I arrived at Fort Benning, GA in early February at 2 a.m. in the morning after an all day bus ride from Fort Polk, Louisiana. Not knowing what to expect or not having any idea what the next 10 weeks would amount to, we were led up to the door of a dilapidated barracks used in WWII that had a huge red sign on the door that said, "Danger, DO NOT ENTER" To Be Condemned. Well, that was the beginning of what was a part of A-1-1. That's Company A of the First Battalion of the First Brigade of the Army on Sand Hill.

There were too many of us in this particular training group, so we were allowed to come up with our own name as there already was 1st, 2nd, 3rd and 4th Platoons. 5 were not allowed in a Company at that time. Because of the fact, many of the 30 of us were grossly overweight, we decided to call ourselves, "The Heavy Second."

We couldn't do the monkey bars, the low crawl pit, many push-ups or sit-ups or run very far at any given time in the beginning. We created our own song(which was unheard of) that we sang on the way to field exercises, classes or while marching. It developed a spirit among us that created an attitude to become the best of the cycle, and that is what we did.

We went from the "Bad News Bears" loosing an average of 25-35 pounds per man to win all inspections(barracks, weapons, uniforms and formations), win the PT tests, Rifle Range, Gas Chambers, Drill and Ceremony, Bivouack and even on KP. We took everything there was to compete with other platoons.

I have to mention the group of Drill Sergeants that took us from what we were and made us all in to responsible - lean, mean fighting machines as we would holler.

This all lead up to graduation, to which we were told we would have to be put in among the rest of the platoons as only 4 could march in parade.

All of that work, mental and physical stress, sacrifice and tenacity of proving your manhood and discovering things about yourself you had no idea that existed and what all you could really put yourself through and come out all right was put to rest and not identified.

We decided to graduate proud of what we had become and to go on to defend the United States of America as best we could.

Respectfully Submitted
Donald I. Gibson

Harpers Ferry, Iowa