Lyssy, Walter (Interview transcript and video), 2017

Smither, James (Interviewer)

Walter Lyssy was born in McCook, Texas in the early 1940’s and attended Texas A&I University in Kingsville, Texas where he was a part of the Army ROTC’s Signal Corps for four years. Upon graduating from college in May of 1965, he was commissioned. Lyssy was then sent to officer’s basic training at Fort Gordon, Georgia for eight weeks. Following his basic training, he received his first assignment at Fort Knox, Kentucky teaching radio operators. In the summer of 1967, Lyssy received his orders for Thailand and traveled to Korat to work in the 501st Field Depot distributing petroleum until July of 1968. Once he returned to the States, Lyssy attended a Special Forces school at Fort Bragg, North Carolina until he received orders to go to Vietnam and left for Vietnam in July of 1970. In Vietnam, Lyssy was assigned to the 101st Airborne Division and received service training at Camp Eagle where he also saw the events of the Ripcord Campaign. The day following the campaign, Lyssy was sent to Firebase Ripcord as part of the 2nd Battalion, 506th Infantry working as a communications officer for a few months before being sent back to Camp Eagle as a 1st Brigade signal officer and later additionally as beacon drop officer. Lyssy left Vietnam in July of 1971 and went to a signal officer’s advanced course in Fort Thomas, New Jersey for ten months. He then left for Hawaii, where he worked in communications, electronics, engineering and installation in the Pacific. While doing this work, Lyssy frequently traveled to Korea to rebuild communication systems and did so for approximately three years before going on to command staff college and Fort Ord, California in the 127th Signal Battalion until 1981. Lyssy was then assigned to Fort Sam Houston, Texas where he was director of telecommunications for Army’s Health Services Command until 1985. After that, he worked as a communication system engineer building a bunker for NATO headquarters until 1988. After that, he was sent back to Fort Knox for his last assignment, where he remained until he retired in 1991.

2017-10

In Copyright

Grand Valley State University Libraries, Special Collections & University Archives, 1 Campus Drive, Allendale, MI, 49401.

Veterans History Project (U.S.)

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