I entered active duty at Ft. Leonard Wood on Jan 9, 1965. I was an enlisted reservist.

Three things; good and bad:

1) On arrival at the Reception station, I was assigned to a barracks overnight. No NCO's. As I entered someone said, "Hey, you. You're fire watch tonight!" I was handed a flash light and a red helmet liner and told to stay up all night to be sure there weren't any fires.

The next day, Sunday, I was still there and most of the guys there left for somewhere. It dawned on me that none of them had any authority to assign anyone to fire watch. So, being a little wiser, but nicer, I assigned the next four recruits to fire watch for 10-12, 12-2, 2-4, and 4-6, and made sure they knew where their relief was bunked. And they did it.

2) As a reservist, my home unit issued me what clothing they could and gave me the clothing issue form to take with me. They forgot to check that they gave me a duffle bag and mistakenly checked the Service Cap box instead of the Garrison Cap box because they called them by different slang names. So, when I was getting the rest of the uniforms, etc., from the active Army Supply, they give me another duffle bag and Garrison Cap, but no Service Cap. They would not listen to me that the form was incorrectly marked. As you know, in Basic Training, there's no place to put extra caps or duffle bags. I asked some passing solders with some stripes (probably a PFC and a Spec-4) what to do with the extras. They took them and said they would take care of the overage but couldn't help with the missing Service Cap. Yeah, they "took care of it" all right; right into their own "surplus."

3) Still in Basic for 2-3 weeks and the Platoon Sergeant (DI) wants to know why my Service Cap isn't on display. I tell him the story and he says I better figure out how to get one. Of course we weren't allowed to go to the PX, so I had no access to buy one.

I wrote my CO at my reserve station and he wrote a letter back on Army stationary, "To whom it may concern," that an error had been made on my clothing issue form and could they please issue me a Service Cap. I took it to the Unit Supply Sergeant, who, after glancing at it, said, "This don't mean nothing," and tore it up. I yelled loudly that it certainly did, and we got in a shouting match.

I was about to climb over the counter after him when the Company 1st Sergeant came in from the orderly room to ask what the H*** was all the yelling about. I told him and he told me no recruit in his unit was going to yell at an NCO and leave! I did.

Another couple of weeks go by and my DI said he had arranged for me to BUY a Service Cap. A 2-1/2 truck was out front and a Sergeant showed me a Service Cap which looked like it had been run over by the truck. "It's yours for 12 bucks." My DI said better I'd better buy it because there's no other choices. And that's how I got a "NEW" Service Cap.