Fort Knox, Kentucky
I joined the Tennessee Army National Guard in January 1975, during my senior year in high school, so just after graduation, June 9th to be exact, I was headed off to Fort Knox, Kentucky for training as an armor crewman. I attended boot camp in Company B, 19th Battalion, 5th Training Brigade under Drill Sergeants Moon and Hinojosa. Since I'd been an Army brat all my life I already knew a lot about the Army and how to use most of the gear and equipment they were training us on, so I got along pretty well.
Our boot camp photo. We started off with Drill Sergeants Hinojosa on the left, and Drill Sergeant Williams on the right, but Williams got re-assigned after roughing up a couple of recruits, or "Trainees" as they called us. Funny how they could say "Trainee" and make it sound like they had just called you a sorry sack of shit. We then got Drill Sergeant Moon. He was an interesting character.
Here I am from waaaaaaay back then.
After graduation, Drill Sergeant Moon on the left, me in the middle, and a different Drill Sergeant Williams on the right. He was a much better drill sergeant than the "other" Williams.
Drill Sergeant Moon surrounded by the basic group of pals of mine during boot. The fella in the front row, second from the right, we called him "Cheese" and I met him again a year and a half later at the Great Lakes Naval Station after we had both joined the Navy. Funny how stuff happens sometimes.
A picture of our barracks back in July of 1975. These were built during WWII and we had to stand a fire watch each and every night to ensure we weren't burned alive in the damn thing.
Same barracks only nearly 25 years later, still there, just repainted. I returned in 2000 to find they were about to tear down all these old barracks, they just hadn't reached this area yet and were using it for some kind of scouting program. My old barracks wasn't being used but some of the others in the area were, and our old chow hall was in use.
A bunch of us guys in front of the barracks before we all departed for various schools throughout the Army. I'm all the way to the left, my bunkmate, Thomas Allgood all the way to the right. He was one okay fellow.
On our weekend pass a group of the guys and I took a Greyhound bus back to Fort Campbell where my dad was stationed and I picked up my car and drove us back. It was cool because it was registered in my dad's name so it had an officer's sticker on it. No one even questioned my having it there for the last week of training...lol. Here we are all sitting on the car on graduation day, back behind the barracks.
Me at one end, Cheese at the other, and the fella in the middle was a really cool guy but I'll be darned if I can remember his name. He had the prettiest wife in the platoon as well.
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