Version 3 August 20, 2018 

Oral history interviews of the Vietnam Era

Oral History Project

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Larry Pruden Narrator

Douglas Bekke

Interviewer

December 18, 2017 Maplewood, Minnesota

Larry Pruden -LP Douglas Bekke -DB DB: Minnesota Historical Society Vietnam Oral History Project. Vietnam Veterans interview conducted on 18 December, 2017 with Larry Pruden at his home in Maplewood, Minnesota. Larry, could you please say and spell your name?

LP: My name is Lawrence Pruden. L–A–W–R–E–N–C–E, P–R–U– D as in dog – E–N.

DB: And we’re going to talk a little about your ancestry first, just so we put you in a place and time. So what do you know about your ancestry, immigrant heritage, whatever?

LP: I’m a mixture of everything I think. I’m German and probably Scandinavian –

DB: Has your family been in the United States a long time, they go way back?

LP: Yes, yes.

DB: All mixed up then?

LP: Yes.

DB: Okay. And your hometown growing up?

LP: Saint Paul, Minnesota.

DB: Saint Paul, Minnesota. And do you know much about your grandparents?

LP: My grandmother on my dad’s side – she was very good to us. Played poker and cards with her all the time. My grandfather on my mother’s side was very close to me. Me and him were very, very, very close. We did everything together.

DB: What kind of things?

LP: Oh, played cards mostly and drank beer. He liked his beer. We played cribbage and 500 and he looked forward to me coming over all the time. We went to the two local breweries, we went to the fair, we went to the zoo and many others. And if I wasn’t working I was with my grandpa mostly.

DB: He was also in Saint Paul?

LP: Yes. Over by Como Park area.

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DB: Okay. Was he a World War I vet? Did he have military experience?

LP: I don’t believe my grandfather was in the service. I don’t think he was in the service.

DB: I asked that because some families have military traditions and I didn’t know if that was something that was –

LP: His son was in the service he got a purple heart.

DB: Oh yeah, okay. I think I remember your mother talking to me about that.

LP: Yeah.

DB: Was he in Korea? Was he lost in Korea?

LP: I can’t remember. I really can’t. Sorry.

DB: That’s okay. And your parents? Your dad was from Minnesota too?

LP: No. He was born in Davenport Iowa and came to St Paul Minnesota later.

DB: Okay. And how would you describe your economic status growing up? Middle class?

LP: I would say yes middle class. My dad was a truck driver and my mom was a stay–at–home mom raising 13 children.

DB: So she had a busy life?

LP: She had a busy life and my dad was a very hard worker. He supported us very well. I have very much respect for my parents. I couldn’t imagine raising 13 kids. That would be hard. Raising two kids was hard enough.

DB: And your dad’s name was Larry too?

LP: My dad’s name was Larry.

DB: Are you a junior?

LP: Junior, yes.

DB: And your mother’s name?

LP: Marlys

DB: Okay. Now, growing up as the oldest child were you expected to help out a lot?

LP: Oh yes we had our chores. Me and my brother Bob, he’s the second oldest, we had our chores.

DB: And what did they consist of?

LP: Oh, we had different kinds of chores. Mine was cleaning the shower and when the little ones came along I’d have to wash diapers and hang them on the line and my mother would probably say I don’t remember that but I do.

DB: She was probably too busy because of 13 kids.

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LP: I have very much respect for my mother. In fact, I had more respect for my mother than the drill Sergeant in basic.

DB: Really?

LP: I respected her.

DB: Had your father been in World War II?

LP: No. I don’t know what my father did in the service.

DB: Yeah I think I remember talking to him years ago and he worked in the defense industry during the war.

LP: He could have, yeah. His brothers were in the service.

DB: And your family was Catholic?

LP: Yes.

DB: And involved in the church?

LP: Yes.

DB: Heavily involved? You went to church? Were you an altar boy or anything?

LP: I wasn’t an altar boy but I went to eight years of Catholic grade school.

DB: Oh you did? And which schools were those?

LP: That was Sacred Heart.

DB: Oh that was grade school through junior high?

LP: Yeah. I went to Van Buren for kindergarten and then I went to Sacred Heart for grade school I was a little behind on my reading so one of the nuns sent me over to Como Junior High so I could catch up on my reading. And then I went to Harding.

DB: Okay, and the teachers were pretty good in junior high?

LP: The nuns – a couple of them were strict. And there was one nun that was involved to send me to Como Junior High. She was very concerned about my reading because they thought I was falling behind. But it wasn’t that, I was just slow. So she sent me over there to get more help

DB: I had the same issue so don’t worry.

LP: Did you?

DB: Yeah. Your family’s political views? We’re they involved much?

LP: None.

DB: Didn’t talk about that?

LP: Couldn’t care less.

DB: 13 kids they’re probably too busy just trying to survive.

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LP: You never hear politics in my family whatsoever.

DB: Okay. And the neighborhood situation? How were your neighbors? Everyone kind of in the same boat or was there stratification, differences?

LP: Basically what happened in the neighborhood was good. I never heard any of the parents or the kids talk about what’s going on. In my neighborhood there were big families. Across the alley had a big family, up the street had a big family, bigger than our family, I mean it was just like you put four or five families together, it was like a playground of kids. Big families were around me. We had lots of friends and we did a lot of things.

DB: Now in some areas in Saint Paul, Catholic areas, there’s a lot of Hispanics that moved in so was that true in your neighborhood?

LP: No. None. No Hispanics whatsoever.

DB: Okay. I should have asked you this earlier, but your birth date?

LP: My birth date is July 6th, 1948.

DB: Okay, and that was in Saint Paul?

LP: Yes I was born over in Midway hospital.

DB: In the hospital?

LP: Yeah.

DB: What’s your earliest memories with the family and everything?

LP: My earliest memories were with me and my brother. We were close.

DB: This is your brother Robert?

LP: Robert, yeah. We lived in a little house and me and my other two brothers slept in the same bed because there wasn’t all that much room. You know me and my brothers had differences sometimes. We fought sometimes like brothers do. Me and my brother Bob had a paper route. I think it was like 200 to 250 papers and we used to do dumb things like throw a knife at your foot to see how close it’d get to your foot without getting hit.

DB: “I dare you” games

LP: Yeah. And one time he was doing that with a pitchfork, he found that he came too close and he went through my foot. As I’m running through the house, yelling I’m going to get you. I’m hanging on to the pitchfork. My mom grabs me and pulls the fork out and says, “Okay, sit over there.” Bob’s there laughing at me, like usual, so what she does, you know so you don’t get poisoned from –

DB: Tetanus?

LP: Tetanus. She gets a big tub out and puts hot water, almost boiling hot water in there, and puts salt in there – “Put your foot in there!” Bob’s over there laughing and I’m sitting there, “I’m gonna get you when I get out of here.” Things like that.

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DB: So that was the one thing your mother found out about that you did anyway?

LP: Oh, we did things that my mom didn’t know, but she said she knew. But, I don’t know how she would find out. Yeah my brother and I we had a paper route and we worked in a grocery store and then I went into the service.

DB: How much money did you get doing that, the paper route? 250 papers – is that considered a large number?

LP: Our route money wasn’t much.

DB: Excuse me, let me clarify the question. You say it wasn’t much money that you got or a 250–paper route wasn’t much of a big route? Or both?

LP: Oh it was a big route. We had a big a route. But, the money you got back in them days, you know, you weren’t going to get rich from it. I mean I saved up enough money to buy my first bike because my mom and dad couldn’t afford them kind of things. And they would always say you know, go out and get a job if you want something. So, I started work very, very early. I think I was 12 when we had our paper route.

DB: But they didn’t ask you to contribute to the family?

LP: No. My dad was a very good– I mean he supported us very well.

DB: The money earned was yours.

LP: Yes. And I remember things like my dad and mom would go out grocery shopping and they’d come back home. They had a big suburban kind of a vehicle, when they’d come back and they’d come in the house and they’d tell us boys, get out there and bring the groceries in. We’d go out there and bags and bags and bags of groceries. You know, simple stuff, nothing fancy or anything.

DB: But the family’s working together?

LP: Yes.

DB: Everybody contributed?

LP: Oh yeah. My mother– you worked, you did your job, or you know what’s gonna happen.

DB: And with these big families in the neighborhood, big herds of kids running up and down the street, the other people in the neighborhood watch the kids and kept an eye on things?

LP: Well back in them days you didn’t worry about anything. There was no nuts gonna grab you or anything. I mean, we’d go on our bikes we’d go to the beach you know we’d take off and go to the beach and you wouldn’t have to worry about any of that stuff. My dad, he drove for Corning and Donahue, it was like a concrete business, and he could get things that were thrown away. The city was throwing away cement blocks or sidewalk blocks. Well he said, “Can I have them?” Because he had some grass in the backyard and he was tired of cutting the grass so he got them blocks and he laid them all out and then he said to us boys, he says, “Well, there you go. Flood it.” So we flooded the blocks and made an ice rink. In the daytime when we were in school the little kids would have the rink and then at night my dad would put a light up and then us older kids would play hockey out there in the backyard. And he did things like that for us. Those

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were very good. If we wanted to skate we had to flood the rink. We would be out there at all times of the night, you know, floodin’. It was kinda cool.

DB: But a loving family?

LP: Oh yeah.

DB: You worked together, you helped each other?

LP: Other than arguments, you know– people have arguments.

DB: Sure.

LP: Oh yeah, I have very much respect for my parents. They were very good parents.

DB: Sure. Did you have any particular interests? Sports? Different kinds of activities, things that you were personally interested in?

LP: Well I was a tall, skinny kid. I looked like a skeleton. I wanted to play football real, real bad but the coach laughed at me and said, “You’ll get killed.” So I was a swimmer. I swam –long distance. I enjoyed that. Other than that, other than doing things like playing kick the can and we had games with the kids, you know, we’d go to Mounds Park and we’d explore caves and throw eggs down on the trains or something. You know, mischief things kids would do.

DB: Go to the park, get a bunch of kids together, play baseball or something?

LP: Yeah, we did that a lot. Played little league.

DB: Any park–organized activities?

LP: Little league.

DB: You did play little league?

LP: Yeah. My brother played hockey and he played hockey for high school. He was a goalie. Other than that, oh we had our fights and we had our good times. My brother would have his friends and I’d have my friends but we’d hang around quite a bit.

DB: So the situation, if I can say, maybe, you and your brother are fighting and then a third person comes in and picks a side and then the two of you brothers are united against–

LP: Well usually me and my brother would have a fight and he’d win or I’d win and then it’d be done with. But if my mother was around, she’d say, “Knock it off!” And that’s it. It’s over with. You don’t argue with my mother whatsoever.

DB: What I meant is in a disagreement, you guys would stick together against a third party or something?

LP: Oh I remember one time this guy, he kicked my brother out on the street and I went and I said some choice words at him and he used to beat me up all the time, this particular guy, and he met me down on a corner of the paper route, and started wailing on me for saying that and – I wasn’t a fighter because I was skinny and I just didn’t like to fight. And then I said well, that’s enough I’m tired of it, and I proceeded to beat him up pretty bad. I wasn’t proud of it.

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DB: It ended the issue though?

LP: It ended the issue, yes.

DB: Scouting? Anything like that that you got involved with?

LP: Me and my brother was in scouts for probably six months.

DB: Cub scouts or boy scouts?

LP: Boy scouts. So it was an in and out kind of thing it wasn’t for very long.

DB: Mm–hmm, mm–hmm. Any other school activities that you got involved with? Did they have class plays or anything? Church activities? Choir? Nothing like that?

LP: No.

DB: Go to Sunday school?

LP: No.

DB: High school. Was it an enjoyable experience? Something to be endured? What did you–?

LP: It was plain. I was a plain guy, skinny, you know, not all that good lookin’ and didn’t really have no girlfriends or nothin’. Stayed by myself. I swam. That’s what I put most of my time in, swimming, practicing. I didn’t go to any proms or any dances or anything like that. I just – I wasn’t very popular I guess. And I really didn’t care I guess. I’d just got through school and go home and–

DB: Did you ever get a chance to go to any of the professional sports games at the old Metrodome or–?

LP: I was selling papers out by the old stadium out in Bloomington. This guy come up to me and he gave me two tickets to the football game. I said, “Well, thanks a lot!” This guy come up right behind him and then he says, “I’ll give you $200 bucks for them tickets.” They must have been good tickets because I didn’t know – and $200 bucks! Here! Here you are.

DB: its mid ‘60s, that’s big time.

LP: Yeah, that’s a lot of money. That’s more than I could make on my paper route for a long, long time.

DB: What did you do with the money?

LP: You know, I can’t remember. I blew it I think, I just bought cake and stuff, bought stuff for me and my brother to eat.

DB: You weren’t a saver?

LP: No, no. There’s no reason to save.

DB: Didn’t have a shoebox under the bed or anything?

LP: I think maybe I put a little bit of it to my first bike that I bought too. Which was stolen the next day after I bought it.

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DB: Did you ever get it back?

LP: No. I went out to Phalen Beach and I forgot to lock it and it was gone when I come out of the water.

DB: I bet that must have been pretty disheartening, angering.

LP: It was very disheartening but it was my own stupid fault, you know? A lot of kids back in them days they didn’t lock their bikes they didn’t figure somebody was going to run off with it. It was your word, you know, you didn’t think about things like that.

DB: But that was a new and shiny one probably?

LP: Yeah it was a new bike. It was a new bike.

DB: Cars. Learning to drive.

LP: I had a friend Larry, he lived across from me and we made good friends. I think I was a senior when I got my first car and he’d always take me out driving and I’d fail two or three times and he would say, “Oh, I don’t know if I want to take you anymore, you’re not very good.”

DB: Was he your teacher then?

LP: He’d teach me, yeah. But he was a lot older than me. By like, three or four years.

DB: Did you have driver’s ed at school?

LP: No, no.

DB: Okay, so pretty much just you and him then, that’s it?

LP: Yeah, yeah.

DB: And your parents were okay with that?

LP: Oh yeah.

DB: Okay.

LP: Then I finally passed and I bought an old car. I can’t remember what kind of car it was – DeSoto I think with the big fins in the back – red. It was a junker.

DB: But I bet you were thrilled to have it?

LP: I was thrilled to have it but it went under right away. So I bought it from some guy and it was a lemon. A real bad lemon.

DB: It became a maintenance nightmare.

LP: Yeah. Well I had to get rid of it. Everything went out on it at once. I wasn’t a mechanic or anything so I kind of learned on the fly what to do.

DB: And this was when you were a high school senior?

LP: Yeah.

DB: And did you get another car then?

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LP: No, and then I got with my wife and she drove me around for a while.

DB: You got a girlfriend you mean?

LP: My wife as a girlfriend.

DB: And she go to Harding too?

LP: No, no she’s from up North, from Thief River Falls. Farm girl.

DB: And where did you meet?

LP: On a blind date.

DB: But this is before the army?

LP: Yeah, yeah. And then I got out of the army and I looked her up again–

DB: Ok, well we’ll come back to that. So what did you do on dates when you were in high school?

LP: Didn’t go on many dates like I said, I was– I think we went to some dances and what I can remember. She’s probably in there laughing. But just did things – hung out. Hung out with her and her friend and my friend and we went out to different places.

DB: What I remember from high school dances, and tell me if this was your experience, is the macho guys are all standing around the sides trying to look cool, mustering their courage to dance, while the girls are all dancing together on the dance floor. Was that your experience too?

LP: Oh, kind of. But you know I didn’t go to many dances, high school dances. I guess I met my wife after I was out of high school.

DB: But in that period?

LP: In that period. Yeah, you know like I said I wasn’t overly popular and the kids that were popular you know I see them once in a while in the life now they’re bald and they’re fat and some of them are still good looking guys. But I don’t remember you.

DB: Early bloomers versus late bloomers.

LP: And I’ll tell them you used to do this and “oh I don’t remember that” oh well I remember it. But just plain simple things you know. I had a pretty good life. It was a lot of work for a big family. A big family is a lot of work.

DB: Do you remember anything going on relating to your high school graduation? Any events or the ceremony itself or was there anything?

LP: You know I remember graduating and barely getting out because I wasn’t the best of kids in the school I got in a lot of trouble – fights and stuff like that. I got expelled a couple of times.

DB: What did your parents do about that?

LP: Well, my dad would ask me did I win the fight and was it a legit fight and I said, “Yeah.” “Oh, okay.” That’s one reason that I know that gets you back into school again. Yeah, being skinny a lot of kids liked to pick on me – pick a fight with me, but other than that I didn’t go to

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any proms like I said. I didn’t do any of that kind of stuff and at graduation the teachers would say, “Pruden I’m gonna give you a ‘D’ just so you can graduate and get out of here. We don’t want nothing.”

DB: And what year did you graduate?

LP: Sixty-six.

DB: Sixty-six. Now, there’s a lot of things going on in the country in the mid ‘60s. The main thing for us to talk about is Vietnam striking up. But there’s a lot of social activities, protests and things going on related to civil rights and the war and things are starting to heat up in those regards. Did you pay much attention to politics or anything? Did you have a TV in your home? Did you watch the news? Did you listen to the radio, listen to the news?

LP: We didn’t look at news, no. To be truthful, politics were nil. I didn’t even know what Vietnam was until I got in army. I didn’t never hear about Vietnam, no politics or anything’s happening. We heard about Kennedy when he got shot, you know–

DB: That was ’63, three years earlier–

LP: We heard about that that was sad. But we didn’t know who Kennedy was, just that everybody was crying and he was a good president.

DB: Okay. You’re just living your life.

LP: Right. In our neighborhood it was kind of concealed. We were a close–knit group of kids and parents they’d take us in and feed us. They were very good people in our neighborhood. They took care of us. They didn’t take us any place and I remember our dad would take us, try to take us, up to the cabin up at Big Marine once a year that was our really big thing.

DB: Was that a rental cabin?

LP: It was a rental cabin, yeah. We would go fishing up there that was his big thing, he liked to do that.

DB: He was a good fisherman, he liked to fish?

LP: Yes. Yeah, he was a good fisherman and a good hard worker.

DB: Did he teach you how to clean them and cook ‘em and the whole deal?

LP: Well he just basically scaled them and cut the head off and gutted ‘em and that’s how he cooked them. Mainly it was pan fish that we caught. I can remember my dad scolded me one time. We were out playing basketball in the alley and my mom called us to come in and I didn’t come in. I’m jumping up to shoot the basket and I felt something on the back of my legs and there my dad was standing there with a twig off the apple tree and, “Did your mom call you? Get in the house!” And that’s the only time I remember he even put a hand out. It was my mother that was the enforcer of the family. My dad seemed, you know, okay.

DB: But as we said earlier your parents were strict. They had to be with that many kids, but it was a loving relationship.

LP: Oh very, very much so.

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DB: So, after graduation what plans did you have? What did you see in your future?

LP: I had no plans. I had no idea what I was going to do or really even thought about or cared. Me and my friend, his name was Gary Stucci, we were walking down University Avenue and we just came out of a bar and what are we going to do now?

DB: This was right after high school, you’re 18 now?

LP: Yeah, or almost right after. And what are we going to do now? And I said, “Oh, I don’t know.” So were walking and we walked past a recruiting office and I looked at him and he looks at me and says, “Well, I don’t really want to go to work yet. And I don’t know where we would get a job so you want to go in there and talk about joining the army?” “Yeah let’s go in there.” We went in there and we were hooked! We joined.

DB: And did you get a spiel about different options or–

LP: We got told we were gonna see all the ports and all the most beautiful women in the world, I mean they give us a line and oh you’ll see Hawaii and you’ll see this and you’ll see that. It was like Ricky Nelson “you’ll see a woman in every port” you know that song? Well, he wasn’t lying I’ve seen Hawaii but it was before Vietnam of course. But it was something, you know–

DB: Was Vietnam at that moment, when you’re enlisting, was Vietnam a consideration?

LP: Vietnam was not even brought up. It wasn’t even mentioned he never even said nothing. We were asking about these ports you would hear as a kid, you know, are we gonna be in army and go to these different exotic places and exciting places.

DB: Did they discuss job options within the military with you? Or was that just left open?

LP: That was just left open I had no idea. I didn’t even know what was available and I want to just do something simple because I wasn’t the smartest kid, like I said, in high school, I wasn’t the smartest so I didn’t want a real technical job. I didn’t know if I could handle it. He threw some options out there and one was supply, being in supply. I said, “Well, that sounds like a job I can handle. Okay, I’ll go for that.” And then he says, “Okay sign here. Be in Minneapolis in a couple weeks after that.”

DB: You wouldn’t characterize the sergeant as being deceitful it was more just your innocence about what you were doing and what you were getting into.

LP: Right. He was just listening and he could see that we had no plan in life and he didn’t force us whatsoever he just listened and we said that we want to do this and what I remember we both just signed and said well let’s do it.

DB: Okay. And then you got a date to report?

LP: Yes. And I can’t remember that.

DB: That’s okay. But it was in the summer of ’66? Or when about was this after graduation? Just generally about when was it?

LP: Summer– yeah it was still warm I believe.

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DB: But it was the same year as graduation?

LP: Yeah.

DB: Okay. And where did you report? I for example went to the federal building in downtown Minneapolis.

LP: That’s where I went, to the Armory in Minneapolis I think it was.

DB: It was probably the federal building.

LP: Might have been the federal building I thought it was the Armory. Yeah it was in Minneapolis.

DB: And there– your activities there? Do you remember what you did?

LP: We went into a big room, me and Stucci went into a big room–

DB: Did you enlist in a buddy program? Were you supposed to through together?

LP: Yes we were supposed to go through together. That’s another reason I signed up was to be with him. After we went to that building we raised our hand and we were in army and then–

DB: You got a physical there?

LP: I can’t remember the physical right then, no.

DB: Took tests? Did you take a bunch of tests?

LP: No, all I remember was raising our hand and I was ready – I got up and me and Stucci were gonna go out the door because like I said my mother when she says be home for supper you know you better do it. I’m going out the door and the sergeant I remember come up to me said, “Where the hell you going?” and I said, “Well I gotta get home for supper.” He says, “Your home is in the army now you just joined the army. I’m your mother right now.” He says, “Get out that door” We went out got on a bus and got on a plane and went to basic.

DB: And was this the first time you’d be in an airplane?

LP: Yes.

DB: And was it daylight or nighttime?

LP: It was daylight.

DB: And what was that experience, getting in a plane? Could you look out?

LP: You know I can’t remember I really didn’t know I can’t remember. And I just remember we landed and that we got on an army bus and–

DB: Where did you go for basic training?

LP: I went to Fort Leonard Wood, Missouri.

DB: Okay.

LP: We got on a bus and I remember –

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DB: Did you fly to St. Louis?

LP: No I can’t remember that either. All I remember we were picked up on an army bus and then we got to the base and I remember the D.I. jumping on the bus and just screaming at us, you know, “You maggots!” And all this crap. And I made the mistake of going up to the D.I. and I said, “Would it be possible I call my mom and tell her I’m not going to be home for supper?” Because this was all on the same day. I might as well have painted a bullseye on my back. That was not the thing to say. At the time I was just thinking of my mother. My mother wasn’t in the picture no more. My mother would say, you know, at 18 there’s the door. I raised you, get out of here. But I’m not thinking this through, all I’m thinking about I don’t want to make her unhappy.

DB: So basically your parents were okay with you going in the service? That was--

LP: I don’t even think they knew I didn’t bring it up. Me and Stucci at that moment said let’s join the army.

DB: But they knew you were going in?

LP: Oh yeah. But she says, “Okay, you know you got to leave so you gotta go do something. You can’t stay here.”

DB: So normally when you go in, at least my experience, a couple years after you, was you get to the base, and you go to the reception station. And in the reception station they issue you–

LP: You get your uniforms–

DB: Yeah so how did that go? You’ve gone down there, you’ve met a few people, you got your buddy, you’ve met a few people probably in the federal building in Minneapolis, you get on the plane together, you get on a bus together, you go down there to Fort Leonard Wood, and you kinda get to know people a little bit.

LP: I didn’t know. I was very quiet and I really wasn’t, like I told you, a sociable person. So I really didn’t talk to nobody other than Stucci. And like you said we went in line and got our uniforms, or maybe it was– first we lined up and they yelled at us and then they told us go do this. I think the first thing we did was we went and got our hair chopped off.

DB: I was gonna ask you about that--

LP: Then I think we went and got our uniforms.

DB: They charge you for the haircut?

LP: No. And there was some guys that remembered they almost were ballin’ and everything because they had the afros and that time period you know, all their hair laying on the floor. I could care less. Cut ‘er off, I don’t care. I’m still that way I like my hair short. But that didn’t bother me whatsoever. Like I said I was, after I did that fiasco with the D.I. that’s what I was concerned about.

DB: After Stucci got his haircut and you got your haircut were you able to recognize each other?

LP: Yeah we kind of laughed at each other. It was kind of funny.

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DB: They cut your hair and then they take your clothes away from you. And everybody’s dressed the same and nobody’s got any hair and all of a sudden–

LP: You look like a bunch of dummies.

DB: You don’t know anybody. Who are you?

LP: Yeah, yeah. And it started off that way and then–

DB: Did your clothes fit when you got them?

LP: Oh yeah, they fit. Like I told you I was skinny so they hung on me a little bit.

DB: Sometimes with the drill sergeants, or often times, if they think somebody’s too skinny they try to feed you a lot and if they think somebody’s too fat they try to lose the weight. Were they pumping food into you?

LP: Not at all. Nope, all I remember–

DB: They didn’t target you specifically then?

LP: He targeted me for the thing I said about my mother. He didn’t let me go in basic. He rode me all through basic. He rode me pretty hard. I probably kinda deserved it and in a way didn’t but that’s the way I suppose he wanted me to grow up. Not be a kid, you know?

DB: So you came from a big family, you lived in a crowded situation –

LP: Very crowded, yeah.

DB: But now you’re in a barracks. And can you describe the barracks that you went into?

LP: Well the barracks I think we were all put in rooms I think it was like five, six guys to a room.

DB: Oh you had small, individual rooms? You weren’t in a big bay?

LP: No we were in small, individual rooms.

DB: Smaller rooms, not individual?

LP: Yeah, there probably was like five of us in a room.

DB: Okay. Brick barracks or wooden?

LP: It was brick barracks. I was on the second floor of the barracks and Stucci, my friend that I joined up with, he wasn’t even in the barracks. I mean, when we got to Fort Leonard Wood, Missouri, got off the bus, he went one way and I went the other way.

DB: You went to different companies?

LP: We went to different companies, yeah. And I didn’t see him after that whatsoever. I just didn’t see him.

DB: So much for the buddy program.

LP: So much for the buddy program. I didn’t see him marchin’ or anything.

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DB: So you get there, you get your haircut, you’ve all got your uniforms on, and training starts. What was your first day of training, what did you do the first morning? Let’s see– did they get you up early and run you around?

LP: They got you up early. You go out there and they start screaming at you for this or that and you’re gonna do this. If I remember right we started screaming we started running somewhere. And then we did marching, marching, marching, marching. That was heck of a lot of marching.

DB: Drilling ceremonies?

LP: Yup.

DB: How to turn around, how to salute?

LP: Yeah. How to spit–shine your boots and brasso your brass and your bed and everything had to be bloused and–

DB: Hospital corners on the bed?

LP: Yeah. If it wasn’t done he’d come in there and he’d rip it all apart and scream at you. You wouldn’t laugh at him. I had a little Puerto Rican drill sergeant. Mean as can be. I was his favorite to pick on.

DB: A little guy picking on a tall guy.

LP: Yeah and he was very good at martial arts and different things so you know, like I said in high school I was in a lot of fights but I didn’t want to be in a fight with him because I knew I’d lose.

DB: Probably wouldn’t have been a good idea.

LP: Oh it would have been a loss. A real, real fast battle. But I think looking back, you know, looking back he was trying to grow me up for Vietnam. That’s where Vietnam was brought to me for the first time because he would say, “Pruden you’re a goof–off and you ain’t doing this right and you ain’t doing that right. Go to the rifle range. You’re a marksman but you could be better.” And I’m saying, “Well, come on. What do you want me to do?” “You don’t march worth a shit!” you know, He says, “Pruden if you ever go to Vietnam you ain’t gonna make it.” Okay, what’s Vietnam?

DB: He’s not just being cruel, he’s pushing you to improve?

LP: I think he was trying to make me think about war. If I ever did go to war my life was going to be in danger or whatever. I would somewhat I guess be ready? But what I learned in basic was not training. Didn’t prepare me for Vietnam.

DB: No. But it prepares you to be a soldier. You learn the basics.

LP: You’re learning the basics. Marching, K.P., duties if you goof up just because he wants to be mean to you. Take a toothbrush and toothbrush the grout, you know? Mop the floor – ain’t good enough do it over again.

DB: You learn how to use a floor buffer?

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LP: No, no floor buffer. You’d be down there with a toothbrush. I remember I would do over and over again. Oh not good enough do it again.

DB: Inspections, wall locker, foot locker?

LP: Yeah, yeah. We had a foot locker I don’t think we had wall lockers, at the end of our bed. But I don’t think he was on me for that at all. I kinda passed that.

DB: He was trying to teach you, help you improve.

LP: Right. If I hadn’t had said that thing about my mother I would be just another Joe to him. But he latched onto me. I was the one.

DB: How about the other sergeants? Did they–

LP: They didn’t have nothing to do with me.

DB: Often you had acting, other trainees, would be acting corporals or acting sergeants and kind of your acting squad leaders under the drill sergeant. Did you have that in your–

LP: We had that and I remember one of the boys, he got acting corporal because he was in boy scouts. Got the– what’s the highest award for–

DB: Eagle Scout.

LP: Eagle Scout, he was an eagle scout. So he automatically got to be corporal. And I’m thinking why didn’t I go to boy scouts and be an eagle scout that would have been kinda cool.

DB: And how was he as an acting corporal?

LP: What I remember he was very fair and not gung–ho or nothing just, you know, did what he was supposed to do.

DB: And he made it all the way through as a corporal?

LP: Yes, as I remember, yes.

DB: Sharp guy then?

LP: And, no sergeant, other than one sergeant was okay. I can’t think of my D.I.’s name, I sprained my ankle real bad, and one of the exercises we were going through and I could barely walk and the one sergeant told me D.I. he says, “He’s got to go to get this medical thing taken care of, it might be broken.”

DB: Go on sick call.

LP: Yeah. And that’s the only time a sergeant stuck up for me. My D.I. didn’t like it – he was making me walk on a real bad ankle. So that’s the only time in basic.

DB: But you didn’t get recycled or anything?

LP: No, no. I went and got checked and it was just a bad sprain so they taped it up and I went back to– But I remember one thing, I was going to church one time and I come across a woman officer. And I didn’t know the rules. I was probably in basic for maybe two weeks, three weeks. And I didn’t salute her, because I didn’t know woman officers. I knew men officers. You didn’t

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see that many woman officers and I didn’t salute her and I went by her and she jumped in my shit like you wouldn’t believe. I mean just up and down. After she got done I says, “Ma’am, I really didn’t know that I was supposed to salute you, really, I just got into basic.” And she says, “Okay solider. I let it roll this time for now, but you salute us women as you would salute a man.”

DB: You learned your lesson.

LP: Yes. I learned my lesson. She could see that I didn’t know.

DB: Did you do obstacle courses.

LP: We did obstacle courses. Going out under the barbed wire and stuff like that. March and march and march. The rifle range, the grenade range. We did a pugil–

DB: Pugil sticks?

LP: Pugil sticks. But that’s a little bit of hand–to–hand. But nothing for training you to go into a war.

DB: It’s all just real fundamental.

LP: Very basic stuff.

DB: K.P. You’d already been helping your mom out with a lot of things – now you’ve got a kitchen that feeds 150.

LP: You see on TV soldiers there with a bucket of potatoes, peelin’ potatoes, I did that. Didn’t think anything about it. I thought it was kind of fun because K.P. to me I wouldn’t be by my D.I. for him to yell at me constantly. I would do that and he’d leave me alone.

DB: How often did you have K.P.?

LP: I think I had it three times the whole time in basic? It wasn’t real extensive. It was mostly just get up and go to reveille and start marching, marching--

DB: How was the food in the mess hall?

LP: You know, I can’t even remember. It wasn’t overly concerned. It was just food. And then in basic, they had an Airborne outfit there and I was thinking about going to be in the Airborne and well I seen them guys marching every morning, running and everything before breakfast– you know I don’t want to do that. I didn’t do that, but that’s where I started seeing these airborne soldiers. I had great respect for them guys. I thought they were almost like little gods with what they could do.

DB: So now you’re graduating from basic training, and you have to go to your specialized training, advanced individual training, A.I.T., and you said you had enlisted for supply training–

LP: That’s what I went for.

DB: And you did go to supply training?

LP: Right.

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DB: And where was that?

LP: I went to Fort Lee, Virginia.

DB: How did you get there? You remember?

LP: I think I went home for basic, I think I was on leave for a while–

DB: After basic?

LP: Yes.

DB: And how did the home leave go?

LP: It went good. I mean–

DB: Back in the neighborhood–

LP: All I had for clothes was my uniform, you know, my greens.

DB: In basic training when you left, you were wearing civilian clothes, and when you got your uniforms they made you mail your clothes home right?

LP: I don’t know what happened to my clothes. We turned them in and got our uniforms and bedding. I didn’t have nothing all I had was my uniform.

DB: And so when you went home on leave, you’re going home on commercial transportation, and you’re wearing your uniform. Were there any issues with that? Were people friendly to you?

LP: They were very friendly because I don’t think the Vietnam kind of deal was really taking effect yet. I mean, nobody bothered me. I wasn’t spit at or– I was just a soldier. And I wasn’t home that long. I think I was home for, I don’t know, a couple of weeks–

DB: Everyone glad to see you, had a lot of questions?

LP: Eh, yeah.

DB: What about your brother Robert? You were real tight–

LP: Well he wasn’t there I don’t think. I can’t remember where he was.

DB: How many school years behind you was he? One year?

LP: One. He was a year younger than me.

DB: So he graduated in ’67?

LP: Yeah.

DB: So you were pretty close though, and he’s still in school at this point?

LP: Yes. I can’t remember if I went down to Fort Lee, Virginia by train or by plane. I think I went down there by train. And then I took my A.I.T. down there, it was like six weeks.

DB: How did that go? More calm experience, not so much yelling? More technical?

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LP: Oh yeah, I didn’t get bothered there at all. You just do you studies and everything there and what you had to do. I don’t even remember doing K.P. there. Then I went up to Washington D.C. for leave.

DB: But in your training, was it mostly learning to do paperwork or was it a specific type –

LP: It was mostly paperwork. Paperwork of getting the supply to this point or to this person or unit.

DB: Nowadays because of computers, all young people know how to type. It’s like walking to them.

LP: Yeah, and I didn’t.

DB: But in those days, it was an exceptional thing to know how to type. It was a rare thing. Did you have to learn how to type?

LP: No.

DB: Okay. Maybe a little bit?

LP: No, I don’t remember typing at all. Just writing in information knowing where to put the supply that you had to get to the certain point. It was very basic. Wasn’t hard at all what I can remember.

DB: Now your friend that you enlisted with, did he show up down there for the same training? Because you were supposed to be buddies together?

LP: Well no he didn’t. He signed up to go Infantry.

DB: Oh he did?

LP: Yes.

DB: Okay, so he was gone?

LP: Like I said when we got off the bus in basic I never seen him again. He went to a different spot on the base. I imagine that was because of Infantry that he signed up for. But no he didn’t sign up for the same thing I did.

DB: Now you enlisted, but there’s a lot of people at this time who had been drafted.

LP: And I didn’t know nothing about that. I knew that I was to be drafted sooner or later.

DB: Not so much for you, ‘cause you’d enlisted, but you’re surrounded by people who had been drafted. Some had enlisted and some had drafted. Was there resentment? Were there people complaining about having been drafted? Did people just accept it? Do you remember anything about that at all?

LP: Nobody around me was even thinking that any of my friend or anybody in school that I can remember were even thinking military whatsoever or thinking about the draft.

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DB: But I mean once you’re in the army, in training, there’s people with you who had been drafted into the military versus people like you who had enlisted. Were you aware that some had been drafted? Was that an issue at all?

LP: Not whatsoever.

DB: Everybody was just there?

LP: We were just soldiers. I can’t even remember if I asked if he got enlisted or did you enlist or did you get drafted or what. I guess I really didn’t care. We were all soldiers, you know?

DB: That was the baseline, you were just soldiers.

LP: If you got drafted, that’s part of the system. I joined because I didn’t really have no future in mind. The army sounded like a job you know you have a roof over your head and three squares a day.

DB: Now growing up in Saint Paul, you’re coming from a neighborhood, you know everybody, you share a lot of things with the people who were you’re with, similar circumstances and everything. Now all of a sudden you’re in the army, there’s people from all over the country who grew up in different circumstances, had different experiences. Maybe they talked different. What was that experience?

LP: You know I really didn’t talk to many people. It sounds weird but I really didn’t have any friends. I’d say hi and how’s your day been. I remember in a room in basic we did things like – I remember one guy he wasn’t very clean and he kind of smelled. One night we dumped water on him and soap and got brushes and brushed him down and says now you’ll be clean, right? And he was. Other than that I can’t remember other than going out and doing our duties

DB: So the guys from New York and the guys from California weren’t in conflict?

LP: No.

DB: And the guys from the north and the guys from the south didn’t get along?

LP: No, not at all. I can’t remember talking much whatsoever.

DB: If there were those things going on you weren’t aware of it anyway?

LP: No.

DB: It wasn’t an issue?

LP: No. I was kind of a person to himself. I guess, I don’t know. Because when I went through life, I was picked on a lot and I really was kind of–

DB: But those things didn’t carry on in the military?

LP: No, no.

DB: People got along?

LP: Yeah, we did what we had to do.

DB: You were just soldiers that did their job.

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LP: It wasn’t “oh, you want to go to the bar?” or anything like that kind of deal. I never did talk much.

DB: So in basic training you probably didn’t get hardly any time off? And in basic training you’re probably getting about $90 a month? Something like that for pay?

LP: Probably.

DB: And in A.I.T. too. Now, you got your meals taken care of, you got your living situation taken care of –

LP: You got your clothes.

DB: Was 90 bucks a month – was that taking care of you? Was that okay?

LP: You know, I really didn’t think of money because I didn’t need it because I had everything gave to me already. I had my clothing, my roof over my head, whatever.

DB: You got paid cash. Did you send it home? Or what did you do?

LP: I think I did because – or else I used it for the stores and stuff. I remembered to go buy brasso and shoe polish and stuff like that. I think that’s what I spent most of the money I got.

DB: But again money wasn’t any kind of an issue or anything?

LP: No, no.

DB: After A.I.T., advanced individual training, your supply training, then what? Did they give you a choice of where you might go? Did they ask you any of these things? Or did you just get orders at graduation for this is where you’re going? What was the situation?

LP: After A.I.T. I got my orders to go to Vietnam.

DB: Right away? So you’re going right to Vietnam?

LP: I’m going right to Vietnam from A.I.T.

DB: And about what time of year was this? If you’d enlisted in the summer, usually your training would be four, five weeks. This is getting close to Christmas now probably?

LP: I think I went to Vietnam – I think it was still summer.

DB: Well it would have had to have been ’67 then by the time you got the training out of the way.

LP: Yeah, yeah. I can’t think of the dates.

DB: That’s okay. But in ’67 you went to Vietnam.

LP: Yup.

DB: And did you get a home leave again before you went to Vietnam?

LP: I think I had a couple weeks of leave–

DB: From Fort Lee?

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LP: Yeah.

DB: And you had your orders, you were going to Vietnam –

LP: And then I think I flew to California.

DB: Right. But going home, you’re going to Vietnam, you’re talking to your friends, you’re talking to your family. Any discussions or any particular conversations that you remember? Attitudes?

LP: I told my mom and dad I think and they told me be careful. I don’t think they really knew much about Vietnam, how dangerous it was, you know, and I didn’t of course. I knew it was something not good because I already talked to people that were either there or in A.I.T. or were going over there and they’d heard horror stories about it. The horror stories, some of them were true some of them were exaggerated. I said that to my mom. I says, “Well, if I can remember right I might not be coming back and I don’t know. I really don’t know.” I think I had a date with my wife. Did we have a date? And then I just remember going to where I was supposed to report.

DB: What about talking to your friends? The friend that you enlisted with, he wasn’t home the same time you were? You just never saw him again?

LP: No, I never saw him again. In fact that last time I seen him was out at a graveyard probably a couple of months ago. Gary Stucci.

DB: Is he passed away you mean?

LP: No, no he was doing a speech for Veterans Day.

DB: Oh, okay. So you’re home, you’ve had this leave, it isn’t particularly eventful, you’ve got your orders for Vietnam, go out to the Twin Cities airport. Did your family go to see you off?

LP: Nope.

DB: Okay, you’re just on your own?

LP: On my own.

DB: Got your duffle bag?

LP: Yup.

DB: And you went to San Francisco you said?

LP: It was some place in California, yeah. I think it was San Francisco it was in California some place but I can’t remember. It could have been San Francisco, yeah.

DB: But you’re all alone. You’re travelling alone?

LP: I’m alone, yes.

DB: You get to San Francisco at the airport you start running into other soldiers.

LP: Yeah and I can’t remember how long we stayed there. We went over to Vietnam on a plane.

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DB: What kind of a plane was it?

LP: I think it was just a commercial jet.

DB: You don’t remember the airlines?

LP: No.

DB: There were a lot of charters that were flying regularly. Commercial airplanes too. But the planes all flew soldiers.

LP: Yes.

DB: And do you remember the route? Did you go Hawaii? Or which way did you go?

LP: Well, we landed in Hawaii, and then I stayed in Hawaii for, I think it was four days, and they didn’t give me no reason whatsoever.

DB: You just on your own?

LP: No they put us all up. It was Schofield Barracks in Hawaii. And they says, “You’re staying here for three or four days.” Didn’t give no reason whatsoever. You just can’t leave the base. No K.P. duty, no duties whatsoever. You just can’t leave the base.

DB: And what are you guys talking about? Everybody’s ‘what’s gonna happen, where we going, where you from, what’s this?’

LP: I guess I would talk you know, where you were from and what do you think about going to Vietnam? And they would all have the same concerns. Different stories you heard and we’re starting to think about the people. Well I’m thinking well it can’t be all too bad for me, you know, because I’m supply. That’s kind of a ticket out of the bad crap.

DB: But they haven’t issued you your jungle uniforms or anything, you’re still in your khakis or something?

LP: Oh, no. Yeah, right. And then I went from the –

DB: Nobody went to Waikiki though in those four days? No vacation?

LP: No, no. We didn’t leave the base. We couldn’t leave the base whatsoever. We couldn’t leave. And then they put us on a bus and took us down to the airport again and we flew and then I flew to the Philippines. And I stayed in the Philippines and I can’t remember what base. I was on the Philippines for a week –

DB: And again, no clothing issues, nothing there?

LP: No, no. And they didn’t tell us why we were staying there. I had no duties again. I mean, I couldn’t leave the base and go down to the beach. And I’m sitting there, “well, what’s happening?” I’m ready to go to Vietnam. I mean what’s happening.

DB: Delay en route it’s called.

LP: Well I heard later, talking to people, they says there was too many guys going in the country and there was a backlog so they were having us stay there until we’re ready –

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DB: Waiting for your time.

LP: Yeah time to go into the country. And then I left the Philippines and we were flying into Vietnam. This was my first experience flying into where we were gonna land, it was Qui Nhon, and they turned the lights off and there was a sergeant sitting next to me and I says –

DB: You flew directly into Qui Nhon?

LP: I believe so.

DB: Okay. It wasn’t Long Bien or –

LP: No, no.

DB: Okay. It wasn’t Long Bien or Cam Ranh.

LP: I’m saying Qui Nhon because that’s off the top of my head. I think it was in both places. But I just remember they turned the light and the sergeant next to me, I asked him, because I’m green and I’m concerned, “Why are they turning the lights off?” This was his second tour in Vietnam, that’s why I was talking to him. And he says, “Well, we don’t want to be missiled out of the air.” And I said, “What?” I’m a kid, you know, that don’t know nothing. I says, “I want to go home.” And so we landed and I’m getting ahead of myself so–

DB: No, no. So you landed?

LP: We landed and I remember there was this big, dirt pit with towers with sergeants yelling this and that, where you’re supposed to report and I remember going up to a sergeant and said, “Well, I’m supply.” This was my golden job ticket I was thinking. Send me someplace to where it was gonna be safe or you know, I’m willing to do my duty in Vietnam. Well he says, “We don’t have supply here. You’re Infantry.” I’m thinking, “Infantry?” I have no training in Infantry. He says, “Get on that ‘copter over there and you’re going –“

DB: When did you get issued your jungle uniforms and everything? Or your fatigue uniforms?

LP: I think when landed there before we did the dirt pit deal. We were issued that.

DB: I don’t understand. What was the dirt pit? What was that?

LP: It was like a big stadium grounds or something or they were yelling you go here and you go there. Go where they need you. And then they told me to get on a ‘copter and I remember flying up to Pleiku, where I was to be stationed.

DB: Pleiku?

LP: Pleiku, yeah.

DB: And what unit did you join there? Was it the 4th Infantry division?

LP: 4th Infantry, yeah. I think I was in Company C– But I remember flying in there it was just a dirt pit with Concertina wire around it, probably 15, 20 tents, sandbags around it. Again, you know, I’m looking, “what in the hell did I get myself into?” I says, “This is not what I trained for. This ain’t supply to me”

DB: It’s not an air–conditioned office.

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LP: No, no. And I remember landing and it was just – I don’t know. They had a POL yard where they had some gas and stuff there I remember. But I don’t even remember – I went to the tent they told me to go to and we were issued our rifle and everything–

DB: And you don’t know anybody now?

LP: I have no idea who anybody is.

DB: Were there a bunch of guys that went with you up there? Or was it just you by yourself?

LP: That sergeant told me they don’t need supply no more you’re Infantry, get over there in the ‘copter. I didn’t know them for Adam. And I still didn’t know many of them from Adam even the time I was over there. I was just quiet. I was a quiet person. I’m not gonna lie I was pretty scared. I was very, very scared.

DB: Well you’re off into the unknown and you’re finding yourself in a situation you didn’t anticipate.

LP: And I can remember going in that tent and I was just sick. I remember the smell of pot, and they were doing all sorts of drugs and I’m looking at them guys and I says, “Oh man, this is screwed up. This is not right.”

DB: A lot of drug use?

LP: Yes.

DB: And now these people you’re talking about, that you’re with, these are people in the infantry unit?

LP: Yes. And I didn’t belittle them, demean them, or say it was wrong or anything. I just looked at them I says, “Why? Why are you screwing yourself up?” That’s what immediately come into my head because drugs to me were unknown. I didn’t know nothing about no drugs. I’m looking at these guys sitting around just loaded and I says, I think I even said, “I would like to get in another tent.” He says, “No, you’re there.” Then I can’t remember then I was just walking around and then that day I think I did perimeter duty, that night.

DB: This is the first day?

LP: The first day.

DB: Did you have an N.C.O. or an officer who briefed you or took charge?

LP: I imagine so. I imagine I did, yeah. You would have to have somebody that tells you. I think that the officer was the rank lieutenant. The officer that I can remember we had one first lieutenant and a captain that was there. The base grew before I first flew in there, it grew. The base grew. I can remember the sergeant told me, “You’re on perimeter duty.”

DB: What was your thought about that? “What’s that?”

LP: Kinda because you didn’t have perimeter duty training in basic. And I remember going down there then gunfire started coming in. It’s going over my head, tracers are going over my head and I’m sitting there, “What the hell am I gonna do now?” So my thought – I just hit the

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ground. I hit the dirt and it was a big puddle there I remember, I didn’t care, I went face in that puddle and I says, “Somebody’s shootin’ at me, this is what I got to do!”

DB: Did you have a rifle at this point?

LP: Yes, I did.

DB: Did you have an M-16 or an M-14?

LP: M-16.

DB: But in training, you had M-14s.

LP: M-14s we train with.

DB: So all of a sudden they’ve given you a rifle and you’re going out on perimeter duty and this is the first time you’ve seen an M-16? Or had you had on in some of your other training?

LP: That was the first time seeing an M-16, yeah.

DB: Did you have any idea how it worked? Did they give you any kind of –?

LP: Well I knew it was semi–automatic –

DB: Yeah but how do you make it semi versus single shot?

LP: I think they explained this to you when they gave you your weapons. That dirt pit I was talking about earlier as I can remember they gave you your supplies and your uniforms because I don’t believe we had uniforms when we took off from California other than your khakis. I kind of knew – I didn’t fire back at that particular time because I remember – I think they had a tank and a bunker there. And they radioed down to that tank and says, “This guy is bugging us.” Oh no, that was later. That was later on, another time we got shot at. I can’t remember what happened. I didn’t fire back.

DB: You went to the bunker. What’s the bunker like?

LP: Just sandbags. Just dirt sandbags.

DB: With a roof? It’s got a protective roof on it or is it an open–?

LP: I don’t believe that one bunker I went to did.

DB: It was more of a reinforced trench?

LP: Open, yeah. I didn’t fire back at this guy but I think some other guys fired back and then it stopped. But I remember I was– I was scared. I was very scared I’m not gonna lie. I was scared. That happened to me again.

DB: Were you in this bunker with other guys? Or were you by yourself?

LP: I was in there with two other guys.

DB: And had they been there for a while? Were they able to tell you what was going on?

LP: I believe they were in the country for a while. I think the one said, or both of them said a month. Not very long. They were pretty green too. But they just says, “Keep your head down.”

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DB: They were less green than you though on your first night.

LP: Yeah they knew a little more. This is not fun and games.

DB: Were you in communication much with your family or specifically your brother as far as the mail or anything?

LP: I think I wrote back to my family once or twice. Like I said, I wasn’t–

DB: It was about this time that your brother Robert went in the service.

LP: Yeah.

DB: Did he go in – did you influence him? Was it his decision to do that?

LP: No, not whatsoever. He just did that on his own.

DB: You never really had long discussions, never asked too much about it.

LP: No. He wrote me a letter and he says, “Be safe.” I got a letter from him in Vietnam, I still have it, “Be safe.” This girl he’s going out with. And you know, “Come back alive.” And stuff. I remember he’s saying that. I wrote back and he says, “You do the same.” But I didn’t talk to him about Vietnam too much.

DB: Again, it was his individual decision.

LP: Oh very much so.

DB: But you guys were so tight growing up. You know sometimes one does something and the other follows.

LP: I think he was getting bored of what he was doing. My brother was a very active. Everything that he did had to be above. Playin’ hockey and this and that –

DB: High achiever?

LP: High achiever. Be a step above. He was getting bored with life, he told me. He said, “I’m thinking about joining the army.” I think remember that and I says, “Oh. You gotta do what you gotta do.” Then I didn’t really hear too much from him after that. I think I got a couple letters from him. After that – there was like a big lapse.

DB: Well he probably went off to training and he was busy there. Young guys aren’t often the best letter writers anyway.

LP: What I understand now, airborne training, special forces. Airborne ranger training it’s pretty time consuming. What I know about them guys is you’re busy. You don’t have much time and they work the bejesus out of you.

DB: Yeah, yeah. So you thought you were gonna be a supply guy. They stick you in the Infantry, right away they stick you out on a bunker, and you’re living in a tent. Do you have a cot?

LP: Yes, we had cots.

DB: What other kind of duties did you have? Did you ever get latrine duty?

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LP: No latrine duty. The only duties I had was I went out on patrol the third night I landed. I didn’t have any idea what I was supposed to do with that.

DB: Were you out with a sergeant or who was leading it?

LP: I think he was an E-4.

DB: Really?

LP: Yes.

DB: He didn’t prep you or brief you or anything?

LP: Well they prepped us, they told us what we’re gonna be doing, where were gonna be going, the coordinates and stuff and what we were gonna be doing. I think that particular patrol we were just going out there to watch the enemy movements and stuff. Like I said, I says, “What the heck.” I mean, I’m only in the country three days and I’m going out in the boonies, you know? And I don’t know what I’m supposed to do other than that. Just somebody shoots at you, you shoot back. That’s what they told me.

DB: Were you teamed with someone who’d been there a little longer?

LP: Yeah I think this E-4 was in the country for like, six months. I think he was – he knew what he was doing.

DB: So was this maybe a platoon that went out or just a half a dozen people or–

LP: I think it was five people.

DB: Five people? So it’s a real small group.

LP: And that’s all patrols I can remember that I went out on was small groups. I remember that patrol I carried an M-16. And then your pouches of ammunition and grenades of course. I hadn’t held one at that time. But I stopped wearing them. I wore boonie caps not too long after that.

DB: So you’re out on these patrols, and it wasn’t a regular occurrence but it happened occasionally.

LP: Occasionally, yeah.

DB: And were they ambush patrols? Were they reconnaissance patrols?

LP: They were recon. Going up to notice the movement of the enemy was a lot of the patrols. I was on two ambush patrols that I remember.

DB: How did you conduct an ambush patrol? What’s the situation there?

LP: We would have five guys on the patrol and we’d set up, maybe three on one side of the trail and then two on the other side of the trail so we weren’t all in one group, as I remember. And I can’t remember that nothing came about. We never captured anybody, nobody ever showed up.

DB: That was usually overnight.

LP: Yeah, that would be over night, yes.

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DB: And how did you stay awake? Or you just didn’t?

LP: Fear. Scared. That’s my main thing that kept me going. I was scared. I’m not lying, I was definitely scared.

DB: Same thing for the other guys?

LP: They really didn’t say whatsoever.

DB: Like somebody falls asleep and they can be snoring out there that could be a lot of trouble.

LP: Well, it wasn’t that they would fall asleep but there was one guy he would light up a doobie and I would say why’re you, you know, screwed up, you should have a clear head if something happens. He didn’t give a shit.

DB: Plus he’s smoking, that stinks.

LP: You might as well turn on a flashlight.

DB: You’re making lights.

LP: And he would be yelling, “I don’t give a shit, go to hell.” I’ll get to that but I don’t want to be around you when you do it. There would be rules – coordinates where were supposed to go, go out. I remember this one first lieutenant really green out of officer school, I was in country for a while after when we went on this one particular ambush patrol. And he would come to us and he would say, “Would our government give the locals, farmers, permission to be out farming until I think it was midnight.” And that the trail that we’re setting up on, to ambush somebody, we were supposed to, until midnight, yell out, “Halt who goes there?” To see if they’re friendly or the enemy. All of us in patrol looked at him and said basically, “Kiss our ass.” We’re not hollering out – if it’s dark time out, you don’t holler out, “Halt who goes there?” And I was particularly mouthy with that one, that lieutenant.

DB: And any consequence of that?

LP: Well, I says, “We’re not gonna do it.” And he says, “Well, you have to or you get court marshaled.” I guess all of us says, “Well start court marshalling, we ain’t gonna do it.” Then I kind of mouthed off at him and I says, “Well better yet why don’t you come out on a patrol with us and we’ll put you over alone on the front and you can yell out ‘halt who goes there?’.” Well he didn’t want to hear that he just – then everything shut up. No there was no consequence he didn’t turn me in.

DB: Did he eventually learn the ropes and get to be a better officer?

LP: I think he got killed.

DB: Really?

LP: Yeah. Out on the field. That particular guy I think he got killed, yeah. That’s what I heard, anyhow.

DB: Did you have many casualties in your unit?

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LP: Not that I can think of, no. We would be out on patrol and we hear over the radio they’re coming and we’re being flanked and then yellin’ and shooting and we’re not too far away from this particular patrol and then it would be quiet and I heard them guys all got zapped.

DB: And how did that make you feel? ‘Cause you know the enemy is out there, you said not that far away. Are you next?

LP: Yeah, we were not too far from them set up and I remember one patrol too, you’re thinking this, and I was out with a sergeant and this was my first time looking through and infrared scope, it was like a square box and this one sergeant, he says look I asked him I says, “You think there’s any enemy around?” And he says, he give me the infrared scope and look

DB: Was it infrared or a starlight scope?

LP: Starlight, sorry. Starlight.

DB: Everything looks kind of glowy green?

LP: Yeah, right, right. It was, you know, the old one. And he says, “Look through this and you answer.” And I look through it and I see bodies out there moving around. And I says, “Why ain’t we dead?” I mean there were like, ants out there. So why ain’t we dead?

DB: How far away were they?

LP: Maybe, oh I don’t know, probably 200–300 yards? I don’t know. They weren’t very far. And the sergeant says, “Well, they’re just not interested with us.”

DB: They don’t know you’re there probably.

LP: Oh they know you were there. They knew, because you’d go down the certain trails and then you come across punji stick pits or something or different booby traps. So they would give you your coordinates but you would never go on the same trail. A lot of us were green and we’d make too much noise and we’d get yelled at for doing that. You learned, you grew up.

DB: And what did you think about encountering the booby traps? What more specific, describe the punji pit and describe some of the other booby trap you might have run into.

LP: Well I’ve come across traps. It was almost right off the trail the one me and another guy come across was like, sod, over this hole. It was like sod, that I can remember, and then you pulled it back and then there was like sharp sticks coming out of the ground. Pit was probably, oh I don’t know, maybe four foot deep?

DB: Bamboo stakes?

LP: Yeah. They were sharp. I remember coming up at angles and I’m sitting there, “wow”. That particular time I was still pretty green I didn’t have any idea. I was kind of proud that me and that guy found it.

DB: Found it without stepping in it.

LP: Stepping in it and you know, something just wasn’t right, that I said to this guy, “What’s that over there? Looks not right.”

DB: What about booby traps with grenades or anything like that?

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LP: No we never came across anything like that or anything where you set off a trap and it would nail you.

DB: But did you think about them being there? Were they a constant reality for you to think about?

LP: You heard about them. You heard about them from the people that were in country. They’d get into your mind and they’d tell you stories, different things. There would be guys there for a while they’d get into your head and they tried to scare you more than you’re already scared. But then as you got accustomed and you were in country more, the more patrols you went on – you kind of knew that you were supposed to do a little bit more and not make noise and just what you’re not supposed to do.

DB: In the field you’re eating C-rations.

LP: C-rations.

DB: And did you get to be a connoisseur of C-rations?

LP: Yes.

DB: Handy with those? Talk about some of the things you can do with C-rations to make them better.

LP: I really didn’t do too much with them I remember I used to like to eat the canned pudding bread that was one of my favorites because on our base we didn’t get much of anything for food. I can’t remember what was in the C-rations. It was something you can put it to boil. But I can’t remember making any fires or anything when we were out on patrol because that wouldn’t be good.

DB: Had cocoa and coffee that you could put in with your C-rations.

LP: Yeah, but I don’t remember that we ever boiled them. If we used them we did it cold. Because I don’t remember making any fires whatsoever.

DB: Did you smoke at the time? Cigarettes?

LP: I didn’t smoke at all –

DB: Did you get the little pack?

LP: That’s when I started smoking.

DB: Oh you did start smoking?

LP: I started smoking with the C–ration cigarettes.

DB: Some guys used to trade them. Trade the cigarettes.

LP: No I smoked them. I smoked them. I got to be a very– chain–smoking person because– I think it was because of fear. It was something that I could do but I didn’t smoke on patrol of course. I didn’t light no cigarettes, unless I was underneath my poncho or something. I’m making sure that I wouldn’t be seen.

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DB: And it wasn’t difficult to get cigarettes over there where you were on your small base? You said your base got bigger as you were there.

LP: 4th Infantry camp in our – when I landed there it was not too big. And then it got to be constant – buildings and towers.

DB: So it became 4th division headquarters?

LP: Yeah.

DB: It was the whole division? So it got to be a pretty major base so you had a PX there?

LP: No PX. I can’t remember no PX.

DB: Well where you bought your cigarettes and stuff? Only had your C-rations?

LP: Yeah, yeah. I remember we had a big pile of beer out in the opening. We got beer, a lot of beer for some reason. Got ‘coptered into us.

DB: It was air temperature though wasn’t it?

LP: Oh yeah no cold. We had no refrigeration whatsoever. No showers that I can remember.

DB: You said you’re in the base, you said that your food situation wasn’t that great but you had a mess hall there on the base. They just didn’t cook very well? Or what was that situation?

LP: I can’t even remember the mess hall I can remember for some reason we got ketchup and bread mistakenly delivered to us. That was like eating chocolate cake to us I remember we dipped our bread in the ketchup and it kind of brought us back to home for some reason. I don’t know.

DB: Familiar taste.

LP: Yeah, yeah. I can’t remember. We had no eggs or anything you know that I’ve talked to people over in Vietnam about. We didn’t have any of that.

DB: Real rudimentary.

LP: Yeah.

DB: Were you eating C-rations sometimes when you’re in the rear area too?

LP: Yeah, yeah. It was a life of – my life I didn’t have no K.P. or nothing because there was nothing really to K.P.

DB: No mess hall.

LP: No. And I just remember I was either doing perimeter duty or I was out on patrol or in our downtime when we come back we were usually, especially coming back from patrol we were just completely wasted, tired, smelly. And then you take a canteen bath kind of like the old days. Eventually came can showers with a tarp around you.

DB: They put up a canvas screen, have a can up above. Probably cold water?

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LP: Cold water, yeah. But we didn’t care, it was something. I don’t remember any kind of duties except when the base got bigger – then I still didn’t have no duties. And other than going on patrol and perimeter duty, one time they asked me, this is when the base got bigger, if I would drive a semi–truck down to Qui Nhon to get some supplies. Well, I says, “Okay I can do that. I don’t know how to drive a truck.” You had to shift and everything. I never did that when I was a kid, I drove a car.

DB: So you learned on the spot?

LP: Well my car was a shift but I didn’t know how to shift a truck.

DB: But you’d had a little bit of fundamentals on it anyway.

LP: Not really. The sergeant I was with, he was screaming all the way. But I eventually learned. You know we went through the mountains, some mountains, going down to Qui Nhon from Pleiku. We come up, and look down, there’s a tankers and all sorts of trucks blown up. Dead bodies lined up of the enemy all burnt up, that’s what I remember in that particular time. I did that once.

DB: They laid –

LP: They’d laid the bodies out there.

DB: The North Vietnamese bodies.

LP: Yeah.

DB: As a warning to others?

LP: It was just Viet Cong. I don’t think that there was any hardcore N.V.A. that I know of.

DB: Were they the first dead people you’d seen?

LP: No. I seen ‘em down on the perimeter. They’d try to overrun us and stuff. These ones, particularly the smell, they were burnt up they looked like they got torched or whatever. I don’t think it was napalm or anything but I just remember the smell and looking out and just – ugly. But you know you glance at it and then you drive on. And I remember we went down the base there –

DB: Down to Qui Nhon?

LP: Yeah, and they had an air force base there and I remember coming in and were all dirty and we got our helmets and flat vests on and I remember the air force guys coming into the base and they’re there sitting up on a hill watering the grass and everything and I’m talking to them guys and I said, “What’s this building over here?” They got their own mailboxes, they got almost like a Dairy Queen and everything there. I said, “What in the hell?” And were 190 miles up north and it’s definitely not like this. It’s bad. That’s one of the things I’m thinking about. But that’s their life, they got that life and they’re doing their duty so I didn’t question it. I guess I was just – well what would you call it?

DB: Mystified by it?

LP: Not mystified– I wish I could have been there, you know?

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DB: Jealous?

LP: Jealous! Thank you, jealous. Jealous of this, I says, “Holy mackerel.” We coming back up in the mountains and then we stopped, I remember this particular stop we made we had to stay overnight because we didn’t want to drive at night. This come up back up north and we stopped at the 5th Infantry division. No– 1st Infantry it was. And I remember we were sleeping and I got up in the morning and they had a Korean outfit there. And I was talking to this one guy and he said, he was looking at this one particular Korean, I don’t know if he was feedin’ me a line of shit or what but he says, “He’s a mean guy, stay away from him.” And I says, “Why?” “Well, he’s got a bag full of the enemy’s ears on this side” “Oh yeah, right.” That’s a bunch of bullshit. And I guess it was true I guess them Koreans – the V.C. didn’t like the Koreans whatsoever because they fought and thought like them and were mean. I got up that morning, this is another things, and this one Korean actually had a brick hanging from a tree and he kicked that brick and he pulverized it and I looked at him and I says, “Wow, I don’t want to cross paths with him.” But its things like that, you know, was particularly–

DB: The Koreans had a reputation. No baloney, no messing around.

LP: I would think, “Boy I’m sure glad that they’re on our side. Because they’re the people that they think like these people and they know where to go and do with them. On a patrol, when we went on a patrol, we had a lot of doings with the Montagnards. They were native – there they lived. And the ones we come across anyhow on patrol lived in a hut off the ground on stilts. They were kind of smelly. I mean, they didn’t bathe very well. And we used to give them soap and everything and they’d actually fight over it and stuff and as I remember there was like a drainage pond, kind of for irrigation for their crops, and this was one particular patrol, the second time – nothing was happening and it probably wasn’t right for me to do but it was hot, very, very hot, and I took off my gear and I put my rifle and my pack on the shore there and I went in for a dip and I was coming out and I looked up on the knoll. There was a V.C. up on the knoll. And he looked at me and I looked at him and I says, “Oh well, that was a stupid mistake.”

DB: Was he carrying an AK?

LP: He was carrying a weapon and he shot one time at me. And it hit the ground in front of me and then he walked off. And that’s what I’m saying, my life was lucky.

DB: You had a lucky day there.

LP: And all I can understand is – the other guys in my patrol were there and he was just a scout or something and he didn’t want to start something by himself or whatever but that one time he shot at me and he left. Well if it makes things worse I got out of the water and there was leeches on me. And I says, “Oh man, oh man.” I took my C-rations and I put salt on them. I don’t know where I got that, that that would take care of that–

DB: Did it?

LP: Yeah.

DB: You didn’t have to burn them off or anything?

LP: No, no. Or take your knife and cut ‘em off.

DB: Was that your only experience with leeches there?

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LP: That’s my only experience with – yup, with leeches.

DB: What about other wildlife in the area? Snakes, tigers, elephants?

LP: No I never seen no tigers whatsoever, no. No tigers. And I really can’t remember any snakes either that I came across. They might have been there but I didn’t see them.

DB: Never an issue though?

LP: No, never an issue. The central highlands was a lot of mountainous terrain and then we went down into some jungle and stuff and set up in some jungle. They had jungle and mountainous terrain.

DB: Usually when you went out though, when you went out on a little patrol, you’d only go out overnight? Or for a couple days? Or what kind of patrols?

LP: It was usually overnight. But there was a couple patrols we went out for longer. One was like three days because we were out there for a long time. Another one was two days I remember for sure. And I don’t particularly know the reason why we were out for so long. We weren’t setting up for nothing other than to look at troop movement.

DB: Potential ambushes or observation, yeah.

LP: I went on maybe two or three ambush patrols. Set up as an ambush but we never come across anything, so– thank god.

DB: You mentioned the drugs and you mentioned the one guy on your ambush was smoking’ dope and did it get to be a serious problem for your unit? Was it an annoyance or was it a serious problem? Did it get to be very widely used?

LP: He just mainly smoked pot. He didn’t do any hard drugs–

DB: I’m just saying in general, beyond him, back in the camp were drugs becoming a real problem within the camp?

LP: Oh no, no. There was a certain amount used. I would say maybe five, or six guys that would. It’d mainly be pot but a couple guys be doing opium and heroin and stuff like that. They were really screwed up.

DB: And do you know where they got it?

LP: Well, what I understood they got it from the enemy. I don’t know. They got it in town or – I don’t really know how they got it funneled to ‘em.

DB: And you talk about “in town”. “In town” is Pleiku?

LP: Pleiku.

DB: And what was Pleiku like?

LP: I don’t know. I never went there.

DB: Okay.

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LP: I stayed on base or, like I said, if I wasn’t out on patrol I did perimeter duty and if I wasn’t tired, mostly I was tired, we would gamble in the tent. I remember we would. And later on we got the hooches built and everything.

DB: Hooches are wooden buildings.

LP: Wooden buildings, yeah.

DB: That was a big step up for you?

LP: Oh tremendous step. It was like going into a hotel. But I still don’t remember any food–luxurious food coming in. I think we got something different. Other than that we gambled and then we’d get mortared or we would get missiled and I remember a lot of times we’d be leaving our pot of money there and head for the bunkers and–

DB: Do you have 107s, 122s coming in? The rockets?

LP: A lot of it was mortars, yeah.

DB: Mortars? Okay.

LP: I don’t remember too many missiles coming in.

DB: Could you hear them firing before they hit?

LP: No, you hear the movement –

DB: Yeah.

LP: And then one particular time well, I think one of the scarier parts, to me, was Tet.

DB: You were there for Tet of ’68?

LP: Yes. And I remember that night we were down on the perimeter and we were ready for all hell to break loose and I just remember all of a sudden, I think it was the P52 planes? You see the tracers coming down and then they dropped napalm. I remember that and I’m sitting there, “Oh wow.”

DB: But you’re on the perimeter?

LP: I’m on the perimeter, yeah.

DB: And was the camp ever attacked? Heavily?

LP: Not heavily. We were overrun a couple times that I remember.

DB: Overrun’s a big deal. You mean they –

LP: They got into the camp, yeah. Because I remember my foot was in a cast.

DB: You got wounded?

LP: I got friendly fire wounded.

DB: Really?

LP: Yes.

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DB: And was this a Tet situation or another situation?

LP: Well, I was waiting in line, I was at the back of the line, waiting – this was probably in country oh, maybe, five months? I was waiting in line to get malaria shots, so just a regular medic tent. And the line where I was standing was next to the road and we had one or two deuce and a half’s on the base. Well this one guy, he was driving a deuce and a half, he’s coming down the road and all I remember is something grabbing my jungle fatigues and turning me around and knocking me down on the ground while I’m down on the ground and my leg went underneath the truck. And the back wheels of the deuce and a half ran – almost snapped my foot and my leg.

DB: You’re lucky you didn’t lose your leg.

LP: Yeah.

DB: But it wasn’t bad enough to medivac you out of the country?

LP: Well the guys picked me up and brought me into the tent, well they didn’t have no facilities whatsoever to do anything for that kind of a wound, you know, so they ‘coptered me down – I think it was Qui Nhon or Cam Ranh. Down there they put a full–length cast on me and send me back out the field. And I remember – I don’t remember why they did that. That’s another rule I couldn’t understand. I was absolutely no use to anybody. And I’m figuring why. Well they send me back out there. Out on patrol, other than carrying an M-16, I carried an M-16 –

DB: You didn’t go out on patrol with a cast on your foot?

LP: No, no, no. But I’m coming up with the reasoning they send me back out there. I carried an M-60 machine gun for a while out on patrol.

DB: M-60?

LP: M-60 machine gun, yeah. I knew it quite extensively. How to clean it, you know, and how to load it and everything. We had – I think it was four M-60s? Oh they had me clean them. That’s the duties I had with a cast. I had ‘em in my tent and was cleaning them and that night we were overrun. I heard them outside running around and yapping and shooting outside. Well I just put one of the M-60s up on the cot and I says, “Well, whatever. Come on.” And I was very, very scared then, because there’s nothing I could do whatsoever.

DB: Well when the sappers came in, when they infiltrated, they had to go in through your wire.

LP: I think they came through the main gate.

DB: How did they get in there?

LP: They overrun us I think, what I understood they overrun us somehow. I don’t know they – because I was in the tent cleaning. But I remember that vividly. And then I heard them yappin’ and shootin’ out there and everything was quiet. Then a head come in the tent, I remember that, and I don’t know why I didn’t shoot, but I – it was a lieutenant. He says, ‘What in the–” – he knew I was in a full–length cast. “What the hell you doing in here? Why ain’t in you a bunker or something?” I says, “I can’t walk and I’m not gonna go hobbling out there when they’re out there. Hell with that shit! My odds here in the tent are better than out there. I remember he went and he got two other guys pick me up literally and take me to the bunker ‘cause they didn’t know

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what the heck was gonna happen after that. They weren’t very happy because they had to leave their concealment but–

DB: So, going back to the bunker duty and the perimeter, what was your barb wire like? Did you have to keep it real clean? Keep the grass out of it? Did you do things to make noise on the wire? You just stayed out of it?

LP: I don’t remember that. No I don’t remember any of that.

DB: But you had barb wire out there?

LP: We had the accordion–style barb wire.

DB: Concertina?

LP: Yeah. I remember that. And then like I said, things grew, you know, then we had the wire and then they built towers with – I think they had M-60s with spotlights in the towers.

DB: When you go out on a patrol, what did you carry? What was your equipment like? What did you carry?

LP: I carried, like I said, I started out carrying an M-16 rifle and then for some reason they asked me if I wanted to carry an M-60 machine gun. I carried a machine gun and another guy carried the box of the belts and everything. I didn’t do that very long because that sucker was heavy.

DB: How much ammunition would you carry for the M-16 or for the M-60?

LP: For my M-16 I would probably have– (Counting) eight magazines maybe at the most? Not real, overly heavy fire – and I remember carrying probably two or three grenades? M-60 I can’t remember how many belts we carried. Because if you’re going on patrol I remember it was, you could only – I can’t remember how many were in the box.

DB: Two hundred fifty rounds in a can. The box.

LP: Yeah. And I think we had a couple boxes. And it wasn’t where you carried the belt around your– you know.

DB: So when you’re there and you’re sitting in a bunker, or you’re out on a patrol, what did you think about? Here I am? What am I doing? Or did you have a mission sense? What was your attitude? What did the guys talk about? I know you said you were kind of a quiet guy and you didn’t interact a lot, but there was some communication about here we are, what’s happening, or whatever. Was that ever a topic of discussion?

LP: We would talk about, you know, what were gonna do if we come across the enemy, other than shoot back. There’s not that many of us to really raise hell.

DB: Most of the time it was business talk or talking about home?

LP: Yeah, if I remember where you’re from or– are you gonna eat the C-rations, I’m hungrier than you are. A lot of times it’d be raining like hell out and we’d all be under our pouches, sitting out in the rain and just – “you think they’re gonna be getting us tonight?” or something on that order.

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DB: It was mostly talking about the specifics.

LP: What you’re out there for, what you’re out there for. And like I said that one sergeant he was concerned about me being green and my concern about the enemy out there with that one particular thing, you know? And he showed me the enemy and I says, “Why ain’t we dead?” and I said that before, “Why ain’t we dead?” He says, “Well, they don’t have no interest in us at this particular time.”

DB: What was your communication with home at this time when you’re in Vietnam? You get many letters from home?

LP: None. None, I don’t think my mother wrote me at all ‘cause she was probably busy with the other kids. She had a whole big family.

DB: Your girlfriend, did she write you?

LP: My wife Sandy wrote me I think once–

DB: But she’s not your wife at this time.

LP: No, she’s my girlfriend. Well, not even really. I went out on a date with her a couple times.

DB: Okay, female friend.

LP: Yeah, a female friend. I think she wrote me a couple times and I wrote back to her and then that quit.

DB: So you weren’t getting a lot of mail?

LP: No, no. No packages no nothing like that whatsoever.

DB: Were you getting things – getting Red Cross packages or anything like that?

LP: No, nothing like that. C-rations, that’s all I really had. They gave us our pay–

DB: Okay. Now, Robert’s got in, and he’s in the service, you know he’s in the service. Did you know he was going to airborne ranger training and stuff?

LP: Yes I believe he told me.

DB: You knew some basics?

LP: Yeah, I think he mentioned that in his letter.

DB: Okay. Were you in Vietnam at the same time he was?

LP: No.

DB: Okay, so you’re starting to get short in Vietnam, were you starting to get anxious about going home or what were you thinking about that?

LP: Well, my main thing is that I made it this far and I was pretty excited about what I’d done. Yeah, I was excited about getting the heck out of there, you know?

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DB: But morale in general for you and in the unit was pretty good? People had a pretty good sense of morale and they had a degree of pride in what they were doing there? Or not?

LP: I would say so, yeah. Other than them few guys that didn’t care, the drug guys. I think the morale was let’s do our duties and take care of each other and get the heck out of there. Especially out on patrol we would, except for that one guy, we were all pretty focused on –

DB: Among you guys, now I’m not talking about what the lieutenant did or the platoon sergeant, but among you guys, when there’s a guy that’s out there smoking dope or causing problems, did you, amongst you, did you do an attitude readjustment on these people?

LP: Oh yes. We told him many times, “Put that damn doobie out. You’re giving away our position”

DB: But if they didn’t, if the guy didn’t do that, did you take further steps to get him to conform?

LP: You mean like beat him up or something? Or literally take the joint out of his hand? No.

DB: You didn’t?

LP: No, no. We figured – and we should have because he was putting in our lives in danger, not only himself he was. You know but we figured he probably had his own problems and his own fear, that’s why he was doing it.

DB: So you’re time is up. Your year is up. And what was the process of coming home?

LP: Well I remember getting on a bus, it was like a school bus, with a screen and bars around it.

DB: Over the windows?

LP: Over the windows. And we were coming into the town of Pleiku and that was all on fire and smoking and you know.

DB: Was this real close to Tet?

LP: No, this was quite a while afterwards. And then I remember going to the airport and then we were waiting to get on a plane and at that particular time the pilots and the stewardess were thinking about going on strike. And what I remember were a whole bunch of helicopter pilots and everything. I’m saying, “Well, fly the damn plane let’s get the hell out of here.” “Well we’ll fly it.” And I remember some other guys raise their jungle fatigue pants, “We’ll be stewardesses we don’t need no damn stewardess! Get the hell out of here!” Well when we got on the plane we found out the pilots’ strike means nothing. We’re getting the guys out of there.

DB: So when you left Pleiku, they put you on a bus, do you remember did you come to Cam Ranh? Because that was one of the out–processing centers.

LP: That’s why I have Cam Ranh on the top of my head. Yes I think we did.

DB: And did you clean up there? Did you have a couple days there you got cleaned up? Did they give you clean uniforms? Did they take your jungle fatigues away?

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LP: I can’t remember because when I got back to the states I don’t think I had my jungle fatigues. I had my greens on.

DB: Did they give you a new set of greens then?

LP: They must have. They must have because I didn’t – I left all the jungle fatigues and all that stuff right there.

DB: And the things you brought over in your duffle bag when you went over, did they all get left in Vietnam too then?

LP: Yes. I didn’t have much that I brought, that I remember. But I remember it was a big building or something we were in and then we got on the jet and we cleared the country horizon we all yelled, “Yay!”

DB: Everybody cheered on the plane?

LP: We cheered. And yeah I says – but I can’t remember, what I remember vividly is I seen the D.I. I had in basic –

DB: The little Puerto Rican guy?

LP: The little Puerto Rican guy that said I wasn’t going to make it through Vietnam.

DB: And he was on the plane with you?

LP: No, he was getting off the plane he was doing his third tour over there, what I understand.

DB: You mean you saw him arrive?

LP: I saw him arriving. Yes, a coincidence and I was going to be like a smart ass and I went up to him and I, the wording was, “Do you remember me?” And he looks at me real mean and, “No. Am I supposed to?” You know, in his little Puerto Rican accent, I remember that. And I says – I told him my name and, “Yeah, so what?” And I says, “Well, you told me I wasn’t going to leave Vietnam alive.” I says, “I’m getting on that plane over there and I’m leaving Vietnam alive.” He says, “You don’t get out of my face you ain’t gonna leave alive I’ll shoot you right here.” That’s what he said!

DB: So he was still a nasty one?

LP: He was a – not nasty guy, he was a complete ass. But that’s his way of thinking, his way of living. I heard he got his third tour, he didn’t make it. But that’s just what I heard, I don’t know. I got no satisfaction out of that.

DB: Yeah. I remember on the plane going over, the stewardesses were all young and pretty. And on the plane coming home, the stewardesses were older women, who were more maternal. And you know, they made us toe the line. They gave you anything you wanted, pop. Whatever, you know, to eat. They took really good care of you but they were older and more maternal and I think that was part of the plan. Did you remember anything like that?

LP: No, I remember that the stewardess going over and coming back were fairly young. Coming back they were very, “thank god you made it. Whatever you need you just ask.”

DB: Took good care of you.

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LP: I mean, whatever you want to drink, whatever you want to eat, what we got, you know you can have it. Thank god you’re coming back, you’re not completely mangled or anything like that.

DB: How was your foot at this time? Your foot had recovered alright?

LP: No. My foot is getting really bad.

DB: No I’m saying when you’re on the plane, at that point.

LP: Other than real bad pain sometimes– it was a bad – I broke every bone in my leg and my foot. It was –

DB: But the cast was off when you came?

LP: Oh yeah, yeah.

DB: So where did you arrive back in the states or what was the route that you took? Did you go to Hawaii or Japan? Or which way did you go back?

LP: We landed in Hawaii and when I was on the field I had an abscess tooth and I remember they went in with a pair of pliers to pull my molar out in the back. And he only got half of it. So, I got infected. This was coming on before I left. And I went to one of the hospitals there, I remember, because we were there for two or three days I think. And I was gonna get the tooth pulled out but they says, “If we pull the tooth out you can’t get on the plane because you might bleed when you’re in the air.” And I said, “Well, how long you gotta stay for that?” And “Well, six, seven days.” I says, “Naw, I want to go home. What can you do?” Well they packed clothes in there in the hole that was left there and I made it back home but that was painful. But we landed in Hawaii –

DB: And the recruiter told you you’d go to Hawaii. So you’ve been there twice now.

LP: Twice, yeah.

DB: Did you ever get off of Schofield Barracks or the base at any time?

LP: Not at all.

DB: Never got to Waikiki or anything?

LP: Not at all, not at all. No.

DB: But you’re in Hawaii.

LP: I was in Hawaii and I was in that hospital and it wasn’t like when I went over there. I did a little walking. I can’t remember where. It wasn’t downtown or nothing. It was near the base.

DB: So where did you arrive in the states?

LP: You know, I want to say down in California someplace.

DB: San Francisco?

LP: Yeah. I think I left from there and come back there.

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DB: A lot of guys coming into San Francisco encountered protesters. Did you have any experiences with them?

LP: The only thing I encountered, not there, but I think went on leave almost directly from there, I think I got off the plane at home and I went into a bar with my uniform on, and then my Vietnam bars and stuff on there, ribbons, [unintelligible] medals and you know, just some basic stuff from Vietnam. I walked in the bar to have a drink and this one guy come up to me and start hassling me and talking about well, you hear about baby killers, I don’t know. Basic Vietnam stuff. I told him, I says, “You know, I don’t really want to hear it. You weren’t there.” I says, “And you don’t know.” I says, “Just leave me alone. I don’t’ want to start nothing just leave me alone.” Well he started pushing me and it got –

DB: Was this a young guy?

LP: Probably about my age, yeah. Probably in his middle twenties. And I says, “Leave me alone.” I says, “I don’t want to go through it.” Well he shoved me a couple, three times and then I wailed on him. And then I left.

DB: What’d the people in the bar do? Anything?

LP: Not really. I think they were kinda on my side because they just sit there listening to the idiot. There’s a lot of people that didn’t understand Vietnam whatsoever. That really was, more than anything, hurt me that you know, I had my uniform on and I was coming home. I wish I would have had street clothes at that time, because the uniform kind of was, not very good.

DB: We all traveled in uniform in those days.

LP: Well that’s all I had. That’s all I had to my name was a uniform.

DB: So you came home on leave.

LP: Yeah.

DB: And where’s your brother at this time? You get updated?

LP: My brother is in Vietnam.

DB: So you go home to the neighborhood, to your family. What’s the reception or what’s the situation when you get home?

LP: Oh they were glad I made it back. What I can remember you know, is that nothing really – my mom still had a bunch of kids, you know. It was, “Are you okay? I’m glad you’re okay.” And we’d talked about Bob a little bit and I says, “I hope he’s okay because I seen what can happen.” And I know he’s an airborne ranger. What I’ve learned later, what I went through was a cake walk. I remember I was home on leave for a while and then I had my orders. I already had my orders cut for Germany so I knew I was gonna leave.

DB: And were you glad about that, going to Germany? Was that exciting for you?

LP: Yes. It wasn’t Vietnam. I wasn’t gonna be shot at no more. And I wasn’t gonna be out on patrol and stuff like that.

DB: And you’re SPEC–4 now? What’s your rank?

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LP: Yeah, SPEC–4. And then I went to Germany and right away I get in Germany and it was good. I mean good.

DB: What were your duties there? Did you finally get back to supply?

LP: Well, yeah. I was back in supply then. I reported and there was another green lieutenant there, I had my uniform on, my dress greens, if I remember right, it wasn’t khakis, and I reported to this lieutenant and he says, “I suppose, you know, we do things here different. Where you coming from? Guys like you, you know, mouth off, they might not make it from Vietnam.” I says, “Yeah, yes sir. What do you do different?” He says, “Well, we spit shine our boots here, we blouse our boots, we brasso our brass.” And I’m looking at him like, “Uh” That’s basic crap. I’d been through enough where I kind of know. I didn’t say nothing, “Okay sir. That’s the way it’s gotta be, it’s gotta be.” So I went to the sergeant major to give him my orders what outfit I was in and he was in Vietnam too and he was pretty close to where I was. But he was there before me I think. He says, “Well solider, how you like Germany so far?” And I says, “I don’t know, it kinda sucks.” He said, “What? You come from Vietnam and Germany sucks? This is the land of beer!” And stuff like that. And I told him what the lieutenant expected out of me and he says, “Yeah. Tomorrow will be a different day.” And I didn’t know what he was talking about. “Oh okay.”

DB: This is all really just your first day there?

LP: Yeah, yeah. I’m reporting I’m given my orders. And tomorrow comes and the lieutenant says, “Well, you do your duties and forget about that other stuff.” Which I was willing to do.

DB: What else are you gonna do anyway?

LP: Yeah, yeah. I’m not gonna get into trouble because of that guy. But you just do your duties and forget about this other stuff. And well, after that –

DB: What was the unit and the location you’re in in Germany?

LP: It was the 3rd Infantry. We were in barracks– me and another guy had our own room I think. And my duties? It was like a big warehouse –

DB: What town was it in?

LP: It was in Kitzingen.

DB: Kitzingen. Okay. And you’re working in a warehouse. Supply?

LP: Supply, yup. It was on base and I remember I would be the clerk at the desk, when they needed tank engines or whatever I’d get it to him.

DB: Heavy equipment?

LP: Heavy equipment stuff, yeah.

DB: Unlike Vietnam, now it’s just a job pretty much.

LP: Yes. Well we had to pull guard duty. No K.P. or anything but you had to pull guard duty, walking by the entrance I remember. And we had to carry – I think we were carrying– well it wasn’t M-16s to me it was like an M-15 or 14 that we were carrying. It was an older than an M-14. Fourteen, yeah.

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DB: You don’t need the latest.

LP: And they were loaded and I’m saying, “What’s this crap?” and I asked about that and they says, “Oh, we’re still in the Cold War with Russia. In Germany that’s pretty close.” “Oh, okay. That’s fine. That’s unreal.” But the time in Germany was awesome. I mean, awesome. The people were great and the beer was terrific.

DB: You got into town? You got out in the economy?

LP: Yes.

DB: You never really did that in Vietnam at all.

LP: Well Vietnam, the only thing other than patrol, I went on an R and R to Hong Kong. That was fun.

DB: We didn’t talk about that. That was a good experience for you?

LP: That was a very good experience. I think I had like, almost $2000 of my gambling winnings because money meant nothing on base. I remember I took a C-130 flew into Hong Kong from Vietnam– that was a noisy bugger.

DB: You had a lot of money though?

LP: I had a lot of money.

DB: Probably had a good time?

LP: I didn’t care. When I got in there I blew it. Every single dime of it. I’d never send no money home I kinda kicked myself in the butt for that but I didn’t know if I was going to be alive the next day. Money meant nothing to us there. I remember that.

DB: But anyways, back in Germany you had pretty good duty, you had good relations with the Germans, plenty of beer –

LP: Plenty of beer.

DB: Schnitzels to eat.

LP: Then they gave you time off. You had your mini vacations and I took a train ride to Holland and I did extensive – around the base there’s German stuff. Mingled with the Germans and became very good friends with them and they had a good time with me and it was good. It was good. And then I did my duties there and then they wanted me to go to warrant officers’ school. The re–up to go to warrant officers’ school.

DB: For supply?

LP: No.

DB: Warrant, property book officer?

LP: I heard it was helicopter.

DB: Oh, be a helicopter pilot?

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LP: Yeah. And I didn’t know if I was gonna be smart enough to do that. Because anything math I wasn’t very good at math. But then what swung me was my friend says that, “If you go to do that, and you happen to make it, 50/50 chance you’re gonna be going back to be a helicopter pilot in Vietnam.” And that’s – I knew helicopter pilots, that’s not a duty. That’s a bad duty. But I says, “Naw, I did my three years I’m heading home.”

DB: Did you make E-5?

LP: I was E-4 still. Yeah, I never went up the rank.

DB: So you decided to come home, and get out, and where’s your brother Robert at this point? He’s still in Vietnam.

LP: He was either in Vietnam– or was he already killed? Because I remember I was then home. I was not home too long and I was standing in the kitchen and my mom was making supper or something I was standing there and a sergeant and a captain came to the door.

DB: Do you think this was after Germany or when you’re just back from Vietnam?

LP: I was home. I was home after Germany.

DB: You’re out of the service.

LP: I was out of the service.

DB: Because this would have been November of ’69. He died November 25th, 1969.

LP: Yeah. I was home not for very long and I remember the sergeant and they came in the kitchen and they went through the spiel, you know, “Bob is missing in action.”

DB: That was the initial report.

LP: Yeah. That he was missing in action and then I said to the sergeant, I says, “He’s dead.” I remember saying that, “He’s dead, ain’t he?” He says, “Well I can’t tell you that. He’s missing in action.” Well not to long after that they confirmed it.

DB: They came back?

LP: They came back and said that he’s killed in action.

DB: What was their demeanor when they came in? That’s a tough duty to have to have. Be the messenger of bad news.

LP: Very sad look on their face and very caring, you know, courteous. Very courteous. All soldiers are courteous to me anyhow. And very grief–stricken if I remember. Like you said, it was like a real bad thing like someone was shooting at them or something. Very sad duty.

DB: And how did your mom take it? She’s there, your dad was not there at the time. He was at work, or?

LP: I can’t remember where my dad was and I can’t remember my mom– if she even cried. You know my mom was a strong woman. I very seldom had seen her cry. I can’t remember what she thought. And I told her, I says, “Mom, I think Bob’s gone.” And she says, “Well, you know, you both knew that when you went over there you might not come back.” And I says, “Well I

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don’t know mom, for sure, but I think he’s gone.” My concerns were confirmed after that. To me it was very, very sad.

DB: He was your best friend growing up.

LP: Yes. Excuse me.

DB: Sure. Do you want to pause for a couple minutes?

LP: Yeah.

DB: Ok.

Pause in recording

DB: So you’re home, you’ve gotten this news your brother’s missing, it doesn’t look good –

LP: Missing in action, yeah.

DB: But this is a big disruption in your life, you’re home, did you have plans? What did you want to do? You had the G.I. Bill available to you for further education or work, or did you have plans for yourself?

LP: Well I went to the V.A. to see what my options were, like I said I wasn’t the smartest person, so I went out to the U to take tests in both math, my math was very, very low, so I couldn’t go there. So I went back and you know, the G.I. Bill, they said, “Would you like to try vocational school?” “Sure!” So I used that – that’s the only time I used the G.I. Bill, that I used that for tuition fee to go to Saint Paul T.V.I. So I went to T.V.I. for nine months.

DB: For?

LP: Hydraulics and pneumatics I went there for.

DB: Well that’s a big deal.

LP: To me it was, yeah. It was something I could do.

DB: And now, when you got the news about your brother, did this derail any of that or did this come afterwards, how did that affect your situation?

LP: No. I was very sad about it because, you know, me and him did quite a bit in our life. As we got older he had his own friends and everything. We were really close, I mean, really close.

DB: And how long after the first contact from the army did you find out that he’d been killed?

LP: It was a matter of a couple of days. If I remember right it wasn’t very long. And that was confirmed that he was killed.

DB: And the family situation again then, with some of your other siblings that were a little older that knew him well, I know there were some that were very small but some of the older ones and your parents, how did that affect the family?

LP: I remember that it affected my dad. Dad was an emotional person, it affected him, it hit him a lot worse than my mother I think because my mother was, not that she wasn’t all caring, but she was hardened –

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DB: Stoic?

LP: Yeah, from raising 13 kids. That’s one thing that gives me much respect for my mother. I think it hit her but she didn’t want to show it for some reason I don’t know.

DB: A more private person?

LP: Yeah.

DB: And how long after you’d found out that he’d been killed did you find out that he was getting the Medal of Honor?

LP: That was quite a while. Was it years?

DB: Sometimes it can take a while.

LP: Yeah it has to go through Congress and be turned in and then they came and I can’t remember it was a sergeant come and told my mom he was receiving the Congressional Medal of Honor. And that they will be picking us up to take us to Washington D.C., the whole family. And I remember that I says – I was in a cast and broke my foot there.

DB: Again?

LP: Again, yeah, but my other foot. And I was in a cast I remember and all my little brothers and sisters were there and I remember some green limo pulled up to the front of the door to pick us up.

DB: That the airport or at the hotel?

LP: At our house.

DB: Oh, at your house?

LP: At our house. They picked us up all at the house. Then they took us out to the airport. I remember out there I was just – V.I.P. treatment for everything. I mean, sergeant had a wad of bills, I laughed about that, “Whatever you want, just let me know.” So, I had enough drinks and food. Then they flew us to Washington D.C. and we stayed in a very nice hotel and went to very restaurants I mean it was terrific. I mean, throughout it was awesome. They just treated the whole family extremely well and took us on different tours of the history – Smithsonian– we went to different very fancy restaurants and then we went to the White House for the medal. That was a great honor. Well my next oldest brother he was still in the marines. He got a medical discharge from the marines he was still in uniform.

DB: I’d seen in the pictures. See I thought that was you that’s why I asked if you’d been a marine.

LP: No, no. That was my brother Mike.

DB: And you’re in civilian clothes?

LP: Yes. Oh yes, I’d been out of the service for a while.

In fact, I was married then. But I remember Nixon was the president at the time.

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DB: Did he talk to you? Did you talk to him?

LP: Oh he talked to us quite a bit. And my mom and dad, yeah.

DB: How was he?

LP: Very, very, very nice. Very nice. “You need anything? Just let these people know. Have a good time in Washington.” Just, what a president would say.

DB: Presented the medal to your – did your mother get it then? Or your parents jointly?

LP: My parents jointly got it, yeah.

DB: And what did they think about that?

LP: My dad was very, very proud. My mom, eh. It’s something, you know? I mean –

DB: Not my son.

LP: She might not even – sunk into her that that’s the highest medal that you can win. Probably somebody told her but, “Oh, okay.” You know? My dad, he was very, very proud.

DB: Long before this, your brother’s body comes back from Vietnam. And he was buried at Fort Snelling. And what kind of a ceremony or service, do you remember much about that?

LP: Well I remember it was a private ceremony, it was like in a Mueller– it wasn’t a soldier doings it was like a Mueller cemetery doings. And I remember looking at my brother, you know, it was an open casket and that was extremely sad then we went out – going out to the graveyard and I made a promise. Excuse me –

DB: Sure.

LP: That I would put flowers on his grave every year. And I have. But anyways he was taken out there and he was buried out at the corner lot there. And then later on, to my understanding, they buried the Medal of Honor recipients in a different place over by the church in Fort Snelling. It’s a different kind of a graveyard and they wanted to take my brother’s body from where it’s buried now and move it over there. Well my mother, she didn’t want that. She said, “He’s laying there, leave him be.” So that’s what they did. But he was a good brother. I mean he was going like 50 miles an hour all the time and nothing – he had to be a step , like I said, and I think that’s why he became a ranger and I even think that was not enough for him. He wanted to be more and more.

DB: High achiever.

LP: High achiever and I guess – I talked to his buddies. They were very, they respected him. They wanted to go on patrol with him, they almost flocked to go out because he kind of knew what he was doing I guess.

DB: Your family had a lot of contact with his team members.

LP: One of them was – his name is Danny Jacks. And we went to Darmstadt, Germany with him and my wife, they invited my mom and dad but my mom and dad was already over there for a doings for Bob so my mom says, “Would you go over there for me?” I guess because I was a Vietnam vet too. She thought it would look good. I says, “Sure I’ll go over there. I don’t mind

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doing that.” I’m very proud of my brother and whatever I can do– So I went over there with the army, they paid my way over to Germany, and we flew into Darmstadt and I was talking to Danny Jacks and some of the things they did on patrols and everything that – that’s where I learned that, you know, I thought I’d seen a lot, but what the special forces did, it was a cake walk compared to what he did. And him and Danny were like me and him were brothers. And I hear with the Special Forces they’re more brothers. You know not like the guys I went out on patrol with.

DB: You get in a small unit, you get real tight. You have to be.

LP: Well Special Forces especially, you know, they’re really like brothers, brothers. All of them you know they –

DB: He was a ranger, a reconnaissance used to be called ‘Lrrp’, L–R–R–P.

LP: Yeah.

DB: Assigned to the Americal Division.

LP: Right. We flew into Darmstadt and we got alone and he was telling me stories like, he held Bob and his arms when Bob was wounded quite extensively, what he did, you know what the citation says but he was telling me stories where he yelled, “Bob!” and Bob says, “Get my guys out of here!” And then they were all in fact waiting out on the helicopter and then he died. But he told me stories where after Bob was dead for a while he was out on patrol with his own unit and he was extensively wounded and his head and in his back and in his leg and he said that he sat down next to a tree and ready to give up, he’s wounded extensively, and he said that my brother came to him, in like a ghost form –

DB: A vision?

LP: A vision. And he says, “Jacks!” And he says I can hear my brother saying that, “Get your ass up and get your guys out of here!” Jacks says, “That saved my life.” And I looked at him I said, “Danny, really?” And he looked me right in the eye he says, “That happened.”

DB: You know that your parents donated almost everything up to Camp Ripley, and the letters from the team members and the letter from the – starts with the president, all the way through the government all the way down to the team members, they’re all up at Camp Ripley.

LP: I didn’t know that, no.

DB: They’re all up there.

LP: Oh, cool.

DB: Your parents donated all that.

LP: That’s very good.

DB: So that’s available if you wanted to see those things.

LP: I will.

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DB: His Dear John letter is there from some girl and there’s a letter from some – kind of snotty letter – from some peace activist to your mother. So it’s all there if you or your family want to go look at things it’s all there so– along with his uniform and all that so–

LP: Yes, I’m planning – next time we go up north, her brother and sister live up north in Thief River Falls and we go through there. So I’m planning – I want to go a couple, three times a week something come up – a snowstorm–

DB: We’ll talk about that after the interview here.

LP: Okay.

DB: But now your life has to go on. You’ve gotten married, you’ve gone to some technical training, and you’ve got a job?

LP: I didn’t at the time have a job yet. I went from vocational school and they place you where they think your training would be – well I wanted to go to Clark Forklift and use my training because that’s what I tore apart and put together in vocational was forklifts. But there were so many journeymen out on the world that they didn’t want apprentices trained when they can get a journeyman so I couldn’t get a job. Well he placed me in a place called Minneapolis Equipment – it’s out by the U of M – and I did some hydraulic stuff out there but I didn’t like it and then he placed me in another place, the Arsenal, where they make the 155 millimeter shells – I got into maintenance out there well then I got laid off after six months. They didn’t need me no more so then I was out and I was wandering around, no work, I’m married and I need to work, so my brother–in–law says, “They’re hiring down in North Star Steel. Go down there and see if you can get a job down there.” I went down there and they says, “Do you know how to cut a billet in half with a torch?” And I says, “No– I don’t think I’ve ever had a reason to do that.” They took me out back and they had a rack of billets there, he says, “Cut that billet, you’re hired.” Well it took me an hour, I cut it in half. Almost started myself on fire. They hired me. I walked in the plant there and see the sparks and the molten metal and everything and I says, “Well I’ll be here for two weeks and then I’m gonna go looking for another job.” Well, 33 years later I retired out of Northstar Steel, that’s where I spent most of my work life.

DB: Did you find that it was a benefit, or a negative, or no difference to have been a Vietnam veteran coming home and looking for work and trying to reestablish yourself?

LP: No difference whatsoever. My service time meant nothing. Cutting that billet in half that’s what got me the job. And they could care less if I was in Vietnam. I mean there was other guys that were my friends down at work, there was oh, maybe four or five of them were in Vietnam.

DB: And amongst yourselves did you talk about your experiences very much? Did people ask about it?

LP: Well we talked about, you know, that there were different places in Vietnam – we talked about what we did, yeah. And patrols and everything and couple of them had pretty lax duties. I have no feelings whatsoever on that. They were in Vietnam, they did their duty, I don’t care if they were a clerk at a desk, you know.

DB: But it was just people talking about their experiences.

LP: Yeah, right.

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DB: Today were talking about Vietnam, tomorrow we’ll talk about next vacation or something. I mean it was just part of the conversation, yes?

LP: Yes. We went out drinking, partying, different things. Work.

DB: At some point your parents moved up to north central Minnesota –

LP: Crosby.

DB: Crosby, Minnesota. Yeah. And was that after all the kids were gone, it was kind of a retirement move, or what was that about?

LP: Yeah– kind of a retirement move, yeah. And my mom was scared to be alone out in the country where they had, like, a cabin. My uncle’s old cabin, where they were living. And so they moved into Crosby itself, the town. They started in the cabin and she didn’t want to be alone in case something happened to my dad, she didn’t ever drive, so she didn’t want to be alone.

DB: And they were right in town? ‘Cause I visited them there twice.

LP: Then they went and bought a big house in town in Crosby. And then my dad passed.

DB: I remember when I went up there, first to borrow his uniform for the Airborne exhibit, and then when I returned everything, when the exhibit came down, and the first time I went up they had the Medal of Honor on the wall –

LP: By the stairs.

DB: In the living room there with some of his other things and when I went back up, that was gone. And I was returning his uniform that we’d had in the exhibit and I said, “Well, where’s his medal? Do you still have that around?” She said, “Oh we gave that down to Fort Benning.” It’s in Pruden Hall at Fort Benning. And I said, well, I asked, and I said, “You know if the time ever came and you’d be interested in donating your son’s uniforms to Camp Ripley we’d be very honored to have them and have them on display at the museum.” Your parents looked at each other and they said, “Oh yeah, you can have it. Do you want the other stuff?” And that’s when they went down and they got the letters from Nixon and everyone else. I don’t know, I forget if it’s Westmoreland or Creighton Abrams, all the way through the government and the senators and the governor I think. And then his team members and all this other stuff so that’s when it was donated. And I forget exactly the year, 2007. So that’s all at Camp Ripley if you or other family members want to go see those things. It’s there. But I remember your mother was, as you said she’s a very strong woman, she was fairly matter–of–fact but I remember your father was more emotional about it.

LP: Yeah, yeah. I remember he would, once to have me take him out, late at night, to the cemetery out at Fort Snelling and sat by the fence talking about him. Things like that. It hit my dad real hard. Real hard. And he was very proud of the medal I remember when I went out there and he says, “Lar, I donated the medal to the Fort.” I said, “Dad, that’s awesome!” I says, “That’s awesome.” And he never told me about donating the other stuff I never knew that until you came and got the boots. Was it you that came and got the boots?

DB: I came and got the boots.

LP: And the dog tags?

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DB: Mm–hmm, yeah. And there’s a story that goes with that too. I don’t know if you remember but your parents, living in Crosby, and they came to Camp Ripley to the museum and they wanted to see how the things were being processed and dealt with, I had things laid out. And as your father was leaving the room he paused for a second and he stopped and took out his wallet and he took out your brother Robert’s driver’s license and he had a funny look on his face and he said, “Here. He should have this too, keep it with the other things.” And he gave me the driver’s license, so that’s up there too. And then we had to send the thank you letter out to your parents and it came back. And I checked the address and I tried calling and nobody answered. And I couldn’t figure out what’s going on. And then you called me up and you said, “This is Larry Pruden.” I said, “Oh, Mr. Pruden, I’m so glad you called!”

LP: You thought I was my dad.

DB: “I’ve been trying to get ahold of you!” And he says, “No, no. This is Larry Jr.” And I said, “Well, what happened to your Dad?” Turns out just a few days, literally a few days after he paused, he had that funny look on his face, and he gave me the driver’s license, it was like the last thing he had to do. And then he died. And your mother closed down the place in Crosby right away apparently and moved down here. And then it was later that summer then, a few months later that you called me with his boots and his beret and the dog tags.

LP: And I was very honored to do that too. I think many guys should be honored this way. I’m kind of very honored for my brother, I suppose I shouldn’t be any more than anybody else but you know, it’s something to get the Medal of Honor I mean –

DB: A huge deal.

LP: That’s not handed down to you. You have to have somebody extensively research to give you that. Yeah it’s – to my understanding he was a very good soldier. A very good leader.

DB: Very much beloved by his teammates, which is a huge thing to say.

LP: Yeah, yeah. Very much. And respected by his teammates. Like I said they almost fought to be on his team. But yeah that’s another thing I would like to go down and see Danny Jacks. He is a character but, when he gets to be serious, he’s very serious. I mean, otherwise – you would like him he’s a very comical guy I mean he makes you laugh all the time.

DB: Really, he and some of the other team members really kind of bonded with your family didn’t they? With your parents?

LP: Danny Jacks especially. There’s more and more coming out of the woods you know it seems like all the time. And I look at posts or on the emails or whatever. I’m not computer literate. But I was on patrol with him and I knew him and I met other –

DB: Other people posting stories.

LP: Right, right. That’s another thing I went out to one of the doings there, one of the ranger doings out by the airport –

DB: Oh they had the national ranger reunion out here.

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LP: Right, right. And they invited me to that and I went to that. That was a life experience like you wouldn’t believe. And then just more recently I went to the Medal of Honor convention, I was invited there.

DB: In Saint Paul here?

LP: In Saint Paul and Minneapolis. Was invited by Bill Lunn what’s the channel 5 anchor– Lunn. He invited me to the gala and I says, “Oh yeah, I’d be more than honored to represent my brother there.” He did a story, a mini–story, out at the cemetery, I don’t know if you’ve seen it on the news –

DB: No I didn’t.

LP: Where they showed his gravestone and everything and he’s still doing extensive stuff for the vets. He’s not even the anchor anymore, he’s doing reporter work for the military and everything, kind of stuff. But he invited me to the gala downtown Saint Paul and then they says, “Well I want you out at the main gala out in Minneapolis Convention Center.” The recipients were downtown too but this was– tuxedo. But anyways to this a short story I went to that and that was very humbling meeting these people I just was honored. It was something else. It was really something else.

DB: Reflecting back on, looking back on your life and your service, and you put things in perspective, we’re getting to the point in life where we’re putting our life in perspective now and thinking back and where do you place your time with the military and your service? Where do you rank that in your life? What was the meaning of that to you?

LP: I rate that as like a learning experience. In Vietnam, I grew up real quick. I went from 18 to 30 maybe. It was an experience that I didn’t know what was gonna happen, I had no idea what was gonna happen, if I was gonna get killed, and I didn’t know what that feeling was gonna be like. And when I left there I finished out my tour in the army. It was extremely more pleasant in Germany. That was a part of my life where I grew up. I had a purpose, I had a purpose. When I got out of the army I had more of a ‘get out there and do something, get a life’ going, you know? And then I met my wife and she had a great deal to do with that, you know, and my look on life is I don’t care what I’m doing but I’m not gonna sit around I’m gonna work. I’ve always been a worker. And that had a great deal of me growing up.

DB: The military experience?

LP: The military experience from basic on through Vietnam. Germany, not so much. That was kind of like a job.

DB: Well you learned a lot about beer.

LP: Well my experience with the D.I. through Vietnam was a very, very growing up part of my life.

DB: And putting it in perspective with the war in general and the loss of your brother, how do you – where do you see that?

LP: A lot of things about Vietnam were stupid. I mean a lot of the rules were stupid, to me, that’s my own opinion. I mean, and I think I have the right to voice my own opinion because I been through a lot over there. But other than that, it was a war and I really, at this part of my life,

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I’m just sick and tired of wars. I mean, it just seems like we’re getting in and out of things all the time. I wish someday that we learn our lesson. Stop losing American soldiers’ lives, you know? But that’s out of my control. I can’t make that decision what’s happening there. And I look at soldiers nowadays and I mean – my tour in Vietnam was ugly but I look at the soldiers now I mean, they’re coming out of the guard and everything and they’re going and doing one, two, three tours over in Afghanistan and Iraq and extensive. And then they wonder why they got PTSD you know and why their mind is screwed up.

DB: A lot of them are older, they have families and careers too and they come out –

LP: Of course, of course!

DB: They’re not unattached 19 year–olds.

LP: They’re not G.I.s that go through – It’s just– I don’t know. But this is just my own opinion. I suppose there’s a reason I suppose we’re now the soldiers of the world and we combat ones that are trying to take over –

DB: World policemen since World War II.

LP: That’s what I was told when I went to Vietnam. We’re making sure to that the Communism don’t come into our country. And that’s the understanding I went over there for and what I fought for. I fought because, I guess, I’m an American. That’s a thing I’m supposed to do.

DB: Any closing thoughts? Anything you want to say wrapping it up here?

LP: I would like, like to thank all the soldiers that are performing their duties, exposing their lives to it. I know what they’re going through and know mainly what they’re almost thinking. Same as you, you’re a serviceman, you know. And I wish this could stop sometime but it just seems like it won’t. And I hope someday we have a safe United States of America. In both our lives not have to worry about this.

DB: Don’t we all wish that?

LP: Yeah, but I don’t think it’s ever gonna happen.

DB: Well, thank you very much.

LP: Well thank you very much.

DB: You did a very good job.

LP: It was very interesting talking to you.

DB: Good, I made it easy for you. You made it easy for me, it worked both ways.

LP: Yes you did. And I hope I wasn’t too mouthy.

DB: No, no you did a great job. Perfect.

LP: Good.

DB: Okay, thank you very much.

LP: You’re welcome.

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End of interview