybe on the wall over at your sons place or, or, or the one with the moustache or, you know three or four because what we can do is before we start the show, we can put ‘em and they can, they can capture them there on camera and we. And you’ll see on the show, what we do is [clears throat] we’ll, we’ll start the show with a, little intro where I’ll introduce you and. And then you and I will just talk, just much like we’re doing right now. And then about halfway through the show if you do have some pictures, we’ll show them and then we’ll do a second half of the show. We don’t, we don’t edit. We don’t cut. We just go thirty minutes straight through, just you and I having a conversation. And, and it’s actually about twenty-eight and a half minutes total. And it’s my job to sort of, to keep the show flowing and keep it going and, and if you start. NS: Right. 01:22:46: BS: And not let it go all day huh. TT: If you start dwelling on one subject, I’ll move you on you know to get, to get as much of the whole thing told as so we, as we can. 01:22:53: BS: Well I don’t know what, what part really that you have. I, I, I. TT: Well I wanna talk about, I wanna talk about obviously your service in Korea. I’d like to talk about 01:23:02: BS: You’d like to talk about. TT: Your travels, your travels you know around the country and across country and, and all of that before you ever got to Korea. I wanna talk about your coaching, your, your career and the places you’ve been in coaching. How you got to A&M with your sons. You know being, you’re not an Aggie, but your sons are, have maroon blood and. 01:23:19: BS: Well we kind of figure we’re Aggies now. TT: Yeah, yeah, yeah like, like me. I’m, I’ve been here since ’84 and I’m, I consider myself a, an Aggie. But you know, we don’t, we don’t have the ring, but we’re, we’re still Aggies. NS: Our. Our, our daughter-in-law is also an Aggie. TT: So. 01:23:33: BS: I had a lots of. TT: You all were Parents of the Year in 1980? Is that right? 01:23:35: BS: Yes. We had a lot of kids. One of the reasons that we got the thing is that we had so many kids from Jourdanton that came to A&M. TT: Right. 01:23:41: BS: That they said that we had influenced them. You know? But maybe it’s kind of like Robert Arzabal who played for football in, in Ganado and, and he was talking about how mean I was. He, a week before practice he said he just dreaded what their. ‘Cause I was always. I started every. I always reminded them that every meal was a banquet and everyday was a holiday and every meal was a banquet. That’s how I’d come in the dressing room with. TT: Well shoot you’re a high school football coach, you’re supposed to be mean. You’re not, you know, you’re supposed to be. NS: Yeah, you are. You gotta be tough. 01:24:14: BS: And I had talked. TT: You gotta be you know. [chuckle] 01:24:15: BS: And I had talked to Robert about. He was coming to A&M and I talked to Robert about getting in the Corps and becoming a Marine officer. And he said, “You know and I think back on it how many times how lucky I’m, I didn’t choose that.” He said, “Because I wouldn’t have this business, whatnot.” And I said “Well Robert.” I said, “D-, don’t feel bad about that.” I said, “But take that as an honor that if I ask you, or talk to you about being in the Corps and being a Marine officer, that meant you were some kind of a special person because I don’t talk to kids that I think are bummers to be a Marine officer.” TT: Right, right, right. 01:24:49: BS: And. So he said, “I’ve never thought about it that way.” TT: I was gonna ask you I just, off the wall. Stroman. Is there any relation to the high school in Victoria that’s named? Is that in your family or anything? NS: Yes. 01:25:03: BS: Yes. It’s some, but it’s some cousin. TT: Some cousin. 01:25:06: BS: You know? Some cousin to my dad which, our family got pretty well split up down there. They were from Gonzales. The Stroman’s were from Gonzales and, they moved there after the War Better the States. My grandfather was a, was captured in that war and, they owned, they were big land owners and, and I guess slave owners and whatnot. And after the war he gave his land, or deeded his land to somebody else and. Back then a bunch of other people, they came to Gonzales, Texas. TT: Right. 01:25:42: BS: They had the first (steam-driven?) cotton gin. TT: Is that right? 01:25:46: BS: In Gonzales. (mic movement) are in that, are in that museum at, in Gonzales. It’s pretty interesting. I was talking to a guy the other day and I went to the house where my mother lived. And he happens to be, as a youngster, (Epright? Ep. Epright?) NS: This is not coach. But I’m proud of this picture. This is Mark, when he went to Kuwait. And you can see. He fought. TT: This is your, your, your youngest son? NS: The youngest one. 01:26:14: BS: Right. NS: Yeah. 01:26:16: BS: He got a Bronze Star there. TT: This was in, in Desert Storm? NS: Kuwait. Uh, uh, what am I saying? Yeah, Desert Storm. TT: In Desert Storm. NS: Yeah. 01:26:25: BS: Yeah. They were, they were one of the first ones through. He was artillery outfit, they were one of the first ones through the Burm. TT: Now is he Army or Marines? NS: Marines. TT: He’s Marines. NS: He’s Marines. TT: I’m sorry, you (tick? Kick?) me out of that. NS: [laughs] TT: Well, you, you’re gonna meet a fellow maybe if he’s there, on Thursday, who works for KAMU. Who, who was a Marine in, in, in Desert Storm. He, he works there. NS: Oh. 01:26:48: BS: What is his name? TT: Do you know who Dave South is? You heard Dave South who’s the Voice of A&M? NS: Yeah. I’ve. TT: The radio. NS: I’ve heard the name. TT: His son. Randy South was a Marine in Kuwait. NS: Was he an Aggie? TT: Yes, uh-huh. NS: He was? TT: Yeah. Hmm-hmm. Yeah. 01:27:04: BS: Must of not been too far off. TT: Right. NS: He and Mark should be, pretty close. TT: Right. I bet you, I bet you are proud of that. NS: Yeah. TT: Yeah. 01:27:11: BS: He’s a good Marine. He’s better. He’s, he’s a. He went around the world. TT: Did he? 01:27:19: BS: Yeah. He took his battery. They left Camp Lejeune. And, they, flew from Camp Lejeune across to the Philippines on their regular, six-months tour. And before, and the, and the Desert Storm started. So he, his outfit then went to Okinawa. And they borrowed the guns from the third Marine division. And then they shipped the guns around the Indian Ocean, to Kuwait. And he took his battery and they flew over the, you know over the ice, over the north part. That’s the short route to Brussels. And then back into, to, Saudia Arabia, where they landed there. And, then when it was over, they flew from there across the Atlantic. And so when they got through, he had taken his. In a year’s time, he, taken his battery around the world. TT: Wow. 01:28:25: BS: On it. Which was pretty, pretty good. TT: Wow. That’s amazing. 01:28:28: BS: He’s a, he’s an, he’s an extraordinary Marine. TT: Do you know how to work the DVD player? 01:28:34: BS: Yeah. TT: Do you wanna put this in? I just wanna start it just to make sure it works right. I’m gonna use your restroom while you’re doing that. NS: Yes. 01:28:39: BS: Okay. NS: Let me turn on the light. TT: I’m gonna use your restroom while you’re doin’ that. 01:28:42: BS: I’ll show you my. TT: I just wanna get, get it started just, just to make sure that it’s work. That I didn’t bring you a bummer, DVD. I don’t think I did. 01:28:55: BS: I talked you all the way into the rest stop huh? TT: [laughs] Well it’s, it’s 20 miles out here. 01:29:01: BS: [chuckle] It’s about 20 miles to the campus. TT: These are both for (sanitary?). 01:29:05: BS: Yes. 01:29:05: [T.V. plays] NS: I’ll run this. 01:29:12: BS: Now I’ve got to go to, what is it? T.V. input or?