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HomeMy WebLinkAboutMilitaryHome Interview L.G. CrumInterviewer: Stephanie Noble Interviewee — L. G. Crum Military (SN) Okay again, I appreciate you letting me do this (LC) Want me to shout? (SN) No, don't, turn the volume up. (SN) Um, again, my name is Stephanie Noble and today is September 9, 1999, and I am interviewing Mr. Crum about his military service. One of the questions they have is, um, ah did you receive any metals of honor or any kind of awards for your service? (LC) well ah, I received ahh, ribbons uh in Vietnam yeah. (SN) Did you serve twice? (LC) No, I just served once, one year. Served one full year over there. (SN) What year? (LC) Uh, sixty- eight, sixty -nine (Mrs. Crum) No, sixty- seven, sixty -eight (LC) Sixty- seven, sixty- eight, excuse me. (SN) So, this is Vietnam, oh, maybe they, I was of the understanding that everyone served in World War II, and that makes sense because you're not, you would be more of the age for Vietnam. (LC) Yeah, I almost had served two tours there. Most people did serve two tours. Others were very lucky. I was getting ready to go back for my second time, and then war was over. That's why I didn't serve a second tour. Not my turn again. (SN) What positions did your play or what did you do? (SN) So, what were your responsibilities? (SN) Were you a student at A &M, and did you go to A &M? Fn I Corl (LC) Well when I was in Vietnam I was with the U.S. Army staff in Vietnam. There for a while I was the ocean transportation officer on staff, and then I was airlift transportation officer. (LC) Well, it encompassed airlift responsibilities, I was responsible for requirements for airlift for army cargo throughout the theater and also for air lifting passengers, relocating from the theater back home, and also my other responsibilities included the shipment of household goods and stuff back to the states. (LC) I was a student at A &M. I graduated from A &M. (SN) Did your service interrupt your education? (LC) No. No, I was in the military at the time. I was a major by then. (SN) Okay. (LC) I had been in the military for several years. (SN) Uh, did, uh, had the war broken out during your time at, at A &M? Or had you seen any... (LC) No. Well actually, my student time at A &M was during the Korean War. So I was exempted from the Korean War by the virtue of the fact that I was a ROTC student at the time. (SN) Ah, okay. (LC) And then, the next major war was then the Vietnam War. And ah I went to Vietnam as a major, I had been working at A &M as a ROTC Instructor. I graduated from A &M and went into the military as a Second Lieutenant, and I decided to stay in the military. (SN) One of the um, their concerns are, um, how the, the city was affected by, uh, by war, and what kinds of things happened in College Station during wartime. Uh, one of the questions is, um, was communication difficult? Did you, were you, had y'all met by /at this point? Or was it easy to communicate with you family during wartime, or how did that work? (LC) Well actually, communication, we primarily communicated by recorded tape, and letters. The mail service was good in Vietnam. But, that was our primary means of communication. Uh As far as anything else, no I don't think we ever got to use the telephone. It was too difficult. (SN) Were you, um, affected by censorship? (LC) No (SN) No, one gentleman that I knew during World War Two, his letters would be read and black inked through, and then delivered. (LC) Fact is we still have one of those v- letters some where. (Mrs. Crum) Yeah. Written by your uncle. (LC) Yeah my uncles used to write me in World War Two. The letters were not only censored but they were photographed. So you did not get the original letter, you got a photograph of the letter... called victory letters. (SN) What were they called? (LC) They were called V- letters. Weren't they? (Mrs. Crum) Victory letters, yeah. (LC) Victory letters. But anyway we've got one somewhere from one of my uncles. (SN) That's a shame that they couldn't just give you the original? (LC) No, No, they were afraid that there was some kind of code or something in the paper or something like that. So they would photograph the letter after it had been edited and then censored, and then they would mail it to the family. And I had several of them at one time I think I kept one. (Mrs. Crum) I think we kept one, it's somewhere. (LC) it's somewhere else... figures. (SN) Um, one of the other questions has to do with A &M's, ah, mission at the time. Obviously it was a military school, but um was it primarily focused during wartime around the efforts of the war? Or were, were the students, uh were they pushed through. Like, some, some of the gentlemen I interviewed, they were accelerated through classes just so they could get out and graduate and, and go to service. (LC) What, which War was this? I haven't... (SN) World War II. (LC) Yeah, World War II. No, Vietnam was not that way. During the Vietnam War, any student who maintained a B average received an exemption from the draft as long as he was in college. (SN) Wow (LC) Also anyone in ROTC who maintained a C average was exempt from the draft. And, uh, so you had students who were in ROTC because they wanted to avoid the draft, and then you had people in ROTC because they wanted to be in ROTC. So... (SN) Right. (LC) You had two different types of students there. But also any student, in any university throughout the United States could maintain a B average and be exempt from the draft, but if their average fell below that, and they were not in ROTC, then they were subject to the draft. (Mrs. Crum) He taught ROTC at A &M for a year and a half. Before he went to Vietnam. (SN) Oh, not, not understanding a lot about Vietnam um, it just the, just the idea that it wasn't fully supported by all facets of our society were were there any um groups that, that any, any one or any group in particular upon return, that um, did you noticed people voicing their concerns and their opinions to you from when served, or was it difficult to adjust back to society after your service? (LC) No. Uh, well actually I stayed in the military so I really didn't think about it as a civilian. I don't think there was a lot of animosity about those who served the war. Uh, there was a lot of demonstrations and so forth that was against the war politically as I remember. (SN) uh -huh, New celebrity (SN) eh -huh (SN) Right, a little more supported (LC) I'll be glad to tell you any story I can. (LC)(Laughs) Oh, my. During the war, in Vietnam, or here? (Mrs. Crum) student wise (SN) Yeah, my generation, we don't know anything about any of the war except the demonstration aspect of it. (LC) Yeah, there were a lot of people who protested against the war. Jane Fonda was very outspoken. (LC) And I guess what hurt the most and I can't speak for the other people, but I guess what hurt some of the people a lot, was support for North Vietnam while they had us POWs there. Some of our famous people visited and gave support to North Vietnam. (LC) I don't remember any particular anti - soldier attitude where I was. You know some G.I.'s reported incidents, but I never experienced that. We wore our uniform a lot and I don't remember any incidents. We had to wear our uniform off duty. Back then the military was mostly men. We wore our uniform a whole lot, you know, going back and forth to work, and stuff like that, and I don't recall any incident at least around here. Of course this is a service and military town, too. (LC) That uh, that we were stationed in Washington, D.C. after that, and uh, I don't recall any problems. There of course I wore mostly civilian clothing because I was assigned to an organization, which worked closely with other civilian agencies. I was with the Army War Gaming Agency where we simulated war with complete models. (SN) This is so exciting another gentleman I interviewed uh, worked for the FCC. Um, he couldn't tell me any of the stories, but I really wanted to hear them. (SN) Do you have any, um did you have any experience meeting generals or anyone um famous in wartime or any story in particular of that that s- sticks out in your mind that you would like to share with us? (SN) Um either. I think they're interested in A &M at the time of war and how it's evolved from then to now and then just about local heroes. (LC) I don't remember A &M being a lot of different, I don't remember anything a lot different other than there not being a lot of women there. There were some with the professors' daughters or wives and stuff like that. The women uh, at A &M came shortly later. When I was here on ROTC duty, there weren't any women except professor's daughters or wives and so forth. (SN) How did most of the students get around, did they, was the busing system in, I mean did they do busses, or they... I guess the campus was smaller they didn't have west campus per se (LC) Well, it was somewhat smaller then but, uh, I don't remember the exact student population. But, uh, well of course most of them walked. And rode bicycles. I don't recall a bus system, but there may have been busses. But, I don't recall. But most of the students walked or rode bicycles. (Mrs. Crum) Most of them lived on campus, still, in the sixties. (SN) Um I recently learned about the houses they had on campus and would give to people if the people would move them. Do you know anything about that? (LC) No, I don't (SN) A lot of them are right around, on George Bush, some of those older houses. I mean, I guess they used to be professor homes and they would give to people. (LC) If you have any questions like that, I can get those answer for you. (SN) Oh really, I have a friend who wants to know if his house is a historic home and he can't get any answers on it. (LC) Well, I'll tell you somebody I bet you can tell him. (SN) Who? (LC) His name is Dick Hervey, and he has coffee every morning between 8:30 and 9:30 at Post Oak Mall in front of McDonald's. He or Homer Adams or John Richards or one of those. Those guys know everything, about this place. (SN) Okay, thanks. Other Questions. Do you know anything about this, this is in a war that is a little out there here, prisoner of war camps in Hearne or anything? That was World War Two, wasn't it? (LC) Those were world war two, yeah, and somebody was writing a history on those not long ago, uh. I was trying to think of who uh, who I was talking to who knew about those kids Roy Henry, but no he was in Vietnam. I don't know somebody was writing a history on that, somebody uh... (SN) Yea, I tried to call him, but um (LC) Who? Roy Henry? (SN) I think so. That name sounds familiar. (Mrs. Crum) He's a Hearne listing (LC) No, he lives here now (SN)I had the Hearne number that was the problem. (LC) Yeah (Mrs. Crum) But, the camps were out where, near where the airport is. In that area. (SN) Was... Was the airfield or air, or any of the, um air bases in effect during Vietnam. Were any of those in use? In College Station, the Bryan one? (LC) Bryan-Bryan field wasn't in during Vietnam (Mrs. Crum) no it was not. They closed down in, um, the late fifties. (SN) Okay. Um, they have questions about what the Battalion was like at the time? (LC) Battalion, huh? (SN) The Battalion. Like the student newspaper? (LC) Oh, the student newspaper. Pretty much like it is now. It had editorials, letters to the editor, stuff like that. Pretty much, actually it looks about the same as it always has... (Mrs. Crum) Well, what was the cartoon guy? Did you know Earl? (LC) Let me think. Earl... (Mrs. Crum) Wasn't he in your class, or the class ahead of you? (LC) His name's Earl. Yeah, he was about class sixty -four or sixty-five. (Mrs. Crum) He, his drawings, aren't they still in the Battalion? (SN) I don't think so. (LC) No, I don't think so. (SN) I haven't seen them (LC) I don't think he draws anymore (SN) Now, did you graduate from A &M also? (Mrs. Crum) No. I graduated from Bryan High School. (laughs) (SN) Well, local Vikings. Bryan High has changed a little bit recently. (LC) Well no I was a bronco. The middle school was the high school. (SN) (UH) They asked if there were any local support groups for families who had students or families that went off to war, and um are those readily available to people? (LC) Well uh... There are several organizations here, American Legions was one that has done some support, had dinners for them and assisted families as they could. In fact I think they had several dinners for y'all. (Mrs. Crum) We had a very large waiting wives club because so many local girls had married Aggies, and uh we would get together a couple times a month and have pot luck dinners. (SN) And how would you get to know each other? (Mrs. Crum) Well most of us had gone to high school together. (laughs) (SN) Oh! Ok. (Mrs. Crum) (Laughs) (LC) No you were talking about the officer's wives. (Mrs. Crum) Yeah, this was the officer's wives. And uh so at these officer's wives clubs a lot of the women came back to live here while their husbands went to Vietnam if they didn't have families somewhere else. (LC) Bobby Myer became an activist she was very active in bringing the POWs home her husband was a POW and she didn't know if he was dead or alive. She just knew he was mission and she was very happy. They still think that he was there for over six years. The Hano Hilton have you ever heard of the Hano Hilton? (SN) Yeah I've heard yeah. (SN) It's kind of like cocktail hour. (laughs) (LC) It's sort of a delicacy. (LC) That's what they call the prison camp in Hano they call it the Hanoi Hilton. (SN) Did you watch 20/20 last night? It talked about a senator who was a POW, McCain. He talked about um, he talked about, they had his coming home on tape. He talks a little bit about his experience and uh, I didn't watch all of it but from what I understood it was just dreadful, awful. Um. (LC) Let me tell you something very humorous that happened when I was in Vietnam, I was at Vungtau a sort of an R and R place. It is sort of a beach resort for the Vietnamese and so forth and I was down there on business and me and the Chief guy we gonna take a little time off and walk down the beach, and so this lady was walking along and she had a big of charcoal pot about that big and it had a whole bunch of eggs laying on top of it. And she was carrying that and a lady motioned her over so she went over and set her pot down and the lady picked out an egg. And she handed her a spoon about the size of a small baby spoon I guess, or something like that. The lady took that spoon and she took the egg and she goes click, click, click she knocks the top off with the spoon and then she reaches in there and pulls up from the inside a pin feathered chicken head. So she starts saying that just before the chicken hatches they cook those buggers on charcoal and it's called a balloot, and they sat there and ate it. And when they were through then she got her spoon back, wiped it on her dress, put it in her pocket and she trodded off down to someone else. (Mrs. Crum) What was the guy? (SN) Oh my, and the bones hadn't fully formed yet so she could chew it. (LC) yeah it was a pin feathered little chick right before it hatched. It was probably a couple days before they hatched. But then they charcoal it. (SN) Oh my! (LC) It's called a balloot. (SN) So you didn't have a balloot? (LC) No I didn't, but I saw it. (SN) Oh no! Did you meet any, oh yikes, did you meet any other Aggies in Vietnam? I mean did you know of anyone that went to A &M? (LC) Oh sure but uh let's see oh what was... yeah, Charlie Zip. Have you run into him? (SN) mumum (LC) Charlie Zip lives here. He's retired, he suffers from Alzheimer right now. I don't know how he's doing, but they got back to town. His wife Margret Ann was the Society Editor she wrote articles for the paper, the Eagle. Charlie Zip and I were in Vietnam at the same time. He actually, well we were on ROTC duty together. He didn't start out here but he wound up at West Point. But uh Westnall passed away, Brad Westnall. (LC) Mitchell. Yeah we worked together at the office. Oh I don't remember. (SN) Did, and I don't know all of these questions are after the war too but, was the community affected by rationing? And does that happen during Vietnam too? (Mrs. Crum) No that was WWII. (SN) WWII. So Vietnam didn't hit us as hard. One it wasn't as large. It was four or five years long wasn't it? (LC) Yeah, about that long. (SN) But it just wasn't quite as economically a problem. (Mrs. Crum) You realize WWII started about '38. (LC) Well for us WWII started in '41. (Mrs. Crum) Well the fighting in Europe started about '38. (LC) But we were fully mobilized building airplanes, everything else before the war ships and all And we had millions of people, millions of soldiers. Vietnam our people there was like 500,000. (SN) Besides the fact they joined ROTC to... And uh something like that but gosh WWII I don't know how many millions we had maybe eight or ten million served in WWII. But I don't know how many people served in Vietnam probably... (SN) But because of that difference there wouldn't be that much concentration of people having to work for the war effort like buildings and go to shipyards and stuff. Did lots of the wives at the meetings did they work on their own or did they... How did they make a living? (Mrs. Crum) Most of them, most of us were housewives. (LC) She is talking about officer's wives. (SN) Is there a big difference? (LC) It was a little different I guess than the enlisted military. (SN) Were there any school holidays for the war effort? I mean did people get out of school? (LC) No, no I don't think so. (SN) Let me see. Did you experience or see many people, or know of anyone that was dodging the draft? (LC) Did I personally know people that were dodging the draft? Well no. Uh. (LC) Yeah the fact that we joined ROTC to stay out of the draft, sure. That and maintain a B average. And really well I guess in a way that wasn't exactly fair, because there were people that wanted to be in college but didn't have a B average that kind of stuff, it wasn't fair. So in a way it wasn't fair. (SN) Did individuals as children did they have to go? Were they drafted? (LC) What does that mean? (SN) Were individuals with children were they drafted? Was that an exclusion? (LC) I don't recall the criteria that they used for drafting people at that time. I don't think too may people got drafted that were married and had children. I don't think so. I don't remember. (SN) um Could you receive, you could receive the tapes in the mail from home. What kind of entertainment did you have? (LC) Entertainment. There was, they had USO shows. Fact is Bob Hope came over there... (SN) Oh really? (LC) For the USO show he always put on the Christmas show over there. And then there were other small USO shows that toured the country. They were bands or comedians, things like that. (SN) Did you get to attend everyone of those? (LC) Well I got to attend some. But usually if they were... (SN) Nearby? (LC) uh, but they traveled around the country. I don't remember who the real famous ones are. (SN) Bob Hope (LC) Bob Hope I guess. (laughing) (SN) That must have got you mind off. Besides the USO shows was there any other big weekends? (LC) There were no guided tours of Vietnam. (SN) No, but (laughing) You didn't want to take any excursions. (LC) We had what is called R and R, rest and recuperation. For those that had been there roughly six months you were authorized one week in one of several places and one of them was Hawaii, one was Australia, one was Singapore. (SN) And were they paying for you to get there? (LC) Yeah. We got to fly with Pan American or United, Pan American did most of them. And actually I flew to Hawaii and met my wife and two kids over there. And spent a week in Hawaii. (SN) So you had children at the time? (LC) Yeah (SN) How old were they? (LC) I can't remember, you tell her. About eight and ten or something like that. (Mrs. Crum) No, but eight and nine. (SN) Wow! That's third and fourth grade. They were completely aware of where you were. (Mrs. Crum) Oh yes! (LC) The thing about being in Vietnam is that they knew more about what was going on in Vietnam than I did and I was there. The only thing I did was my job, which was getting people in and out of countries and getting cargo moved and stuff like that. I didn't know what battles were being fought, we did not have any televisions to tell us what was going on, we didn't have any public radio. Right back here they sat right in front of the television. "There's the war" right in front of their own television. Our information was from the Armed Forces Radio and Television Network. No public news broadcasts. (SN) Alright that was the first war that we actually had instant TV coverage. (LC) And they were seeing what was going on at Long Bin Nha -Trang, Canto and all those kind of places. I would say, " I was in Nha -Trang all day. ", and, huh huh, they knew all about the Nha -Trang and all that kind of stuff. Here I was, I didn't know what was going on, I didn't know anything. (Mrs. Crum) The news, I know one day I was watching the report and an ammunition thing blew up. I'm watching it on the news and reading about it in my letter, the postman and I became very good friends. We're still friends. (SN) Yeah, you depended on him. (Mrs. Crum) I'm reading and I'm watching this, my eyes are glued, and I read the letter real fast and it says, " Well the ammunition dump got blown up last night." (SN) You're like, "Yeah, yeah, I see that." (LC) I mean I knew about something like that, I didn't hear that. (SN) Were you in the middle of fire? (LC) Not really, well, I guess during the Tet Offensive we became pretty close to getting in the war, but uh, I was all over the country and uh, mostly traveling by helicopter. And it was ? (SN) Right. (LC) I went into, uh Saigon. I flew all over country by helicopter. Tet Offensive was like I guess in January or February and it lasted for several weeks there. We were in a pretty tight situation. We were running out of ammunition and everything, we couldn't do anything But not really, I got caught in a rocket attack one night when I was at Peiku I guess and I was trading places here and there and rockets started going off all around me and I jumped up and hit the bunker and I started scurrying around trying to find the doorknob and all I could fmd was the wall and I said, "Why are we... where am I going to hide" and I stopped and thought, "This is a clothes rack, I'm in the closet." I had made it right into that closet and had missed the door. And so I got out of the closet and looked outside and man I was scrambling and could not find the door or anything, I was m a closet. But they uh, they hit a hospital that night and blew it all to pieces..., but there's only one person killed in that rocket attack, a small boy who actually got scared and got up and ran about the time the rocket hit. Everybody else had taken the patients had taken their mattresses and gone out onto the floor and covered them and the mattresses took all the shots from the rockets. All the patients, nurses and everything lived, but the little boy died. ( ?) (SN) Did the school do anything for the students in terms of letting them know what was going on? (LC) I don't think so. It was on the news everyday. You know it was on television. (SN) They needed a break. (LC) But uh, they needed it more than we did. (SN) Now how often could you get letters, did it take a while in writing letters? (SN) Now, you stayed in D.C. how long? (LC) I was there for two years. (Mrs. Crum) It was about nineteen months. (LC) It took about three days. (SN) Three days? Wow, sometimes it takes longer than that to get one from Houston. (LC) It took about three days, but it was all sent by air mail. (SN) And so you served, you served one tour? (LC) One tour. (SN) and then you came back to D.C. and worked for... (LC) the army ? ?? (SN) And, what would you do for them? (LC) Well what we did there, we would simulate wars and determine how much, how many resources would be needed for a war. That was basically what we did. I was in the uh, transportation division of that and my job was determining how many ships and airplanes it would take to move the cargo and equipment and people necessary to fight the war and how long it would take. (SN) Now, what kind, is that on the job training? I mean what kind of information, where did you get your information to learn how to plan that kind of thing? You know, you don't learn that... (LC) Actually at that time, I had, uh, about fifteen years in my, it was about seventy ... I had about seventeen years of experience, plus, I had a master's degree in business administration and uh, you know a lot of your planning actually comes from operations research. L. G. Crum 3900 Golden Trail College Station, TX 77845 Dear Mr. Crum, COLLEGE STATION Sincerely, Regan Green CITY OF COLLEGE STATION Conference Center 1300 George Bush Drive College Station, TX 77840 (409) 764-3720 FAX: (409) 764 -3513 Internet: www.ci.college- station.tx.us October 7, 1999 Thank you for participating in our Oral History Project. Your military experiences will be an enlightening addition to the book. Enclosed it a copy of your transcript. If you could make corrections on it and return as soon as possible that will be greatly appreciated. Once again thank you for participating. If you have any questions please contact me at 764 -3720. I am here on Tuesday and Thursday afternoons. Our address is 1300 George Bush Drive, College Station 77840. I hereby give and grant to the HISTORIC PRESERVATION COMMITTEE, City of College Station, Texas, for whatever purposes may be determined, the tape recordings, transcriptions, and contents of this oral history interview. 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