My Navy Reserve Career

I was going through some old pictures and found this one of me in early July, 1965.  You may notice that I have one stripe on my sleeve and hair.  I don’t know that I’ve referred to my brief stint in the Navy Reserve before online, but I started out as a weekend warrior.  There you have it.

I knew enough at the time (Spring, 1965) to know that I was going to be in a uniform before too long (I was right, by the way.  I received my draft notice in September, 1965, while I was in boot camp.) so I made a plan.  I was going to enlist in the Navy Reserve, go to the Regular Navy boot camp in September (instead of to the two-week Reserve boot camp), go to Hospital Corps school, go directly into my two-years of active duty, and then go to college in 1968 and become a history teacher.  That was my plan.

A little bit about my rationale:  I knew only enough to be dangerous to myself.  I knew that I needed to be an E-2 (Seaman Apprentice) before I could go to Corps School, and I knew that I would be advanced to E-2 on graduation from regular boot camp but not from reserve boot camp.  As for becoming a Corpsman, I was mindful of the movie “Destination Tokyo;” however, I did not yet know how the Marine Corps got their medics.

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As we mustered for the next drill, a Chief came out and asked me when I wanted to go to my two-week boot camp and my two weeks of active duty.  I wondered that the recruiter hadn’t shared my plan with him but I repeated it, and then he shared with me that a) I needed to score highly enough on tests that were given at reserve boot camp to go to the regular boot camp, b) I needed to be an E-3 before going on my two-year active duty cycle, and c) I was in an Engineering and Hull unit so I was definitely not going to be a Hospital Corpsman.  I told him I’d need to get back to him.

I thought about hanging around Davenport in limbo for a year before going off to spend two years in an engine room or boiler room or some other machinery space for two years, and none of that sang to me.  My next stop was at the Regular Navy recruiter’s office where I asked how many ways there were out of an enlistment in the Reserve, and whether or not he could guarantee me Hospital Corps school.  I was at the Examination and Enlistment Station in Chicago on August 24th and in a bunk at Great Lakes Naval Training Center that night.

As I said, I got my draft notice toward the end of my sixth week of boot camp.  I was seriously concerned but my Company Commander just laughed when I told him about it, and then he laughed and laughed some more.  ABEC Dennis was a sick man.  It turns out that enlistment is not considered draft evasion.