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Growing Community: Oceana’s Agricultural History Project
A project supported by a National Endowment for the Humanities Common Heritage Grant
Project Director: Melanie Shell-Weiss, GVSU Liberal Studies Department
Growing Community: Oceana’s Agricultural History Project
Diana Azereth Giles Mendez Interview
Total Time – (17:35)
Interviewed by Norma Gonzalez Buenrostro, May 17, 2016, in English.
Background
• Diana grew up in Hart, Michigan
o She grew up where all the stores were, next to the police department
• She is not really used to life in the country
• In a small farm town, community members get to know everyone else
Vivid Childhood Memories – (1:50)
• Diana got to know the neighbor kids pretty well
o They would go over to each other’s houses and ask if they wanted to play
Coming to Oceana County – (2:31)
• Her family moved to Oceana County around 2002 when Diana was five years old
• Diana’s parents were migrant workers, and someone recruited them to come to Oceana
to work in agriculture
• Diana and her family were the first Hispanics that settled in the area
o Going to school was very difficult
o Diana and her parents did not know English
Diana’s Parents – (3:55)
• Her parents had agricultural jobs
o They started by picking asparagus and peaches
o Years later, they went into factory work and worked on assembly lines
o Later, her mom was a lab technician in the factory and her dad got a better
factory job too
• When Diana was growing up, she would go to work with her parents because they didn’t
have a babysitter
1
�Growing Community: Oceana’s Agricultural History Project
A project supported by a National Endowment for the Humanities Common Heritage Grant
Project Director: Melanie Shell-Weiss, GVSU Liberal Studies Department
•
•
•
o She would take the bus to school and then come back after school and wait until
her parents were done
o Her mother would tell her that she didn’t want Diana doing work like that
Work ethic was very important to Diana’s parents
o Diana would ask her mom how to do things to help, and she would teach her
Back then, her family was not wealthy, and her parents didn’t make enough money
between the two of them
o When Diana was 9 years old, she began working alongside her parents
o Diana and her siblings experienced what it’s like to do labor work
o Going through this gave her the motivation to go to college and get higher
education
Diana appreciates what her parents did and has learned to work harder towards what
she wants
Current Job – (9:34)
• Diana is currently a community health worker at a migrant clinic
• She is studying to be a nurse and a respiratory care therapist
• What she does now gives her experience and better medical understanding
Agriculture in Oceana – (10:30)
• Agriculture is the biggest business in Oceana and what brings many people to the area
• Sometimes this is the only type of job that some people can get, so they come there
• There is also some tourism
• Some migrants come there together, and they always help each other out
• Some farmers are close with their employees and are more understanding towards
them
• There are always new workers too because they’ve heard there are jobs in Oceana
Future Thoughts – (13:00)
• Diana hopes that her mother doesn’t have to work in those kinds of jobs anymore
because she doesn’t like doing it, and Diana wants to take care of her
• Her father really likes the agriculture
2
�Growing Community: Oceana’s Agricultural History Project
A project supported by a National Endowment for the Humanities Common Heritage Grant
Project Director: Melanie Shell-Weiss, GVSU Liberal Studies Department
•
•
•
Diana wishes that there were other opportunities in Oceana too
Many people don’t know what it’s like to do such hard work when they’ve never done it
themselves before
Diana’s children will never understand the struggle that it is to be a first generation
migrant like she did
3
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https://digitalcollections.library.gvsu.edu/files/original/71f1a7948b65cf2efb96d4a65ffa8bb9.pdf
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Growing Community: Oceana’s Agricultural History Project
A project supported by a National Endowment for the Humanities Common Heritage Grant
Project Director: Melanie Shell-Weiss, GVSU Liberal Studies Department
Una comunidad que cultiva: El proyecto de la historia agrícola de Oceana
Entrevista de Diana Azereth Giles Mendez
Tiempo total – (17:35)
Entrevistado por Norma Gonzales Buenrostro, 17 Mai 2016
(Traducido al espaňol por Kassie O’Brien, May 2016)
Antecedentes
• Diana creció en Hart, Michigan
o Creció donde había las tiendas y el departamento de policía
• No está acostumbrada a la vida rural
• Los miembros de la comunidad conocen a los demás en un pequeño pueblo agrícola
Recuerdos vívidos de la niñez – (1:50)
• Diana conocía a los niños vecinos
o Se iban a la casa del otro y se preguntaban si querían jugar
Venir al condado de Oceana – (2:31)
• Su familia se mudó al condado de Oceana cerca de 2002 cuando Diana tenía cinco años
• Los padres de Diana eran trabajadores migrantes, y se les contrató para trabajar en la
agricultura de Oceana
• Su familia fue uno de los primeros hispanos que se estableció en el área
o Fue difícil asistir a la escuela
o Diana y sus padres no sabían inglés
Los padres de Diana – (3:55)
• Sus padres trabajaron en la agricultura
o Empezaron a recoger espárragos y duraznos
o Años después, trabajaron en las fábricas y en cadenas de montaje
o Luego su mamá fue técnica del laboratorio de la fábrica, y su papá consiguió
trabajo mejor en la fábrica también
1
�Growing Community: Oceana’s Agricultural History Project
A project supported by a National Endowment for the Humanities Common Heritage Grant
Project Director: Melanie Shell-Weiss, GVSU Liberal Studies Department
•
•
•
•
Mientras Diana crecía, iba al trabajo de sus padres porque no tenían niñera
o Iba a la escuela en autobús, y después regresaba y esperaba hasta que sus
padres terminaran de trabajar
o Su madre le decía que no quería que Diana hiciera ese tipo de trabajo
La ética laboral era muy importante a los padres de Diana
o Diana le preguntaba a su mamá cómo hacer las cosas para ayudarle, y su mamá
le enseñaba
Entonces, su familia no era rica y sus padres no ganaban suficiente dinero
o Cuando Diana tenía 9 años, empezó a trabajar con sus padres
o Diana y sus hermanos tuvieron la experiencia de trabajo laboral
o Eso le dio la motivación para asistir a la universidad y obtener educación superior
Diana aprecia lo que hicieron sus padres y ha aprendido a trabajar duro para alcanzar lo
que quiere
Su trabajo actual – (9:34)
• Actualmente Diana trabaja como agente sanitaria de la comunidad en una clínica para
trabajadores migrantes
• Estudia para ser enfermera y terapeuta respiratoria
• Lo que hace le da experiencia y mejor conocimiento médico
La agricultura en Oceana – (10:30)
• La agricultura es la industria más grande de Oceana y es lo que atrae a mucha gente al
área
• A veces es el único tipo de trabajo que algunas personas pueden encontrar, así vienen
allí
• También hay turismo
• Algunos migrantes llegan juntos y siempre ayudan a los otros migrantes
• Algunos agricultores y empleados tienen amistades íntimas
• Siempre hay trabajadores nuevos porque han oído que hay trabajo en Oceana
Pensamientos futuros – (13:00)
• Diana espera que su madre ya no tenga que hacer este tipo de trabajo porque a ella no
le gusta, y Diana quiere cuidarle
2
�Growing Community: Oceana’s Agricultural History Project
A project supported by a National Endowment for the Humanities Common Heritage Grant
Project Director: Melanie Shell-Weiss, GVSU Liberal Studies Department
•
•
•
•
A su padre le gusta mucho la agricultura
Diana desea que existan otras oportunidades en Oceana también
Muchas personas no entienden este tipo de trabajo físico porque nunca lo han hecho
Los hijos de Diana nunca entenderán la lucha que existe para los migrantes de primera
generación como ella
3
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https://digitalcollections.library.gvsu.edu/files/original/aa3d5d1199a2b95ff854311193acdb80.mp3
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Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Title
A name given to the resource
Oceana County Migrant Labor History Collection
Creator
An entity primarily responsible for making the resource
Shell-Weiss, Melanie
Description
An account of the resource
Collection contains images and documents digitized and collected through the project "Growing Community: A Century of Migration in Oceana County." This project was a collaboration between El Centro Hispano de Oceana, the Oceana County Historical and Genealogical Society, and Grand Valley State University funded by a Common Heritage grant from the United States National Endowment for the Humanities. The materials in this collection document the history of communities in Hart, Shelby, and Walkerville and explore themes of migration, labor, religion, family, belonging, national and cultural identities, regional, national, and international connections, and citizenship.
Coverage
The spatial or temporal topic of the resource, the spatial applicability of the resource, or the jurisdiction under which the resource is relevant
Oceana County (Mich.)
Source
A related resource from which the described resource is derived
Grand Valley State University. Kutsche Office of Local History
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
Grand Valley State University Libraries. Special Collections and University Archives
Contributor
An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource
El Centro Hispano de Oceana; Oceana County Historical and Genealogical Society
Relation
A related resource
Growing Community (NEH Common Heritage project)
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
DC-06
Format
The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource
application/pdf
image/jpeg
audio/mp3
Type
The nature or genre of the resource
Text
Image
Sound recording
Language
A language of the resource
eng
spa
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
2016
Subject
The topic of the resource
Oceana County (Mich.)
Hart (Mich.)
Shelby (Mich.)
Farms
Farmers
Migrant agricultural laborers
Hispanic Americans
Account books
Diaries
Oral history
Oral History
A resource containing historical information obtained in interviews with persons having firsthand knowledge.
Título
Spanish language Title entry
Giles, Diana (entrevista de audio y resumen)
Descripción
Spanish language Description entry
Entrevista de historia oral con Diana Giles. Entrevistada por Norma Gonzalez Buenrostro. Idioma en Inglés. Mayo 17, 2016. Diana creció en Hart, Michigan. Su familia se mudó al condado de Oceana en 2002 cuando Diana tenía cinco años. Sus padres eran trabajadores migrantes, y se les contrató para trabajar en la agricultura de Oceana. Su familia fue uno de los primeros hispanos que se estableció en el área. Sus padres tuvieron trabajos en los campos y en las fábricas allá. Cuando Diana tenía 9 años, empezó a trabajar con sus padres y tuvo la experiencia de trabajo laboral. Actualmente Diana trabaja como agente sanitaria en una clínica para trabajadores migrantes. Estudia para ser enfermera y terapeuta respiratoria.
Sujetos
Spanish language Subject terms
Migrante
Agricultura
Hispano
Inglés
Fábrica
Se estableció
Primera generación
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
DC-06_Giles_Mendez_Diana
Creator
An entity primarily responsible for making the resource
Giles, Diana
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
2016-05-17
Title
A name given to the resource
Giles, Diana (audio interview and summary)
Description
An account of the resource
Oral history interview with Diana Giles. Interviewed by Norma Gonzalez Buenrostro. English language recording. Summary in English and Spanish. May 17, 2016. Diana grew up in Hart, Michigan. Her family moved to Oceana County in 2002 when she was five years old. Her parents were migrant workers who were recruited to work in Oceana’s agriculture business. Diana and her family were the first Hispanics that settled in the area. Her parents had agricultural and factory jobs there. When Diana was 9 years old, she began working along with her parents, experiencing what it was like to do labor work. Diana is currently a community health worker at a migrant clinic. She is studying to be a nurse and a respiratory care therapist.
Contributor
An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource
Gonzalez Buenrostro, Norma (interviewer)
Shell-Weiss, Melanie (director)
Subject
The topic of the resource
Migrant
Agriculture
Hispanic
English
Factory
Settled
First generation
Source
A related resource from which the described resource is derived
Growing Community (NEH Common Heritage)
Rights
Information about rights held in and over the resource
<a href="http://rightsstatements.org/page/InC/1.0/?language=en">In Copyright</a>
Type
The nature or genre of the resource
Sound
Text
Format
The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource
audio/mp3
application/pdf
Language
A language of the resource
eng
spa
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
Grand Valley State University. University Libraries. Lemmen Library and Archives
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https://digitalcollections.library.gvsu.edu/files/original/3efda927628120a6bebd6213057b8688.mp4
a29ad08391a250f24c711d47ed78268d
https://digitalcollections.library.gvsu.edu/files/original/cfb15a8c1bbaf9dbc45854cdbc27f2ae.pdf
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Text
Grand Valley State University
Veterans History Project
Andrew Gill
(22:03)
Background Information (00:10)
Born May 9th 1966 in England. (00:10)
Served in the Royal Navy. (00:11)
His father served as a detective. He also has 1 brother and 1 sister. (00:43)
Since a child, Andrew always wanted to join the Royal Navy. (1:05)
He had no direct family in the military, however his father did work on submarines during World
War II.
When he joined the Navy he had just turned 18 (1984). (1:58)
Training (2:10)
After joining the Navy, Andrew was sent by train to Dartmouth, England, in September of 1984.
(2:11)
He passed out of the Naval College in December of 1985. (2:49)
He was somewhat prepared for military life as his interests prior to joining helped him prepare
and inform himself on the Navy practices. (3:10)
Andrew is still in contact with some of his friends he had met while in the Navy. (4:00)
He was given a chance to enter the German Naval College which was interesting to many of the
cadets. The training appeared to be very similar to the British Naval College. (4:31)
Service (5:18)
Andrew spent much time in the North and South Atlantic in 1988. (5:24)
He also served in the Pacific and Caribbean. (6:22)
Andrew also had a service where he sailed around the world. (6:40)
The Royal Navy worked with a U.S. aircraft carrier to enforce a no fly zone. (7:45)
Letters and mail was how the men contacted home. Depending on where the ship was mail
could take 1-4 weeks to get to its intended location. (8:21)
Near the end of his service men were aloud 1 ten minute phone call once a week via satellite
phone. (9:13)
End of Service (9:38)
Several weeks ahead of time, sailors tell family and friends that the ship will be coming into port.
Often times, there is a military band there to greet the sailors. (9:47)
Adjusting to civilian life was seen as very odd. One thing that was odd was the different
language Andrew required as a result of being in the Navy. (10:58)
It took time to adjust to the wife’s and kid’s routine. (11:40)
Moving to the U.S. (12:00)
�
He came to the U.S. in May of 2000. Andrew left the Royal Navy in April of 2000. (12:00)
His wife was American. This influenced him to move to the U.S. Military life was difficult with a
wife and children. (12:21)
He served 16 years in the Navy (1984-2000). (12:50)
He very much dislikes being late. (13:25)
Andrew is also a stickler for having a tidy room. He believes this is due to his military experience.
(14:23)
Life in the Navy (15:10)
At sea, Andrew was lucky enough to have his own cabin while at sea. This room consisted of a
pull out desk, a sink, and a bunk. (15:11)
Andrew’s main job was to steer the ship. He was a seaman officer and was a member of the
executive branch which ran navigation. (16:02)
He was also assigned a group of sailors that he was in charge of. (17:44)
Andrew was later made a warfare officer. This meant he was responsible for the ship’s battle
tactics. (18:26)
The sailors very much liked seeing different countries as a result of being in the Navy. Military
life also gave him appreciation of what he had at home. (19:00)
Early on in his service, he served in a NATO unit. He enjoyed seeing the many different cultures
as a result of this service. (20:27)
He believes that his time in the military was very useful and would encourage others to pursue
it. (21:14)
�
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Title
A name given to the resource
Veterans History Project
Creator
An entity primarily responsible for making the resource
Grand Valley State University. History Department
Description
An account of the resource
The Library of Congress established the Veterans History Project in 2001 to collect memories, accounts, and documents of U.S. war veterans from World War II and the Korean War, Vietnam War, and conflicts in the Middle East and elsewhere, and to preserve these stories for future generations. The GVSU History Department interviews are part of this work-in-progress, and may contain videos and audio recordings, transcripts and interview outlines, and related documents and photographs.
Coverage
The spatial or temporal topic of the resource, the spatial applicability of the resource, or the jurisdiction under which the resource is relevant
1914-
Rights
Information about rights held in and over the resource
<a href="http://rightsstatements.org/page/InC/1.0/?language=en">In Copyright</a>
Subject
The topic of the resource
Afghan War, 2001--Personal narratives, American
Iran Hostage Crisis, 1979-1981--Personal narratives, American
Korean War, 1950-1953--Personal narratives, American
Michigan--History, Military
Oral history
Persian Gulf War, 1991--Personal narratives, American
United States--History, Military
United States. Air Force
United States. Army
United States. Navy
Veterans
Video recordings
Vietnam War, 1961-1975--Personal narratives, American
World War, 1939-1945--Personal narratives, American
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
Grand Valley State University. University Libraries. Special Collections & University Archives
Contributor
An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource
Smither, James
Boring, Frank
Relation
A related resource
Veterans History Project (U.S.)
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
RHC-27
Language
A language of the resource
eng
Source
A related resource from which the described resource is derived
<a href="https://gvsu.lyrasistechnology.org/repositories/2/resources/455">Veterans History Project interviews (RHC-27)</a>
Oral History
A resource containing historical information obtained in interviews with persons having firsthand knowledge.
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Title
A name given to the resource
Gill, Andrew (Interview outline and video), 2012
Creator
An entity primarily responsible for making the resource
Gill, Andrew
Description
An account of the resource
Andrew Gill, Born May 9th 1966 in England, served in the Royal Navy from September of 1984-April of 2000. During his service, Andrew served on many cruises including one that evolved NATO operations as well as another that traveled around the world. His primary tasks included ship navigation as well as warfare tactics.
Contributor
An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource
Maczka, Lillian (Interviewer)
Subject
The topic of the resource
Oral history
Veterans History Project (U.S.)
United States--History, Military
Michigan--History, Military
Veterans
Video recordings
Persian Gulf War, 1991--Personal narratives, American
Persian Gulf War, 1991--Personal narratives, British
Other veterans & civilians--Personal narratives, American
Language
A language of the resource
eng
Rights
Information about rights held in and over the resource
<a href="http://rightsstatements.org/page/InC/1.0/?language=en">In Copyright</a>
Type
The nature or genre of the resource
Moving Image
Text
Relation
A related resource
Veterans History Project (U.S.)
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
2012-05-31
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
GillA1397V
Source
A related resource from which the described resource is derived
<a href="https://gvsu.lyrasistechnology.org/repositories/2/resources/455">Veterans History Project Collection, (RHC-27)</a>
Format
The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource
application/pdf
video/mp4
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
Grand Valley State University. University Libraries. Lemmen Library and Archives
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https://digitalcollections.library.gvsu.edu/files/original/06b7c5a031999e48c2321bbcda347223.mp4
6d063be20723141f03f6c1e75505163f
https://digitalcollections.library.gvsu.edu/files/original/bff40ea1645af1665fb5bb22dd5a9b1b.pdf
35c3260600c73fe85ed82a8f7c197e03
PDF Text
Text
Grand Valley State University
Veterans History Project Interview
Name of War: World War II
Interviewee name: Ray Vincent Gill
Length of Interview: 1hr. 22 minutes
Pre-Enlistment (00:13)
•
Childhood (00:17)
o Raymond Vincent Gill was born into an immigrant family in 1926, the first of
their children to be born in America. His father, a former British Navy man, upon
arriving took a job working at a steel mill near Cleveland, Ohio at about the time
of his birth. (00:52)
•
Education (00:56)
o The place he grew up was a melting pot of diverse cultures. He describes his early
childhood years briefly while attending school. (01:18)
o The four junior colleges in the area where he grew up were divided based on
ethnicity while there was one high school in his town. (02:17)
o Describes the town he grew up in and various high school activities he was a part
of. (03:12)
o First heard about Pearl Harbor after going to a band concert with a few buddies
from the parking attendant who told them of the event. (04:11) Briefly describes
his reaction to the attack. (05:01)
o While still in high school, at the age of 17, he relates how government recruiters
came to his school and administered a round of tests to students with the purpose
of selecting those that passed for the Army Specialized Training Program. (06:02)
o Education/Training in Army Specialized Training Program (06:11)
Where he went and who he trained with (06:16)
•
Sufficed to say he passed and was soon sent to Purdue University
where he briefly describes what classes he took and what type of
military tactics they learned there. Was there for 16 weeks with no
time for entertainment. (06:33)
•
Living Conditions during basic training (06:40)
�o Training to become a mechanical engineer, the basic
training was tough. Because the Normandy Invasion
fighting was getting tougher the army program was broken
up/ For Gill this meant that because he was 17 when he
joined the program that the army could not touch him until
he turned 18 to sign up for active duty. (09:34)
o After completing about six credits of college courses he
dropped out because he was needed at home. His mother
did not think he needed college because she considered it a
waste of time and that family was more important. (10:31)
Enlistment/Basic Training (10:58)
•
Where he went and what company he served with (11:05)
o Was sent to Fort Benjamin Harrison, Indiana where he was inducted. Ran through
a round of tests which he passed before moving on to basic training. (11:20)
o Spent 17 weeks at Camp Wheeler, Georgia near Macon during the summer and
fall months. Briefly describes what the layout of the camp was like and mentions
where some of the people he lived within the barracks came from. (11:40)
o Describes his instructors in some detail. In addition, he mentions what he was
taught and also having an experience with one of his instructors later on after the
war. (12:50)
o Following basic training, he went home for a short time to visit family.
Afterwards, he reported to the 76th Division at Camp McCoy, Wisconsin. (15:59)
While here he briefly describes his cadre training. Briefly describes what it
was like to run military maneuvers in the snow was like. (17:05)
Was soon told that his whole cadre division was soon to leave for Europe.
(18:12) As time went by the Army developed a new type of combat boot
for the infantry to wear. (18:33)
Briefly goes into his training to become a 1st scout rifleman in the first
squad of the 76th Division. (19:46)
Active Duty (20:40)
•
Campaign Background (20:56)
�o Left from Camp Myles Standish in Massachusetts aboard a special troop transport
the morning after he had taken a train from the place he had been training
previously. (21:10) Left the U.S. for Europe in November 1944 for Europe. Had
graduated high school the previous January 1944. (21:50)
o Left aboard the SS Sea Owl in a convoy of 42 ships. (22:10) On his trip overseas
his convoy was approached by German U-boats upon which they dropped many
depth charges to scare them off. Describes living conditions while aboard in some
detail. (23:03)
o Their destination supposedly France turned out to be instead a trip to Portsmouth,
England and then by night to Bournemouth, England a resort town. (24:54) While
there returning veterans already in combat would come to them with stories with
action from the front. (25:27)
•
Living conditions in England (25:50)
o While stationed in England, Gill mentions that he spent much of his time
practicing his saxophone and performing with an army band at various clubs in
the area. The band he was a part of was a dance band which played for 30 solid
nights for the army troops in the area. (26:25)
o Was asked on several occasions he wanted to be promoted to sergeant which he
refused b/c it would take him away from the 13-man band he was a part of.
(28:10)
o On one instance, after obtaining permission from his chaplain he took a train to
visit some relatives living in England. While on the train he mentions a story of
meeting a tweet couple in his train compartment. He mentions that wherever he
traveled that he had been given special orders to keep quiet about his duties and to
remove any unit designations for fear they might be discovered by spies.
Interestingly enough also aboard with him were six British sailors who he
describes in some detail. (29:45)
•
France (33:01)
o Soon afterwards he was deferred back to a rifleman and then went by ship to Le
Havre, France which the Germans had destroyed. The buildings he saw had been
reduced to rumble and mention that he was awed by the devastation. By this time
the Allies were continuing to move towards Germany by truck when possible.
(33:55)
o During winter 1944 Gill describes briefly what camping conditions were like in
the harsh weather conditions as his unit moved towards the Bulge. (34:42)
�o Was part of the group in February 1945 that helped to push the Germans back into
Germany. (35:51)
o Mentions one instance in some detail of an encounter of the Allies and Germans
exchanging shell fire over a particular river which he didn’t remember. While this
occurred, men were not allowed to make fires and so they dug deep pits to try to
keep warm. The greatest danger American soldiers like him faced was frostbite.
(37:11)
o During one instance while on patrol and dressed in camouflage clothing he moved
by night to an observation tower to observe German movements. To communicate
their positions they used signals to keep in contact with each other. (38:51)
•
Movement towards Luxembourg (40:50)
o
Gill mentions as they proceeded towards the Sauer River region to town called
Echternach, Luxembourg where near there his regiment the 417D was assigned to
build a bridge across the river since all the previous bridges in the area had been
blown up by the Nazis. The building of this pontoon bridge cost many men
frostbite. (41:40)
o His regiment the 385th with the aid of the 304th Regiment and the 317th Regiment
attempted to make the river crossing. (42:17)
o About the time of the Sauer River crossing, Gill mentions that the river was at
flood stage and was flowing very fast. The crossing of the pontoon bridge very
difficult being that they were being fired on by German machine guns and
German heavy artillery. The 417th eventually made the crossing and sustained
80% causalities and was never as effective after that. (43:12)
o Upon crossing the Sauer River the Allies ran into the Siegfried Line and there was
heavy fighting that occurred. One would usually have to jump over a dead body
as they crossed the river and on the other side the Allied units regrouped. (44:17)
o Upon approaching the Siegfried Line demolition engineers made a path through
the tank traps for the tanks to make their way to the front. Gill describes what the
German line composed of. They went through the line 3 times before the way was
clear for tanks to penetrate. (45:20)
o Inside the Siegfried Line the terrain was bumpy and was dotted with machine gun
nests, artillery emplacements, and mortars. Scouts like him were responsible for
identifying artillery placements. The fighting along the line was very savage.
(46:57)
�
Often the PFCs and even the officers didn’t know where they were going.
Causality rates were very high. (48:34) From January to May his regiment
went through 9 different regiment commanders because the other ones
were either killed or wounded. Eventually the line was overrun. (49:20)
When it was overrun, Allied infantry men had to navigate the maze of
concrete pill boxes and destroy them with flamethrowers. As the war
progressed a tank artillery was developed to deal with pillboxes. (50:02)
During one instance, Gill had to crawl over a little stream and then move
towards a few pillboxes. He and his unit were pinned down for several
hours. It was cold and muddy that day. (52:41) A friend of his, Vincent
Lamberto, charged the German position and sprayed the pillbox with
bullets. His action led to the Germans surrender at that specific pillbox.
(53:51) His friend then cracked because he had lost a sense of reality.
(55:03)
Describes in some detail the thousands of Allied soldiers marching in
columns of twos along the road with the armor usually taking the lead and
battling German tanks. On one occasion, when they came to a town the
Germans were ready for them. Gill would go into town and then report
back that he was getting shot at and Allied tanks would be dispatched to
that area. (56:27)
Usually what happened was that the Germans would let the scouts go
through and then when the rest of the column came up they would fire on
them. As the war continued, the Germans realized they were losing and
mass desertions followed. As the number of German officers decreased,
German soldiers more and more didn’t know what to do whereas
American soldiers and officers were taught to improvise. (59:10)
•
Briefly describes the pattern of town-taking and where once prisoners were taken what
they did with their prisoners. (1:00:20)
•
On one occasion, he and a few other scouts were approaching an empty farm building
and realized there was a German machine gun nest right there. The Germans positioned
there immediately surrendered. The ammo man was a 14 year old kid. (1:00:52)
•
Germany (1:01:21)
o In Germany, an organization called the Volkssturm served as the defense of towns
in the area. Women acted as supporting roles. (1:01:25)
�o In towns where the Gestapo or SS were there was heavy fighting where otherwise
there would just be sporadic fighting. (1:02:37) In other places, ordinary folks
surrendered or fled to the next own. As they moved along, Allied soldiers rounded
up all the firearms. (1:03:34)
o As they moved further into Germany’s depths, especially in the country where
many Germans were just farmers didn’t want any part of the war and surrendered.
(1:04:46)
o Near the Czech border, Gill mentions that they dug foxholes in anticipation of
meeting the Russians who came in with their wives [?] singing and dancing.
(1:05:52) Upon meeting them, many Russians traded weapons with the
Americans. The Russians, Gill mentions, lived off the land with no regard to
German welfare whatsoever. (1:06:50)
o The Allied Army was then given orders from the “Big Three” from the Yalta
Conference that Germany was to be divided up into military zones. (1:07:45)
o Gill mentions that the land they had just fought so hard to free from the Nazis was
to become part of the Russian military zone. Gill shares his thoughts on this issue.
(1:08:30)
o With the end of the war in sight, many Germans tried to surrender to U.S. soldiers
but were turned around and ordered to surrender to Russian forces that then
pillaged and raped many German women because of the previous treatment of the
Nazis during their invasion of Russia. (1:09:21)
o Gill mentions that he was standing in a foxhole with water up to his calves on VE
Day when he was ordered to report to service company headquarters to report to
the regiment dance band. (1:10:25) He was then sent to the rear where he found
out that he had combat fatigue and here again was asked if he wanted to be a
sergeant upon which he refused. (1:11:48)
•
Battle for the Rhine (1:12:17)
o Gill briefly backs up and describes what conditions had been like for the four
month period that he had been trudging towards Germany with only two showers.
(1:14:00)
•
Germany’s Occupation (1:14:37)
o Gill and other Allied soldiers tried to reestablish some German political order
while maintaining its towns also. (1:14:52)
�o Sometimes, his dance band would go around and play for captured laborers who
had been enslaved by the Nazis from other countries. They did this until their
division was disbanded. (1:15:35)
o Mentions that with only 42 points he was sent back to France with a traveling
show which traveled around Europe while all the while accumulating discharge
points. Was then discharged in May 1946. (1:16:38)
o At about the time the war in Europe ended he was sent to France where he was
stationed in Compiegne, France waiting to be shipped to Japan. Was near a depot
station when the war officially ended. (1:18:17)
o While touring through one town he auditioned with another band and got in and
stayed on in Europe later on. Upon being discharged the next day, he received
separate orders to join the Dixieland Band in Compiegne. (1:19:20)
o Stayed on in France after he was discharged and joined a traveling soldiers band
touring Europe for a while before going home. (1:20:32)
o Wraps up by mentioning that he had more stories he could tell for a later time.
(1:21:33)
�
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Title
A name given to the resource
Veterans History Project
Creator
An entity primarily responsible for making the resource
Grand Valley State University. History Department
Description
An account of the resource
The Library of Congress established the Veterans History Project in 2001 to collect memories, accounts, and documents of U.S. war veterans from World War II and the Korean War, Vietnam War, and conflicts in the Middle East and elsewhere, and to preserve these stories for future generations. The GVSU History Department interviews are part of this work-in-progress, and may contain videos and audio recordings, transcripts and interview outlines, and related documents and photographs.
Coverage
The spatial or temporal topic of the resource, the spatial applicability of the resource, or the jurisdiction under which the resource is relevant
1914-
Rights
Information about rights held in and over the resource
<a href="http://rightsstatements.org/page/InC/1.0/?language=en">In Copyright</a>
Subject
The topic of the resource
Afghan War, 2001--Personal narratives, American
Iran Hostage Crisis, 1979-1981--Personal narratives, American
Korean War, 1950-1953--Personal narratives, American
Michigan--History, Military
Oral history
Persian Gulf War, 1991--Personal narratives, American
United States--History, Military
United States. Air Force
United States. Army
United States. Navy
Veterans
Video recordings
Vietnam War, 1961-1975--Personal narratives, American
World War, 1939-1945--Personal narratives, American
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
Grand Valley State University. University Libraries. Special Collections & University Archives
Contributor
An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource
Smither, James
Boring, Frank
Relation
A related resource
Veterans History Project (U.S.)
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
RHC-27
Language
A language of the resource
eng
Source
A related resource from which the described resource is derived
<a href="https://gvsu.lyrasistechnology.org/repositories/2/resources/455">Veterans History Project interviews (RHC-27)</a>
Oral History
A resource containing historical information obtained in interviews with persons having firsthand knowledge.
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Title
A name given to the resource
Gill, Raymond (Interview outline and video), 2004
Creator
An entity primarily responsible for making the resource
Gill, Raymond
Description
An account of the resource
Ray Gill is a World War II veteran who served with the U.S. Army from 1941 to May 1946. In this account, Gill discusses his pre-enlistment, enlistment and basic training. He also discusses his active duty and how difficult the fighting was in France, Luxembourg, and Germany. He talks about soldiers living conditions, and the occupation of Germany. Gill also toured with a dance band throughout Europe.
Contributor
An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource
Boring, Frank (Interviewer)
Michigan Military Preservation Society (Grand Rapids, Mich.)
Subject
The topic of the resource
Oral history
Veterans History Project (U.S.)
United States--History, Military
Michigan--History, Military
Veterans
Video recordings
United States. Army
World War, 1939-1945--Personal narratives, American
Language
A language of the resource
eng
Rights
Information about rights held in and over the resource
<a href="http://rightsstatements.org/page/InC/1.0/?language=en">In Copyright</a>
Type
The nature or genre of the resource
Moving Image
Text
Relation
A related resource
Veterans History Project (U.S.)
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
2004-06-26
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
GillR
Source
A related resource from which the described resource is derived
<a href="https://gvsu.lyrasistechnology.org/repositories/2/resources/455">Veterans History Project Collection, (RHC-27)</a>
Format
The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource
application/pdf
video/mp4
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
Grand Valley State University. University Libraries. Lemmen Library and Archives
-
https://digitalcollections.library.gvsu.edu/files/original/d41ebe88106ea411e4e3c946e58ac2e7.mp4
fa16394d3c3c71ee97a2a46984315a07
https://digitalcollections.library.gvsu.edu/files/original/f7c61eee54520c3f73f8afc31730bd7c.pdf
721380d39739f6ecb13df8b0f4deb865
PDF Text
Text
Grand Valley State University
Veterans History Project
Richard Gillard
(01:35:00)
Pre-Enlistment (00:21)
•
Childhood (00:23)
•
•
•
•
Gillard was born in Muskegon, MI on March 14th, 1919.
Family (00:50)
•
Gillard’s father was a salesman for E.M. Shelving Company while his
mother was a house wife who was the first female bank clerk in
Muskegon. (00:56)
•
Gillard’s father served in the 39th ‘Polar Bear’ Division in Russia
about the time Richard was born. (00:56)
Education (01:42)
•
Graduated Muskegon High School in 1937. (01:46)
•
Went to Muskegon Community for 2 years and then attended the
University of Michigan where he studied dentistry. While in school he
found he wasn’t cut out for dentistry so he dropped. (01:52)
Job (02:22)
•
Soon afterwards, Gillard worked for Charlotte Walker Inc. He
describes his primary responsibilities there.
Enlistment/Training (02:50)
•
•
Influences (03:30)
•
When Pearl Harbor was attacked Gillard like many young men rushed
to enlist because he felt it was his patriotic duty to serve his country.
(03:31)
•
Gillard was drafted on July 6th 1942 upon which he went to Fort
Custer, MI
Relevant info regarding the service (04:11)
�•
•
•
While at Fort Custer he describes some of the odd jobs he did while
there
•
From there he went to Jefferson Barracks, Missouri for army induction
and gunnery training. (04:19)
•
He describes briefly the weather conditions there, what life was like in
the Jefferson Barracks, and the men he served with. (04:56)
Daily/Work conditions (05:57)
•
Briefly describes what he did in basic training. (06:44)
•
After basic training he was transferred to Fort Lowry outside of
Denver where he underwent air corps training, bomb loading, and
training in 50-caliber machine guns. (06:34)
•
Afterwards, he was transferred to St. Louis where he went to powerturret school to learn about aircraft maintenance. (08:50) While there
he received training in the functioning and maintenance of power
turrets aboard B-24s. (10:01)
•
After graduating power-turret school went by train to Salt Lake City,
Utah for advanced training. (10:48)
•
Went to California from there for more training. (11:23) Briefly
describes his feelings as he disembarked from Stockton, CA on
Valentine’s Day 1943, and the largest American-passenger ship of
10,000 people aboard. (13:39) Describes his time aboard the troop ship
briefly. (14:18)
Shipping out (15:37)
•
Briefly mentions his time aboard the ship and trip across the Pacific
with no convoy support doing nothing more than a zigzag course.
Gillard mentions that troops were dropped off first at Wellington, New
Zealand, and then at Melbourne, Australia. (15:52)
•
Gillard briefly backs up and highlights a few instances with MPs.
(16:31)
•
From Melbourne, Australia, Gillard’s next stop was Bombay, India
where he had his first encounter seeing beggars on the street. (19:26)
Stayed there for a few days.
�•
Briefly describes his time in Egypt and his visits to Cairo, Alexandria,
and the pyramids. (22:29)
Active Duty (22:40)
•
Battles/campaigns/activities (22:41)
•
•
North Africa (22:42)
As Gillard was visiting these Egyptian sights the Germans and
English were fighting the Battle of El Alamein. Gillard
describes his feelings as he traveled towards Tunisia.(22:58)
Along the way he remembers seeing wrecked jeeps and tanks.
(23:16)
From there he reported to an airfield just south of Benghazi,
Libya. (23:47)
Gillard describes one encounter there where he loaded tubs of
machine guns, mortars, belts of ammo, and bombs. His
superiors then would often times just toggle the switches on
these bombs. He describes his feelings about that. (24:23)
Gillard’s company was attached to the British 8th Army and
their job was to service bomber planes. (25:39) At about this
time, bombers flew long-range low level bombing runs over
Europe. He was based in North Africa for 4 months before
being transferred to Italy. (27:17)
Palestine (27:40)
On one occasion, Gillard describes going on a supply run to
Palestine to pick up supplies for troops in Tunisia. (27:48)
While they were there they were told that German paratroopers
had made a dead drop onto their home base. (28:33)
Tells of how he spent a whole week in Palestine visiting
Jerusalem and Bethlehem. Further elaborates on a time when
one of his friend’s on sentry duty killed a bunch of goats that
he mistook for Germans. (29:08)
In another encounter, Gillard elaborates on how British gurkha
troops dealt with German paratroopers by the fact that they
�used swords and daggers and how the Germans felt about
them. (30:07)
•
Daily/Working conditions –
•
In Palestine (30:28)
•
In North Africa (33:07)
•
Briefly elaborates on the daily routine and responsibilities that
he conducted. (34:41)
Battles/campaigns/activities continued… (36:36)
•
•
During his brief stay in Palestine, Gillard met an Arab girl who
he briefly elaborates on in some detail. Also mentions that had
the Arabs known he was with her she would have been
resented in their eyes. (30:54) Briefly describes the atmosphere
of the people there.
North Africa (36:36)
Gillard also mentions that they never had any power turret
maintenance problems. (36:38)
Summer 1943 Gillard was transferred to Tunisia to a city called
Sfax. (37:16) For about a week there the weather was rainy and
nothing but muddy and wet on the ground for planes to take
off. (38:15)He spent much of his time with a local teacher
visiting Tunis and the ancient sites there. (40:08)
From Tunis, they ran bombing missions into Austria. (40:33)
On Thanksgiving 1943 Gillard boarded a liberty ship bound for
Italy. (41:27)
Gillard goes back and discusses what desert conditions were
like under perimeter tents in the Libyan Desert and an
experience with locusts. (1:01:40)
Daily life/working conditions –
•
Italy (41:57)
Landing at Brindisi, Italy, they went on to capture an airfield
near Lecce, which from there they conducted bombing
�missions into Germany, Rome, and Monte Cassino. (42:35)
Took a lot of men and time to destroy Monte Cassino because
bombing runs weren’t done below 20,000 feet when bombing
factories. (43:50)
•
Didn’t fly many missions to support the troops. (44:16)
Describes briefly his visits to Rome and his audience with the
Pope. (45:06)
Gillard describes how friendly the Italians living outside his
base were. Also mentions in some detail an encounter with an
Italian outside the base. (47:07)
While stationed at his base (47:53) Gillard was a secretary
performing duties such as typing various other things. Also
mentions meeting a certain Douglas Duffy who he had a
correspondence with for several years. (48:49)
Battles/campaigns continued
•
Description of bomber missions (50:18)
Gillard mentions that bombers almost always had fighter
escorts. In early bombing runs the lead bombers would have to
stall briefly so as to let the other bombers lifting off get into
formation. Bombers would then fly alone until they reached the
border of enemy territory where they would be joined by
fighter escorts. Overtime, plane fighting evolved so much that
Mustangs eventually came on the scene. (51:53)
Briefly discusses bombing missions conducted in Yugoslavia.
(53:34)
Gillard mentions that in one instance that a B-24 pilot returned
with just 2 engines even though this was not ordinarily the case
the pilot was able to land the plane. (55:24)
Gillard mentions that his base eventually resorted to having
soldiers on 12-hour guard duty of aircraft because of previous
sabotage. (56:38)
Gillard notes that group HQ found out that many air-force
officers had previously come out of civilian life and joined the
service. (59:05)
�•
•
Other activities in Italy (1:06:44)
•
While working at HQ’s office in Lecce, Italy Gillard mentions being
involved with reconnaissance. He mentions that he helped to organize
social events for the locals. (1:04:55) He also discusses a peculiar
instance with an Italian baroness and her daughter. (1:06:08)
•
Also mentions that they continued their bombing campaigns
throughout Austria, Germany, parts of Romania, Bulgaria, and
Yugoslavia. Their focus was in bombing the ball-bearing factories in
those areas. (1:10:14)
•
June 1944 Gillard paid another visit to Rome. Describes his personal
thoughts of its people and his trips throughout Italy to his wife.
(1:11:29)
•
As American and Russian forces pushed on into Germany bombing
missions became less and less. (1:12:39)
•
On May 6th 1945 they were marched down to the docks ready to
leave. Wasn’t there for the celebrations that happened on VE-day.
(1:13:36)
•
Had just passed through the Straits of Gibraltar on May 8th when news
reached them that the Germans had surrendered. (1:13:47) Briefly
discusses the excitement the soldiers felt when FDR died because he
was such a good president. (1:15:42)
•
Gillard briefly describes a few instances in which soldiers brought
local girls to bed with them (1:16:32) and that no disciplinary actions
were taken.
Activities in United States (1:19:34)
•
Landed in Hampton Roads, VA. Upon arriving back in the states they
were given 2 weeks leave. During that time Gillard took a train to
Muskegon and spent his 2 weeks there. (1:20:03)
•
Upon getting back, he went to Sioux Falls, South Dakota to
supposedly reorganize the B-29s to go the Pacific. Wasn’t there long
since news came that Japan surrendered in August 1945. (1:20:36)
•
Spent a month in Sioux Falls organizing discharges for soldiers who
had less points then he did to get out. (1:21:37) Gillard had
accumulated 140 points.
�•
Discharge, why he left (1:22:14)
•
Gillard was discharged around September [8th/9th] because he had
accumulated the necessary points to leave.
After the service (1:22:20)
• Adjusting to home (1:22:36)
•
After being discharged, Gillard took a train for Chicago and reported
to Fort Sheridan and then was able to make it back in time to reenroll
into the University of Michigan. Graduating from there with a major in
History and Political Science he got a job selling insurance. Discusses
his personal thoughts. (1:23:10)
•
Discusses other career directions that he took and how he met his wife.
(1:24:35)
•
Wraps up by mentioning that his military service helped him to grasp a
better awareness of the world and how blessed he was at being
uninjured during the war. (1:28:02)
�
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Title
A name given to the resource
Veterans History Project
Creator
An entity primarily responsible for making the resource
Grand Valley State University. History Department
Description
An account of the resource
The Library of Congress established the Veterans History Project in 2001 to collect memories, accounts, and documents of U.S. war veterans from World War II and the Korean War, Vietnam War, and conflicts in the Middle East and elsewhere, and to preserve these stories for future generations. The GVSU History Department interviews are part of this work-in-progress, and may contain videos and audio recordings, transcripts and interview outlines, and related documents and photographs.
Coverage
The spatial or temporal topic of the resource, the spatial applicability of the resource, or the jurisdiction under which the resource is relevant
1914-
Rights
Information about rights held in and over the resource
<a href="http://rightsstatements.org/page/InC/1.0/?language=en">In Copyright</a>
Subject
The topic of the resource
Afghan War, 2001--Personal narratives, American
Iran Hostage Crisis, 1979-1981--Personal narratives, American
Korean War, 1950-1953--Personal narratives, American
Michigan--History, Military
Oral history
Persian Gulf War, 1991--Personal narratives, American
United States--History, Military
United States. Air Force
United States. Army
United States. Navy
Veterans
Video recordings
Vietnam War, 1961-1975--Personal narratives, American
World War, 1939-1945--Personal narratives, American
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
Grand Valley State University. University Libraries. Special Collections & University Archives
Contributor
An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource
Smither, James
Boring, Frank
Relation
A related resource
Veterans History Project (U.S.)
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
RHC-27
Language
A language of the resource
eng
Source
A related resource from which the described resource is derived
<a href="https://gvsu.lyrasistechnology.org/repositories/2/resources/455">Veterans History Project interviews (RHC-27)</a>
Oral History
A resource containing historical information obtained in interviews with persons having firsthand knowledge.
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Title
A name given to the resource
Gillard, Richard (Interview outline and video), 2008
Creator
An entity primarily responsible for making the resource
Gillard, Richard
Description
An account of the resource
Richard Gillard served in the U.S. Army Air Corps from June 1942 to September 1945 during World War II. In this account, Gillard discusses his pre-enlistment, enlistment and training and his combat experience abroad in North Africa and Italy. Gillard mentions aspects of war not generally discussed such as bombing missions conducted into Yugoslavia, Romania, and Germany and the maintenance aspects of B-24s. Gillard concludes with his life after the war and his thoughts on service in the army.
Contributor
An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource
Smither, James (Interviewer)
Subject
The topic of the resource
Oral history
Veterans History Project (U.S.)
United States--History, Military
Michigan--History, Military
Veterans
United States. Army. Air Corps
World War, 1939-1945--Personal narratives, American
Video recordings
Language
A language of the resource
eng
Rights
Information about rights held in and over the resource
<a href="http://rightsstatements.org/page/InC/1.0/?language=en">In Copyright</a>
Type
The nature or genre of the resource
Moving Image
Text
Relation
A related resource
Veterans History Project (U.S.)
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
2008-04-29
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
GillardR
Source
A related resource from which the described resource is derived
<a href="https://gvsu.lyrasistechnology.org/repositories/2/resources/455">Veterans History Project Collection, (RHC-27)</a>
Format
The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource
application/pdf
video/mp4
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
Grand Valley State University. University Libraries. Lemmen Library and Archives
-
https://digitalcollections.library.gvsu.edu/files/original/b782aa1d207025128b6cae333a4e7ca7.mp4
de816569e26ae7d3df60fba051a5b0bc
https://digitalcollections.library.gvsu.edu/files/original/466812f1eb1a9536bdda7dfb598a5bf0.pdf
ab49d5eeb9ca173ba646973f820cce5f
PDF Text
Text
Grand Valley State University
Veterans History Project Interview
Denny Gillem
Vietnam War
Total Time: 2:47:00
Childhood and Pre-Enlistment (00:00:00)
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
Born June 4th 1941 in Sacramento, California.
Father was an architect.
Attended Catholic School.
Took ROTC in High School. Intended during this time to become part of the
military and hopefully get into West Point.
Was also in the Boy Scouts during his childhood.
Applied to West Point but did not get in on the first try.
After this, attended a junior college in California and then enrolled at a Military
Junior College in New Mexico at age 19.
On the third try, was accepted into West Point after his Congressman’s
appointment dropped out.
Was accepted in the middle of June and classes began in July.
West Point (00:11:45)
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
Was told where to be on what day, he showed up and was greeted in a very rough
way. Was screamed at and harassed by the older cadets on the first day.
The Cadet officer in charge wore a red sash and he gave orders on day one.
He was first issued standard sweats and then was issued his uniform after the fact.
Very few of the Cadets, other than him, had any military experience.
(00:19:15) For initiation, he was marched to Trophy Point. Each barracks had a
Upperclassman Squad Leader and they led them on this march. Each barracks had
around 120 people and there were around 800 men total in his class.
He described the different names for the different class levels. For instance, a
Plebe is a freshman, and a Firsty is a senior. Also, Beast Barracks was the
nickname for barracks for the newest guys at the school.
(00:24:58) A typical day began with the Cadets waking themselves up and going
to Reveille formation, and then the Cadets made their beds for inspection. After
that, they went to breakfast. Food was served family style on platters. Breakfast
was an opportunity for Upperclassmen to pick on Plebes. Much of the day’s
activities consisted of physical training and some class work.
On some days, the Cadets would camp. They would march or be trucked to the
site.
There were ways that underclassmen could get back at upperclassmen.
After the summer, the recruits were placed in new barracks with some upper
classmen
�•
•
•
•
•
Jobs for the Plebes were rotated between different positions between their
barracks.
His class had a 20% heavier work load then other classes.
Work consisted of Mathematics, History, and Foreign Language among others.
At times, Plebes were made to entertain the other classes at dinner.
(00:40:05) Decided that Infantry was his first choice once he graduated.
Training (00:41:00)
•
•
•
•
•
•
Moved on to Fort Benning, Georgia after West Point.
(00:41:50) Attended Ranger School. At the point in history when he served, the
Rangers did not have special dedicated units. They just completed specialist
training and then went into regular infantry units.
Generally did not see any significantly different treatment from any of the people
he met.
Became a rifle platoon leader in a mechanized unit.
(00:50:15) Graduated Ranger School in December 1964 and Reported to duty in
January 1965.
In June 1965 requested to serve in Vietnam, but his request was denied as there
were only Advisors there at the time.
Active Duty (00:53:30)
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
After he was approved for Active Duty, he reported to Travis Air Force Base and
flew to Vietnam. Remembers being fearful during the flight. Remembers how hot
and humid it was when he got off the plane.
(00:55:45) Stayed overnight at the base, and was then shipped out to the 2nd
Brigade 1st Infantry Division as a replacement. Joined the platoon in the middle of
an operation that they had been on for a week. This was the only time in the war
he had ever been in a platoon that had the proper ranking structure.
(00:57:55) Recalls at one point that he was told to set up an ambush at a location
that didn’t exist, and so he made his own revisions to the mission. A month later,
he was told to ambush the same position and he remembers being very angry
about this. This was his first exposure to the difficulties of the army.
He was given no specific instructions on how to deal with the enemy.
Missions were called ‘Search and Destroy’ missions to find Vietcong and kill
them.
The only way that one could see the enemy in the jungle was in a crawl position
and often they were simply firing at the noises they heard.
During this time, the platoons would go out into the jungle for several days and
then they would go back to base camp for several days and then back out again.
(01:08:00) He recalls one particular instance of North Vietnamese atrocities
which occurred during his second tour of duty. He fought into a village outside
the city of Hue. Several men, women, and children were machine gunned just
minutes before they arrived.
�•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
(01:09:10) Had some training on booby traps in Vietnam, but had no other
training before he arrived.
Only lost one soldier in his first tour.
When he was there, he had a sense that he was winning because they never lost a
fight.
Didn’t get much news from home. His fiancé wrote him daily and his parents
wrote him weekly, but other than that he was pretty ignorant to what was going on
at home.
(01:16:50) All of his men were enlistees and thus they were better soldiers as a
general rule.
Six months into his tour he was transferred to be an Aide de Camp to a One Star
General named General Hollingsworth. The general was kind for the first month
but became very tough the last 5 months.
Did not hold reporters in high esteem. Most of the reporters were there for a story.
(01:28:50) Had some contact with the South Vietnamese and for the most part he
liked them.
(01:32:45) Had some interaction with the local population. Held an amount of
respect for the people of Vietnam. He did some shopping in the local areas,
including Saigon.
Recalls one episode where he almost had to work with a smuggler to get beer for
the generals at his camp. However, he did not have to in the end.
(01:44:00) Was hurt during his second tour of duty, and he was replaced as
commander of a rifle company. He went to division HQ from there.
(01:47:05) He recalls when he was at Division HQ that he was required to do a
complete recount of the enemy casualty figures given while the previous general
was in charge. Through the recount they figured out that the initial numbers were
inflated by around 3 to 1.
(01:52:35) Worked in the Operations Center after the recount. This was the
control center for operations in the vicinity. He worked the night shift. Came to
Division HQ in March 1968. There were daily briefings which let the Operations
Center know what was to happen each day.
(01:55:40) The Operations Center occasionally worked with the South
Vietnamese. US commanders worked with South Vietnamese units through South
Vietnamese command centers.
Their brigade was sent to the North near the DMZ with the 101st Airborne
Division to reinforce the Marines in I Corps.
Was aware of the Anti-War movement in the US, and did not like the reaction of
the public.
(02:03:00) By the time he was rotated home, I Corps was in charge of cleaning up
after the Tet Offensive.
(02:07:30) He had the choice to do another tour in Vietnam but he did not because
he wanted to get home to his wife. While in his second tour he was promoted to
Major and he was also selected to go to the Army Officer Advanced Course at
Fort Knox, Kentucky. This is an academic-style training regimen by which tactics
and logistics were taught.
�•
•
•
•
•
•
(02:11:51) After Army Officer Advanced Course, got an offer from West Point to
teach and an offer for graduate school from University of Texas-El Paso to major
in Political Science and International Relations. He decided to go to graduate
school. Got his masters degree. The Army required a utilization tour for those
who had earned their graduate degrees on Army money, so after graduating he
was sent to the ROTC department at Stanford. Also worked on his second
graduate degree at Stanford.
(02:20:30) After his time at Stanford, he attended the Armed Forces Staff College
in Norfolk, Virginia and then was placed as second in command of the
Mechanized Infantry Battalion in Germany. This was the 26th Infantry Battalion.
He was assigned as the Operations Officer and was then promoted to Executive
Officer of the Battalion, which was his title for most of 3 years he was there.
There was a lot of international training during his time there. Was in Germany
during the mid-1970s.
NOTE : 14 SECOND ERROR IN DISC
(02:29:48) At the end of his tour in Germany, he was Assigned to the US
Readiness Command in Tampa, Florida, and he worked as a Joint Planner in the
Planning Section of the Command. He was initially responsible for the plan for
general war in Europe and the backup plan for war in the Middle East. He was
then rotated to the position responsible for the plan for war in the Middle East.
The command was responsible for sending troops to combat zones in case of the
war, so he had to keep track of where units were in the US and abroad. This was a
top secret assignment. Was in this position for 4 years. They wrote what became
the first draft of Desert Shield.
(02:25:25) He then worked as the Professor of Military Science at the University
of Tampa. He enjoyed his experience at the university.
(02:39:10) He was then transferred to Wyoming, Michigan as an Army advisor to
the Michigan National Guard. He was the Brigade Advisor to the 46th Infantry
Brigade. After two years in Wyoming, he retired.
Post-Army (02:40:50)
•
Discusses his views on Patriotism and how his Army experience affected him.
�
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Title
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Veterans History Project
Creator
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Grand Valley State University. History Department
Description
An account of the resource
The Library of Congress established the Veterans History Project in 2001 to collect memories, accounts, and documents of U.S. war veterans from World War II and the Korean War, Vietnam War, and conflicts in the Middle East and elsewhere, and to preserve these stories for future generations. The GVSU History Department interviews are part of this work-in-progress, and may contain videos and audio recordings, transcripts and interview outlines, and related documents and photographs.
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1914-
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<a href="http://rightsstatements.org/page/InC/1.0/?language=en">In Copyright</a>
Subject
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Afghan War, 2001--Personal narratives, American
Iran Hostage Crisis, 1979-1981--Personal narratives, American
Korean War, 1950-1953--Personal narratives, American
Michigan--History, Military
Oral history
Persian Gulf War, 1991--Personal narratives, American
United States--History, Military
United States. Air Force
United States. Army
United States. Navy
Veterans
Video recordings
Vietnam War, 1961-1975--Personal narratives, American
World War, 1939-1945--Personal narratives, American
Publisher
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Grand Valley State University. University Libraries. Special Collections & University Archives
Contributor
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Smither, James
Boring, Frank
Relation
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Veterans History Project (U.S.)
Identifier
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RHC-27
Language
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eng
Source
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<a href="https://gvsu.lyrasistechnology.org/repositories/2/resources/455">Veterans History Project interviews (RHC-27)</a>
Oral History
A resource containing historical information obtained in interviews with persons having firsthand knowledge.
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Title
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Gillem, Denny (Interview outline and video, 1 of 2), 2004
Creator
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Gillem, Denny
Description
An account of the resource
Denny Gillem was born in Sacramento, California, in 1941. He intended to make the military his career during his high school years, and applied to West Point several times before being accepted. After West Point, he was trained as an Army Ranger, and served two tours of duty in Vietnam. After his tours, he attended the Army Officers Advanced Course at Fort Knox, Kentucky, and was the director of the ROTC at Stanford University. He then attended the Army Forces Staff College and became second in command of the 26th Infantry Battalion in Germany. He was then reassigned to Tampa, Florida, and the US Readiness Command. He also worked at the University of Tampa as a Professor of Military Sciences. He was then transferred to Wyoming, Michigan, to be the Army Advisor to the 46th Battalion of the Michigan National Guard.
Contributor
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Boring, Frank (Interviewer)
Michigan Military Preservation Society (Grand Rapids, Mich.)
Subject
The topic of the resource
Oral history
Veterans History Project (U.S.)
United States--History, Military
Michigan--History, Military
Veterans
Video recordings
United States. Army
Vietnam War, 1961-1975--Personal narratives, American
Language
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eng
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<a href="http://rightsstatements.org/page/InC/1.0/?language=en">In Copyright</a>
Type
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Moving Image
Text
Relation
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Veterans History Project (U.S.)
Date
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2004-11-03
Identifier
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GillemD
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<a href="https://gvsu.lyrasistechnology.org/repositories/2/resources/455">Veterans History Project Collection, (RHC-27)</a>
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application/pdf
video/mp4
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Grand Valley State University. University Libraries. Lemmen Library and Archives
-
https://digitalcollections.library.gvsu.edu/files/original/8a4e3deb26de009c8a15ec6c99db5cf4.mp4
6dd397f7dbf074e3dead774fe85f93a6
https://digitalcollections.library.gvsu.edu/files/original/df6f9c0227fea70eb7f7b70f19dab334.pdf
ee1f511bbecd8104a2c9ee3a9b861203
PDF Text
Text
Grand Valley State University
Veterans History Project
Denny Gillem
Vietnam War
(Note: This session covers the material missing from the original interview, mostly dealing with
his second tour in Vietnam)
Interview Length: (01:48:51:00)
Review of West Point / 1st Vietnam Tour (00:01:02:00)
Gillem initially had two years of college with the intention of getting into the military
academy at West Point; Gillem eventually succeeded in getting into the academy, on his
third attempt (00:01:02:00)
o In the four years Gillem was at West Point, he had one elective every year and
other than that, all the classes were geared around making he and the other
students engineering majors (00:01:12:00)
o Gillem’s pervious two years of college only counted for one credit, in American
History, which gave him the chance to take another elective (00:01:29:00)
o Gillem did fairly well, finishing at the top of the bottom third of his graduating
class (00:01:39:00)
o More so than the grades, the experience at West Point molded Gillem, which
along with high school and college ROTC, helped set the values that Gillem
followed and continues to follow (00:01:53:00)
o One of Gillem’s tactical officers at the academy helped steer Gillem in the
direction of joining the infantry branch of the Army, a direction Gillem had
already been considering (00:02:23:00)
Joining the infantry was Gillem’s first choice after graduating from West
Point and he was given it (00:02:35:00)
o Gillem graduated from West Point in 1964 (00:02:49:00)
After graduation, Gillem received a thirty-day leave before reporting to Fort Benning,
Georgia to attend Airborne and Ranger school (00:03:14:00)
o Interestingly, in the year Gillem began at Fort Benning and in the following year,
the Army decided that all West Point graduates would not attend their branch’s
Basic Course (00:03:35:00)
Although there was an Infantry Officer Basic Course that all the other
officers went to, Gillem and the other West Point graduates in the infantry
for those two years did not (00:03:46:00)
Instead, the West Pointers were required to attend OJT, part of which was
a mandatory period in Ranger school (00:03:51:00)
OJT did not bother Gillem but the officers who had gone into the
other branches, such as the Signals Corps or Air Defense Artillery
did not like it as much (00:04:14:00)
The Ranger school headquarters was located at Fort Benning and that was
where the first three weeks of the Ranger training took place; after the
three weeks at Fort Benning, the men went to Dahlonega, Georgia for the
�
mountain phase of the training, which lasted an additional three weeks,
then spent the final three weeks training in the swamps surrounding Eglin
Air Force Base in Florida (00:04:39:00)
o During the four years Gillem was at West Point, he never saw Army beat Navy in
their annual football game; however, the first year after he graduated, Gillem was
in the swamp-training phase of Ranger school and on the day before the game, the
men had gone through several days of long, wet patrols (00:05:01:00)
The men were trucked onto the base late at night and after cleaning their
equipment, they all went to bed (00:05:35:00)
The following day was the Army – Navy game and although Gillem made
it into the day room to watch the game, he slept through most of it;
however, it was the first time he saw Army beat Navy (00:05:43:00)
Gillem graduated from Ranger school just before Christmas, 1964 and received some
leave time before reporting to Fort Carson, Colorado to join 2nd Battalion, 11th Infantry
Regiment as a platoon leader (00:06:17:00)
o The 11th Infantry was mechanized infantry and although Gillem did not know too
much about mechanized infantry, it was an easy subject to learn if an officer had a
platoon sergeant who was willing to teach them (00:06:33:00)
Gillem himself had an incredible platoon sergeant, a man who had been in
the Army since the end of World War II, was captured during the Korean
War and held for about a year, and after being released at the end of the
war, decided to get out of the Army (00:06:42:00)
The sergeant left the Army, found a civilian job, and got married
but after two years of being a civilian, he decided civilian life was
not for him and when he told his wife, she told him to go and that
she would be waiting for him to return (00:07:05:00)
The sergeant re-enlisted but the Army brought him back as a
private; he had worked his way up to sergeant by the time Gillem
was assigned to be the platoon leader (00:07:21:00)
Gillem got as good a training as a second lieutenant could receive from the
sergeant (00:07:48:00)
The pressure on Gillem and the other lieutenants to perform their job
properly, having gone through all the training they had, as tremendous;
although some lieutenants failed to heed their sergeant’s advice or
received bad advice, the majority of the lieutenants grew in large part to
the advice they received from their sergeants (00:08:16:00)
The first large contingent of US Army ground forces, not just advisors, arrived in
Vietnam in June but even before they arrived, Gillem had volunteered in May for
assignment to Vietnam, as an advisor (00:09:20:00)
o Although his request for assignment as an advisor was denied, the following
month, Gillem received orders for assignment to Vietnam (00:09:43:00)
By then, the Army had decided to deploy three brigades, the 173rd
Airborne Brigade, the 1st Brigade of the 101st Airborne Division, and the
2nd Brigade of the 1st Infantry Division, and Gillem was the first officer
replacement sent to the 1st Infantry (00:09:46:00)
�o When he received his orders for Vietnam, Gillem was told to report to Travis Air
Force Base in California, where he boarded a transport plane for the flight over to
Vietnam (00:10:04:00)
When Gillem got off the plane in Vietnam, he had no idea where he was
going or what he was going to be doing (00:10:14:00)
o During the tour, the fighting in the area where Gillem was assigned was not
overly intense, usually fighting against small units or individuals; nevertheless, it
was still scary the first time a bullet flew past Gillem (00:10:40:00)
o It was very common to rotate officers between combat and non-combat units,
both so that the officers in the non-combat units could eventually gain some
combat experience and to ensure that there were always experienced, combattested officers in the various units (00:11:11:00)
Routinely, an officer would start in the field in a combat unit then rotate
into the non-combat unit (00:11:21:00)
In Gillem’s particular case, his company commander, a fellow West
Pointer, was selected to be the aide for the division’s newly-arrived
commanding general (00:11:31:00)
Gillem kept in touch with the captain and several months after the
captain moved to be the commanding general’s aide, the captain
told Gillem that there was a new one-star general arriving in the
division and Gillem asked of there was any chance he might have a
shot at the new general’s aide position (00:12:01:00)
Ultimately, Gillem received the aide position for the new general;
although Gillem does not know or remember exactly how he
received the position, part of it came from the fact the general
wanted a West Pointer as his aide (00:12:32:00)
When he first took the aide position, Gillem had no clue what he
would eventually be exposed to by working with the newly-arrived
general (00:13:34:00)
o If given the choice at the time of his rotation to the aide position, Gillem would
have preferred to stay in the field, but only as a platoon leader or company
commander (00:14:07:00)
However, the probability was higher that Gillem would end up working on
an officer’s staff (00:14:13:00)
Gillem was a good platoon leader; he liked the soldiers in the platoon and
they liked him back (00:14:21:00)
Throughout the platoon, Gillem remembers that all the NCOs were
one rank too junior for their position; the platoon sergeant was an
E-6 although the position was supposed to be an E-7, the squad
leaders were E-5s, which as an E-6 position, etc. (00:14:45:00)
When the 1st Infantry was told they were deploying a brigade to
Vietnam, the commanders combed through all three brigades in the
division to make a single brigade where all the officers and NCOs
were the correct rank (00:15:05:00)
o Gillem’s initial platoon sergeant was an experienced E-7
but the sergeant was eventually promoted to a different
�
position and an E-6 already in the platoon was given the
platoon sergeant position (00:15:24:00)
o For the most part, the sergeants in Gillem’s platoon were
all experienced, having been in the Army for several years
and been in combat for several months before Gillem
arrived (00:15:35:00)
At the time, rank promotion was extremely slow and when Gillem
was told he would be receiving a sergeant’s promotion to give to a
soldier, he had to decide which soldier to give it to (00:16:42:00)
o After thinking about the decision, Gillem decided to give
the promotion to a soldier from Chicago who had shown
immense courage under fire (00:16:51:00)
o When Gillem talked with the other sergeants about the
decision, one of the squad leaders advocated for a soldier in
his squad, reminding Gillem of some of the trouble the
original selection had been in (00:17:02:00)
o Gillem relented and promoted the second soldier, who,
although he was qualified for the promotion, had not shown
the courage under fire the other soldier had (00:17:17:00)
o At the time, the war was not expected to take long and part
of the question was whether they wanted the soldier to be a
sergeant during peace time (00:17:38:00)
Gillem’s first tour in Vietnam ended in October 1966, after which, he returned to the
United States (00:18:47:00)
o Just before Gillem deployed to Vietnam in 1965, he had become engaged and
when he returned home in 1966, he got married (00:19:02:00)
The biggest problem Gillem faced once he was home was that when he
had deployed to Vietnam, he was a 2nd lieutenant and when he returned
home, he was only a couple of months away from promotion to captain;
during his wedding, Gillem had planned on wearing his dress uniform but
only had the insignia for a 2nd lieutenant (00:19:28:00)
Gillem did not want to buy the 1st lieutenant insignia to only wear
once, so before the wedding, someone suggested taking model
airplane paint and painting the 2nd lieutenant insignia silver to look
like a 1st lieutenant insignia (00:19:47:00)
o While Gillem was in Vietnam, his original assignment when he came home was
to join the “Old Guard”, the 3rd Infantry Regiment stationed at Fort Myer,
Virginia (00:20:47:00)
However, around that time, the Army was beginning to accelerate
promotions and by that time, Gillem had spent a year in-grade as a 1st
lieutenant; whereas it normally took three years in-grade for promotion
from 1st lieutenant to captain, Gillem would receive the promotion in
thirteen months (00:21:03:00)
At that time, the 3rd Infantry was not in need of captains but lieutenants, so
when Gillem arrived at his fiancée’s house, which he had listed as his
�leave address, there were orders sending him to the 101st Airborne
Division (00:21:23:00)
Although he was a little disappointed not to be going to the 3rd
Infantry, Gillem was not too disappointed (00:21:37:00)
101st Airborne Division / 1967 Detroit riots (00:21:57:00)
After Gillem and his wife married, they took a short honeymoon before packing a trailer
with all the gifts they had received from their wedding and heading to Fort Campbell,
Kentucky, where the 101st Airborne was stationed (00:21:57:00)
o When they arrived at the base, Gillem was delighted to find out he was in line to
become a rifle company commander (00:22:13:00)
Initially, he was made the rifle company executive officer for several
months before receiving the promotion to company commander after the
previous company commander moved to the battalion staff (00:22:16:00)
Gillem was given command of C Company, 2nd Battalion, 501st Infantry
Regiment, 2nd Brigade, 101st Airborne Division (00:22:31:00)
o When Gillem first arrived at the base, he went through a reception center, where
he was told which unit he would be assigned to (00:23:01:00)
Someone from the 2nd Brigade picked up Gillem and took him to the 2nd
Battalion, where someone else took him to C Company (00:23:09:00)
The entire series of events was very casual and Gillem felt accepted
immediately in the unit (00:23:14:00)
At the time, there were not very many personnel who had combat
experience and the fact Gillem was joining the unit with combat
experience made him quite welcome (00:23:30:00)
Gillem was extremely excited to take command of an airborne rifle
company (00:23:41:00)
o Gillem and his wife slowly settled into the area, finding an apartment for four or
five months until they received housing on the base (00:23:54:00)
o Fort Campbell was right on the southern border of Kentucky; the northern half of
the base is in Kentucky and the southern half is in Tennessee (00:24:04:00)
The base was located in a nice area but it was very rural, with the largest
settlement, Clarksville, being five miles away in Tennessee (00:24:42:00)
o Gillem reported to the base in December 1966, just before Christmas
(00:24:45:00)
o When Gillem first arrived at the division, there was not any expectation that the
brigade would eventually deploy to Vietnam; although a brigade from the 101st
Airborne was already deployed to Vietnam, the remainder of the division had no
deployment expectations (00:24:59:00)
o When Gillem took command of his company, the draft was going on but soldiers
had to volunteer to join the airborne (00:25:14:00)
Therefore, all of the soldiers in Gillem’s were young volunteers who were
full of adrenaline; on occasion, the soldiers would get in trouble and
Gillem would have to take care of the problem but on the whole, the
soldiers trained hard (00:25:26:00)
The company had a pretty solid mix of ethnicities (00:25:48:00)
�
The original company first sergeant was a black man and was on
sick leave when Gillem arrived to take over command of the
company (00:25:51:00)
o While the first sergeant was on sick leave, Gillem worked
with the acting first sergeant, a platoon sergeant from one
of the platoons in the company (00:26:07:00)
o After Gillem had been with the company for about a
month, the original first sergeant returned to the company
and left two impressions on Gillem (00:26:17:00)
First, the sergeant was in incredible shape to begin
with and second, when the company went out for its
morning run, the sergeant ran circles around the rest
of the company for the entire run (00:26:25:00)
There was a tremendous mix of soldiers in the company, with
ethnicities range from black and white to Hispanic and homes in
both the North and the South (00:26:43:00)
o One of both the positives and negatives of the Army is that
the soldiers were treated like who they were (00:27:05:00)
o The soldiers were able to, for the most part, look past any
differences and work well together (00:27:27:00)
o Gillem was not aware of any problems in the company
based on race, let alone, the division (00:27:35:00)
o The ethnic diversity amongst the soldiers continued up and
down the entire chain of command, with both the battalion
executive officer and the captain who Gillem took over for
being black men (00:27:49:00)
Gillem remembers when the original first sergeant
returned to the company, he addressed the other
men and said that now that Gillem was in charge,
the men had two options for haircuts, a black
sidewall or a white sidewall (00:27:59:00)
In some ways, the situation in the company was an ideal situation for
Gillem when he took command (00:28:45:00)
Although the company did not have all the ranks they would have
wanted, regarding the NCOs, most of the soldiers were at their
correct rank and most had not been rush promoted to those ranks,
which would happen later (00:28:47:00)
Normally, if a draftee volunteered for the airborne, the company
would only see the man for eighteen months, only after he had
finished all his training, and he would normally leave as a PFC
(Private, First Class) (00:29:12:00)
The promotion and experience system was one that worked well
and one that Gillem liked to see (00:29:27:00)
o Although not a training company, Gillem’s company went through training
constantly (00:29:44:00)
�
One of the benefits Gillem earned from his time as an aide was he realized
what available to him (00:29:48:00)
During his first couple of weeks in command of the company,
Gillem was traveling around to find the different areas on the base
and when he wanted to see the base’s maneuver area, he requested
a helicopter (00:29:55:00)
o Had Gillem not been an aide, it would have never occurred
to him to request a helicopter (00:30:06:00)
o By using the helicopter, Gillem had a chance to see the
entire maneuver area from the air (00:30:13:00)
During training, Gillem would send the soldiers out as individual platoons,
although they would also go as an entire company and sometimes, as an
entire battalion (00:30:21:00)
During the training, Gillem integrated his experiences from serving in
Vietnam (00:31:00:00)
o At this time, the 101st Airborne and its sister division, the 82nd Airborne, were still
airborne units (trained to make parachute landings, as opposed to airmobile units,
which moved by helicopter) and were the strategic reserve for the Army
(00:31:08:00)
At least one unit within one of the divisions was always on stand-by, ready
to go if needed; typically, it was a battalion that would be ready to go in
twenty-four hours and a company ready to go in three hours (00:31:19:00)
Gillem’s company pulled its fair share of this rotation, which meant they
had to stay on somewhat higher alert level in the event that they did have
to deploy to a location (00:31:33:00)
The concept of being airmobile was just one mission that the divisions
could potentially perform (00:31:54:00)
Around the time Gillem was going through Ranger school was
when the Army first developed the concept of the airmobile force,
which eventually became the 1st Air Cavalry Division
(00:32:03:00)
Although the 101st had more helicopters than conventional aircraft
when Gillem arrived, airmobile was just one mission the division
could do; the soldiers in the division still had the traditional role of
jumping out of airplanes (00:32:16:00)
Jumping out of the airplanes was good for Gillem; he was afraid of
heights and jumping out of the airplanes was one of the ways he
overcame that fears (00:32:28:00)
Whenever Gillem’s company was on stand-by and received an alert, the
soldiers would line up on the parade ground with their equipment then
head to the parachute building; however, if the parachute building was
locked up, the soldiers knew it was a drill (00:32:48:00)
At one point, the division received a new commanding general and
during one of the “drills”, the men were sleeping in their trucks
when the general came down and started yelling at them, saying
they should be training or cleaning their rifles (00:33:01:00)
�
o Gillem’s battalion commander got in the general’s face and
said that the men would not be there if their rifles were not
ready to go and that soldiers in a combat situation did not
know when they would be sleeping next, so they should be
sleeping (00:33:30:00)
o Gillem had been standing about six feet away from the
conversation and he thought he was going to die; he never
thought anyone would talk to a general like that but in the
end, it worked (00:33:43:00)
The one time the company did deploy from an alert was to attend to the
1967 Detroit riots (00:34:04:00)
The deployment happened less than a month after a new battalion
commander had taken command (00:34:10:00)
Usually, one Friday morning every month, the battalion had
command reveille, where the soldiers would stand in formation an
hour early and the commanders would go through announcements
and promotions within the unit (00:34:18:00)
On the Friday before that month’s normal command reveille,
Gillem received a phone call early in the morning saying that he
needed to report in (00:34:32:00)
o Gillem figured the call was from the new battalion
commander, mistaking alert for something else, so Gillem
made a mental note to chew the battalion commander out
for making the mistake (00:34:44:00)
Gillem packed up his gear and when he arrived in, he saw that the
battalion commander had not made a mistake; the brigade had been
selected to go into Detroit to deal with the riots (00:34:59:00)
The men in the company had no idea what they were going to be
doing; a fourth of the men had combat experience from Vietnam
and for a couple of the older soldiers, Korea (00:35:14:00)
The brigade loaded onto C-130 transports and flew to Selfridge Air
National Guard base outside of Detroit (00:35:35:00)
o When the brigade got off the C-130, the base personnel did
not know what to do with them, so the soldiers dug in at the
base, something Gillem figures the Air Force was not too
happy about (00:35:45:00)
After awhile, the men eventually boarded Michigan National
Guard trucks to be moved into Detroit (00:36:04:00)
Up until that point, the soldiers had yet to see an angry, riotous
person or hear of anything that was out of place (00:36:14:00)
o As the soldiers rode in the trucks through the city, it was
like a normal trip through any city (00:36:27:00)
The soldiers were eventually placed in a junior high school and
moved into various classrooms (00:36:34:00)
�
Once the soldiers had settled in, Gillem was given the job of
starting combat patrols around the neighborhood to see what was
going on (00:36:57:00)
o Gillem had re-enforced rifle platoons equipped with flak
jackets, fixed bayonets, and loaded weapons going through
the neighborhood (00:37:05:00)
The majority of the rioting was occurring in downtown Detroit and
was spreading in two directions; the brigade was stationed where
the two directions intersected, although there had not been any
rioting within the immediate area (00:37:13:00)
o The residents were so happy to see the soldiers that
Gillem’s biggest problem was all the people trying to bring
the soldiers food and girls wanting to flirt with his soldiers
(00:37:30:00)
o The patrols would be moving down the street, ready for an
attack, and people would be smiling, waving, honking their
car horns, offering food, etc. (00:37:42:00)
o It became clear to the soldiers that they were not in too
much danger (00:37:53:00)
One of the challenges was the men had been advised that the
enemy was going to try and poison them (00:38:09:00)
o Therefore, although the locals were bringing the soldiers a
host of different food, the soldiers could not accept any of it
and were forced to eat C-Rations (00:38:21:00)
The biggest problem Gillem had was that whenever the soldiers
were not on duty, they would be standing next to the fence
surrounding the school’s playground three-deep and on the outside
of the fence were girls five-deep (00:38:48:00)
o Although it made for happy soldiers, it was difficult for
Gillem to control the situation; however, he did not bemoan
having to do it (00:39:07:00)
One night, Gillem was sleeping when someone grabbed him and
told him to get to the operations center because there was
information that the rioters were going to attack a power station
and the soldiers needed to get there (00:39:26:00)
o Gillem threw a couple of platoons in some trucks, got in a
jeep himself, and went to the power station, only to find the
National Guard had already been at the power station for a
month (00:39:40:00)
o However, the National Guard soldiers thought Gillem’s
force was relieving them and left (00:39:51:00)
Fairly regularly, Gillem would send fire teams of five or six
soldiers with fire trucks and those soldiers often encountered
rioters (00:40:08:00)
�
o In the two weeks that the brigade was in Detroit, Gillem
himself never saw an angry person, or at least, a person
who was angry at Gillem (00:40:08:00)
o For the most part, Gillem’s soldiers did not confront rioters;
the National Guard soldiers did encounter rioters and
Gillem’s soldiers assisted them by taking over guard
positions and allow the National Guard soldiers to focus on
dealing with the rioters (00:41:01:00)
The worst thing Gillem did was court-martial a couple of soldiers
who either lived in the area or had a girlfriend in the area and left
the school; when the soldiers returned after a day, Gillem courtmartialed them, which he did not like having to do (00:41:22:00)
Once the National Guard had the situation under control, the brigade
mounted back up and returned to Fort Campbell (00:41:44:00)
Before they deployed to Detroit, the soldiers had not received much in the
way of crowd-control training, apart from a few drills (00:41:59:00)
While in Detroit, the soldiers followed the rule that only an officer
could authorize them to shoot; the rule somewhat worried Gillem
when he sent out the fire teams with the fire trucks because they
were only commanded by a sergeant (00:42:09:00)
The brigade deployed to Detroit in August 1967 and after the brigade had returned to Fort
Campbell, rumors started swirling that the remainder of the division would soon be
deploying to Vietnam (00:42:44:00)
o Roughly another month passed before the soldiers were formally told that they
would be deploying to Vietnam (00:43:01:00)
o At the time, the Army had a policy that officers could be required to serve a
second tour in Vietnam but enlisted personnel did not (00:43:08:00)
Therefore, all the enlisted personnel who had already served a tour in
Vietnam and did not want to go for a second tour were transferred to the
82nd Airborne and all the personnel in the 82nd who had not served in
Vietnam transferred to the 101st as fillers (00:43:19:00)
However, the division was still understrength, so the Army did a search
and found every airborne-qualified enlisted man in the Army who had not
yet served in Vietnam and transferred them to the 101st (00:43:34:00)
The new personnel ranged from satellite communicators to
bulldozer repairmen (00:43:46:00)
Gillem’s company received twenty-five replacements, after which
the replacements went into the field for three weeks for infantry
training (00:43:55:00)
For the most part, the attitude of the replacements was shock
(00:44:12:00)
At one point, the 173rd Airborne got into a large fight in Vietnam
and took a large number of casualties (00:44:28:00)
o The 101st was the only source of airborne-qualified
soldiers, so every company in the division had to give up a
sergeant and four privates (00:44:36:00)
�
Gillem personally did not send his best soldiers to
the 173rd and as a whole, the removal of the
replacements for the 173rd helped the 101st shake off
some of the lower grade soldiers (00:44:49:00)
o Prior to the entire division deploying, advanced parties were sent over by ship
carrying the division’s supplies (00:45:10:00)
Gillem sent one officer and a dozen enlisted men as his company’s
advanced party and they left roughly four weeks before the remainder of
the company (00:45:18:00)
o During the last 48 hours before the deployment, all the soldiers in the division
were confined to the base (00:45:42:00)
Gillem’s executive officer lived off the base, so Gillem and his wife
offered to let the executive officer and his wife use the guest bedroom in
the Gillem’s house on base (00:45:47:00)
o When the day to deploy finally came, the soldiers boarded C-141 transports and
left for Vietnam (00:45:55:00)
The division commander had told the soldiers that when they got off the
plane, they would all have loaded weapons; however, the Air Force policy
forbid this (00:46:03:00)
There was some negotiating and it was eventually worked out that
at the last moments before the soldiers got off the plane, they were
issued loaded magazines (00:46:27:00)
Each soldier placed the magazine in his weapon but did not
chamber a round (00:46:42:00)
There was some equipment with the soldiers on the flight and some of the
planes were carrying only equipment (00:47:11:00)
The division had pre-shipped a lot of the equipment and a lot of
equipment, such as 106mm recoilless anti-tank rifles, was left
behind at Fort Campbell (00:47:28:00)
From what Gillem can remember, the planes made three stops total from
Fort Campbell to Vietnam (00:47:53:00)
For sure, the planes stopped on the west coast of the United States,
on Hawaii, and one other place (00:47:57:00)
2nd Vietnam Tour (00:48:08:00)
The planes landed at Bien Hoa Air Force base in Vietnam, an area Gillem knew from his
first tour in Vietnam (00:48:08:00)
o When the planes landed at Bien Hoa, there were trucks already waiting to pick up
the soldiers (00:48:16:00)
o Most replacements came through Bien Hoa and most of the personnel working on
the base were not thrilled with the idea of the soldiers carrying around loaded
weapons on the flight line (00:48:21:00)
However, although he might ridicule the decision, Gillem believes
carrying the weapons was a good thing because carrying the weapons
helped set the attitude of the soldiers (00:48:40:00)
�
The soldiers spent the night at Bien Hoa and the next day, moved to an already
established base camp; the division briefly stayed at the base before moving to Cu Chi,
where it stayed for several weeks (00:48:52:00)
o Once the division settled in a Cu Chi, the soldiers began running operations and it
became apparent then that something was going on with the enemy (00:49:21:00)
The division arrived in Vietnam a handful of days before Christmas 1967 (00:49:33:00)
When the Tet Offensive happened at the end of January 1968, it did not catch everyone
by surprise (00:49:48:00)
o Prior to the actual offensive, there had been indications of trouble in I Corps, in
the northern part of the South Vietnam (00:49:52:00)
o Then, one day, the entire 2nd Brigade was flown to LZ El Paso, which later
became known as Camp Eagle, just outside of Hue (00:50:00:00)
o Once the brigade arrived at El Paso, they set up the position and had just begun
operations when the Tet ceasefire occurred; when the ceasefire happened, the
soldiers were told they to stay in their barracks and get some rest (00:50:20:00)
However, when the battalion S-2 was circling around Hue in a helicopter,
he ended up taking fire and was nearly shot down; however, nobody could
figure out why there was enemy fire from Hue (00:50:36:00)
As it turned out, the North Vietnamese had successfully taken control of
Hue, which the soldiers did not know (00:50:52:00)
o All of a sudden, it was a whole new ballgame and the offensive consisted of some
of the most intense fighting Gillem had ever seen (00:50:57:00)
When the offensive started, the Marines were responsible for I Corps and
in the areas where they did control, the Marines had control; however,
they could not be everywhere and the North Vietnamese had figured out
where the Marines were located and where they were not (00:51:10:00)
There was a large area filled with trees, bamboo, and undergrowth
about a mile-and-a-half north of Hue along the main highway and
the enemy had been occupied that particular area so long that they
had set up, amongst other things, a fully-functioning OCS (Officer
Candidate School) for Viet Cong personnel (00:51:27:00)
o The 101st eventually had to fight its way into the area and it
was amazing what they ran into (00:52:14:00)
o During the offensive, Gillem’s battalion had the job of fighting up to the walls
surrounding Hue (00:52:29:00)
During the advance, the battalion fought its way into a small Vietnamese
village; however, it got real quiet as the soldiers entered the village
(00:52:35:00)
In one respect, the quiet was normal because the enemy had
withdrawn but it was normally not that quiet (00:52:42:00)
Once the soldiers advanced enough into the village, they saw that
the entire population of the village, men, women, and children, had
been stood against a couple of walls and were shot (00:52:50:00)
Seeing the dead villagers was an incredible shock for the soldiers;
however, because they were in pursuit of the enemy and could not
�
stop, the only thing Gillem could do was have his medic check to
make sure all the villagers were actually dead (00:53:11:00)
Another time, the battalion had to attack across a field in a traditional,
World War II-era, battalion-sized attack (00:53:23:00)
The soldiers had advanced across most of the field before the
enemy began firing on them (00:53:37:00)
At one point during the attack, a platoon sergeant in the other
company that was attacking with Gillem’s company was hit in his
private parts by a dummy rifle grenade (00:53:50:00)
o The sergeant was in pain on the ground and the giggle that
passed through the assault line was incredible
(00:54:24:00)
In the end, the attack was successful, with the battalion advancing
across the field and successfully sweeping out the enemy
(00:54:56:00)
o The enemy gunfire was not terribly accurate and Gillem
believes once the enemy saw the strength of the attack, they
pulled back, although plenty were still left (00:55:02:00)
Once they had secured the area, the soldiers began patrolling and found
out the enemy had a large number of spider holes in the area, with men in
them who were ready to fight (00:55:22:00)
Gillem lost several soldiers by shots that no one could identify
where it came from (00:55:38:00)
One time, one soldier was hit and the other soldiers began firing at
the tree tops, figuring it was a sniper, when in fact, the enemy
shooter was in a spider hole (00:55:44:00)
It rained that heavily that night and Gillem remembers coming
under rocket fire (00:55:57:00)
o As it turned out, the place where the battalion had dug in
was a place where a previous unit had already been dug in
(00:56:13:00)
All of the sudden, Gillem heard the sound of a rocket coming in,
then a “slurping” sound; the rocket had landed in a mud-filled
trench and instead of going off, slid down the trench (00:56:24:00)
Gillem called the dud rocket into battalion headquarters and was
asked to measure the size of the rocket; Gillem sarcastically replied
asked if the person wanted him to get out of his trench under
incoming fire, find the rocket, use a flash-flight, and measure the
rocket (00:56:48:00)
o When the person said they did, Gillem told them “no”
(00:57:16:00)
After the battalion frontal attack, Gillem’s company lost around eight or
ten soldiers out of the one hundred soldiers in the company (00:57:40:00)
One of the soldiers as a black sergeant with a distinctive part of
white on his hands (00:57:51:00)
�
o Gillem remembers walking past where the medics had
established a “morgue” for the dead bodies waiting to be
transferred out and see the hand of the sergeant sticking out
from a poncho (00:58:03:00)
o From the beginning of the advance towards Hue until the soldiers set up their
position was the better part of a week (00:58:49:00)
As the battalion got closer to the wall, the fighting became less intense
with only an occasional sniper, so that by the final day, it was pretty
mundane (00:59:22:00)
During that time, the men also received a resupply, including a copy of the
Stars & Stripes newspaper, in which the headline read Marines Retake
Hue (00:59:32:00)
Once Gillem’s battalion finished fighting around Hue, they were moved through a series
of fire bases to the north of Hue, where they began running combat operations
(01:00:10:00)
o Ultimately, the battalion ended up at Camp Evans, which was a base that
originally had been established by the Marines (01:00:22:00)
Camp Evans was already quite full when the decision was made to move
the battalion there, so the battalion was forced to set up their position on
the outside of the camp (01:00:39:00)
Just outside the camp was the camp trash dump and someone decided the
battalion would set up a perimeter around the trash dump (01:00:52:00)
Having the perimeter around the trash dump was interesting
because the soldiers found more supplies in the trash dump than
through their own re-supply system (01:00:58:00)
o The men managed to find supplies such as rain suits and
slings for rifles (01:01:06:00)
o Gillem’s first sergeant always had a crew searching through
the dump to find anything useful that the previous units at
Camp Evans might have thrown away (01:01:18:00)
o One day, a helicopter from the base flew out and found a supply ship that was
supposed to dock in Hue but could not because of the fighting still happening
within the city (01:01:25:00)
The ship was refrigerated and had sailed from the United States carrying
fresh steaks (01:01:42:00)
The helicopter landed on the deck and the crew of the re-supply ship, not
know what to do regarding the situation in Hue, gave the pilot as many
steaks as he wanted (01:01:46:00)
Once the pilot returned, for one day, all the men ate during the three meals
was steak (01:02:03:00)
o The fighting the soldiers encountered whenever they went out from Camp Evans
was wildly intense (01:02:32:00)
For awhile, there would be nothing then the men would receive orders to
patrol near a hill that the enemy was known to occupy; sometimes, the
soldiers would patrol near the hill and find nothing and other times, they
patrolled and find the enemy (01:02:38:00)
�o One day, Gillem’s company had just come in from the field, which meant the
soldiers had the day off (01:03:02:00)
Gillem was in the battalion operations center when someone noticed that
one of the companies in the field was not moving very fast (01:03:09:00)
Someone called out to the company to see why the company was
not moving very fast and they were told that the entire company
had diarrhea (01:03:22:00)
o Because Camp Evans was closer to the DMZ, Gillem’s company was now facing
off with North Vietnamese regulars (01:03:55:00)
Usually, the soldiers did not see the NVA, although there was one time
when the company was working along a river and managed to flush a
large contingent of NVA troops into the open (01:04:02:00)
The next day, the company was working along a different river and was
often the case, there were irrigation ditches running perpendicular to the
river; at one point, there was a large irrigation ditch with a town on the
other side (01:04:22:00)
As the company approached the irrigation ditch, it came under
intense enemy gunfire (01:04:41:00)
Fortunately, Gillem managed to get either Air Force or Marine
Corps air cover to attack the enemy but the soldiers still had to
advance through the town (01:04:45:00)
Gillem managed to get a squad across a small land bridge but the
squad was taking a large amount a enemy gunfire that they were
starting to take casualties (01:04:51:00)
o One of the soldiers was wounded so badly that the others
did not know if they could move him; Gillem ended up
sacrificing his one item of comfort, an air mattress, because
he inflated the air mattress, placed the injured soldier on it
and floated the soldier down to the river to a spot where he
could be safely medi-vaced out (01:05:12:00)
Ultimately, the company fought its way into the town with
assistance from the air strikes (01:05:37:00)
There were a lot of people in the town and all through all of them
claimed to be just residents, some of them obviously were not
(01:05:45:00)
o The soldiers managed to identify one man who was clearly
being non-cooperative (01:05:55:00)
The company had a Vietnamese interpreter handling
the interrogations (01:06:14:00)
Gillem wanted to advance the company into the
next village and wanted to know what the man
knew, so he walked up next to the man, said “fire in
the hole” and shot a .45 caliber round into the
ground next to the man’s foot (01:06:20:00)
Although Gillem intentionally missed the foot, the
man immediately started talking (01:06:38:00)
�
Gillem was annoyed that he needed information
about the area and the man had it but withheld it
while still claiming to be a friendly (01:06:52:00)
Once the company had the information, they advanced into the
next village and did encounter a large firefight (01:07:12:00)
After the fighting near the river, nothing really happened with the
company and one day, the company was operating near a river and all the
men stunk, so Gillem told have the men to take off their equipment and go
swimming in the river (01:07:18:00)
The morale amongst the soldiers in the company was pretty good (01:07:51:00)
o The one thing that Gillem noticed was whenever the company was in the field,
moral was good; problems happened whenever the company was stationed on a
base, with knowledge that the base had never been hit by the enemy, yet the
soldiers still had to be alert (01:07:54:00)
Gillem rarely had issues in his company to begin with because the
company rarely spent extended amounts of time stationed on bases
(01:08:11:00)
Whenever the company was on a base, it was often a fire base that had
been hit at some point, so the soldiers knew there was the possibility it
could happen again (01:08:17:00)
One of the last operations Gillem took part in during the tour was when the battalion was
flown to a location next to the South China Sea and ordered to advance into the
mountains (01:08:44:00)
o The enemy was really well dug-in on certain mountains but for the soldiers, it was
difficult for themselves to dig in because the mountains did not have the best soil
for digging in (01:08:56:00)
o One night, Gillem’s company was occupying a ridge top and there was so much
enemy activity below them that the soldiers were shooting through all their
ammunition (01:09:21:00)
The company was taking a lot of enemy gunfire but most of it was not
overly accurate (01:09:38:00)
At one point, Gillem had a C-123 gunship circling overheard, spraying the
entire area for a couple of hours (01:09:46:00)
The next day, there was nobody below the ridge line and the next night, it
was like the first night; however, the soldiers started taking casualties
during the second night (01:09:58:00)
During the second night, helicopters were constantly flying in, both the resupply the soldiers and to carry out any wounded (01:10:10:00)
At one point, Gillem carried a wounded soldier onto a helicopter
and he was just turning to walk back to his command post when
someone else was running past and hit him; Gillem had played
football but nobody had ever hit him that hard (01:10:17:00)
The next day, Gillem himself needed evacuation because he could not feel
much below his hips (01:10:43:00)
Division G-3 / End of Tour (01:10:43:00)
�
When Gillem was evacuated, he had been in command of the company for one year at
Fort Campbell and four months in Vietnam and the Army decided that was long enough
for him and moved a replacement captain to the unit (01:11:06:00)
o Ultimately, the decision was made to move Gillem to the division level; however,
Gillem did not need to report to the division for a couple of weeks, so when his
battalion was attached to another brigade, Gillem was sent to the other brigade as
a liaison officer for the two weeks (01:11:26:00)
The other brigade was fighting in one of the valleys leading into Hue and
was having a tremendous amount of contact with the enemy (01:11:59:00)
Gillem remembers the brigade commander talking with the division
commander on the radio, giving the division commander an update on the
situation (01:12:11:00)
The division commander asked about how many enemy had been
killed and when the brigade commander said it was a small
number, the division commander said the number was not good
enough and the brigade should have killed more (01:12:55:00)
The brigade commander sardonically asked how many enemy
should be dead and when the division commander gave him a
figure, the brigade commander said that was how many enemy
soldiers were dead (01:13:10:00)
The exchange between the two commanders shocked Gillem
(01:13:24:00)
o Once the two weeks passed, Gillem reported to the division’s G-3 section to be
the night duty officer (01:13:40:00)
o About a month after Gillem moved to the G-3, the division’s commanding general
was relieved and another general was brought in; the new general happened to be
the other assistant division commander when Gillem had served as an aide to the
general during his first tour in Vietnam (01:13:57:00)
When the new commanding general arrived, he address the division staff
and said although there were rumors that some of the reports regarding
enemy activity were false, if the rumors were true, then they were going to
fix the problems (01:14:22:00)
Because Gillem was the night duty officer, three-quarters of the time, he
had nothing to do, so he was given the job of reviewing the reports by the
G-3 (01:14:32:00)
As part of the review, Gillem had to contact officers who had since
left the various units to make sure the information in the official
reports were accurate (01:14:40:00)
Gillem had never been prouder than re-reading the reports to make
sure they were accurate (01:14:50:00)
He re-read reports of battles that he had fought in and founds those
numbers were padded as well (01:14:56:00)
o When Gillem was a company commander, if his company was involved in
fighting, he would report to his battalion, the battalion would report the battle to
the brigade and the brigade would report the battle to the division (01:16:30:00)
�o Once he was with the G-3, Gillem’s job was to keep track of all the action going
on in the division’s area for the entire night (01:16:41:00)
Sometimes, there was fighting going on and sometimes, there was not any
fighting going on (01:16:53:00)
o One of the funnier stories Gillem heard was when the division received a new
aviation officer, an officer who had come from being a senior general’s personal
pilot (01:17:06:00)
At some point, the general decided that since he was flying so much, he
would get his own pilot wings and fly himself around; however, the
condition was that the general could fly, so long as he flew with an
instructor/pilot at all times (01:17:22:00)
One day, the instructor/pilot showed up and found the general
already waiting in the airplane; although he assumed the general
had gone through the pre-flight preparation, the instructor/pilot
went through pre-flight preparation anyway (01:17:45:00)
As the instructor/pilot went through the pre-flight preparation, the
general said there was something wrong with the pedals of the
airplane (01:17:58:00)
The instructor/pilot told the general to take both his feet off the
pedals, the press down only one, which caused the pedal to move
perfectly fine (01:18:14:00)
o For the most part, Gillem’s job was keeping track of all the information and
making sure that everything was up-to-date (01:18:41:00)
In the morning, Gillem would brief the day shift to report to the general
about what, if anything, had happened during the night and what any
specific units had planned for the next day (01:18:46:00)
Because he worked during the night and had the days off, whenever an
officer needed to be sent somewhere, Gillem was often the officer chosen
to be sent off to do liaison work (01:19:05:00)
o Gillem remembers that the base would occasionally take enemy rocket fire;
however, the enemy rocket fire happened infrequently and was not very intense to
begin with (01:19:27:00)
One time, Gillem was walking out of his barracks when a jeep went
roaring past; Gillem yelled at them to slow down but when he later found
out the crew was taking a soldier injured in a rocket attack to the aid
station, he went and apologized (01:19:38:00)
o When he was an aide, Gillem remembers watching the process of the division
from the general’s perspective; once he started working in the G-3, he got the
perspective of the workers at the division level (01:20:07:00)
o At the time Gillem was with the division, there were five major subordinate
commands in the division: the three infantry brigades, division artillery, and a
support command (01:20:52:00)
However, the support command was normally medevacing soldiers or
delivering supplies and the artillery was often working with the infantry
brigades, so for the most part, Gillem only needed to worry about the three
infantry brigades (01:20:59:00)
�
Typically, Gillem would interact with the brigade-level operations officer
and did not bother talking with officers from the company- or battalionlevel (01:21:06:00)
The brigades rarely moved and when they did move, the division
knew exactly where they were, so Gillem did not have much
problem maintain communication with the brigades’ operations
officers (01:21:19:00)
For the most part, if the information was unavailable, Gillem
would report it as such, such as saying the brigade did not know
what was happening or a battalion had yet to report in their current
situation (01:21:26:00)
When Gillem was doing the numbers corrections in the after-action
reports, that was when he interacted with officers at the company- and
battalion-level (01:21:41:00)
One thing that the operations was absolutely forbidden to do was interfere
with communications (01:21:46:00)
When Gillem was serving as an aide, whenever there was fighting,
the general was always flying over the battle (01:23:14:00)
o At those times, Gillem’s job was to keep the radio lines
open in case the general needed to talk with someone;
however, he cannot recall the general directly talking with
company and platoon leaders on the ground below him,
although he is not sure it did not happen (01:23:26:00)
o This when Gillem acted as a liaison officer were times such as when another
division would be working with the 101st and there needed to be direct interaction
between both division staffs (01:24:04:00)
Other times, as would often happen, another brigade was assigned to the
division and someone needed to interact face-to-face with the other
brigade’s staff (01:24:12:00)
The work was not particularly exciting or memorable; in fact, it mostly
annoyed Gillem because he was losing sleep while going on the liaison
missions (01:24:21:00)
o Because he had served on the ground, Gillem believes he had a good sense of how
the fighting was going (01:24:54:00)
Whenever someone would say something was happening in a specific
area, Gillem could picture it in his mind because he had either already
been over the area on foot or flown over it (01:24:56:00)
The only place where the division was really pressing forward was up a
large valley; although the fighting in the valley was hard, the soldiers
knew it was going to be hard, which made the fighting somewhat
predictable (01:25:17:00)
Although there were occasional missteps, such as an air strike
hitting the wrong area, Gillem does not recall any situations where
the officers felt like the situation was getting too out of control for
the soldiers (01:25:33:00)
�
Gillem’s tour ended at the end of November 1968 and he made it back home to the
United States almost a month early (01:26:00:00)
o Based on Gillem’s recollection, as it became the fall of 1968, things were quieting
down; the soldiers had to go further out to find a fight (01:26:22:00)
Although there was still plenty of fighting to be done, it was not in the
immediate vicinity of Hue (01:26:32:00)
o Although Gillem acknowledges that there needs to be certain rules governing how
the soldiers fought, at a certain point, the soldiers have to be allowed to go look
for and engage the enemy (01:27:51:00)
Most of the time, the soldiers had the freedom to look for the enemy but in
at certain times, they did not and it was very frustrating (01:28:01:00)
For example, the fact that the Ho Chi Minh Trail, despite being a
combat area, was off-limits (01:28:10:00)
When Gillem was an aide, one of the things his general decided was he
wanted to see Cambodia, so the general and Gillem took a helicopter and
flew along a river bordering Cambodia (01:28:36:00)
As the helicopter flew under the tree canopy, it began taking
enemy gunfire from the Cambodian side of the river (01:28:48:00)
There was not a doubt in Gillem mind that the enemy was in
Cambodia but the Americans never went after them (01:28:58:00)
Being a platoon leader on the ground, Gillem was not affected too much
by this but when he was in a position to see the bigger picture, it was
frustrating (01:29:08:00)
Occasionally, the division would have South Vietnamese military liaisons working with
them (01:29:23:00)
o More so, Gillem remembers that when he had been an aide, the general had
planned an offensive with the intention of picking a fight with the enemy forces
(01:29:26:00)
The general briefed the South Vietnamese military about the plan and said
that while the main division would attack in one direction, a small column
of bulldozers would go in another direction, towards an Special Forces
camp (01:29:52:00)
In reality, the column of bulldozers was really an armored cavalry
squadron, consisting of tanks and armored personnel carries; the hope was
that the enemy would attack the column, which they did (01:30:08:00)
When the enemy attacked, there was a whole division waiting to respond
to the attack (01:30:20:00)
Briefing the South Vietnamese military was deliberate in the belief
that there had to be at least a few South Vietnamese personnel who
were working for the enemy (01:30:28:00)
st
o The 101 tended to work less with the South Vietnamese military, mostly because
the ARVN soldiers were not around all that much (01:30:38:00)
Gillem remembers during his second tour that he made it a point that every evening,
almost without exception, he would write a letter to his wife (01:31:28:00)
o Gillem’s wife would write letters to him in return but often, he would receive a
stack of letters one day then not receive anything for several days (01:31:38:00)
�
o Nevertheless, the communication presented in the letters was good, both for
Gillem and for his wife (01:31:46:00)
o For whatever reason, Gillem’s executive officer in the company never wrote to
his wife, so Gillem’s letters, apart from keeping his own wife up-to-date, helped
keep the executive officer’s wife up-to-date (01:31:52:00)
The normal routine for the battalion when Gillem was the company commander was a
company’s first sergeant stayed in the rear and pushed supplies to the front; however,
Gillem’s first sergeant wanted to be at the front, so he negotiated with the executive
officer so the executive officer stayed in the rear while the first sergeant traveled to the
front (01:32:37:00)
o Once the switch happened, whenever Gillem was in the field, the first sergeant
was always there with back-up radios and spare parts; although his executive
officer was an outstanding officer, he did not have the experience of twenty plus
years in the Army, at the first sergeant did (01:32:48:00)
Misc. Recollections (01:34:33:00)
One of the things that the Army did in Vietnam was rapidly accelerate the promotion
process (01:34:33:00)
o If a draftee or enlistee scored high enough on aptitude tests, the Army would offer
them sergeant school; the men who took this route became known as “shake n’
bake” sergeants (01:34:39:00)
The school lasted for several weeks, at the end of which, the soldiers was
promoted to an E-5 sergeant (01:34:56:00)
o When Gillem first enlisted in the Army, it took eighteen months of service to
reach 1st lieutenant and four years to captain; by the end of the war, it was a year
to 1st lieutenant and a year to captain (01:35:09:00)
o Although the rank was still there, there was a lack of experience, which ultimately
hurt the Army (01:35:20:00)
o When the draft ended, some of the problems with the soldiers ended as well,
although not all of them (01:35:29:00)
After Vietnam, Gillem made stops at graduate school and the Armed Forces Staff College
before deploying to Germany (01:35:33:00)
o In Germany, there were issues with soldiers using drugs, having apathetic
attitudes, etc. (01:34:42:00)
o One of the largest problems was “Project 100,000”, which was a proposal to enlist
soldiers who normally would not have even been allowed to enlist for various
reasons (01:35:57:00)
Once the Project 100,000 soldiers enlisted, something needed to be done
with them and additional education seemed like the best prospect
(01:36:12:00)
Some of the soldiers accepted the additional education but others did not;
for those that did not, life in the Army was just something for them to do
and they were the soldiers who caused the most problems for the Army
(01:36:20:00)
�
o As well, there were problems with gangs and racial divisions; although these
issues did not happen in huge amounts, they were still large enough to make
things difficult (01:36:32:00)
o While in Germany, Gillem served as a battalion executive officer and at one
point, he was asked by a soldier in the battalion to speak to the soldier’s GED
class (01:36:57:00)
Gillem said he would and on the graduation day, there were forty soldiers
in the class when Gillem made his speech (01:37:22:00)
During the speech, Gillem made a joke about generals, not
knowing that the student who had asked him to speak was a
general’s jeep driver and the general had slipped into the back of
the room (01:37:34:00)
All of the soldiers knew the general was in the room, so they all
laughed at the joke (01:37:52:00)
o Gillem deployed to Germany in 1974 and returned to the United States in 1977
(01:38:40:00)
While in Germany on his second tour, while Gillem was working in the G-3, there was a
promotion board to major, which was the next logical step for promotion, with Gillem
being a captain (01:39:14:00)
o Traditionally, when the Army considered promotions, they looked at the rank they
were planning on promoting to then selected the top 5% of the next lowest rank
for promotion; however, while Gillem was in Germany, the Army selected not
only the top 5% of captains from promotion to major but also the next 5%, the
group Gillem was part of (01:39:23:00)
Gillem was selected for promotion to major having only four years of
service; however, he did not actually receive the promotion until he had
about five-and-a-half years of service (01:39:43:00)
The promotion lists were designed to last for roughly a year to a year-anda-half and Gillem’s list did; the next promotion list took eight years to
completely exhaust and the next one took almost as long (01:40:07:00)
Therefore, Gillem received promotion to major ten years before most of
his peers because he had a been selected for promotion just before the
promotions stopped (01:40:26:00)
Although it is a fairly well-known fact that Vietnam veterans were abused when they
returned home, Gillem was not (01:41:43:00)
o Having come home and gone straight through military schools before deploying
to Germany, Gillem knew that the abuses were happening but they never
happened to him or anyone around him (01:41:50:00)
Gillem’s last assignment was as an advisor to the Michigan National Guard, which at the
time, was very different from the current National Guards (01:42:19:00)
o At the time, the National Guard was essentially a general reserve in the
eventuality of a conflict but did not expect to be activated for anything other than
that (01:42:24:00)
o Therefore, the motivation amongst the National Guard personnel was different but
not too shocking because that was the way it had always been (01:42:38:00)
�
Gillem does not think he experienced much of the culture change that occurred within the
Army; if he did, he did not pay too much attention to it (01:43:03:00)
Looking at the current situation in the United States, Gillem believes that Vietnam
veterans have taken it upon themselves to make sure that the treatment they received does
not happen to the returning soldiers now (01:44:05:00)
o From what Gillem had seen, the next time the United States commits a significant
amount of military forces to a conflict, the Congress should have to pass a
declaration of war, which would place the country on a war footing (01:44:26:00)
Gillem reminds his students that on certain days during World War II, the
country went onto rationing (01:44:38:00)
o For the most part, Gillem sees that the majority of the American military
personnel are treated well; however, there is also a large number of people in
American who denigrate military service (01:45:01:00)
o The major issue Gillem sees is the most important 1% in America is the 1% who
choose to serve in the military; for most people, service in the military is not
something they want to do or they want their children to do (01:45:32:00)
The military is more isolated than ever before because the military
personnel are “strange” for wanting to serve (01:46:00:00)
As well, the military is so small and the requirement of personnel to serve
consecutive tours has opened up new areas for concern; Gillem does not
believe Americans have gotten close to problems such as PTSD and brain
injuries (01:46:14:00)
These problems will further distance the military from the
everyday public, who have not had to go through the experiences
that the military personnel did (01:46:50:00)
Gillem sees a widening gulf between the normal, everyday American
public and the people who go off for military service (01:47:00:00)
�
Dublin Core
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Title
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Veterans History Project
Creator
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Grand Valley State University. History Department
Description
An account of the resource
The Library of Congress established the Veterans History Project in 2001 to collect memories, accounts, and documents of U.S. war veterans from World War II and the Korean War, Vietnam War, and conflicts in the Middle East and elsewhere, and to preserve these stories for future generations. The GVSU History Department interviews are part of this work-in-progress, and may contain videos and audio recordings, transcripts and interview outlines, and related documents and photographs.
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1914-
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<a href="http://rightsstatements.org/page/InC/1.0/?language=en">In Copyright</a>
Subject
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Afghan War, 2001--Personal narratives, American
Iran Hostage Crisis, 1979-1981--Personal narratives, American
Korean War, 1950-1953--Personal narratives, American
Michigan--History, Military
Oral history
Persian Gulf War, 1991--Personal narratives, American
United States--History, Military
United States. Air Force
United States. Army
United States. Navy
Veterans
Video recordings
Vietnam War, 1961-1975--Personal narratives, American
World War, 1939-1945--Personal narratives, American
Publisher
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Grand Valley State University. University Libraries. Special Collections & University Archives
Contributor
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Smither, James
Boring, Frank
Relation
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Veterans History Project (U.S.)
Identifier
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RHC-27
Language
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eng
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<a href="https://gvsu.lyrasistechnology.org/repositories/2/resources/455">Veterans History Project interviews (RHC-27)</a>
Oral History
A resource containing historical information obtained in interviews with persons having firsthand knowledge.
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Title
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Gillem, Denny (Interview outline and video, 2 of 2), 2011
Creator
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Gillem, Denny
Description
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This interview replaces the missing portion from his original interview in 2004, and primarily covers the period between the end of his first tour in Vietnam in late 1966 to the end of his second tour in 1968. During this period, Gillem was assigned to the 101st Airborne Division, based at Fort Campbell, Kentucky, as a rifle company commander. He and his brigade were sent to Detroit in the summer of 1967 in response to the race riots there, and soon afterward received orders for Vietnam. They arrived late in the year and were initially based at Cu Chi, but went up to the area north of Hue just before the Tet Offensive started in 1968, and participated in the American counterattacks and recapture of Hue, and in followup campaigns in the I Corps sector. Gillem was reassigned to division headquarters after about four months in Vietnam, and spent the rest of his tour with the division's operations (G-3) section.
Contributor
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Smither, James (Interviewer)
Kentwood Historic Preservation Commission (Kentwood, Mich.)
WKTV
WKTV (Wyoming, Mich.)
Subject
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Oral history
Veterans History Project (U.S.)
United States--History, Military
Michigan--History, Military
Veterans
Video recordings
United States. Army
Vietnam War, 1961-1975--Personal narratives, American
Other veterans & civilians--Personal narratives, American
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eng
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Veterans History Project (U.S.)
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2011-05-27
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GillemD1198V2
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<a href="https://gvsu.lyrasistechnology.org/repositories/2/resources/455">Veterans History Project Collection, (RHC-27)</a>
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Grand Valley State University. University Libraries. Lemmen Library and Archives
-
https://digitalcollections.library.gvsu.edu/files/original/049ef6bce8228d1602cbee889fdfce19.mp4
fd98391ec129e449d020b95bbddf70c7
https://digitalcollections.library.gvsu.edu/files/original/e2072733ed3347e9ff1fe44883b48e96.pdf
46215f15e38c675de993351d4144c033
PDF Text
Text
Grand Valley State University Veterans’ History Project
Oral History Interview
Veteran: Bill Gillesse
Interviewed by James Smither
Transcribed by Jennifer Hughey
Interview length: 58:31
Smither: We’re talking today with Bill Gillesse of Grand Rapids, Michigan and the interviewer is James
Smither of the Grand Valley State University Veterans’ History Project. Bill, start us off with some
background on yourself, and to begin with, where and when were you born?
I was born in Grand Rapids, Michigan, a little over 90 years ago.
What year was that?
That was in 1926.
Tell me a little bit about your family background. Where were your parents from?
My parents came from the Netherlands in 1923 with four boys in steerage. I was the youngest, I was
born five years later and my sister another two years after that. I was the youngest of the boys, and
those boys were one year apart. They graduated from Grand Rapids High School, Grand Rapids South
High, as I did later. They graduated in ’37, ’38, ’39, and ’40. The oldest one was called up early and went
to fight with the 32nd Division National Guard. The youngest of that bunch in ’40 joined the Navy
immediately and was at Pearl Harbor during the bombing.
Your family has connections.
They started the war and I ended it.
Did you grow up speaking Dutch at home or were you speaking English?
No, we spoke English. My dad had difficulty, but he always insisted, and he tried to speak English. My
mother spoke what’s called Yankee Dutch. That’s a blend of the two. Unless you’re one or the other,
you’re not gonna get it. That’s the way it was.
What did your father do for a living?
My father was a mason basically, he was a bricklayer. When he came to the old country he immediately
worked on, in those days they were building a whole series of—Standard Oil was building—lots of
stations, and he was in that cycle. They continued to build them as different cycles and different
architecture. That’s what he did, and then in WPA he worked also, and he laid manholes, he worked in
the manholes. Later, he had his own contracting business.
[2:36] You mentioned the WPA, that’s a New Deal Program. Was he out of work for a while in the ‘30s
and had to go to the WPA?
Yes, that’s correct. In fact, I remember him going to work for the City of Grand Rapids on occasion to pay
for his taxes, and of course we were all on script, so we would take the sled across St. Andrew’s
Cemetery and number four fire bars and get our milk, prunes, and grapefruit, and so forth.
�So, it was kind of lean times for a while back.
Lean times, especially for laborers like my dad.
But you were able to stay in high school and graduate from high school.
Yes, actually my 18th birthday was in September, but I had enough credits, so I probably chose to go, and
I was sitting in December then of that year.
[3:38] Do you remember how you heard about Pearl Harbor?
How I remember about Pearl Harbor?
How did you hear about it?
My dad, mother, and I were riding to Lansing to visit a brother at that time, and driving back, that’s how
I first heard about it.
So, on a car radio?
Car radio, yeah. In my 1939 Chevy.
Did you know at the time that your brother was at Pearl Harbor, or did you find out about that later?
No, because prior to that we had gotten letters from him from June of that year stating that “from now
on my address will be APO San Francisco, so we didn’t know where he was.
At what point did you find out he had been at Pearl Harbor?
I really don’t know. At that point, I don’t know how soon it was that we found out, I can’t remember
that.
Do you think it might have been kind of a long time?
I guess we kind of assumed where he was, because that’s where all Naval action took place.
That was the main base of the Pacific fleet at that point.
Yeah, and I know he was on a destroyer at that, I did know that, the name of the destroyer and so forth.
Before the war started, did you pay much attention to the news, the war in Europe, that kind of thing.
Definitely did, because I know we’ve got electricity in our house. Mind you, in the city of Grand Rapids,
in the middle of the city, in 1936. And my Dad and I went to Sears Roebuck and got a Silvertone radio,
and that was a highpoint in ’36. And you know what’s going on in Europe. So, my dad especially was very
attentive to the news, he listened to the news. Gabriel Hader and you know, “there’s grave news
tonight,” that’s the news we’d hear.
[5:50] Of course, you still had relatives in the Netherlands at that point, so when the Germans go
there in 1940, you’re aware of those things.
Yeah, my mother had relatives there, my dad—when he came here—he had two sisters here just prior
to that, and their husbands and their families, kids then were our cousins, so forth.
�So, you’re paying attention to those things, then Pearl Harbor happens, and when it happens, did you
think that maybe the war would end before you got into it or did you not think about that?
You know, as a kid, I was hoping it would not end. I wanted to, you know, all our friends were going, our
brothers were going, and we wanted to be patriots, you know.
When did you finish high school?
I got credit for graduating prior to my going to the service, so I didn’t have to go back to get a GED, I had
my diploma so to speak.
When did you enter the service?
Enter?
Yeah.
I went in in December of ’44.
Did you enlist or were you drafted?
I was drafted. Draft Board number 44 called me and I went to Fort—thinking of where I was inducted, I
was in inducted in Chicago.
Chicago, did you go Fort Sheridan?
Yeah, Fort Sheridan, and then we went to Camp Joseph T. Robinson, Arkansas.
[7:43] Where in Arkansas was that? Was there a town nearby?
Yeah, Little Rock was one, not too far, I don’t really remember.
So, Central Arkansas basically?
Yes
How did they get you down there?
How did—train. The troop train.
Do you remember anything about that train ride?
Not much about that train ride, no. Many others though I could tell you. The weather then was spring, I
mean early in the year, and so we had a lot of wet snow, slop, that was our experience there. And our
training was based on going to Germany.
What did the basic training consist of?
That was, like most, gas mask training. Learned to put your gas mask on and so forth. Bayonet training
and marching of course and hiking, discipline, lay your pack out, marching, KP. It was just general, basic
training.
The guys you were training with, were they mostly from the same area or were they from all over the
place?
�They were from all over the place, there were guys from the South and the East, from all over. There
was a pretty good collection there.
[9:16] Were you part of a division at that point that was based there, or was this just training?
No, not at all, we were just in training. That was a 15 to 16-week course. When that was over, then I
went on delay in route and that decided where I was going to go, and that was to Germany, which I was
very happy about that, but when we got to Fort Meade, Maryland, the tide had changed. You
remember, when I went in in December it was the time of the Battle of the Bulge, so things were already
beginning to change then. So, when I got to Maryland they said “woah, no more. We don’t need you
anymore, we need potato peelers over there.” Then we went to camp, we were sent to Camp Howze
Texas to learn how to hate the Japanese and then went to Fort Ord to the replacement depot.
[10:23] Back up here to Camp Howze, Texas. You said you learned how to hate the Japanese. Were
you simply learning about the Japanese, or were you training for fighting in Japan?
Not specifically that, it was a mental thing. It was more or less movies showing the atrocities the
Japanese had done. “This is the kind of soldier you’re going to meet” kind of thing. And more bayonet
training, which I hated. You had to be strong to be good at bayonet.
You were at Camp Howze and then after that the next stop was?
Port of embarkation, Fort Ord, California.
Did you stay at Fort Ord for any amount of time, or did they load you up quickly?
Not for very long. It was a beautiful place to be, so naturally, when you’re army, you don’t stay
anywhere where it’s a beautiful place to be. So, we went from there—fort Ord, that’s Monterey, a
couple beach golf courses. You know, that’s a beautiful area. Then we went from there, from Fort Ord
by train to Frisco, I guess, and left there.
What kind of ship do they put you on?
They put us on, I guess what’s the usual troops. I don’t know if it was a Kaiser build or what it was, but it
was full impact and the thing I remember about that was the roughness of the sea at that point. There
were a lot of sick guys, and I was sick. After a couple of days or so, I guess we got over that. From there
we went past some of the other places that had already been taken, Guam, Ulithi, or some of the other
places, we went right past. Hawaii of course, we didn’t stop at Hawaii for any pleasure trip, and on to
the Philippines from there.
[12:32] Where did you land in the Philippines?
I don’t know where it was. I don’t know the name of the place. I don’t know the name of the place, no. It
was a replacement depot, IRTC they call it. We didn’t do much different there, just waited, waited for
our assignment.
About how long do you think you stayed there?
Probably about a week, yeah, probably a week.
When you crossed the Pacific, did the ship go by itself or did you have escorts?
�We had escorts, I don’t remember the zigzag, but yeah, I always saw a ship on either side at a distance.
Do you think you were in a larger convoy or was this just your ship and a couple of escorts?
I don’t know that we were in a convoy, I don’t remember that.
Alright. So anyway, you get to the Philippines, they land you, you’re basically in a camp and you don’t
really know where you are or what’s going on, and you’re there for about a week, and then what
happens?
Then we got onboard an AP, Assault—I guess AP is assault personnel or something—on one of those
ships and then we went to—I guess—directly to Legazpi and come down the nets and onto the landing
boats and went ashore. That’s where we met our new assignment, our new company.
[14:17] What unit were you joining?
It was the company A of the 158th Regimental Combat Team.
Was the company there by itself, or was the whole regiment there?
The regiment was there but spread out. Our company, and maybe even the battalion, was right in the
Legazpi area. The others were spread out because I remember when we heard rumors that a Company A
or whatever it was made ice cream on Sunday so that we were able to confiscate a weapons carrier and
see if that was true, things like that. So, we were just there. And during that time that’s where were
introduced to all the other guys, you talked to all the guys that had been through a lot and so forth. I
read, I found this on the internet more than anything, I learned more about that outfit on the internet
than I did by talking to the guys. One of the things I learned was that this regimental combat team was
one of MacArthur’s favorites, and I found out that in preparation for the invasion of Japan, this outfit—
our outfit—was two days earlier attack the island of Tadakashima, which was south of Honshu.
[15:59] Well Kyushu was the island that you were gonna land on, that’s the big island, the
southernmost of the big islands so this is gonna be a smaller island off.
South, south of that. I don’t know how many miles, but that one held the radio communications, and so
what I read was that it would be attacked early, before the main attack, I forgot the name of what they
call that and that there would be heavy casualties, that was a really well protected part.
But in the meantime, were you training at all?
We did, we did for that month or so, whatever it was, yeah. Usual training, we did a lot of bayonet work
again and a lot of compass work, and the jungles and things.
Did they have you practice amphibious assaults, or did you just stay on land?
Amphibious assault, yeah.
So, you’d go back out on the boats and get on landing craft and come back in and all that sort of stuff?
Yeah.
When did you actually arrive at Legazpi, when did you get there?
�I don’t know the date, but it was in July.
July ’45 you’re there, getting close to when the invasion was supposed to take place.
The bomb hadn’t gone off yet either.
[17:25] While you’re there, at that point, do you see much of the local population or they kept away
from you?
No, I don’t remember local population per se, individuals yeah. We had girls who would bring us eggs
and so forth. We had our squad tents, it was pretty well organized, and we had a good kitchen crew
which was made up of the Koreans who were left there that the Japanese had used, and they became
our cooks and so on so forth. So, we had pretty good meals there, beside drinking out of a lister bag, but
the food was a lot better, yeah.
Do you remember hearing about the atomic bomb?
Yeah, we heard about the atomic bomb, yeah.
Did you have any sense of what that meant at the time?
No, only that it was spectacular. You know, talk back and forth, huge bomb, it looks like that, sounds
good to me. Then the second one, and we started to have some positive thoughts about what we were
doing. Then when it was finalized, when we heard that the hostility was over, we had completely
different mindset. I don’t know if the discipline was as good as it was before.
What was the reaction in camp when you heard the war was over?
Everybody started planning what they’re gonna do at home, you know? And then, of course, the guys
started counting their points. The high point guys, I forgot what the top one was, 80 or something like
that, and then you know if you were a married man that’s so many points and so many children, years
overseas, and awards, medals, they’re all points for you, see? I don’t think that any guy, any of our guys
left then at that point and I think our whole outfit as it was at that time then was dispatched to Japan.
[20:01] Do you know when you arrived in Japan?
I think it was April 13. April 13 of that.
April 13th is quite a long time after the surrender.
Yeah.
So, you were basically in the Philippines then for a long time after the surrender.
Yeah.
What were you doing in the Philippines all that time?
Just doing routine Army stuff.
Did you get a chance to go off the base and look around at all?
�No, we didn’t. We just stayed right there in camp. Some of the guys did, they went to other—there were
no cities there except just Legazpi itself, but no we just, boring army stuff: waiting, anticipating. We had
a lot of free time.
Over the course of the time then between August of ’45 and April of ’46, then presumably some of the
guys are rotating home now. They’ve got enough points now and they’re leaving.
They did have, yeah. They had enough points
And when they left, did anyone come in to replace them or did the unit just get smaller?
No, nobody replaced them. We would if they wanted us to go on.
Did the Army provide any kind of entertainment for you in the Philippines?
No, most of that was self-entertained. The guys, there were boxing tournaments and things like that.
Did they have movies or other stuff like that?
Yeah, anything they could do to keep us happy. Just a lot of boring time.
Did you have much communication with people back home at that point? You’re writing to your
parents or anyone else?
Yes. We were writing. I don’t remember getting much mail, but yeah, we were writing.
[22:02] So it’s just kind of this long sort of blank period. Not much happening.
Long blank period. Very boring.
But then finally then in April of ’46 you get orders for Japan. How did they get you up to Japan?
We were on kind of an LST, and it was typhoon. We had that typhoon season and it was very, very
rough. It was rough. I don’t know if that was the time, that’s a different story, I had a monkey on the
ship I got from another guy. He would sit on the edge of it, he was sick. But that was on another tour,
that wasn’t on this trip.
Now, if you’re on an LST in a typhoon, did you wonder if the whole thing was gonna break up and
sink?
Oh yeah, yes. This was new. This was new, that was a—it was like you were in a tin can. Yeah.
How long did that go on?
Well, I guess several days. It wasn’t that far, I guess, from the Philippines to Japan really. But yeah,
several days.
But you managed to hit a typhoon. Where did you land in Japan?
We landed, apparently, in Yokohama and then we got on a train right away and we went north to this
area Usnomi, and then we went through town, which had been—you can see it was bombed. Some of
the wood poles and stuff had been scorched and burned, things like that. I remember walking or driving
through town, or village, we didn’t see anybody. We just didn’t see anybody. And we went to an
�encampment, it was a high wood fence, you see a lot of those in this area, and I understand it was a
former Japanese cavalry officers’ training center. It wasn’t large maybe—what would I guess—5 acres
maybe. Something like that. And beyond that was the rice paddy.
[24:44] So this is still fairly flat country that you’re in.
Yeah, and around that of course was a service road, and that’s where we had to do our guard duty, I
don’t know what we’re guarding, but we’re on guard duty, that’s what you do in the Army. The
interesting thing there was, we always had this little book of Japanese American. We were quarantined
there, I remember for a week or something like that, so we weren’t out on the streets of the city. When
I got duty and was walking, there was a mama-san, an older Japanese woman, who was washing some
clothes on her rock or whatever it was. And of course, I don’t know how it was with other GIs, but we
didn’t like to wash our own clothes, so another guy and I, who did that guard post quite often, would
meet with her and we would say, we were trying to say “mama-san, you wash your clothes. Sekken, I
guess, was the name for soap” and she said “no” no she couldn’t do that cause she didn’t have any
Sekken, and I said, “that’s okay, that’s okay we have soap.” So then, of course we got the GI soap out of
the kitchen and so on and so forth and kind of secretly used her to take care of our laundry, and then of
course we would make sure she had candy and cigarettes and all that sort of thing. So, while we didn’t
really talk or communicate or ask any questions, which I regret, I wish that when I was there I had done
a lot more research because one of the questions I would’ve asked would be “finally when your emperor
said he was not your spiritual god, but he was your emperor, how did you perceive that? What did you
do with deity at that point?” That’s kind of my question. Anyway, she was very gracious and she invited
us to dinner and so we went into her home, the shoji panel they have the pit in the floor which, I would
suppose was 3 feet square or something, and inside of that was the charcoal pot and then the blankets
over us and she served us a dinner then. We hit it off well, but not with a lot of people, we knew her
more intimately by what we did with her.
[27:31] Were there many other around that you saw when you were on guard duty? People going by
or just not very many?
No there, see, next to the fence was this little road, and this was the back of her house so to speak, so
no we didn’t see many other people around. Kids came later, after we got on the street, then the kids
would come out, young people, because the chocolate was the big thing, and that always won them
over.
You said going out on the street, did you begin patrolling or something, or what were you doing?
Nope we didn’t.
Just wandering around.
We had no duties there, we’re just waiting to, I guess, to dissipate, I guess. No, we really didn’t have
much of anything to do there. That would be in April, did I say April, no January. We went to Japan in
January 13, I said April?
Yeah.
�Oh, that’s wrong. The colors of the national guard went back in April. So, in that fan of time I can’t
remember we did much of anything. Then when the colors went back, we left that place, back to
Yokohama.
Basically about 3 months there, so you get to know the area a little bit.
A little bit. I can’t remember we did anything protective, we didn’t do any repair, we just played soldier I
guess is about all we did then.
While you were based there did you get to go into Tokyo or anywhere else or were you just stuck out
there?
Not when I was based there, let me think. I did get to Tokyo, yeah. I’m trying to think who I was with and
where I was with. I think I went to Tokyo after I was reassigned to Yokohama, I think that’s right. Then
we took a trip so to speak.
[29:46] And there were trains that went back and forth at that point?
Yeah. When we first were reassigned in Yokohama, our quarters were in what was called the Bunjido
racetrack. It was like MSU stadium, all concrete, that’s where our housing was, was in this place. Cold,
you know. At one time, at one end of it there was a printing company of some. There was also at that
time when we read in the Stars and Stripes, you begin to read what ships are coming in to pick up guys
and take them home. It’s there that I saw that my brother’s ship, my brother who was bombed at Pearl
Harbor, was assigned to a transport, the Blatchford, R.M. Blatchford. So, I some way or another
connected with him and I said “when you come in I wanna know” so when they came in, then I was the
guest in the officers’ quarters. It was such a change for me because the officers all had—in those days—
they had—what did you call the guys that were…
They were stewards. sort
Stewards, yeah. They were black stewards on board ships, and they served the meals and so forth.
That’s the first time I had had milk in a good, long time. So, I was treated pretty royally. There were
nurses on board ship also. I was permitted to be on board for awhile and live like a king.
[31:45] When you transferred to Yokohama, what unit were you joining or what did you become a
part of?
I think it was that construction, 1279 Construction Engineering Battalion if I remember right, and then
from there I think what we did was change quarters out of that place into an area in Yokohama itself,
and that was another flat area made up of tarpaper Quonset, not Quonset but tarpaper huts set in
order, and that’s where our company then stayed and from there our work assignments were
interesting. Mine was. I was driven every day for a long time to a batching plant, a hot mix batching
plant somewhere in North Yokohama and there was a Japanese guy who was in charge of that. He was
in charge of the plant and he was in charge of the men that work there.
Can you explain what a batching plant is?
A batching plant is where you mix and the hot tar. You heat the tar, mix it with the gravel and you mix it
and that’s your black tar pavement. And then the trucks would come, and they would all head off and be
doing paving and batching somewhere. The astounding thing was, I was supposed to unload these—
�these were flat cars, and they had wooden sides on them, and I had a D8 Bulldozer. Now, how you
unload those cars with the blade of a D8 bulldozer is beyond me because you just don’t do it. It’s the
clumsiest operation, I can’t explain it. Instead of having a backhoe to pull the gravel of or something or a
hopper you drop, no it came in on flat cars and that was how primitive it was. Then there was a lot of
handwork that the Japanese guys had to do to get that stuff in the conveyor. That’s kind of the way I
spent my days and he had a garden at home. He had lived in the United States at one time.
[34:26] This is the Japanese manager?
Yes, he was a man much my senior. He might have been 60, maybe 60 or so. He knew what life in the
United States was like and he would bring me fruits and things like that to eat. That was kind of what my
day was for a while. Then maybe prior to that my job was to run what was called a Barber Greene
Ditcher. Barber Greene ditcher, or Barber Greene is made, just like John Deere but it had a conveyor like
this and the soil up there was nice to dig, it was sand and you’d dig trenches, just trenches, and then
somebody came and put a foundation of some sort and they would set huts, quonset huts on those.
Right next to that was, next to that one area was a Russian embassy or
A consulate maybe.
Something in Japan. They did not like it when one of the guys’ bulldozers knocked the tents down. I
remember that. I thought “oh boy, now here we go, third World War” so we did that, and put those huts
together. It was a lot of just plain work, work bees. But the thing that I found in going to Yokohama was
a hotel was there and I wanted to get a haircut and I went out. I was alone, I don’t know what I was
doing that day, but I went into this hotel and got my first haircut for almost nothing. I didn’t have a lot of
interaction with Japanese, and they’re very passive. There was never a controversy or anything like that.
One of the other things we did—what outfit was that now I’m thinking of—in Yokohama it was, there
are a lot of airports around that area and one of the things we had to do was to disarm, supposedly,
these things, machine guns and bomb sites and things like that. I didn’t take the engines off, I never did
anything at that, but they took engines off and you lined them all up in a big row and then the Signal
Corps, somebody came in and then they dynamited those engines, they just blew everything apart. And
we would lay the machine guns on the railroad tracks like this and have a bulldozer run over and bend
them. And he would take the planes with a quick way crane and pick them all up and get all that stuff on
the pile and would take a barrel of gasoline and pour it all over that aluminum and then light it, so all
that aluminum was charred, whatever. I thought that was a horrible waste, terrible waste. But anyway,
those are some of the thigs we did. One of the problems was getting into there with our dozers that one
day. I think our dozer blade, the finished blade, was probably 16-foot, maybe 14, very wide. Well, you
know, you go down a narrow Japanese street, and make a corner with a semi—caught the corner of a
house, you know. What do you do? So, people’s homes were damaged sometimes just getting your
equipment. There was only one airport that I remember, one or two that we worked on like that. Some
of the other things we did was, already then there was a begin to exchange of goods, and sometimes
we’d have to take a big oil tank or something because some Japanese guy businessman needed a tank or
whatever. We’d deliver a tank or something like that. So, we did a lot of variety of things.
[39:14] When you went in into Tokyo, what was there to see or do there?
�In Tokyo we went and saw the palace and all that sort of thing and the gardens and the things around
there, the streets of Tokyo. Of course, in those days, all the women had the kimonos, not like today and
so forth. It was just mainly scenery observing regulars there.
Was there still a downtown area that was still in reasonably good shape?
Yeah, there was a downtown area, but I don’t remember going to any specific ones there. I did in
Yokohama cause I spent more time there. Then of course there was the camera shops and so forth, and
one of the hospitals was there. That was undamaged in Yokohama.
Did you see a lot of cleaning up activity going on, people rebuilding?
You know, it’s amazing how much cleaning up was being done and had been done. Some of this stuff, if
they needed some equipment for moving heavy stuff then our outfit could do that, but it was really
amazing how quickly things got picked up and put aside and the streets opened up and cleaned and
swept. It was my experience, you see, was more one of experience a little bit of a different culture and
travel, you know, cross the country back and forth and so forth. And there’s an advantage of being the
tail-ender. My brother was the front-ender and I was the tail-ender and I was glad for that of course in
the end. But it also qualified me for some better benefits and so forth, just having been in a short time.
[41:33] You’re mentioning travel, did you travel around much within Japan? You went from Yokohama
to Tokyo; did you go anyplace else?
Not a lot but once in a while we would go to Atami, A-T-A-M-I, it was on the coast. It was situated where
it would get the hot water from Fujiyama, I think, or from the higher elevations there. We would often
rent a place for a weekend, maybe two nights. We’d spend that time there in the pools and so forth, it’s
a beautiful spot, overlook the ocean. But I didn’t go to the other side of the island to the Navy base or
anything like that. Some of the guys I knew from school would come down, one guy that I went to high
school from the 82nd airborne, I think he was at Hokkaido or something, so we’d have time together.
Did you ever see anything of General MacArthur or see where he was based?
Actually see him, I did not, but I saw the guards. The interesting thing was that the various guards was
nice to see the changing of the guards and so forth because there were different countries, and one of
the things I was most impressed with of course, the Indian Gurkhas. They had their machetes or swords
down their backs and so forth. No, but I did experience saluting his car when we were in the southern
part of Yokohama. Eichelberger’s headquarters was just beyond the racetrack, the Bunjido race track I
was telling you about, they always had to pass our place, so we had plenty of times when the star was
on the front of the car “star on the car!”
[43:43] Did you have to salute Eichelberger’s car or just MacArthur’s?
All of them. If anything came by.
Did they have a little flag on the car or a sign on the window or something?
There was a, I think on the front of the plate, there were stars on the front of the plate. I don’t
remember the flag exactly, but maybe.
But anyway, it was something a marker telling you that if that went by you were supposed to salute it.
�Oh yeah, and when you were right there on the street, you’re right there on the street you see them
coming.
Another side of the occupation of Japan, or one of the things that shows up in the books and so forth
is that apparently there was a lot of prostitution and issues like that. Was that around or were you
aware of that?
Well, I imagine individuals yeah. But really, I didn’t—we knew it was going on, we knew that guys were
doing what guys do. As far as it being flagrant, girls on the streets not really, I don’t think I saw that.
No particular establishments or anything like that.
Well, if there were, I didn’t know where they were.
That’s probably a healthy thing.
Yeah. The other thing was great in Yokohama, first cavalry they had a great baseball team, and so we
had spent a lot of time at baseball games in Yokohama. Very competitive, some of those games.
[45:34] Did they ever play Japanese players or was it all Americans against each other?
They were all American teams at that time. I keep thinking about going through town, and then, of
course, you know the rear of the streetcars were all energized by the cables up above and the guys and
then the guys for a little mischief got up and pulled the cart down. Poor Japanese guy, what could he do
against all the GIs, mischief, kids, you know, kid stuff.
How long did you spend in Yokohama do you think?
That was until the time I came home. So that would be from April to November. It was quite a ride.
Think about the time that you spent in Japan, are there other memories or impressions that stand out
that you haven’t brought into the story yet?
Yeah, no I-Has he left out anything?
Offscreen voice: He had a houseboy involved.
[46:45] You had a houseboy at some point?
Well, yes, I did. That was great. After we got our barracks in Yokohama, then our big containers, you
know you threw your GI stuff, your junk and your slop in, kids would come up here, stick their heads in
there, get whatever food they could get. I took a liking to this one little guy. I was 18 and he was 18, but
he was about that high. Taksa. His name was Taksa Shannara. I’d like to meet him again. He then
became our house boy and he would, we were in squad tents I don’t know how many maybe a dozen
guys in the barracks, and he would make our beds, he would shine our shoes, and he’d keep everything
tidy. Then of course you know we paid him and then he got all the benefits of food and all the rest. But
he also became kind of a brother you might say because he would learn to tease. He’d learn to tease. I
would make some remark about Tojo or Yamashita or something, that they were bad guys, you know,
and then he would say “no, no they were not, they were good guys” you know, stuff like that. But
�overhearing conversations, GI conversation is always “when are we gonna go home?” When GIs gripe,
you know everything is alright, they’re alive. He would hear us say “how many points till we go home?
We wanna go home.” I remember him saying “where do you come from?” I always say, I didn’t say
Grand Rapids, Michigan, I made it easy for him I said Chicago. “Oh, you gangster, you gangster.” Or of
course you always heard the story of Babe Ruth but Taksa Shannara caught on and pretty soon he would
tease, he would stand on my footlocker and he would say “aha” he would sing, he would say “No goal”
in his laugh, he wanted me to chase him you see, so that was our game. Then I said to him, it was the
day I was to leave, I said “Taksa, I think I wanna take you home” I said “I’m gonna take you by the
pants,” I said, “and I’m gonna stick you in my barracks bag and take you home.” “No no no” he said
“mamasan pissed off.” I laughed. Life in Japan, so I imagined there were a lot of little things that
happened along the way that we had fun with. The Japanese people, what little interchange we had
with them, was always positive. Downtown you’d have people, beggars. There was a lady, I don’t know
if she had a physical handicap, she would sing, I think she was partially blind or something, she would
sing a song. She would sing (sings in Japanese) we heard that so often, it was something like that. I don’t
know what it means, so forgive me any Japanese person. But she was begging for food, she would stand
in the hot sun and sing that song.
[50:47] Eventually though, did you have enough points to go home or did a whole bunch of you get to
go at once or what happened?
I don’t—I think it was just a matter of the end. I didn’t have enough points over two years, one year
overseas. I imagine it was a matter of another unit just going home. I don’t know what any of the other
guys did.
But a lot of people wound up, at the end of the war, staying in less that two full years.
Well, that is true. One of the guys in our outfit, he was from West Virginia, he told me something about
his lifestyle when he was home and it was not very high living. It was even difficult for shoes. So, he did
say to me “this is a good place for me, I have clothing, I have shoes, I have this.” His memories were
something about not a good living at home and I think some of those guys did stay rather than go home
to work in the coal mines and so forth. But not many of our outfit that I remember stayed.
When it’s time for you to go home, how do they get you back? How do you get home from Japan?
How did I get home? I got onboard ship in Yokohama and we went to Seattle, the port in Seattle. I think
that’s Fort Lewis if I remember right, Fort Lewis, Washington? I have to say it was the happiest day of my
life I think, going home, USA. It was a beautiful time of the year; it was just like Michigan and football
season was on. It almost made you think “gosh if the army was always like this every day, eating like
this, being fed like this, maybe I’d stay” but no, it was time to go home, happy day.
[53:02] Once you got home, what did you do next?
After I got home? After I got home, I think I had the opportunity for the GI Bill, but I didn’t take
advantage of that in any way. I think I intended to just find a job and I worked for my dad for a little
while in concrete. Didn’t like that of course. At the same time, I had applied at Consumer’s Energy,
Consumer’s Power Company at the time, Grand Rapids Police and Fire, both, they were separate at least
at that time. So I applied there, did the civil service exam thing and they all came at the same time, I
could’ve gone to any one and I chose the power company. I worked at Consumer’s Energy for six years
�as a groundman and later as a lineman, and then after that I considered going to the concrete business,
at least we thought that’s what it was at the time and then with my dad, I went back to work with my
dad in the concrete business. Then a little after that, I poured concrete walls. I bought a set of wall forms
and I poured concrete walls for a good long while, most of my years. Then after that, I don’t know how
old I was then, I did some inspection work for Bill Holmier in Muskegon Soils and Structures. When they
were building some of the Haworth buildings in Holland, I did some of the soil testing and concrete
testing and some inspections for placing of concrete, things like that. I did that for a while. Then as years
went by, I think our church was going to build a new church, so I did the clerk of the works business on
that and just kind of faded out of the picture.
[55:46] Look back on the time that you spent in the service, what do you think you learned from that,
or how did that affect you?
I thought it was an experience I would never have, I would do over any day; because after all, I didn’t get
shot at and I didn’t have to kill anybody. I know what the army is like. I think the mistake I made was I
didn’t take advantage of more communication with the people of Japan and maybe even the Philippines
although I wasn’t there that long. I think I would have done more research trying to interview more
people there. Travel more maybe.
And when you got back to the States, had you learned things from being in the service that helped
you in your jobs or otherwise?
What did the service teach me? It taught me what it was like and it taught me about war, the effects of
war, what happens to guys when they go through these things. I think you learn; you always learn more
than you know, more than you can put your finger on. You learn how to get along with people, you learn
how to size people up, you know who to stay away from and so forth. I think it’s a great learning
experience. I think from the standpoint of discipline it’s a good thing. I think—from the standpoint of
discipline—all young people should go through it, I do. I don’t have a negative feeling toward—I do say
this when my children and grandchildren, I say to my grandchildren who lean towards the military that
you get your college education first, and then if you want to be an officer or whatever comes after that
okay, but you get that first. You don’t want to be on the bottom of the ladder, not that it’s great up on
top either, I know that.
Thanks for a good story. Thank you very much for taking the time to share with us today.
�
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Title
A name given to the resource
Veterans History Project
Creator
An entity primarily responsible for making the resource
Grand Valley State University. History Department
Description
An account of the resource
The Library of Congress established the Veterans History Project in 2001 to collect memories, accounts, and documents of U.S. war veterans from World War II and the Korean War, Vietnam War, and conflicts in the Middle East and elsewhere, and to preserve these stories for future generations. The GVSU History Department interviews are part of this work-in-progress, and may contain videos and audio recordings, transcripts and interview outlines, and related documents and photographs.
Coverage
The spatial or temporal topic of the resource, the spatial applicability of the resource, or the jurisdiction under which the resource is relevant
1914-
Rights
Information about rights held in and over the resource
<a href="http://rightsstatements.org/page/InC/1.0/?language=en">In Copyright</a>
Subject
The topic of the resource
Afghan War, 2001--Personal narratives, American
Iran Hostage Crisis, 1979-1981--Personal narratives, American
Korean War, 1950-1953--Personal narratives, American
Michigan--History, Military
Oral history
Persian Gulf War, 1991--Personal narratives, American
United States--History, Military
United States. Air Force
United States. Army
United States. Navy
Veterans
Video recordings
Vietnam War, 1961-1975--Personal narratives, American
World War, 1939-1945--Personal narratives, American
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
Grand Valley State University. University Libraries. Special Collections & University Archives
Contributor
An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource
Smither, James
Boring, Frank
Relation
A related resource
Veterans History Project (U.S.)
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
RHC-27
Language
A language of the resource
eng
Source
A related resource from which the described resource is derived
<a href="https://gvsu.lyrasistechnology.org/repositories/2/resources/455">Veterans History Project interviews (RHC-27)</a>
Oral History
A resource containing historical information obtained in interviews with persons having firsthand knowledge.
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
RHC-27_GillesseW2112V
Title
A name given to the resource
Gillesse, William (Interview transcript and video), 2017
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
2017-03-21
Description
An account of the resource
Bill Gillesse was born in Grand Rapids, Michigan, in 1926. He remembered hearing about the attack on Pearl Harbor over the car radio during a family road trip to the state capital. Gillesse was drafted in December of 1944 and sent to Fort Sheridan, Illinois, and then Camp Joseph T. Robinson, Arkansas, for Basic Training. After training for war in Europe, he was redirected to Camp Howze, Texas, for mental conditioning and adjustment training necessary to fight the Japanese in the Pacific. Gillesse was then assigned to A Company of the 158th Regimental Combat Team. When the Japanese surrendered and the war was over, Gillesse remained in the Philippines before joining the occupational forces in Japan in April of 1946 with the 1279th Engineer Battalion back in Yokohama. In November of 1946, Gillesse was shipped back to the United States and was discharged at Fort Lewis, Washington, before traveling back to Grand Rapids where he went to work for Consumers Energy Company.
Creator
An entity primarily responsible for making the resource
Gillesse, William
Contributor
An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource
Smither, James (Interviewer)
Subject
The topic of the resource
World War, 1939-1945--Personal narratives, American
United States. Army
Oral history
Veterans History Project (U.S.)
United States--History, Military
Veterans
Video recordings
Format
The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource
video/mp4
application/pdf
Type
The nature or genre of the resource
Moving Image
Text
Source
A related resource from which the described resource is derived
Veterans History Project collection, RHC-27
Rights
Information about rights held in and over the resource
<a href="https://rightsstatements.org/page/InC/1.0/?language=en">In Copyright</a>
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
Grand Valley State University Libraries, Special Collections & University Archives, 1 Campus Drive, Allendale, MI, 49401.
Relation
A related resource
Veterans History Project (U.S.)
Language
A language of the resource
eng
Coverage
The spatial or temporal topic of the resource, the spatial applicability of the resource, or the jurisdiction under which the resource is relevant
World War II
-
https://digitalcollections.library.gvsu.edu/files/original/263a1c6b8f94698252fde018c5bdac53.m4v
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https://digitalcollections.library.gvsu.edu/files/original/02163796e87c12acaf188a0b579b0000.pdf
133e8e919026de44334a8d38399269f0
PDF Text
Text
Grand Valley State University
Veteran’s History Project
Gregory Gilmore
Length of Interview (00:08:11)
Background/Training
Served from 1962 until 1968
Volunteered for the draft
Basic Training in Fort Knox, Kentucky
Quite stressful, rigorous training physically and mentally
Get through with determination and survival
Service (00:00:55)
Went down to Fort Lee, Virginia after training
Cuban Missile Crisis, deployed to Miami, Florida
Quartermaster Corps
Supplied troops and acted as back-up combat unit
Didn’t see combat
Food was good
Entertainment through writing letters, playing pool and cards, going out to clubs, drinking
One of the guys in his unit once tried to make home-made wine, ended up bursting in his locker
and spilling into the rooms
All Officers were well trained and good men
Was happy when his service time ended
Hopes no one has to go to war, but sometimes it’s necessary
Doesn’t attend reunions
All of his training helped prepare him for life; it’s a good experience
Stayed in touch with his family via letter and phone calls, family also visited a few times
Did some relaxing after being let out of the service
�Went back to school only for medical training for the Fire Department
Made some good friends in the service but didn’t stay in touch with them for long
Worked in a Sport’s goods store for a few years with his father, then worked for the B. F.
Goodrich Avionics and Aeronautics Division; retired after 23 years
Military is a good base for young men
Learn to function under stress
�
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Title
A name given to the resource
Veterans History Project
Creator
An entity primarily responsible for making the resource
Grand Valley State University. History Department
Description
An account of the resource
The Library of Congress established the Veterans History Project in 2001 to collect memories, accounts, and documents of U.S. war veterans from World War II and the Korean War, Vietnam War, and conflicts in the Middle East and elsewhere, and to preserve these stories for future generations. The GVSU History Department interviews are part of this work-in-progress, and may contain videos and audio recordings, transcripts and interview outlines, and related documents and photographs.
Coverage
The spatial or temporal topic of the resource, the spatial applicability of the resource, or the jurisdiction under which the resource is relevant
1914-
Rights
Information about rights held in and over the resource
<a href="http://rightsstatements.org/page/InC/1.0/?language=en">In Copyright</a>
Subject
The topic of the resource
Afghan War, 2001--Personal narratives, American
Iran Hostage Crisis, 1979-1981--Personal narratives, American
Korean War, 1950-1953--Personal narratives, American
Michigan--History, Military
Oral history
Persian Gulf War, 1991--Personal narratives, American
United States--History, Military
United States. Air Force
United States. Army
United States. Navy
Veterans
Video recordings
Vietnam War, 1961-1975--Personal narratives, American
World War, 1939-1945--Personal narratives, American
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
Grand Valley State University. University Libraries. Special Collections & University Archives
Contributor
An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource
Smither, James
Boring, Frank
Relation
A related resource
Veterans History Project (U.S.)
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
RHC-27
Language
A language of the resource
eng
Source
A related resource from which the described resource is derived
<a href="https://gvsu.lyrasistechnology.org/repositories/2/resources/455">Veterans History Project interviews (RHC-27)</a>
Oral History
A resource containing historical information obtained in interviews with persons having firsthand knowledge.
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Title
A name given to the resource
Gilmore, Gregory (Interview outline and video), 2005
Creator
An entity primarily responsible for making the resource
Gilmore, Gregory
Description
An account of the resource
Gregory Gilmore volunteered for the draft and served from 1962 to 1968. He was deployed to Miami, Florida during the Cuban Missile Crisis as a part of the Quartermaster Corps. He was based in the United States during his time in the service.
Contributor
An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource
Fox, Sandra (Interviewer)
Caledonia High School (Caledonia, Mich.)
Subject
The topic of the resource
Oral history
Veterans History Project (U.S.)
United States--History, Military
Michigan--History, Military
Veterans
Video recordings
Vietnam War, 1961-1975--Personal narratives, American
United States. Army
United States. National Guard
Language
A language of the resource
eng
Rights
Information about rights held in and over the resource
<a href="http://rightsstatements.org/page/InC/1.0/?language=en">In Copyright</a>
Type
The nature or genre of the resource
Moving Image
Text
Relation
A related resource
Veterans History Project (U.S.)
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
2005-06-06
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
GilmoreG
Source
A related resource from which the described resource is derived
<a href="https://gvsu.lyrasistechnology.org/repositories/2/resources/455">Veterans History Project Collection, (RHC-27)</a>
Format
The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource
application/pdf
video/mp4
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
Grand Valley State University. University Libraries. Lemmen Library and Archives
-
https://digitalcollections.library.gvsu.edu/files/original/b816b565351be9b30af0be8f3525821d.mp4
0e91185107acdebc177c4757f12573d6
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e4bc100e49d4c8b966e98ec4fb68943b
PDF Text
Text
Grand Valley State University
Veterans History Project Interview
Troy Girke
(1:01:22)
(01:25) Background Information
• Troy was born in Allegan, MI
• He has one brother and a very close family
• He had a fun childhood in the country where he was able to spend a lot of time hunting
and fishing
(2:15) The Service
• Troy joined the Navy in 1983 and spent 20 years in the service
• He had thought about joining only shortly when he was very young
• He tried to get his brother to join with him, but it was during hunting season, so he joined
shortly after Troy
• He chose the Navy because he thought that he would be more safe on a boat
(4:40) Training
• Troy went from Detroit to Great Lakes Naval Base in Illinois for boot camp
• He was very busy every day and time went by quickly
(7:00) 9/11
• His most memorable moments were during his time spent in Afghanistan and Desert
Storm
• He was on a flight deck working on a turnover when he heard the news of 9/11
• He had previously been deployed in Singapore and near India
(9:40) Getting Ready for Afghanistan
• The ship was full of many weapons; more than he had seen anywhere in his entire life
• He was working on the flight deck of an air craft carrier and saw many missiles launched
• He never experienced any combat, but did visit many combat zones
(13:05) A World Cruise on the Kitty Hawk
• His brother was in the same battle group so they went to the Philippines and Africa
together
• They were allowed some time on leave and went on a four day safari in Africa
(14:50) Showing of pictures
• He never lost anyone close, but has many friends that are on their fourth or fifth tour of
Iraq
• The USS Midway was the first ship that he was on
• He traveled to Africa, Australia, Spain, France, Bahrain, the UAE, Korea, Japan,
Singapore, Hong Kong, and the Philippines
�•
•
Most of his medals were earned by “being in the right place at the right time”
Others are for doing above and beyond what is expected of you
(20:30) Aboard the Ships
• The food was not very good; there was not much seasoning because it would be hard to
please 5,000 different people
• Sometimes he would eat roast beef for three weeks in a row
• He was able to email his family and friends often
• The ships had phones on them and everyone was given a phone card
• Everyone had to start work every day at 6:30am
(25:35) Entertainment
• The watched movies and TV, listened to the radio, played cards and dominos
• There were some USO shows and they were visited by the Dallas Cowboys Cheerleaders
(34:20) Showing of Pictures
• He last time was spent on Operation Enduring Freedom
• He had been stationed in Japan, Alaska, and California
• His highest rank reached was E-6
(35:45) Time After the Service
• He still has many dreams about the Navy and believes that they will continue, since it
took up 20 years of his life
• He now is more safety conscious
(51:00) Reading of Retirement Speech
(53:35) Showing of Foreign Currency
�
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Title
A name given to the resource
Veterans History Project
Creator
An entity primarily responsible for making the resource
Grand Valley State University. History Department
Description
An account of the resource
The Library of Congress established the Veterans History Project in 2001 to collect memories, accounts, and documents of U.S. war veterans from World War II and the Korean War, Vietnam War, and conflicts in the Middle East and elsewhere, and to preserve these stories for future generations. The GVSU History Department interviews are part of this work-in-progress, and may contain videos and audio recordings, transcripts and interview outlines, and related documents and photographs.
Coverage
The spatial or temporal topic of the resource, the spatial applicability of the resource, or the jurisdiction under which the resource is relevant
1914-
Rights
Information about rights held in and over the resource
<a href="http://rightsstatements.org/page/InC/1.0/?language=en">In Copyright</a>
Subject
The topic of the resource
Afghan War, 2001--Personal narratives, American
Iran Hostage Crisis, 1979-1981--Personal narratives, American
Korean War, 1950-1953--Personal narratives, American
Michigan--History, Military
Oral history
Persian Gulf War, 1991--Personal narratives, American
United States--History, Military
United States. Air Force
United States. Army
United States. Navy
Veterans
Video recordings
Vietnam War, 1961-1975--Personal narratives, American
World War, 1939-1945--Personal narratives, American
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
Grand Valley State University. University Libraries. Special Collections & University Archives
Contributor
An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource
Smither, James
Boring, Frank
Relation
A related resource
Veterans History Project (U.S.)
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
RHC-27
Language
A language of the resource
eng
Source
A related resource from which the described resource is derived
<a href="https://gvsu.lyrasistechnology.org/repositories/2/resources/455">Veterans History Project interviews (RHC-27)</a>
Oral History
A resource containing historical information obtained in interviews with persons having firsthand knowledge.
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Title
A name given to the resource
Girke, Troy (Interview outline and video), 2006
Creator
An entity primarily responsible for making the resource
Girke, Troy A
Description
An account of the resource
Troy Girke was born in Allegan, Michigan in 1963 and enlisted in the United States Navy in 1983. Troy remained with the Navy for 20 years and traveled to Africa, Australia, Spain, France, Bahrain, UAE, Korea, Singapore, Hong Kong, and the Philippines. The most memorable moment for Troy was when he heard the news of 9/11. Troy was in the Navy for a significant amount of time and explains the changes that took place within the institution over time.
Contributor
An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource
Timmerman, Austin (Interviewer)
Espinoza, Maria Fernanda (Interviewer)
First Baptist Church of Otsego (Otsego, Mich.)
Subject
The topic of the resource
Oral history
Veterans History Project (U.S.)
United States--History, Military
Michigan--History, Military
Veterans
United States. Army
Iraq War, 2003-2011--Personal narratives, American
Other veterans & civilians--Personal narratives, American
Video recordings
Language
A language of the resource
eng
Rights
Information about rights held in and over the resource
<a href="http://rightsstatements.org/page/InC/1.0/?language=en">In Copyright</a>
Type
The nature or genre of the resource
Moving Image
Text
Relation
A related resource
Veterans History Project (U.S.)
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
2006-04-02
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
GirkeT
Source
A related resource from which the described resource is derived
<a href="https://gvsu.lyrasistechnology.org/repositories/2/resources/455">Veterans History Project Collection, (RHC-27)</a>
Format
The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource
application/pdf
video/mp4
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
Grand Valley State University. University Libraries. Lemmen Library and Archives
-
https://digitalcollections.library.gvsu.edu/files/original/e48f9013f39801c6c1c263ad12158e2c.mp4
2298499e5c83b81fd8f805ee308da9ec
https://digitalcollections.library.gvsu.edu/files/original/03e713ba61256eba31ccabf3e79180ee.pdf
320d8349e012aae5e8b33d39d041093e
PDF Text
Text
Grand Valley State University
Veterans History Project Interview
World War II
Rita Glanz
Length of Interview: 41:30
(02:03)
JS: We’re talking today with Mrs. Rita Glanz of Kentwood, Michigan. The interviewer is James
Smither of Grand Valley State University. Mrs. Glanz, can you start by telling us just a little bit
about yourself. To begin, where were you born?
RG: I was born in Vienna, Austria.
JS: In what year?
RG: 1938.
JS: 1938 or 1933? What year were you born?
RG: Oh, 1933. Sorry. I was born in 1933, but my first memory is 1938. November 19th,
actually, when they took my father away.
JS: Explain a little bit about the background. Your family is Jewish.
RG: Yeah. My family is Jewish. My father was in the feather business. Which back in those
days was apparently very profitable.
JS: What do people do with pillows? Was it stuff pillows or other things?
(02:55)
RG: (laughs) We used to have mattresses that were made of feathers. Comforters used feathers.
He had two places. One for the comforters and mattresses and pillows. And another one,
women used to wear boas. Hat feathers. Various things. So that was another place. And he
owned an apartment building. And, back in those days, my mother was very sick. I didn’t know
why. She was in bed a lot. We, I had a nanny and we had a maid and a washer-woman. And
my father was pretty well-off.
(03:48)
RG: But then November 10th, 1938, they came and they took him away. I remember my
mother screaming. And…back in those days, apparently, you could still bribe your way out.
JS: The Germans had only taken over Austria in April that year, so the Nazi’s hadn’t really been
there that long yet. And you still would have had Austrian police officials and things like that.
�RG: Yeah, but they were all Nazis. Because I remember looking out the window, and (makes
face). Well, this was after they took him away, actually. And they were beating up people in the
street. And, uh, anyway, he bribed his way out. Three days later he came home.
(04:41)
RG: One thing that really sticks in my mind. His sister came over and they had taken her
husband away too. He had a hardware business. And she was sitting on the bench in the
hallway…well, as a young child this sticks in my mind…all of a sudden, she was talking to him
and she must have fainted, and my father ran and got a bucket of water and threw it at her. This
really impressed me. But they had taken him, my uncle, to Dachau. They loaded them all on the
truck. But my father got out with the proviso that he leave the country immediately. So he went
and left for Switzerland, but he left illegally. So they put him into a labor camp, digging roads.
And, uh…
(05:50)
JS: Now, were there…did he tell you much about that? I mean, were there a lot of Jews who
wound up doing that kind of thing?
RG: Yeah. Yeah. It was a big, big community. In fact, well, that’s skipping a lot but I met
several people after I came to New York, but they were in that camp. And, as a result of him
going to Switzerland, and writing letters, he got to put me on this Kindertransport.
(06:24)
JS: Can you explain what that was?
RG: This is a system whereby the English people let in ten thousand Jewish children. Between
the end of 1938 and July of 1939. I got out on the next to the last train. July 11, 1939. And, I
remember my nurse took me to the station, cause as I said, my mother was really sick. And I had
two cousins that came along, a girl and a boy, who later ended up in what was later Palestine.
They escaped. And, it was a horrendous trip, because I remember, I guess crossing the English
Channel…I have motion sickness. Which I found out then. I was very very sick.
(07:27)
RG: I got put…we all got put into this orphanage in London. Rows and rows of beds. And a
few times, people came and took us out for walks. I guess, like I said, this was July of ’39, and
England hadn’t declared war yet.
JS: Right. The war hadn’t started yet.
RG: And I remember, someone took about six of us for a walk and a lady came out and bought
us a box of Black Magic chocolates. It was such a nice surprise. Cause I’m a chocoholic
anyway. And then, around in September, people used to come around, looking at us, and this
wonderful couple came, Harry and Frieda Morgan, and they adopted…well, they took me with
the proviso that it was for the duration of the war. And they lived in Coventry, which it turned
out was very very badly bombed.
�(08:41)
RG: So when they first took me, I didn’t speak a word of English and they didn’t speak a word
of German. It was terrible, but they sent me to school. And the kids used to throw rocks at me
and call me “Nazi.” So, I learned English very fast, because I explained to them that I was
running from the Nazis too. So, I think in two or three weeks, I was really making myself
understood. And we lived, like I said in Coventry, and each time the bombing was really bad.
Like at night, they would drop the bombs and you could go outside and read a newspaper, that’s
how bright…it was as bright as this studio.
(09:33)
JS: So this happened on a lot of different nights?
RG: Every night. They were bombing. Because Coventry was practically wiped off the face of
the map, if you’ve ever heard of it.
JS: Yeah, yeah.
RG: And we lived at 36..3 Altamont Green. No, 37 Altamont Green Road, I remember. The
first place, but then it got so so bad, we moved further down the road. To 363 Altamont Green
Road. And it just kept getting worse. Like…
JS: Now was this just kind of still in a kind of built up area, like a suburb?
RG: Yeah. Coventry is, yeah, we were like on the outskirts of Coventry, but it didn’t matter. It
was a very industrialized city. I think they supplied rubber, or made airplanes, or whatever.
JS: Yeah. A whole lot of factories were there and that’s why it was targeted.
(10:27)
RG: So, then my adopted family, I called them “Aunt” and “Uncle,” they were conscientious
objectors. Christians, called Christadelphian religion, they…he was a stretcher bearer in the
hospital, and she was an air raid warden, so most of my time, I spent under the stairs. We had
what was called an Anderson table. It was steel, with netting. And I slept in the closet, under the
table. With my cat, Tubbins.
JS: Now did they have children?
RG: No.
JS: About how old were they at the time, do you think?
RG: Oh, they must have been in their early forties. And the reason they took me is because my
name was Rita, and they had always wanted a child to name Rita.
(11:23)
�RG: So, anyway, the bombing just got worse and worse. Like I said, they bombed the
waterworks. And we didn’t have water for several days and then they put pipes above ground.
And, you had to boil the water all the time. And, also, this is funny to tell about it now, but they
told you to take a bath only once a week. And first I…it was only like six inches of water. First
I took a bath, then my Aunt Frieda took a bath, then my uncle, in the same water. Which now
seems like inconceivable, but we managed. And we didn’t have that much food either. But my
uncle used to grow vegetables, so sometimes for supper, that’s all we had. We roasted an onion
in the fireplace. That’s what we had for supper. It was good though. And every day, she made
rice pudding, which now, I won’t touch rice pudding. For seven years, rice pudding was a bit
much.
(12:42)
RG: And then it just got worse and worse. So we moved to another little suburb of Coventry. It
was called Nuneaton. Which was much better. There wasn’t as much bombing. And suddenly
the war was over. But I didn’t want to leave them, because I didn’t hardly even remember my
mother. Or my father, you know. But in the interim, I had gotten a letter from my father that my
mother had died. But I don’t really know if she died, or was put to death. Because back then
they used to put sick people to death.
JS: Yes, they did.
(13:33)
RG: But, years and years later, a cousin of mine, um, went to Vienna and he put her name on my
grandmother’s tombstone, so…I don’t know what happened to her. And, anyway, I didn’t want
to leave England, because to me, these people were my only family. But my father, he wrote a
letter to the Prime Minister, Churchill, the king at the time, that he wanted to get me out of there,
I don’t know why. And in the meantime, his brother-in-law, my uncle who had been in Dachau,
he had a sister in Brooklyn, and as a result, she was able to get him out of Dachau. Early ’39.
He was in there like six months. And get him to a place called Kitchener Camp, in England,
which was like a rehabilitation camp.
(14:48)
RG: But he was never rehabilitated. He was like a nervous mental wreck. And because of this
sister of his in Brooklyn, he was able, with my aunt, to come to America. But they couldn’t
stand New York, cause like I said, he was such a mess, so they went to relatives that had escaped
in the First World War, and gone to Birmingham, Alabama. And so that’s where they lived.
And my father threw all of his letter-writing…see, I would have legally been belonging to my
aunt and uncle by September of…from Setember of ’39 through September of ’46. The seven
years would have been up, but he wanted me out of there. So he got me out of there in May, of
1946. To Birmingham, Alabama.
(16:05)
JS: Let’s back up a little bit. I’d like you to fill in a little bit more of the story. You lived there
in England, in the Coventry area for seven years. Now, once you had begun to make yourself
understood there, in school, how did you get along with the kids in school?
�RG: Oh, great. I was really happy there, you know. I felt at home. And I made lots of friends.
I felt like, well, my aunt and uncle, I felt like they were my parents, because, as I said, I hadn’t
seen my father since I was five. My mother since I was six. And then, I knew she was dead.
My father taught himself English in Switzerland, and he used to write letters.
(17:01)
JS: Now did you remember any of your German then, at that point? Or did you lose track of
that?
RG: Not really. No, I like blocked it out of my memory. However, well, to skip back then, if
you want me to, I lived in Birmingham, Alabama, which I thought I’d died and gone to hell.
Cause back in those days, the worst thing was being black and the next worst thing was being
Jewish.
JS: Right.
RG: This was in 1946. God, I hated it. Plus it was so hot, coming from a European climate.
And in fact, when I got to the railroad station…back in those days, trains, everything was
segregated, and I, myself, had never seen an Afro-American person. And the terrific, intense
heat when I got off the train…I was still wearing winter clothes. This was May 13, 1946. Uh, I
thought when I saw these black people, I thought that was a deep suntan, because it was so…you
have no conception the heat, from…coming from Europe to that.
(18:27)
RG: So, I really hated it there. Back those days, America had a quota system, I don’t know if
they do now. And I was on the Austrian quota, that’s why I was able to come here in ’46. But
my father had been…back in those days, sometimes it was Poland, sometimes it was Russia, in
1914. When his family escaped and went to Austria. So he was on the Polish quota, which the
United States had on a lower quota system. So he didn’t get here until 1947. And when he got
off the train, my aunt said “That’s your father.” And I really really didn’t know him. Because he
had been a business man prior to my…
JS: Right. Right.
RG: And then for seven years he’d been digging roads. He was real thin and he didn’t look like
the same person…I didn’t have that overwhelming feeling, like wow. That’s my father. You
know. But anyway, he hated Birmingham, too. So he stayed like two weeks. And he went to
New York. And people that he had done business with prior to the war, and started with the
feather business. Because he was working for someone. It wasn’t his own business.
(20:02)
JS: Right.
RG: So I stayed in Birmingham until 1949, and he used to write letters…you know, how lonely
he is, blah blah blah. So I thought I would go to New York, because I had heard better things
about New York. And I went there and he put me up with some friends of his, from Switzerland.
�So I only saw him on weekends anyway. And then on my seventeenth birthday, I made a lot of
friends in Brooklyn, and they made me a surprise birthday party. It was a Saturday night. I
called him up to tell him and he wasn’t home. And the next morning he came to the house where
I was staying and said, “c’mon get up. I got married last night.” So he had married this woman
that he had also met in Switzerland. From Stuttgart, and her husband had been killed.
(21:10)
RG: And, back in those days, it was hard to get apartments and everything.
JS: Right.
RG: So they had gotten a furnished apartment in Queens, New York. And that was also a funny
story. The people that lived in the other floor, they were also, had lived in England, and the
mother-in-law, she came over one day and she was talking and she said, “Yes, I came over on
the ship called the Drottningholm.” Which was the ship I came on. And she said, “Oh my
goodness, you’re the little girl they carried on board screaming.” She remembered me. And I
was seasick the whole ten days. It took ten days.
(22:00)
RG: And then finally, they were able…my father was able to get an apartment in Brooklyn. We
moved to Brooklyn. We moved to…back in those days, it was the biggest high school in the
United States, Erasmus Hall. And I graduated from Erasmus Hall and went into Brooklyn
College for two years. And I quit to get married. And said I would go back within a year. Oh,
well, yes. It’s fifty four years later and I never did. Unfortunately. And, I met my husband in
Brooklyn and, he had escaped, I think I mentioned, from Germany. And was in Ireland. So we
were always in next door countries. When I came to Alabama, he came to Connecticut.
JS: Not quite so next door.
RG: Well, (laughs). He came to Brooklyn and I came to Brooklyn and that’s how we met.
JS: And how much older was he than you?
RG: A lot. Eleven years actually.
JS: Did he say much about what it was like to be in Ireland during the war?
(23:17)
RG: Yeah, well, what happened was the Jewish community in Ireland donated land. And a lot
of these kids…well, some of them were older, in their twenties, or fifteen, sixteen, seventeen.
But they built it up, made it like a farm. And they grew vegetables and stuff, for the soldiers.
And it was in Drogheda, and he went back in 1980, no I think 1990, went and looked at it. They
didn’t have hardly any bombing.
JS: Was he in Northern Ireland, the British part, or… okay. Because if he was in the Irish
Republic, that was a neutral country at that point.
�(24:12) Note: sound quality shifts at this point. Difficult to hear RG.
RG: So then, he had family that also escaped in 1914, and ended up in Connecticut. And that’s
how he…put an ad in the paper, and anybody related to Nathan [unclear] Glanz, back then, you
used to have two last names. And he immediately got an answer from a great aunt of his. And
so she sponsored him and within three weeks, he was there to see her. Cause the German quota
was larger.
JS: Right.
RG: So, that’s my story. That’s how I, uh…
(25:12)
JS: Okay. If we may, I’d like to go back a little bit here, to what was going on in England.
During that period when you were living in Coventry and so forth, how much were you aware of
what was going in in Europe and the world? Were you paying attention to that kind of thing?
RG: Oh, yeah. We used to…
(Brief interruption to change microphone.)
(26:03)
JS: I was asking you about following news of the war and so forth. So how did you learned
about things?
RG: Well, we read the newspaper. And we had broadcasts every night, on the radio. There was
no such thing as tv. And they used to play, every night, the national anthems of each allied
country. On the radio. We always stayed up to listen to that. And, you know, you knew what
was going on, somewhat. Not everything.
JS: How worried did people seem to be, in the first couple of years in the war?
RG: Very. Very worried. England, when I first got adopted, seemed to think, from what I
understood, that Hitler was going to be there any day. This was in September of ’39. Well, that
was when the war started. And, yeah. We had so many air raids.
(27:18)
RG: And it was…two specific times I remember… as I said, my uncle was a stretcher bearer.
And he was gone for five days. I think it was in 1940 or ’41, I don’t know. We had straight
bombing. It just never ever stopped.
JS: Yeah. It was late in 1940, was a major attack.
RG: And we didn’t see him for five days. You know, my aunt was frantic. And then he finally
came home. And of course, they bombed the hospital, too. And then Coventry was very famous
for its cathedral. And the shell of the cathedral is still standing. I mean, I’ve been back, many
many times. And it was just like an empty hole. And the only thing that was left, which was
�amazing to most people, was a little plaque that said “In God We Trust.” Which is still there.
And now next to it, they’ve built this beautiful ultra-modern cathedral, which is very
controversial because people think it’s a little too modern. But basically, Coventry was like
wiped off the map. They bombed everything.
JS: And was there a lot of damage in the neighborhoods that you were living in, at least at first?
(28:47)
RG: Yeah. I remember walking to school and the houses were like piles of rubble. Once I saw
a hand, an arm. Another time, this was terrible, I saw a head sticking out. And we had our
classes, mostly, in the air raid shelter, because…and we would have a little board, a little
blackboard like this (motions a square with her hands), each, with a little piece of chalk. Cause
we had no paper.
JS: Right.
RG: In fact, this is ridiculous, but we didn’t even have toilet paper. We used to have to use
newspaper. I mean people here can’t comprehend what it was like. It’s hard for me, even, to
comprehend what it was like at that time. But, like I say, certain things, I’ll never forget.
(29:47)
RG: Like in Vienna, they used to walk along and women, men, kids, they used to say “Sieg
Heil.” It was unbelievable. That’s why it’s really hard to comprehend how people can be that
way.
JS: Did your father tell you much about what life was like in Vienna before the Nazis got there?
RG: Oh, it was wonderful. That’s why I said to him, how come you kept staying there? So he
said, well, what do you think, that I would ever believe that this crazy person would make
something of himself. We never thought it would happen. And I had two businesses. I had an
apartment building. We had everything. And I wasn’t going to leave because I thought nothing
would ever happen. And, now, he had nothing.
(30:54)
RG: I mean, he tried to get like retribution, or whatever it’s called, but he never did. But he
died, he was 89 years old. Here, he died in Brooklyn, so at least he had some peace. But, ah, he
kept…I used to say to him, why didn’t you leave before? Because I’ve spoken to several people
that did leave, and he said, why would you leave your business, your property and everything.
Because this was a crazy person.
(31:42)
JS: Yeah. And it was a little bit different being in Austria, rather than being in Germany, too.
RG: Well, from what I understand, the Austrians were worse than the Germans, as far as being
anti-semitic. Then I had an aunt and uncle, they were both physicians, and they were head of
what was called the Krankenkase, which was like socialized medicine. And they were able to
�get out with their two sons to the Dominican Republic. And then…that was my mother’s brother
and his wife. Then my father had a sister, another sister, that was able with her husband to get to
Mexico. Because people, if you had a visa, you got on a boat, if you had enough money and you
didn’t even know where you were going.
(32:39)
RG: So, like I said, my father was one of eight. But they all got killed. And my mother, her
brother and sister and her husband and child, they were all killed. But one story, which I will
never forget, this was right, the day after they took my father away. November. We had an egg
man, which we used to call the schwendler, which meant “the swindler.” He came all the time,
delivered eggs and the cook would always give him coffee and everything. It was like, friendly
person. Well, the day after they took my father away, he came to the house, and we had this big
china closet, like, which I didn’t realize, but there was a bunch of gold dishes in there. Which I
certainly didn’t care about. And he came and he took my doll carriage and he went like this
(motions with her hands), and swept these gold dishes into the doll carriage. And was pushing it
away and I was screaming and grabbing his leg. And my nurse came over and she’s pulling me
away.
(34:00)
RG: I mean, later, when I came to Birmingham, my aunt told me “those dishes were real gold,”
because my mother’s brother had owned a goldmine. And, I mean, I didn’t really care about the
dishes. But my doll carriage, that was a very upsetting, traumatizing thing for me. Which seems
silly now, but…
JS: It doesn’t sound silly at all.
RG: I can’t forget…I can still see his face. And like I say, he must have been aware of what was
going on because why else did he come the day after they took my father away.
JS: That’s also right at the time when they had Kristallnacht.
RG: It was Kristallnacht. November 10th. But, anyway, I told you I forgot my German. So
when my father married my step-mother, she was illiterate in all languages. So I was trying to
teach her English to become a citizen. And my German all came back to me. She never did
learn English. Because I was teaching her, well, back then, there’s forty eight states in the
United States, you know. And five boroughs in New York. And I took her for her citizenship
papers and they asked her how many states in the United States, and she said, “funf,”which is
five. But then they passed her anyway. But that’s how my German came back to me. But I
don’t like to speak German because it brings back too many bad memories.
(35:56)
JS: Sure. Now in England, you had there’s a period early in the war where the Germans do a lot
of bombing, and this is a phase after that, where a lot of that lightened up. Did life get somewhat
more normal or were there continually raids at night?
�RG: Oh, in Coventry, it was like every night. We had…they did two hours daylight savings
time. Which was ridiculous. Because they thought they wouldn’t come if it was daylight. Well,
like I told you that one instance, they bombed five days and nights straight.
JS: Right.
RG: And it was terrible…I can’t really remember. It was a nightly thing it seemed like, every
night.
JS: Throughout 1940 and ’41, they did a lot. After that, they were running lower on bombers
and needed them other places.
RG: Yeah.
JS: But they still did conduct raids.
(36:58)
RG: A lot. And then I told you we moved to Nuneaton. It was like Kentwood to Grand Rapids,
maybe. So it wasn’t as bad, but you could hear. And when the war was over, it was June 6, I
remember we had this big block party. And my aunt made me a costume out of the blackout
curtain. I mean, that was her job. She used to go around as an air raid warden, looking for little
specks of light coming through the window. But Nuneaton never did get bombed that much, but
Coventry was unbelievable.
(37:55)
JS: Now did you see anything of American or foreign soldiers during the war? Were they based
anywhere around there?
RG: I saw a baseball game. Yep. American soldiers. A bunch of us went and we were sitting
in the stands. And they were playing baseball. And this one friend, her name was Marie, and the
baseball came and hit her right here. (points to forehead) And she was, like, unconscious for
quite a while. That was my first impression of baseball. Ugh…and then also there was this, let’s
see, a distant distant relative. He must have been in the American Navy. And he came over. My
aunt in Birmingham had told him where we were living and everything. And he was stationed
not far from Coventry. And he came (laughs) and he brought Planter’s peanuts, two one pound
cans, and as I said, we had hardly any food and certainly hardly any candy, everything was
rationed. So I pigged out on these Planter’s peanuts.
(39:19)
RG: And it was around Christmas time, and one day I just passed out, and I had a ruptured
appendix. And apparently, what the doctor had said back then, it was from eating all these
peanuts. Aggravated my appendix and caused it to rupture. But that was my, ah, being a pig,
actually. And another time my aunt had sent me from America, some chewing gum. And I was
caught in class, chewing gum. Which you weren’t allowed to chew. We didn’t have any gum.
So I got kept after school, I was walking home by myself. It was about 4 o’clock and sirens
went, and it was the rule that you had to get into an air raid shelter. Cause we had them along the
�road. But most people had their own. In the house. So I went in and it was empty. I stayed
there a while and it was dark. And I was scared of the dark. I must have been about eight, I
think. So I started to run away from the shelter. And there was a direct hit on the air raid shelter.
(40:38)
JS: Oh, wow.
RG: So I guess I had a guardian angel someplace cause I had a couple of narrow escapes. But,
other than that, I guess I’m lucky to be alive. Because most of my family didn’t make it. So…
(41:04)
JS: As families go, you had a pretty good record. You had relatives who got out.
RG: Yeah. Two aunts. And my mother’s brother. They later got to New York. Of course,
they’re all dead now. But, yeah, they managed to get out.
JS: It’s a remarkable story and thank you for telling it to us today.
RG: You’re welcome. I’m glad I survived to tell it. (Laughs)
(41:30)
�
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Title
A name given to the resource
Veterans History Project
Creator
An entity primarily responsible for making the resource
Grand Valley State University. History Department
Description
An account of the resource
The Library of Congress established the Veterans History Project in 2001 to collect memories, accounts, and documents of U.S. war veterans from World War II and the Korean War, Vietnam War, and conflicts in the Middle East and elsewhere, and to preserve these stories for future generations. The GVSU History Department interviews are part of this work-in-progress, and may contain videos and audio recordings, transcripts and interview outlines, and related documents and photographs.
Coverage
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1914-
Rights
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<a href="http://rightsstatements.org/page/InC/1.0/?language=en">In Copyright</a>
Subject
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Afghan War, 2001--Personal narratives, American
Iran Hostage Crisis, 1979-1981--Personal narratives, American
Korean War, 1950-1953--Personal narratives, American
Michigan--History, Military
Oral history
Persian Gulf War, 1991--Personal narratives, American
United States--History, Military
United States. Air Force
United States. Army
United States. Navy
Veterans
Video recordings
Vietnam War, 1961-1975--Personal narratives, American
World War, 1939-1945--Personal narratives, American
Publisher
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Grand Valley State University. University Libraries. Special Collections & University Archives
Contributor
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Smither, James
Boring, Frank
Relation
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Veterans History Project (U.S.)
Identifier
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RHC-27
Language
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eng
Source
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<a href="https://gvsu.lyrasistechnology.org/repositories/2/resources/455">Veterans History Project interviews (RHC-27)</a>
Oral History
A resource containing historical information obtained in interviews with persons having firsthand knowledge.
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
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Glanz, Rita (Interview transcript and video), 2008
Creator
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Glanz, Rita
Description
An account of the resource
Rita Glanz was one of the 10,000 Jewish children saved before WWII started as a result of the Kinder Transport. Her father, a successful businessman, was driven out of Austria and into Switzerland by the Nazis. Mrs. Glanz was taken in by a couple from Coventry, in Great Britain, and remained with them for the duration of the war. Afterwards, her father wrote letters to Winston Churchill and George VI, and managed to get his daughter out of there. She spent three years with relatives in Birmingham, Alabama. She grew up in New York, graduated from high schoo, and spent two years in college before getting married. Her husband had escaped from Germany to Ireland, eventually coming to the United States.
Contributor
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Smither, James (Interviewer)
Kentwood Historic Preservation Commission (Kentwood, Mich.)
WKTV (Wyoming, Mich.)
Subject
The topic of the resource
Oral history
Veterans History Project (U.S.)
United States--History, Military
Michigan--History, Military
Veterans
World War, 1939-1945--Personal narratives, American
Other veterans & civilians--Personal narratives, American
Video recordings
Women
Language
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eng
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<a href="http://rightsstatements.org/page/InC/1.0/?language=en">In Copyright</a>
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Moving Image
Text
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Veterans History Project (U.S.)
Date
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2008-04-24
Identifier
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GlanzR
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<a href="https://gvsu.lyrasistechnology.org/repositories/2/resources/455">Veterans History Project Collection, (RHC-27)</a>
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application/pdf
video/mp4
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Grand Valley State University. University Libraries. Lemmen Library and Archives
-
https://digitalcollections.library.gvsu.edu/files/original/1dcdc0832ad09c161401d75f8ef96de1.mp4
d0b886ab6db7bd9397412d65416ea9b0
https://digitalcollections.library.gvsu.edu/files/original/8aa95fb2d1dc2955625ab33c07f93eca.pdf
082de21a9fd3cce84e0d6cba88da054f
PDF Text
Text
Grand Valley State University
Veterans History Project Interview
World War II
Alida Glas
Length of Interview: 42:35
(00:08)
JS: We’re talking today with Alida Glas of Kentwood, Michigan. The interviewer is James
Smither of Grand Valley State University. Mrs. Glas, can you start by telling us a little bit about
your personal background? For instance, where were you born?
AG: I was born in Broek op Langedijk, North Holland.
JS: And is that near a city?
AG: It’s north of, about twenty miles north of Amsterdam.
JS: Okay. And what year were you born?
AG: I was born in 1930.
JS: Okay. Right. Now what did your family do?
AG: My dad worked for a marketplace. We had mostly truck farming in the area. He worked at
the place where they would bring it to market.
JS: Okay. And where did you go to school?
AG: I went to school, a Christian school in Broek op Landedijk. And I went to high school in
Noord-Scharwoude, it was the village over.
JS: Okay. Now, as the war in Europe was starting, the German attacked Poland in 1939 and so
forth, were you aware at all of what was going on? Or did your father talk about that sort of
thing?
AG: My dad was called up. He was in the Army, in Den Helder, which was a coastal town
north of us.
(01:16)
JS: So he would have been a reservist. About how old do you think he was then?
AG: He must have been about mid-thirties.
JS: What was his reaction to being called up?
�AG: Well, he knew it was necessary. He didn’t like it.
JS: Now did he, or the people in your community, did they hope the Germans would just leave
the Netherlands alone? Cause in World War I, the Germans, they invaded Belgium, but they left
the Netherlands neutral. What were people thinking then?
AG: Well, I think they realized they weren’t going to escape this time. And we couldn’t stay
neutral. They had hoped to.
(01:57)
JS: All right. So there’s a period there of a few months where not much is happening. And then
in May of 1940, the Germans attack the Netherlands. What do you remember about those
events? Or what did you see or hear about them?
AG: Well, I remember waking up real early in the morning, by what I thought was the neighbor
lady’s beating the rug. Cause it was Friday morning and it was usually house-cleaning days for
the Dutch ladies. And they would hang their rugs on the clothesline and be beating them. And I
thought, what? My neighbor is awful early, and waking me up like that. Then we heard the
noise of the airplanes and they were bombing the airfield, close by.
(02:40)
JS: All right. And what happened to your father? Was your father away from the action, or…
AG: Well, he was north of there. And there actually wasn’t any fighting there, because they
dropped parachuters in the center of the country, close to Amsterdam and Utrecht. And Haag,
and that’s where most of the fighting was.
JS: And did you hear much about it, what actually happened, when the Germans landed?
AG: Well, we listened to the radio all day, of course. It was…the whole thing was very scary.
And hard to imagine what was going on.
JS: Now, did you see any Germans before the surrender?
AG: No.
(03:30)
JS: And do you remember hearing about any events or things that happened, while the fighting
was gong on?
AG: Well, we knew that a lot of our soldiers were being killed. And, I was kind of glad that my
dad was where he was. But the fighting only lasted about five days, and that’s when they
bombed Rotterdam. And they bombed Rotterdam, not just the harbor but the whole city. And
that’s when the Queen gave up, the government…
�JS: All right. Was there an announcement over the radio, that the country was surrendering,
or…
AG: (nods head) Yeah. They had no choice.
(04:15)
JS: All right. Now, then what happened in your community after the surrender? Did Germans
come in? Did government change?
AG: Not at first. We were just a small town. So we didn’t notice it that much. My dad came
home and he was very angry. He said, "I didn’t even fire a shot." And, he was really…very
angry about the whole thing.
JS: What political preferences, or affiliations did your father have?
AG: Well, it was a Christian party. Yeah, he was involved in that.
JS: Now was it a Christian democratic party that didn’t like the Nazis?
AG: (laughs) That’s for sure. He…I don’t know how to say this, but they were involved, he
was very much involved in it. And it was mainly through the Christian Reformed Church, that
this party was from, and the Reformed Church. I think they were about eleven parties in
Holland. Instead of joining together…they should have done that, but…
(05:32)
JS: There were some conservative parties in some countries that affiliated with the Nazis or
made friends with them. And others didn’t. So it was sort of clear that he did not like them?
AG: Oh, no. Oh, no. He was very anti-Nazi.
JS: Now did he continue working in the same job that he had before?
AG: Yes. Yes.
JS: Now, you said at first you didn’t notice much change, or difference in things. Now what
kinds of things started to change as the war went on? Or in what ways did you rally start to feel
the effect of the situation?
AG: Well, we…everything was being rationed, you know. And the products of the vegetables,
all that was sent to Germany by the trainload. And we stood in line for everything. I mean, I
remember standing in line for a bunch of carrots. To this day, I hate to stand in line.
JS: Now did you have a garden or anything at your own house? Were you able to grow
anything?
�AG: Not much. There were people who were the farmers themselves, you know, the truck
farmers. They had some gardens. But my dad worked at the place where they brought the stuff
for sale, so quite often they would give him some, of their products.
(06:55)
JS: Now was there less and less stuff for sale, as the war went on?
AG: Oh, yeah. We had rationing for everything. Even for textile products, I mean, so many
points is what they called them, for clothing, towels, sheets. I mean, we had nothing any more. I
mean, it wore out and you couldn’t replace it.
JS: Did your family do better, do you think, than some other people that were in the village, or
was everyone kind of sharing what they had?
AG: I don’t think we did better. I think the ones that had their own farm did much better. We
ate pretty poorly there, for quite a while.
JS: In what other ways did the war affect the community or the people within it?
(07:43)
AG: Well, we did get occupation in our village after a while, and they took over the bigger
homes. Our home was not bigger, fortunately. But right next door, they were in the home. And
the home across the street. So you were surrounded by those people.
JS: Okay. So the German soldiers there, what impression did you have of them? What did they
look like? How did they behave?
AG: They didn’t behave very well. I mean, the homes that they were in, some were better than
others, but some they would just deliberately destroy, I think. And the people who had to give
up their homes, they could have a room in the back. And fend for themselves. They took over
the best part of the house.
(08:39)
JS: And did they just take things from the house or wreck things?
AG: (nods head) Yeah. And later on in the war, after the invasion began they would dig up to
the front yard, to put gun emplacements in the front yard. If it was in the bend of the road, then
they would be able to take care of that whole street. With the gun.
JS: Now, did you have much contact or communication with the German soldiers? Did you talk
to any of them?
AG: No. My dad, the place where he worked, they had most of their stuff stored. Cause it was
a big storage place, also, for the fruits and vegetables that were sold there. And they had all their
hay there, cause they were still horse cavalry.
�JS: Well, the Germans had horse drawn transportation for everything but the motorized
divisions, so…
AG: That’s right.
JS: Most of the regular units, or certainly the ones that would be in occupation in the
Netherlands, yeah, they would get around with horses and horse carts.
(09:33)
AG: Right. And they had their hay and their straw, all that was stored in that building there. So
my dad, he talked to one of the soldiers, and he was an Austrian and he was compelled to occupy
the country, so he got along okay with him.
JS: Now did your father ever speak any German?
AG: Somewhat. He always read a lot. He was self-taught.
JS: You mentioned before the interview that your father was also interested in writing, and
writing for newspapers. Did he…
AG: Yeah, he was writing editorials. Pieces for the paper.
JS: Now, what was…so there were still independent newspapers being published in the
Netherlands then?
AG: (nods yes) They just had to be careful what they said.
(10:04)
JS: How careful was your father in what he wrote?
AG: Not too careful.
JS: What kinds of things could he write about?
AG: Well, he would tell them the things that weren’t right with the country, you know. And I
was a child. I didn’t read so much of that.
JS: Right. Right. But he found ways to do it that didn’t get him arrested.
AG: That’s right.
(10:45)
JS: Now describe a bit about the German soldiers, themselves. How old do you think they
were? Were these older men? Were they boys?
�AG: They were older men, but not the commanders. They were in their twenties, I think. But a
lot of them were older me, especially later on in the war, they were really…well, you know, you
would call them older men, in their late forties.
JS: Now were their people in your village or community who were friendly with the Germans,
or got along with them?
AG: (nods yes) Yes. Absolutely. And they were…they were shunned in the village. People
did not want to go around with them.
(11:30)
JS: Did most people in the village just try to stay away from the Germans?
AG: Yeah.
JS: Now what happened to the population of the village? Were there people who had to leave
and go work in Germany, or anything like that?
AG: Well, they disappeared, you know, as soon as they had a calling up. They wouldn’t go.
JS: Explain that. A calling up? What do you mean by that?
AG: Well, being called up for the service. For working in Germany. As soon as you were
eighteen, you were eligible to work in Germany, in the munitions factories. And you
were…people just didn’t want to do that, so those boys disappeared.
JS: And where did they go?
AG: They would hide in other towns. They just wouldn’t have the papers.
(12:21)
JS: Right.
AG: And so we had an underground working. They would go out on raids and steal papers.
From…
JS: Right. Steal identification papers.
AG: Yes. And they would make out their own papers. They had forgeries. So in order to get
food, you had to have your papers.
JS: Now were the Germans sort of trying to catch these people, or did they have Dutch police
helping them?
AG: Oh, yes. We had raids. There was quite a bit of that.
�JS: Now did any of the raids ever come in your house?
AG: They did, yeah.
JS: Can you describe a little bit what happened when…
(13:01)
AG: Well, they’d just go through the whole house, you know. And they were rough with
everything. And sometimes you could tell that they had been told to go. There were betrayers in
the village. And they were running an illegal press in the neighboring village, that my dad was
also involved with. Cause we were listening to a radio illegally. We were supposed to turn in
the radios.
JS: Now were you able…did you listen to the BBC?
AG: Right. In fact, we had our neighbor’s radio. He had a beautiful radio. And he was afraid
to keep it. So my dad told him, I’ll take care of it for ya.
JS: Now did he have a place to hide the radio?
AG: Well, our house was built, the bottom part was brick, the top was wood. And no insulation.
There was a bedroom upstairs and in the top of the bedroom, in the attic where he could barely
bend over, that’s where the radio was. But it was on the street side. And I think anybody being
on the street would be able to hear it. (Laughs) So one night, I remember that real well, he was
up there and some of the neighbors came in. And they would trust people, to hear the latest
news. Especially towards the end of the war, we were really getting desperate. So he was
listening to it, and it was after curfew, and we hear the steps in front of the house. Well, we
knew, we had the Germans right next door. We knew their steps. They had the heavy boots.
And they stopped right in front of our house while my dad is listening to the radio upstairs.
(14:54)
AG: So, we managed to tell him to turn it off right away, because he hadn’t noticed. And we all
kind of panicked.
JS: That would be pretty scary at that point.
AG: So a couple of the guys said we’ll go outside and see what’s going on, because, we were
afraid. Cause if we were caught, we would have been sent to a concentration camp, the whole
bunch of us.
JS: Now did that happen to some people in your village? Were there families that got arrested
and taken away?
AG: Well, yeah. Not very many though, because they usually got warning in time. Those fellas
went outside in the pitch dark. One went one way and the other went the other way and they
�meet each other in the middle and the each thought the other was a German. So they grabbed
each other by the throat and started fighting and they realized…
JS: Oh, that they had found each other. (Laughter)
(15:47)
AG: So I mean some strange things happened, you know.
JS: Now you could learn things that were happening in the war by listening to the BBC. Also,
could you observe anything…for instance, a lot of Allied bombers flew back and forth over the
Netherlands. Could you see those as they flew over?
AG: Oh, yeah. We were right in the flight path. And hundreds of them would go over at once,
you know. It was unbelievable. The windows would be rattling. It was very scary. Not so
much on the way over, but coming back. You could hear if the engines weren’t going right.
You knew that some of them were crippled.
JS: So damaged planes were flying over. Did any planes crash? Or parachute…
(16:33)
AG: One did. Right, oh, I’d say, a couple of hundred yards right behind our house. And the
pilot ejected. And he was never caught. So I think somebody in the village helped him, we
never knew who, but he must have taken care of him. They would send them through Belgium
to Spain, and back to England.
JS: Right. Through the underground network. And, now, did you have anti-aircraft defenses in
your area? Did the Germans have those kinds of defenses someplace else?
AG: Oh, no. They were there. In the airfield close by.
(17:16)
JS: Now, about what time of the day or night did the aircraft go by, normally?
AG: Well, they went during the day and they went at night.
JS: That’s right. Because the Americans went during the day and the British went at night.
So…
AG: And they’d come back in the night. And, I didn’t sleep very good after that plane crash.
Cause I’d be listening. You’d wake up and you’d be shivering in your bed. And you’d
wonder…you’d listen if the engines would go all right. You could hear it on the engine if
something was wrong.
JS: Now were there places near where you lived that actually got attacked by aircraft? Positions
that got bombed, or were you in a quiet enough place that that didn’t happen?
�(17:57)
AG: Well, towards the last winter, in fact the last year of the war, they told us not to go into
anything that was moving, cause they’d come and they shoot…they shot at everything that
moved. Boats or buses or cars. So everything came to a standstill.
JS: Right, because they were…how far were you from the areas that the Allies occupied in the
fall of ’44? Cause they went into the Netherlands, they attacked at Arnhem, but that would have
been some way east and south of where you were.
AG: Right.
(18:28)
JS: Now when that invasion is going on, were you hoping and learning about that and hoping
they would keep going?
AG: Oh, yeah. We heard it over the BBC. That’s all we heard, because according to the
Germans, everything was going fine for them. Their news, you just couldn’t listen to it.
JS: So the German news continued to act like basically everything was okay?
AG: Oh, yeah. They had strategic withdrawals. (laughs) You know, that’s how they used to
tell us. So…
(19:00)
JS: So they did to some extent concede that this was actually happening. What the outcome was
there on the continent and that they were moving forward.
AG: Oh course, they were winning that battle, at Arnhem. And that was terrible. My dad
thought, now we’re never going to get out from under. And he was always listening to the BBC
and he knew what was going on.
JS: Now did you know any people who wound up being involved in the Resistance, or…
AG: Oh, yeah.
JS: How old… were they all different ages, or…
AG: Well, most of them were young fellas. The ones, as soon as they were fifteen, you had
what you call your personal papers. And by the time they were eighteen, they were sent to
Germany. And those fellas all disappeared. We had one at our house. I didn’t see much of him,
but he slept in our barn, in the attic. But in the day time, he was gone and worked on the illegal
press.
(20:04)
JS: So you people really were right in the middle of things.
�AG: Oh, yes. We were.
JS: And you could have gotten into a while lot of trouble, if the wrong ones found out. But I
would guess that…if the Germans never came in and found anything, and they didn’t arrest your
father…
AG: No. The press was not at our house. But he would have the papers. In fact, I personally
delivered some of those papers to people that we trusted.
(20:31)
JS: So you had your list.
AG: Yeah.
JS: I have the impression that most of the people in the village were pretty much on the same
side you were.
AG: They were. But there were some that were more afraid than others.
JS: Now in what other ways did the war sort of affect life in your village? For instance, did you
have… were there refugees who came through?
AG: Yes. We had refugees mostly from Den Helder, which was the city where my dad was. On
the coast. And that was bombed. And those people all came walking down. And there was
really no organization. They were just taken in by people as they went along.
(21:14)
JS: And did your family take any people in?
AG: We had one man there for a while. But our house was small. It was really a two bedroom
home. There was not, you know, very well suited to have too many people in there.
JS: Right. And I think with what you had written about your experience before, you mentioned
that there was a young girl who stayed with you at some point?
AG: Yeah.
JS: Can you tell us a little bit about her?
AG: Well, she came with her sister, walking. They came for food, you know. They lived in
Haarlem and they came with a handcart. And they came to get food. And they stopped at our
house. It was towards evening and I think they were just dead tired. So my mom took them in
and we shared what food we had with them. And the older sister went back home, and she
stayed with us. She was my age. And she stayed with us for the rest of the war.
(22:09)
�JS: About how long was that then?
AG: A couple years.
JS: All right. Did you get to know her very well? Did she keep to herself?
AG: Well, I knew her very well. We slept in the same bedroom, I mean. But she was very
closed mouth and I always wondered about her. And I think her name was, it was a German
name, I wondered if something was wrong, because she never talked about her folks.
(22:34)
JS: Is it possible she was Jewish, or just…
AG: No. She wasn’t Jewish. But I wonder if they were collaborators. On her folks side.
Because we never heard from her folks and she never talked about them.
JS: Of course, if they had been collaborators, they might have been better taken care of and
wouldn’t have had to go looking for food.
AG: That’s true, yeah.
JS: It was very hard to tell. And she wasn’t telling you anything…
AG: She wasn’t telling us a thing. But, I got along okay with her. And we were, we went to
school. She was in high school, the same as I was.
JS: Now how many children were in your family?
AG: I had a sister that was four years younger and then a brother was twelve years younger. We
were spread out. And my fourth…my other brother wasn’t born until after the war.
(23:26)
JS: Okay. And let’s see, you were talking about different kinds of rationing and shortages and
so forth. So food, clothing. Did it affect fuel, heating?
AG: Yeah. We used to have just a round stove in the living room. And we used to burn coal in
there, you know. But coal was very hard to get, so we ended up having to burn wood. But it was
hard to get wood, because in the first place there aren’t as many trees, like there are in Michigan.
So, there weren’t any trees left in the village.
JS: Was your father able to get scrap wood from where he worked, or anything like that?
AG: Oh, whatever he could find, yep. And like I said, they were so desperate, they were
stealing the railroad ties from between the tracks. So, a lot of stuff went on at night after curfew
that shouldn’t have been.
�(24:25)
JS: Now did the Germans over the course of time get increasingly harsh or angry? Did their
behavior get worse as the war went on, or did they stay about the same?
AG: Yeah. Well, you know, these were older guys, and I think a lot of them were Austrians that
didn’t really want to be there in the first place. But there were some that were pretty nasty. Yep.
JS: By the end of the war, what kind of food did you have? The stories go that the civilian
populations in the Netherlands gather less and less food and the Germans took more and more
away from them, because the Dutch didn’t help them enough.
AG: Well, we, ah, my dad managed to get sugar beets. And I remember standing there over a
big tub, grating them. And then we cooked the pulp and used the syrup for bread. And the bread
that they had was terrible. And I remember they said it was made from beans instead of from
flour. It was just…it would stick to your mouth and you could hardly chew it. A terrible taste.
It filled your stomach, but that was it. Then we had that syrup over it. And then, somebody had
a poppy field. And they got oil from that. You know, they tried to get a bottle of this…And I
remember there wasn’t anything to make clothes from and we did our knitting, of course. And I
remember going to the back country on the bike and getting a sheep skin from a farm. This was
illegal too.
(26:11)
AG: And, but my mom had gotten a hold of a spinning wheel and we cleaned it, the sheep skin,
ourselves and she spun yarn. It wasn’t the best. There were a lot of knobs in it, but at least I
could knit myself a sweater.
JS: But there was enough yarn there to make something you could actually use?
AG: Yeah.
JS: Yeah. A lot of this kind of thing is very difficult for a lot of Americans to imagine, because
we did not go through that kind of thing here and did not have those kinds of things for a very
long time. Are there other things like that that you remember? Things that characterize what it
was like to live there at that time?
AG: Well, the bikes. You know, it was all traffic by bike. And the tires wore out and there was
no replacement for it. So, then they came with wooden tires. And that was terrible. (laughter)
So, we tried it once and we said we’d rather walk. So I went to high school, so I had to walk to
our village and then the next village and then the third village, I was in the high school. So I
walked quite a ways every day.
JS: About how long did it take you to walk to school?
(27:25)
AG: Oh, about forty minutes. And then we’d stay for lunch, such as it was. But there were
times when there was no bread. We could always get some potatoes because we lived in an area
�where a lot of potatoes were grown. So I’d walk home at noon and then back to school again.
Got my exercise.
JS: Right. Were the farmers able to kind of hide away some of what they grew?
AG: I think they probably did, yeah. They couldn’t possibly control everything, you know. But
for people who did not grow their own, it was very hard.
(28:02)
JS: Now you were probably still a little better off than people in the cities…
AG: Oh, yeah.
JS: At least there were farmers around and you were…
AG: People in the cities, they were starving, absolutely. Living in the country, we didn’t do so
well either. We did get a lot of disease. And my dad had to work out in the cold, with not really
enough warm clothing. He developed lung problems. And then the whole family had dysentery.
Cause of the food we had, which was pretty awful.
JS: What kind of medical care did you have?
AG: Well, there wasn’t anything. There were no medications. So, they said beets was good for
dysentery, so we ate beets. (laughs)
JS: Were there any doctors around?
AG: We had a doctor in the village, but like I said, everything was in short supply. And, it was
just pretty awful.
(29:03)
JS: Now, were you aware of the kinds of things the Germans were doing, and that the Jews were
being deported?
AG: Oh, yeah. Well, at first we didn’t want to believe it, until they started going through the
village too, you know. And even if you were Aryan, as they called it, and you were married to a
Jew, they considered you a Jew. And the same with the children. It was unbelievable. And they
stole everything they had. A lot of the Jews, especially in the Amsterdam area, were better off.
they had nice possessions and that was all stolen from them. You read the book from Anne
Frank, and you know.
(29:47)
JS: Now during the war, did you know that the Germans were actually taking people off and
killing them, or did you just think they were going into prison camps somewhere?
�AG: We thought they were going into concentration camps. Later on we heard through the BBC
what was happening to them, too, you know.
JS: Okay. Now, do you remember what it was like as the war was coming to an end? In the
spring of 1945, the Allies actually get into Germany. Your area was still being controlled by the
Germans. What was it like to be listening to that?
AG: Oh, we lived for the radio news. We really did.
JS: As it got close to the end, did the Germans begin to change their behavior at all, to begin to
think that maybe these people know?
(30:33)
AG: Well, yeah. They did allow us, in April, they did allow us to have bread sent from Sweden,
who was neutral. And it was white bread from Sweden, and like I said, it tasted like cake.
(laughs) We hadn’t had bread like that for years.
JS: But did they continue to search for resisters, and radios and all that?
AG: Oh, yeah. Yeah, yeah. Some were pretty mean, too. But we couldn’t wait for it to end.
JS: Now, did our father ever get into trouble, get questioned or interrogated, things like that?
AG: Well, one time when there was a raid, he just happened to run into them. And then the
fella, the soldier that was walking ahead of the wagon that had the prisoners in it, he told him,
Dableiben. Stay right there. And he walked on and Dad didn’t stay right there. So, he ran, into
the marketplace where there were a lot of different buildings and he managed to find a hiding
place. But that…where we lived, it was mostly canals. And farmers would go to work by boat.
And they’d have maybe one acre lot here, and one there, and it was all surrounded by water. So,
the minute we had warnings about the raids, they all took to the fields. And since there weren’t
any helicopters, they could get away with that. Hide out in the boats in the canals.
(32:19)
JS: The boats in the canals is where you could get out of sight relatively easily. Now did the
Germans let them keep the boats?
AG: Well, it was their livelihood. It was the only way they could get their produce off the field.
So they had to leave them the boats. And, uh, it just was a good thing that we had that.
JS: All right. Now, how did you learned that the war was over, that the Germans actually
surrendered?
AG: Well, we heard news the day before that they surrendered, but we, so we all, I think I was
in bed already, and the news went through. Of course, we couldn’t stay in bed then. (laughs)
And we all ran outside and everybody was in the street, making a lot of noise, and happy.
�JS: What did the Germans in the town do?
(33:10)
AG: And then the Germans started shooting in the air, because it wasn’t official yet. And I
thought, we’re going to get killed now, the day before? You know. So we all ran back home
again. It was just so frightening. They were just flexing their muscles yet, again, I guess.
JS: And then what happened the next day?
AG: The next day, the Germans walked out.
JS: So they just left? They just left everything behind.
AG: Yep. They didn’t look quite so brave then. And we were dancing in the street.
(33:43)
JS: Now how long was it before any Allied forces or any Dutch people working with them came
into your village?
AG: Well, most of them were in the southern part of the Netherlands. And we had Canadians
troops, mostly. And we would see them come by on motorcycles and they would go to the
official buildings. In fact, one of them kind of stopped, I was kind of mad about that…I was
standing there with a couple of girls and a Canadian on a big bike stopped and asked for the
distribution center, and I was the only one that understood him, and I was trying to explain it and
one of the girls hops on the bike and off she went. (Laughter) I wasn’t happy about that, I know
that. But, anyway, that’s what happened.
(34:33)
JS: How long was it before you started to get in some food and things like that?
AG: Oh, that still took a while. We did get a lot of stuff already in April, because they were
dropping it. They dropped it from the planes.
JS: Oh, okay. And then the Germans didn’t manage to take all of that?
AG: No. They didn’t. They let us have it. I think they realized by then that it was the end for
them. And we used to get Spam, which was wonderful stuff. And corned beef hash and stuff
we’d never had before. And I think a lot of people get sick, because there, all of a sudden, we
had rich food. And I remember, my mom and I both had hepatitis. We were sick when the war
was over, and it was kind of hard, because then we weren’t allowed to eat all of that.
JS: Right. It took a while to get your system to be able to handle those things.
AG: That’s right.
(35:32)
�JS: Now what did your father do after the war then?
AG: He went back to his job in the village. But he was very unhappy with it.
JS: What did he want to do?
AG: Well, he had wanted to be a teacher, but he was the only son with ten sisters and he had to
be on the farm. His dad wouldn’t allow him to go study. And he had taught himself some
German. Because they had had an exchange student from Hungary, in World War I, I guess. So
from him, he learned to speak German.
(36:09)
JS: And then he also, I guess, learned to write well enough to be writing for that newspaper.
AG: Oh, yeah. He was a very smart man. He just didn’t have the education. And so he was
just really disgusted that things went right back to the people who had collaborated and had been
hiding all this time, while they let the underground do all the work. So he said, I want to go to
America.
JS: So he wasn’t able to continue writing for the regular newspaper, then?
AG: No. The man came right back, the one who was so afraid before.
(36:45)
JS: So he decides to go to America. So when do you move to America?
AG: In ’48.
JS: And where did your family go? Did they come out here to Michigan?
AG: We came here with an empty liberty ship, cause there weren’t any liners at that time. So
we were the only passengers on board. And they had hauled coal to Europe. It was a pretty dirty
ship, because of the coal dust.
JS: Do you remember what time of year it was?
AG: Yeah. September.
JS: And what was the weather like on the ocean?
AG: Well, we were on the ship for thirteen days because we had to go around because of
hurricane season.
JS: Okay.
(37:23)
�AG: We weren’t in a hurricane ourselves but the sea was pretty rough. And we slept in sick
bay, in the back. And that was right above the screw, you know. And the ship would be going
up, and that screw would (motions a spin). They were afraid it would fly off. In fact, we were
all assigned to different life boats already. The whole things was kind of scary.
JS: Well, sure. Because, well, had you ever been in a bigger boat than the ones on the canals?
AG: No. I was brought up on the water. It didn’t scare me as far to be on a boat, but that storm
got my attention.
JS: All right. Once you got to America, where did you go?
AG: Our sponsor lived in Maryland, on the eastern shore. So that’s where we…we landed in
Newport News. Of course, he was waiting for us a couple of days already and we were late
because of the hurricane. So he was not a very happy man when we came. And he had a big
three hundred and fifty acre estate, he used to work for the government. But at that time, I guess,
Truman got in too, and he was a Republican, so he was out of favor, and…
(38:47)
JS: Well, the Republicans hadn’t been in favor for quite some time, but…
AG: Well, we didn’t know that much about it. Well, we knew Roosevelt, of course. We loved
Roosevelt. So my dad was a gardener there. And I worked as an upstairs maid, because it was a
big estate. And I didn’t trust my English enough to look for other work. And besides, they were
our sponsor, they wanted us to work for them. And we did. And then their grandma came into
town and Grandma was not the easiest person to live with. So they had got a little bungalow for
her in town and they wanted me to take care of her. Well, I lasted three months and that’s was it.
Because that lady belonged in a home. She wasn’t really normal anymore, you know. So then I
ended up in New Jersey. Cause people in New Jersey had a farm in Maryland and they loaned
me to them. And they were Dutch, originally. And they wanted to have a Dutch maid, so I
ended up in New Jersey. In Upper Montclair. Lived there for a year and a half and then my
folks moved to Michigan because my dad had a sister in Michigan.
(40:03)
JS: And what did your father do when he got to Michigan?
AG: He worked for a factory. And then he worked for the city of Kalamazoo. And then…but
his health was bad then, by that time. He died of a heart attack at 55. And, uh, so I was in New
Jersey for a year and a half, and then came to Kalamazoo and that’s where I met my husband.
(40:32)
JS: All right. Well, it’s a pretty remarkable story. Are there other things about that time that
you remember that we haven’t talked about yet? You’ve done a pretty good job of covering the
things that you’ve written about before.
AG: Um hmmm…
�JS: How do you think the whole experience affected you as a person?
AG: Well, I tell you, when I first came here, and I would hear sirens, I’d start crying. I don’t
know why but I just couldn’t control myself. But it was just those raids, they were so scary.
And it took a couple of years, to get over that.
JS: Do you think you had to grow up a little bit faster, just because of all of the stuff that went
on around you?
AG: Yes. And then also because I was the oldest in the family, and we had a small store for a
while. And I used to have to deliver the groceries. My dad used to do that. My mom ran the
grocery store while he worked at the marketplace. And then I had to deliver the groceries
because he was in a sanitarium for half a year because his lungs were bad. So I think, yeah, I had
to grow up a lot faster than…
JS: Now did they have the store during the war or after it?
(41:51)
AG: We had it during the war. But we ate the inventory. So after a couple of years, we had to
close the store. My dad had caught a bad cold and it was, he went to the eastern part of Holland,
which was higher ground. Not as damp as where we lived. And it was better for his lungs and
that’s where he was for half a year. So, I had to help my mom quite a bit.
JS: All right. Well, we’re glad you came out this well and that you’re here to tell us your story
today. So thank you very much for coming in.
AG: You’re welcome.
(42:35)
�
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Title
A name given to the resource
Veterans History Project
Creator
An entity primarily responsible for making the resource
Grand Valley State University. History Department
Description
An account of the resource
The Library of Congress established the Veterans History Project in 2001 to collect memories, accounts, and documents of U.S. war veterans from World War II and the Korean War, Vietnam War, and conflicts in the Middle East and elsewhere, and to preserve these stories for future generations. The GVSU History Department interviews are part of this work-in-progress, and may contain videos and audio recordings, transcripts and interview outlines, and related documents and photographs.
Coverage
The spatial or temporal topic of the resource, the spatial applicability of the resource, or the jurisdiction under which the resource is relevant
1914-
Rights
Information about rights held in and over the resource
<a href="http://rightsstatements.org/page/InC/1.0/?language=en">In Copyright</a>
Subject
The topic of the resource
Afghan War, 2001--Personal narratives, American
Iran Hostage Crisis, 1979-1981--Personal narratives, American
Korean War, 1950-1953--Personal narratives, American
Michigan--History, Military
Oral history
Persian Gulf War, 1991--Personal narratives, American
United States--History, Military
United States. Air Force
United States. Army
United States. Navy
Veterans
Video recordings
Vietnam War, 1961-1975--Personal narratives, American
World War, 1939-1945--Personal narratives, American
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
Grand Valley State University. University Libraries. Special Collections & University Archives
Contributor
An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource
Smither, James
Boring, Frank
Relation
A related resource
Veterans History Project (U.S.)
Identifier
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RHC-27
Language
A language of the resource
eng
Source
A related resource from which the described resource is derived
<a href="https://gvsu.lyrasistechnology.org/repositories/2/resources/455">Veterans History Project interviews (RHC-27)</a>
Oral History
A resource containing historical information obtained in interviews with persons having firsthand knowledge.
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Title
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Glas, Alida (Interview transcript and video), 2008
Creator
An entity primarily responsible for making the resource
Glas, Alida
Description
An account of the resource
Alida Glas was a teenager in the Netherlands during WW II. In this account, Glas discusses family and friends, the invasion of Holland, and life during the German occupation. She mentions the activities of the Dutch Underground, the effects of the food shortage in the Netherlands, and what German troops were like in her village. Glas concludes by discussing her life after the war and some of her thoughts on the war.
Contributor
An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource
Smither, James (Interviewer)
Kentwood Historic Preservation Commission (Kentwood, Mich.)
WKTV (Wyoming, Mich.)
Subject
The topic of the resource
Oral history
Veterans History Project (U.S.)
United States--History, Military
Michigan--History, Military
Veterans
World War, 1939-1945--Personal narratives, American
Other veterans & civilians--Personal narratives, American
Video recordings
Women
Language
A language of the resource
eng
Rights
Information about rights held in and over the resource
<a href="http://rightsstatements.org/page/InC/1.0/?language=en">In Copyright</a>
Type
The nature or genre of the resource
Moving Image
Text
Relation
A related resource
Veterans History Project (U.S.)
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
2008-02-21
Identifier
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GlasA
Source
A related resource from which the described resource is derived
<a href="https://gvsu.lyrasistechnology.org/repositories/2/resources/455">Veterans History Project Collection, (RHC-27)</a>
Format
The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource
application/pdf
video/mp4
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
Grand Valley State University. University Libraries. Lemmen Library and Archives
-
https://digitalcollections.library.gvsu.edu/files/original/8148e0be8beaada71a201e47dcbd1b16.mp4
726972006765f8e1997db36638fc36f4
https://digitalcollections.library.gvsu.edu/files/original/d33745bf25d7c9e92342afde377be8ad.pdf
80ed07a6451de18f64ad37e1e0b4fc75
PDF Text
Text
Grand Valley State University
Veterans History Project Interview
Greg Glazier
(41:12)
(00:10) Background Information
• Greg was born on April 8, 1967
• He enlisted in the Army in 1985 when he was 18 years old
• Greg went to high school in Lansing and has 2 sisters and a brother
• He enlisted because he was bored and wanted to do something different
• He wanted to travel and to make some money
• Greg felt that the Marines were too hard core and he does not like to fly, so he chose the
Army
(2:30) Training
• There were lots of people yelling and screaming at him; they shaved all his hair off
• He worked from 4:30 am till 10pm and only received 3 meals a day
• Training was scary and he did not know anyone
• He was trained in Fort Knox, Kentucky and had one instructor from Michigan
(6:35) In Germany for 5 Years
• Greg was stationed in Germany and had been called upon to go to Iraq, but it fell through
• He had to guard American houses and keep watch for terrorists
• Often he checked school busses for bombs
• For his MOS job, he was a tank crew member
(13:50) M-1 Abrams Tank
• These weighed 55 tons and Greg started out as a driver
• He then helped loading shells for the main gun, which were 120 mm shells
• He ended up as a gunner and tank commander
(16:15) Germany
• They ate very starchy foods with lots of carbs; he gained 30 pounds
• It was very stressful because he never got enough sleep
• The men drank a lot on the weekends
• He was often able to call his friends and family
• He had time on leave to visit Paris and Amsterdam
• Most of his time on leave was for a month in which he went back to the US
• His family once visited him in Switzerland
(24:50) The End of His Service
• His time ended on February 1, 1995 and it was weird because he had been gone for so
long
• Greg went back to Fort Knox and then back to Michigan where he was married
�•
•
•
•
He went back to school and received his Bachelors Degree in 2003 from the University
of Phoenix
He works with computers doing research in Grand Rapids
The GI bill helped pay for college, up to $25,000 plus an extra $1,000 a month
Greg now likes to spend his time camping, golfing, and playing softball
(32:35) Overall Experience
• Greg believes that it is good for anyone to spend time in the service; it helps them to
mature and meet all kinds of different people
• It provides discipline and good working ethics
�
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Title
A name given to the resource
Veterans History Project
Creator
An entity primarily responsible for making the resource
Grand Valley State University. History Department
Description
An account of the resource
The Library of Congress established the Veterans History Project in 2001 to collect memories, accounts, and documents of U.S. war veterans from World War II and the Korean War, Vietnam War, and conflicts in the Middle East and elsewhere, and to preserve these stories for future generations. The GVSU History Department interviews are part of this work-in-progress, and may contain videos and audio recordings, transcripts and interview outlines, and related documents and photographs.
Coverage
The spatial or temporal topic of the resource, the spatial applicability of the resource, or the jurisdiction under which the resource is relevant
1914-
Rights
Information about rights held in and over the resource
<a href="http://rightsstatements.org/page/InC/1.0/?language=en">In Copyright</a>
Subject
The topic of the resource
Afghan War, 2001--Personal narratives, American
Iran Hostage Crisis, 1979-1981--Personal narratives, American
Korean War, 1950-1953--Personal narratives, American
Michigan--History, Military
Oral history
Persian Gulf War, 1991--Personal narratives, American
United States--History, Military
United States. Air Force
United States. Army
United States. Navy
Veterans
Video recordings
Vietnam War, 1961-1975--Personal narratives, American
World War, 1939-1945--Personal narratives, American
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
Grand Valley State University. University Libraries. Special Collections & University Archives
Contributor
An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource
Smither, James
Boring, Frank
Relation
A related resource
Veterans History Project (U.S.)
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
RHC-27
Language
A language of the resource
eng
Source
A related resource from which the described resource is derived
<a href="https://gvsu.lyrasistechnology.org/repositories/2/resources/455">Veterans History Project interviews (RHC-27)</a>
Oral History
A resource containing historical information obtained in interviews with persons having firsthand knowledge.
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Title
A name given to the resource
Glazier, Gregory (Interview transcript and video), 2007
Creator
An entity primarily responsible for making the resource
Glazier, Gregory A
Description
An account of the resource
Gregory Glazier was born in Alma, Michigan in 1967. Gregory enlisted in the Army in 1985 and was part of the 1st Armored Division for 10 years. For most of his time in the service, Gregory was stationed in Germany where he guarded American housing areas and kept watch for terrorist activity. Gregory was also a tank crew member and his duties included driver, loading 120mm shells, gunner, and eventually tank commander.
Contributor
An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource
Betts, Taylor (Interviewer)
Subject
The topic of the resource
Oral history
Veterans History Project (U.S.)
United States--History, Military
Michigan--History, Military
Veterans
United States. Army
Other veterans & civilians--Personal narratives, American
Video recordings
Language
A language of the resource
eng
Rights
Information about rights held in and over the resource
<a href="http://rightsstatements.org/page/InC/1.0/?language=en">In Copyright</a>
Type
The nature or genre of the resource
Moving Image
Text
Relation
A related resource
Veterans History Project (U.S.)
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
2007-04-13
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
GlazierG
Source
A related resource from which the described resource is derived
<a href="https://gvsu.lyrasistechnology.org/repositories/2/resources/455">Veterans History Project Collection, (RHC-27)</a>
Format
The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource
application/pdf
video/mp4
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
Grand Valley State University. University Libraries. Lemmen Library and Archives
-
https://digitalcollections.library.gvsu.edu/files/original/9e29aba9fd95d8f32d7287369733923e.pdf
b5f67674f724d2b18ce1ea5bb60747c7
PDF Text
Text
COVID-19 has changed my life in a lot of ways. I work in health care, and I am thankful to keep busy with
that during this stressful time. Although, I feel that my constant exposure to the general public dooms
me to eventual exposure to the virus. I am young and healthy and know that my body could fight this,
but it is still terrifying to think about.
I am trying everyday to be grateful. In some ways, this virus is my worst nightmare. I am extremely
extraverted, and I am also clinically depressed. I thrive from connection with my friends and family. On a
normal day, I leave my house early for work and do not return except to eat or freshen up, spending the
rest of my day with my friends or family. I know though that it could be so much worse, and stay
thankful for my safe home environment and try to stay positive.
I have been keeping vey busy, making art and watching various shows and movies. Zoom and facetime
have become my safe haven, thriving from speaking with my loved ones, but wishing I could give them a
big hug. Yesterday, my friend came over and sat on my porch while I sat inside and we spoke through
the door. It was so nice to see her!
I have always lived with my parents, but now I have reawakened a deep appreciation for all that they do
for me. While my mother is an essential worker like me, my dad has been off of work for at least 4
weeks now. He, like me, struggles when he is not kept busy. This has led him to make large
improvements on the house and start many projects. For this I am thankful, and yesterday I helped him
paint.
I am also very thankful for my coworkers. Together, we stay sane and keep each other company. While
we focus on keeping others separated by 6ft while in our building, it is nearly impossible to distance
from each other. This has led us to band together to stay sane. I feel that our conversations have
become far more intimate and meaningful, I feel very united with them and am thankful to be part of
such an amazing group, working together to make the world healthy again.
Overall, I will get through this. The hardest time for me was the initial couple of weeks. Now I know how
to handle negative thoughts, and how to keep busy and cope healthily. Honestly, just writing this journal
has helped clear my head, and I have plans today to make art and enjoy the sunshine. Thank you for
reading.
Grace Catherine Glemboski 4/26/2020
�
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Title
A name given to the resource
COVID-19 Journals
Creator
An entity primarily responsible for making the resource
Grand Valley State University. University Libraries
Description
An account of the resource
This collection of journals and personal narratives was solicited from the GVSU community by archivists of the University Libraries during the events of the 2020 COVID-19 global pandemic. During this unprecedented crisis the university closed suddenly, following federal and state guidelines of social distancing to reduce the spread of the novel coronavirus. The university closed its campuses on March 12, 2020, and quickly moved students out of campus housing. Faculty swiftly transitioned to fully-online teaching for the remainder of the Winter 2020 semester, and all campus events, including commencement, were cancelled.
The purpose of the COVID-19 Journaling Project was to document the individual and personal experiences of GVSU’s students, staff, faculty, and the wider community during this time of international crisis. Some project participants were university student employees who were compensated for their journaling. Other participants were granted stipends or extra credit for submitting entries to the archives. Still others participated without any compensation or credit. The University Archives remains grateful to all who submitted journals, for helping us to understand the impact of this crisis on our community.
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
2020
Source
A related resource from which the described resource is derived
University Archives. COVID-19 Journaling Project
Subject
The topic of the resource
Epidemics
Grand Valley State University
College students
Personal narratives
COVID-19 pandemic, 2019-2020
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
Grand Valley State University. University Libraries. Special Collections & University Archives
Text
A resource consisting primarily of words for reading. Examples include books, letters, dissertations, poems, newspapers, articles, archives of mailing lists. Note that facsimiles or images of texts are still of the genre Text.
Dublin Core
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Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
COVID-19_2020-04-26_GlemboskiGrace
Creator
An entity primarily responsible for making the resource
Glemboski, Grace
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
2020-04-26
Title
A name given to the resource
COVID Journal
Description
An account of the resource
Journal from GVSU student Grace Glemboski's experiences during the COVID-19 pandemic.
Subject
The topic of the resource
COVID-19 pandemic, 2019-2020
Epidemics
Grand Valley State University
College students
Personal narratives
Source
A related resource from which the described resource is derived
University Archives. COVID-19 Journaling Project
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
Grand Valley State University University Libraries. Special Collections and University Archives.
Rights
Information about rights held in and over the resource
<a href="http://rightsstatements.org/vocab/InC/1.0/">In Copyright</a>
Type
The nature or genre of the resource
Text
Format
The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource
application/pdf
Language
A language of the resource
eng
-
https://digitalcollections.library.gvsu.edu/files/original/e49ea5c8911db509d630dc3ee85f424b.mp4
6052d5bb59c1eb5a97c1e50b4fcfc7ba
https://digitalcollections.library.gvsu.edu/files/original/e567fd8b5c3457ffab3accbcd536d3f7.pdf
ee97b91fe0521317ad79abddd7e263c5
PDF Text
Text
ORAL HISTORY INTERVIEW
MARTIN GLENNON
Tape # 1& # 2
Born: December 26, 1949 in Hammond, Indiana
Resides: Valparaiso, Indiana
Interviewed by: Mike Mc Gregor GVSU Veterans History Project, and James Smither
PhD GVSU Veterans History Project
Transcribed by: Joan Raymer, December 19, 2012
Interviewer: To get started Martin, where and when were you born?
Hammond, Indiana, 1949, on December 26th
Interviewer: Did you grow up in Hammond?
I grew up in, actually Whiting. Whiting, Indiana, which is right next door to Hammond,
but I only stayed there five years. I didn’t really grow up there. We moved to Gary,
Indiana.
Interviewer: To Gary
Gary, Indiana, and I was there until sixteen, and at sixteen we moved to Highland,
Indiana, and that’s where I got drafted, from Highland.
Interviewer: What did you parents do?
My father was an insurance agent and my mother was just a homemaker. 1:03
Interviewer: Did you have any brothers or sisters?
I had two sisters and no brothers, and I was the oldest.
Interviewer: Where did you graduate from high school from?
I graduated from Bishop Noll, Hammond Bishop Noll. My parents sent me to
Bishop Noll.
Interviewer: What did you do after high school?
1
�After high school I was going to college when I got drafted. I dropped a class and then
they got me.
Interviewer: So, how long were you in college?
I was only in college for a year, less than a year, actually, and it was during the time
when I came out of high school and went into college that I dropped a class, and that was
1969.
Interviewer: 1969, what class did you drop?
It was an English class, yeah.
Interviewer: Did you at that point, when you dropped the class, realize that you
would lose the student deferment?
Well, I went to—some of my friends were in Vietnam and I went to the office and they
told me, they informed me about that. 2:07 There was a picture of Uncle Sam, ―I Want
You‖, behind them and they said, ―That guy wants you‖. If you drop this class, he may
get you, and they were right.
Interviewer: So, you dropped the class, and then you’re up for grabs in the draft.
What did you know about Vietnam at that time?
All I knew was that I had some friends over there and I got a letter from them and they
told me what was going on and to be honest with you, I wanted to do my duty as a citizen
of the United States. I was willing to go, I was willing to be—I didn’t go out and enlist,
but I was willing, if I got drafted, not to go to Canada, but to do what I had to do. My
father was in WWII and he was also a medic, so when I went in to basic training, and
they had that one question toward the end, ―What do you want to do?‖ I said, ―Ok, I
wouldn’t mind being a medic, my father was a medic‖. 3:13
2
�Interviewer: So, you got your draft notice and where did you go then?
I went to Fort Leonard Wood.
Interviewer: Before Leonard Wood, did you go to the induction center in Chicago?
Oh yeah, I went to Chicago to the induction center, right.
Interviewer: How long were you there?
I don’t know maybe a day. They took us through really quick. If your blood pressure
was too high they kicked you out, if you had flat feet they kicked you out. Fortunately, I
guess, for me, I was in good health, but they sent me over there, but my whole
experience, I will say, even though it was painful, it had a silver lining.
Interviewer: When you were at the induction center in Chicago, were there guys
trying to get out, faking symptoms or different things? 4:07
I did not see any doing that.
Interviewer: So, you finished your tour in Chicago there, you took your one step
forward when they swore you in, and they put you on a bus to Fort Leonard Wood?
Fort Leonard Wood, Missouri, yeah
Interviewer: How long was that bus ride?
I don’t know, maybe—I don’t know how many hours, ten hours maybe.
Interviewer: Tell me about arriving at Fort Leonard Wood. What happened in
that part?
Fort Leonard Wood had a—there was a—I had a tall black guy, Sergeant Saunders, I still
remember him. I can still see him in my sleep; actually, he was really kind of rough. He
was in, he was a Vietnam veteran, and he was there to train us, so if we went there we
could survive, and he was rough on us, but that’s okay. 5:03 We probably needed it, I
3
�know I needed to get in shape and everything, and so at the end of the basic training he
even mentioned, ―Now, look at Martin, he’s only five feet seven and he did good on his
training and stuff, you know‖, so I got sort of an accommodation from him, sort of like
a—he kind of favored me a little bit and I appreciated that, but I did my best to do what
he said.
Interviewer: What all did you do in basic training?
Well, we just did the PT and got in shape. Then we went through some classes for things
that we needed to know, and physical training exercises. We did a lot running.
Interviewer: Rifle training, bayonet training? 6:00
Rifle training, yeah rifle training to, M16’s, not M16’s, for some treason they had M14’s.
They had a few M16’s, but not very many in 1969 and I don’t know why.
Interviewer: What was the hardest part of basic training for you?
It wasn’t hard. It was not hard at all because I was in track in high school and I was in
fairly good shape, so I got through everything okay.
Interviewer: A good runner.
That’s right
Interviewer: Now, when you got to Fort Leonard Wood, you went through the
reception center and is that where they asked you about your MOS, and what job
you would like to do, or was that later in basic?
Well, it was at the end of the class, of the basic training class. 7:01 What would you like
to do? What do you have a favor for? I said, ―Ok, I wouldn’t mind being a medic like
my father‖.
Interviewer: So, you expressed a preference for being a medic.
4
�They looked at my scores and everything and they said, ―You could be a medic‖. I
preferred a hospital, but they sent me as a combat infantry.
Interviewer: So, now you graduate from basic and you have orders for AIT?
Yes, right, AIT at Fort Sam Houston, Texas.
Interviewer: Did you have a leave before you went down to Fort Sam?
Yes, we had a two week leave.
Interviewer: I should backtrack, when were you drafted?
I was drafted in August of 1969.
Interviewer: August of 1969
Yes, August 5th
Interviewer: So, then you got to fort Sam around November sometime?
Yes
Interviewer: How long was the AIT at Fort Sam? 8:00
At Fort Sam, I believe that it was—I mean we’re talking forty years ago, it was about, it
was supposed to be about eleven or twelve weeks. They told us, ―We’re shortening you a
week or two because they need you. They need medics in Vietnam, you know‖, and I
said, ―Oh my goodness‖ to my friend, which actually, my friend Frank, he ended up
coming to the same unit I did. Frank Gonzales, he was also a medic and he was a recon
medic and I was a regular platoon medic, and I was making a joke with him, ―Man, they
need medics because they’re getting wounded so fast, or what’s going on there?‖ I said,
―Well, we gotta do what we gotta do‖.
Interviewer: Describe the medic training that you got in the AIT. What did that
involve? 9:03
5
�They gave us all kinds of training to be able to keep the guys alive until the helicopter
gets there, and then they take over from there and get them to the right place, you know,
to get their healing.
Interviewer: So, to do that, what did they have to train you to do? How to prevent
shock?
Right, how to prevent shock, mainly stop the bleeding, you have to give them morphine,
make sure that you’re giving them the right—that you’re giving them morphine if you’re
not supposed to, certain wounds, maybe, a head wound or something that you’re not
supposed to. So, that’s what they mainly taught us, and so I learned it and when I went
there I did exactly what they said. And it worked. 10:02
Interviewer: During the AIT would you have some hands on practice, experience
dressing wounds?
Oh yeah
Interviewer: Practice in dressing wounds, how was that conducted?
Well, I thought that it was conducted—I don’t have any problems with it, they showed us
how to put on the Band-Aids, put on the wraps for whatever type of wound it is. They
showed us videos, well, I think they were 8MM or 16MM, but they showed us the
pictures and what to do and how to treat it. It was great and I enjoyed it.
Interviewer: So, you had visual training and the presentation. Then did you have
hands on training?
Yes we did, we wrapped each other’s arms and legs and we also did shots, we gave shots
to one another. First we did it in an orange and then we said, ―Okay now, the guy next to
you, you get a shot from him‖. 11:07 I’ll tell you thought, a few of them broke off that
6
�needle and that was terrible. By accident the needle broke off in there and they had to
send them and get that out, you know, medically.
Interviewer: All during your training were they specifically gearing you for
Vietnam?
They were gearing us for Vietnam, very much, without a doubt.
Interviewer: Was it your expectation that everybody was going to go to Vietnam
then?
Well, they said some would go to Germany, but probably a lot of you, I mean even the
basic training DI, Sergeant Saunders, said, ―A lot of you will go to Vietnam‖. Actually,
Sergeant Saunders was a little bit sad. It seemed like he was almost crying when we left
because he knew what we were going to go through, and I’m sure that some of those guys
didn’t make it. 12:00
Interviewer: Was Sergeant Saunders a Vietnam veteran?
Yes he was
Interviewer: Now, your training at Fort Sam is winding down, what orders did you
get then?
The orders I got were Vietnam, and I called my family, parents and stuff, and they said,
―Oh no‖, and I said, ―Don’t worry about it mom, I know Paul Walla is over there and
he’s okay‖. Paul Walla was a friend of mine, he was a couple years older than me, and
he went over there too, and so I said, ―Ok, I’m not worried about it, you know‖. I had a
good mental attitude towards it, you know.
Interviewer: So, you got your orders, you know you’re going to Vietnam, and then
did you have a leave?
7
�Yes, a two week leave, my friends had a little party for me and all that stuff you know,
and I ended up going to, I shouldn’t have, but my friend took me to downtown Gary
where the girls were, and everything. 13:06 And then he said, ―Hey, this guy’s going
to Vietnam‖, so the thing is that we went up—this is really a funny story too, we went up
the two stories and my friend, fortunately, was like a body builder, he was a tall guy and
he was strong. I wasn’t as big as him and he took me up there and when we got up there
and we paid our money, all of a sudden we found out, ―Hey this is a scam and something
is going to happen, something is going to come down on the second story‖, so then these
two big black guys came up, you know, but fortunately for me Peter was bigger than
Africa. 14:00 We got ripped off and I actually went down stairs. Peter said, ―Go down
stairs real quick, Martin and I’ll take care of them, don’t worry about it‖, and I got hit on
the back of the head with brass knuckles and started bleeding, going down stairs, but
these two guys went up after him and he took care of them. He knocked them out. I
don’t know what he did, but they didn’t come back down when he did. He ran back
down and then he got in the car. I was dazed, but the hooker down on the street was
going through my pockets, but because I was dazed and I was bleeding I didn’t do too
much, but he got in the car, honked the horn, and said, ―Please, please, come on Martin
hurry up, so I ran across and fortunately made it. I went into the—I had a little knot
there. 15:02
Interviewer: So, even before going to Vietnam you got your first combat
experience?
That’s for sure, yeah
8
�Interviewer: Ok, so you had your party and then then you had to leave. Where did
you go, the region area?
Well, we went to, let’s see, that one base where everybody goes to in Vietnam when they
come in, Cam Ranh Bay.
Interviewer: Cam Ranh Bay, where did you go in the states to ship out?
To ship out I went to Chicago.
Interviewer: Chicago, and then you went to Fort Lewis or Oakland?
I went to Oakland, yeah
Interviewer: And then you shipped out of Oakland?
Yeah, and the funny thing about Oakland is that when we’re coming in, those guys are
coming in a line back, you know, and these guys are looking pretty disheveled. We’re
going in and saying, ―How was it?‖ They’re just shaking their heads, that’s all. 16:04
Interviewer: When you saw them there, that’s your first view of, kind of the reality
of the situation, and looking at those guys did you have some second thoughts?
Well, you couldn’t bail then. It was impossible; you just had to go through it.
Interviewer: Okay, so you flew out of the San Francisco area, and you ended up in
Cam Ranh Bay.
That’s right
Interviewer: As you’re getting off the plane, what is your first impression or
thought of Vietnam?
Actually, we came in at night and couldn’t see it until a couple of days later, because we
had to stay there at Cam Ranh Bay until we got our unit that we went to. My friend,
Frank Gonzales, which was another medic which I was with, he was there too, and then
9
�we both were on the same floor and they said, after about three days or five days, I think
it was five days, finally our call came up. 17:13 ―101st Airborne, you’re going in the
101st, Frank Gonzales, Martin Glennon‖, and a couple other guys.
Interviewer: So, you arrived at about January, the end of January or February?
The beginning of January
Interviewer: So, now you got orders for the 101st. What was your thought?
My thought was, ―Wasn’t that the ones that fought in WWII at Bastogne or something?‖
I thought, ―Man that must be a tough unit. Were they going?‖ Going up north, you know
where the Marines were or something like that. I said, ―Well, okay‖.
Interviewer: Did you ever question, “Why me?” Because never went to jump
school or anything. 18:04
Exactly, I said, ―I didn’t even go to jump school‖, and they said, ―Don’t worry about it,
nobody's jumping in Vietnam anyway‖.
Interviewer: Okay, so you leave Cam Ranh Bay, and then where do you go?
After I left Cam Ranh Bay we go to—we went up to Camp Eagle. From Camp Eagle,
after a couple days, we went to Camp Evans. They said, ―You’re going to be with the 2nd
of the 506 and you have to go through SERT School, which is jungle initiation school. In
SERT School we were taught what to do, how to take care of the troops and we went out
on different excursions around the base and were shown things like, what to look out for,
punji sticks and all that kind of stuff.
Interviewer: What was your search training as a medic any different than say
somebody coming in as a grunt, or was everybody the same? 19:10
It was different
10
�Interviewer: So, they had specialized search training for medics?
Yes they did, and Gerald Cafferty, he was another one who was a Silver Star winner. He
went to Charlie Company; Frank Gonzales went to Echo Company. Gonzales, he’s
deceased now, but I mean, in his honor I’d tell his story, he was a fine medic, a good
man. Echo Company was recon, a five man [five squad] unit, and then Gerald Cafferty
was Charlie Company and he actually got a silver star, and he’s not here at this.
Interviewer: You guys went for SERTS together?
Yes, we went to SERTS together and I had a bronze star and the guy that was a
conscientious objector, Delta Company, he’s not here right now, but he went—was with
Delta Company. 20:05 When we were surrounded by enemy soldiers, Delta Company,
actually, was the company that came and got us, so I saw him when I was leaving. He
was a conscientious objector and he took care of us. Those guys—there were fifty-one
wounded and twelve killed on July 22nd, and that was my last day in the field too. I went
to Charlie Company after that.
Interviewer: I just want to back track to your training now. When I was in, a lot of
the conscientious objectors went through the medic training. When you were going
through your AIT, were there many CO’s there?
Yeah, there were a few of them, but I can’t say there were many, but there were some.
Interviewer: Mostly for religious reasons?
Yes
Interviewer: So, you go through SERTS, and now—when you got assigned to the
101st, were you assigned to a medical company and they assigned you out to the rifle
companies, how did that assignment work? 21:07
11
�Headquarters Company, Headquarters Company will divvy you out where you want to
go.
Interviewer: So, now you were assigned to A- 2nd of 506?
2nd platoon, yes
Interviewer: So, when you—okay, you finish SERTS, tell me about the process of
joining your unit, joining Alpha Company.
Okay, when we went to join our unit, I went to my unit and I went with Lieutenant Kelly,
not the same one that had that problem in Vietnam and had eliminated that whole village.
Not the same Lieutenant Kelly [William Calley], a different one. I make that distinction
because a lot of people think I was in that unit. But, Lieutenant Kelly was the Lieutenant
that for two or three months I had him before Lieutenant Lee, which you didn’t talk to
yet. 22:05 Lieutenant Lee was a very good Lieutenant. Unfortunately Lieutenant Kelly,
he was different, he was—to try to keep us alive, sometimes he would call up the
Lieutenant Commander [company commander?] and say, ―Hey, how about putting us in
this AO, or something, so we got in very little contact for two months, very little. So, it
wasn’t until the Ripcord came in, that operation, that we really started having contact
then.
Interviewer: When you joined the company, what was your basic load as a medic?
What equipment would you carry?
I would carry this big back pack on my back. It was probably about thirty pounds at
least, thirty pounds and it had the Dextran, all of the bandages, morphine, and it had all of
the stuff in it. A couple big things of Dextran, blood filler, because when the guys would
12
�lose blood you would have to get the fluid back in them or they would go into shock , so
that’s what they taught us, to keep them out of shock and keep them alive.
Interviewer: So, your medic kit was about thirty pounds?
Right
Interviewer: How about your personal gear?
My personal gear, also, was about fifteen to twenty pounds, so we’re talking about a
double pack on my back.
Interviewer: Did you carry a weapon?
Yeah, I chose the M16, I could have had a 45, but I took the M16.
Interviewer: How much ammunition did you carry?
I just had a bandolier or two that just went around the front. 24:03
Interviewer: Okay, in joining Alpha, we talked about the basic load that you
carried and everything. In joining the company, did you feel physically challenged
because of the demands of humping the hills?
I did not; it wasn’t too much for me because, like I was telling you, I was in track and in
fairly good shape, so it wasn’t that bad. The only time that I said something to the
commander, who was a Captain [Burkhart], the Captain before Captain Hawkins, and
there was a commander and he wanted—I don’t understand this, but for some reason this
Captain came into our—took our whole four platoons and he wanted to sweep the whole
area, which was, maybe, my goodness, it must have been at least five miles and he didn’t
want to stop. 25:07 Some of the guys were really getting tired so, I went up to them
and I said, ―Look these guys are really, really tired. We’ve been walking for a couple
miles, three miles, four miles, let’s stop and take a break‖, and he said, ―If we stop and
13
�take a break they’ll get a bead on us‖, which is understandable. I understand that, but I
think even a three or a five minute break, it wouldn’t have been that bad, but he said,
―No, we have to keep going‖, so I think he was a little bit afraid that we were going to get
hit, you know. He took us all, real quick, as a sweep, and usually when that happens the
NVA doesn’t do anything, anyway you know, they kind of back off and say, ―We’ll just
see what they’re doing‖,
Interviewer: The reason I asked that is because it sounds like you’re It was more
classroom related kind of lab related as opposed to the extension of the physical
training from basic as dud some of the other IT’s. 26:12 When you first joined
them, what kinds of calls for your talent would you get? You didn’t have much
significant contact at that point.
Well, there were booby traps. The one Kit Carson scout, his name—I believe his name
was Tong or Tau, they got strange names, you know. Tong, Tau, something like that, and
he actually was seventeen years old , he already had a couple children, at seventeen, and
he was married and he walked on point for us with a transistor radio listening to
Vietnamese music and alerts. 27:12 He was listening to alerts from South Vietnamese
radio, he would listen to that too, and I didn’t really think that he was watching the road,
the path very much and, of course, it became true, he didn’t watch the path and he did trip
a booby trap and I did try to save his life. He was my first causality. I tried to save him
for forty-five minutes, and he didn’t come in. He was alive when he left me, but I heard
that he died on the way to Camp Evans to Charlie 326 Med.
Interviewer: That was your first casualty—I guess I should back track. You were a
medic with the 2nd platoon. Were you the only medic with the platoon?
14
�Every medic had a platoon. I was the medic 2nd platoon, 1st platoon was Danny Freest,
and 3rd platoon was a medic named Doc Draper. 28:14 Doc Draper was from Indiana,
so I had a good relationship with him. I talked with him a lot when we got together.
Sometime they would just take platoons out one way, and another platoon that way, but
when you got together then I would talk to him, you know.
Interviewer: So, each platoon had a medic. Was there also a medic with the
company's CP? Was that the senior medic?
That was sort of the senior medic. He usually had a rank higher and he was in there a
little while and that medic was Doc Kalestone.
Interviewer: So the injury to the Kit Carson, which was fairly extensive, was that
your first?
All over his body and his mouth 29:02
Interviewer: What other complaints did you deal with in terms of soldiers?
Okay, fortunately when you went out in the field, there wasn’t any messing around and
they didn’t usually smoke marijuana. They did in the rear, but not when it’s fairly
dangerous out there. They were—everybody watched everybody’s back and made sure
they were alert.
Interviewer: What kinds of ailments did you see? Did you see a lot of jungle rot?
Did you see a lot of boils?
Jungle rot, yeah, and I sent a couple guys back because they’d get a scratch one day and
the next day their whole arm was all double size. One guy got a scratch in his neck and
I’m not kidding you, his neck looked like a bull’s neck, and he went to the rear. 30:03
15
�Later I worked at Charlie med and I was putting in penicillin and giving penicillin shorts.
You had to clean that thing out, and that was nasty.
Interviewer: So, that was the most prevalent kinds of things that you dealt with?
Yeah
Interviewer: Did normal little cuts get septic?
Yes they did if you didn’t treat them right, right away.
Interviewer: Did you have a lot of APC capsules too? That was always our
complaint.
Well, I gave out those pink capsules every day, you know, for Dapsone, and then the big
orange one once a week for malaria.
Interviewer: Once a week for malaria.
Yeah
Interviewer: That was your responsibility as the platoon medic to do that?
Yes, that was once a day we gave out the little ones, and the other one once every four
days or something like that, but I made sure that I gave it out because that was my
responsibility and I didn’t want anybody on my watch to get what the mosquitoes bring.
31:16
Interviewer: Did you have to keep any records of the malaria medication?
No records, no records at all. Even the morphine, they knew back in the rear that I had
two morphines, but later when we went down to Eagle Beach for stand down, I had two
of the morphines stolen from my backpack when I went to eat. I came back and
somebody had rummaged through it. They thought it was me, but it wasn’t me, it was
not me. I told them I would take a lie detector test because it wasn’t me.
16
�Interviewer: Obviously morphine, we consider that a controlled substance was
there any kind of accounting of it for you? Did you have to sign for it when you got
some and turn it back? 32:05
I didn’t have to sign for anything. The only thing is they had there record that they gave
it to me, and then if I used it, and I had to get more, I had to tell them how I used it. But,
those two were stolen at the Eagle Beach stand down and there was nothing I could do
about it, but they said, ―Are you sure you didn’t use it yourself?‖ I said, ―It wasn’t me‖.
Interviewer: How did you discover they were gone? Was your pack just open?
Yeah, my pack was open when I came back from lunch.
Interviewer: So, now in Alpha Company the first two months were kind of
uneventful. Were you patrolling in what we call the flatland area around Camp
Evans, or were you out in the hills?
No, we were in the mountains. 33:02 I remember one time when Lieutenant Kelly said,
―I’m getting a case of grenades, guys, and we’re going to have a little grenade practice‖.
We were in an area where it didn’t really matter too much, so they kind of had us in a
more safe area. Like I said, Lieutenant Kelly would get us in a safe area, sort of, and that
was good. That was good, so he got this case of grenades and we all got some grenades,
two or three grenades. And he said, ―Get on line, get on line‖.
Interviewer: So, Lieutenant Kelly brought a case of grenades out and said you were
going to have some practice, so what happened?
Okay, then a whole bunch of guys, ten or twelve guys on line, thirteen, fifteen, had two
grenades each and we threw them down the side of the hill and they got caught up in the
trees. There were a few trees and somehow they got caught in the trees and the shrapnel
17
�came back on us. 34:16 And five guys got wounded, and I turned around to go into the
foxhole and then I got a piece of shrapnel and it’s still there in the back of my neck, so
five guys got Purple Hearts for that. That was my first Purple Heart.
Interviewer: So, you got a Purple Heart for grenade practice and not enemy
attack?
Yeah, and I had to take shrapnel out of guys for the whole next month, little pieces of
shrapnel would come up and I knew that they would come up, so I said, ―Don’t worry
about it, it will come up after a couple of days or a week, or something and we’ll pull it
out with tweezers‖. One guy had a little piece right in his nose and after two weeks I
pulled it out. 35:07 I couldn’t really get it out and he said, ―let me work on it doc‖, and
he got my mirror and he got it out finally.
Interviewer: Would you use tweezers or forceps?
Like tweezers or forceps type of things, yeah
Interviewer: Was anybody injured seriously enough to be medevaced?
No, just small little shrapnel things
Interviewer: What did the Lieutenant say after that?
He said nothing. He said, ―Sorry guys‖, and that’s about it, you know. I should have
said something about the trees, ―Make sure you don’t get in the trees‖.
Interviewer: When you would be operating with the platoon, would you basically
stay with the command section of the platoon?
Yes, I would 36:00
18
�Second interview section with James Smither PhD GVSU Veterans History Project
Interviewer: In your initial interview session that we did back at the Ripcord
reunion in Indianapolis last fall, one of the things you talked about a little bit was
your time in basic training. You mentioned, in particular, that you had decided for
yourself that you were kind of going to go ahead and do the best job you could and
that the sergeant, the drill sergeant, very much appreciated that. What were the
other guys in basic like? What attitudes did they bring with them when they came
into camp?
Most of the guys that came in, many of them were drafted. Some were actually NG’s,
National Guard, some were, they believed wanted to go lifers, so those people that
believed that they were going to stay there a while seemed to have more perspective that
they wanted to be there, but many of the people that were drafted, like myself, we just
said, ―Ok, we’ll go through these two years‖. 1:10 ―We’ll go through it and that will be
it. Because we were drafted we’ll do the best job we can‖.
Interviewer: Was that a fairly common attitude among you guys?
I think so, yeah
Interviewer: Were their people who were trying to push against it, or didn’t want to
adjust to being in the army?
Maybe a few, maybe a few, and usually they did something wrong and they would send
them back or—but not very many.
19
�Interviewer: So, even at this stage in the war now, the anti-war movement has to
some extent picked up and there’s more publicity, once you got drafted an awful lot
of guys are still going to say, “Ok, I’m going to do my job”.
There are more of them that said that than went to Canada.
Interviewer: By quite a bit, yeah
Yeah
Interviewer: Something we tend to lose track of. 2:00 Now, you’ve gone through
basic, you’ve signed up to be a medic, you’ve done Medical Corps training down at
Fort Sam Houston, now you mentioned that in your medical training that you got a
lot of things designed to prepare you for Vietnam, in terms of combat wounds and
things like that. Did they try to teach you anything about what Vietnam its self was
like, the culture, the people, or what you were going to have to do?
Yes they did. They had a mock Vietnamese village even that they set up, and they
showed us maybe a few things, words like mamasan, papasan, and, you know, what these
things are and they actually tried to help us to be able to understand them a little bit. The
only way you could really understand them is to live there with them and so, that’s the
way that they did it. 3:06
Interviewer: So, they did try to prepare you as much as they could for the general
environment you were going to get in?
Yes
Interviewer: Once you finish your training, you go home on leave, they get you to
Vietnam, and you arrive in Vietnam, was it January of 1969?
January, 1970
20
�Interviewer: 1970 rather, you were drafted in 1969. You arrive there in January
and then you’re assigned to the 101st Airborne, and you go out---now, did you join
your company and platoon, was that at Camp Evans or Camp Eagle?
At Camp Evans we were sent to SERTS training in the RTS and there they told us which
actual company we would be in and I was assigned to Alpha Company 2nd in 506
Infantry.
Interviewer: Right, you are going to be a medic then for the 2nd platoon, so we’ve
done that. Then, was the platoon at Camp Evans or was it out in the field
somewhere? 4:05
The home for Alpha, 2nd of the 506 was at Camp Evans, but at that time they were in the
field.
Interviewer: So, did you chopper out to join them?
Yes, I choppered out to join them.
Interviewer: When you joined the platoon, what kind of reception did you get?
Well, I got a handshake from the outgoing medic and he said, ―Once you get out, stay
out, out of the jungle as much as possible‖, and I said, ―Ok, I will‖, and he said, ―Just
keep your head down and do your job, and these guys will love you and they will protect
you‖, and they did.
Interviewer: But they didn’t do anything else in helping you get oriented? Was he
taking the chopper out?
He was taking the chopper out, and I was taking the chopper in.
Interviewer: What kind of reception did you get from the men in the platoon?
21
�I got a good reception, some of them came up to me and introduced themselves and said,
―Doc, if I get wounded I want you to just do your best job on me‖, and I said, ―I will, I
promise I will‖. 5:07 One thing that, after a while that I noticed that they liked, is every
day I went to each one of them and gave them their tablet for malaria, anti- malaria, and
once every four days the big orange one, which is for a different type of malaria. They
actually felt confident in that, and the only day that I didn’t do it, that I didn’t give it out,
they said later, was the day we got surrounded by NVA soldiers.
Interviewer: There was other stuff going on. All right, so when you start going out
in the field then, are they trying to coach you at all, or tell you what to do, or just
staying behind the Lieutenant?
Not really, they didn’t really coach me too much. I just—we knew to stay in line, you
know, when we’re going down a path or something, and the point man would always
check out. 6:06
We had a Kit Carson Scout, we always had a Kit Carson Scout, which
was a Vietnamese.
Interviewer: You mentioned in your first interview session that you had a Kit
Carson Scout with you early on and he was your first casualty
Yes, he was my first casualty after two weeks. He was going down—he was only
seventeen and a half years old. I still remember it, he had a transistor radio in his ear and
he actually tripped a booby trap. He was probably just not watching where that little wire
was that he tripped.
Interviewer: Now, was it normal for you to use the trails as opposed to trying to go
through the jungle?
Yes, it was more normal to use the trails.
22
�Interviewer: But, you were aware that’s what got booby trapped?
We were aware, and the point man and the slack man were supposed to check that out,
you know. But, at that time, for some reason, they actually missed it. 7:00 The point
man missed it, but the Kit Carson Scout, I think, was the second there, or third there, and
he tripped it, so I don’t know what happened there.
Interviewer: All right, now do you remember who your original company
commander was when you got there?
Yes, my original company Captain was Burkhart, and then my Lieutenant was Lieutenant
Kelly.
Interviewer: And you talked a little bit about Kelly in the first interview session
that you did. You pointed out that he was someone who kind of liked keep the
platoon out of trouble if he could.
Yes, that’s true, he did.
Interviewer: All right, now, how long did you have those two commanders, or when
did they go out?
The first commander, Lieutenant Kelly, I only had for probably two months, two months,
because he was short and his time was up. 8:00 But, however, through him at that one
location, we did bring in some grenades, in which I did get friendly fire, and five guys got
wounded. Friendly fire, through grenade practice, in which we were on top of a hill and
we threw them down the side of the hill, the two or three grenades that each one had, and
then some of them got stuck in the trees, and they came back on us, and five guys got
friendly fire, and I was one.
Interviewer: Right, and did Lieutenant Kelly last long after that?
23
�Lieutenant Kelly, he was on his last months and he didn’t last long after that, not at all.
He was pretty well replaced after that.
Interviewer: That was kind of a silly thing to do.
Yes it was
Interviewer: And then your company commander, how long did he stick around?
Captain Burkhart stayed a little bit longer, maybe a month longer or so, but he was pretty
much on the end also, of his time there, out in the field. 9:12
Interviewer: Did you have time to build any particular impression of him as a
leader, or commander, compared to what you saw later?
Captain Burkhart, I would say, was not one that would stay in the jungle very much. In
actuality he was pretty aloof. Pretty aloof, and I didn’t actually see him that much. The
one time I do remember is that we were going down a—he said, ―We want to go to
these—we want to check out these three or four clicks‖, and he came in and he led our
three or four platoon, at the time, and this was early, before April, and we went down
humping through the jungle and I remember it was the longest hump we ever made in one
particular time. 10:07 Usually it’s, maybe, a couple clicks, but this was like four or five
clicks, four clicks at least, and everybody was getting tired and saying, ―Let’s stop‖, and
he kept saying, ―No, no, we can’t stop, we have to keep going ―. Possibly because he
knew that if we stopped they would get a bead on us and their mortar, their NVA mortar
men would start shooting, and the VC would start shooting, so we just kept going, but we
were exhausted. I remember going to him and saying, ―Sir, we need to take a break,
come on, please, these guys are really complaining and these are my men, you know, in
my platoon‖, and he said, ―Well, Martin, we have to keep going‖.
24
�Interviewer: Did he have you all going on a single trail or was he trying to have the
company fan out into a larger area? 11:01
It was a single trail.
Interviewer: The whole company just down one trail?
There were three or four companies [platoons] right in a row, just right through it, yeah,
fast, quickly.
Interviewer: Now, did anybody trip any booby traps that time?
No booby traps and we didn’t see any NVA. They probably saw us and they were
probably watching, and they were waiting for us to stop, probably.
Interviewer: Now, at what point did you—now at a certain point things start to
change in terms of what the unit does. The Lieutenant rotates out, you get a new
one in and after that Burkhart gets replaced etc., and then they start moving the
platoon to different places?
Yes
Interviewer: We’re going to pick up your story there, at that point.
Okay, when Lieutenant Widjeskog came in, he was new from West Point and everything,
and some of us wondered if he was going to make it or not. 12:00 However, he actually
proved to be a very good Lieutenant, a very good Lieutenant, and he helped out us guys
and I would say that he was top notch, but in the beginning we weren’t sure until about a
month or so later when we had more confidence in him. This was right before Ripcord
started on April 1st. Then on April 1st we went in and then we knew that we could trust
him. He took care of the men, but he also obeyed his commands that he got from the
higher up and by that time then, our Captain was changed to Captain Hawkins.
25
�Interviewer: All right, and what did you know about Hawkins or what his
background was?
All I knew was that he was a Captain that actually wasn’t a Captain when he first came
in, but he got a higher rank because of his skills in the jungle and they put him up as
Captain. 13:04
Interviewer: What kind of style of command did he have as opposed to Burkhart?
He was more commanding. He was more hands on, we saw him more and so, I would
say that he had a little bit greater understanding skill of the terrain and he probably knew
the forest better than Burkhart too.
Interviewer: About how large do you think your company was when the ripcord
Campaign started?
When the Ripcord Campaign started, I think we ended up having about a hundred and
twenty or twenty –five.
Interviewer: So, for that period in the Vietnam era, that’s a pretty strong unit.
A fairly strong company, a hundred, a hundred and twenty-five, and that’s including,
actually, four platoons. By the time we did get hit, later on, we were down to seventy and
only three platoons. 14:03
Interviewer: Now, talk a little bit about the Ripcord Campaign its self. Where was
it relative to Camp Evans or places you had been before that and what were you
doing there?
Well, we were on firebase O’Reilly, and firebase O’Reilly was closer to the coast. The
firebase Ripcord, they say, was a firebase earlier by the Marines a couple two or three
years earlier, so it was re—and I do not know the name of it. However, I do know that it
26
�was about seven miles from Hamburger Hill, seven miles inland from Hamburger Hill.
Hamburger Hill was closer to the A Shau Valley and on the edge of the A Shau Valley,
but we still—here are some different things here. 15:01 I don’t know if you can see
this, but Ripcord here, Hamburger Hill seven miles, right there.
Interviewer: Very close to each other, sort of mountainous terrain with jungles and
valleys and so forth.
Mountainous terrain, jungles and valleys, yes
Interviewer: Firebases tended to be built on cleared off hilltops.
Yes
Interviewer: So, you could mount artillery there and so forth?
Yes
Interviewer: Okay, What did your unit start doing then in April?
In April we were on different missions and actually what we did was we were given
order, of course, from higher up and they said to go this this area, go to that area, so we
just did what they said. We went to different areas and I was the medic and I was to keep
them alive. So, for the most part we checked out places where we thought the enemy
might be and sometimes they weren’t really there. 16:00 Maybe they passed through,
but maybe a few times we did see contact, but the enemy continually wanted to dominate
the hills surrounding Ripcord. There were various hills, Hill 1000, Hill 805, all these
hills—Hill 1000 had many, many of the enemy on it and that is one time I know we lost
Wieland Norris.
27
�Interviewer: Now, as you’re say into April here and into May kind of before
ripcord heats up. Were you working out of O’Reilly and doing patrols out of there
initially, or were you being put on hills in the Ripcord area?
Initially we went in with the April 1st, Alpha Company went in with the rest of the
companies, and then we were pulled back, actually. 17:00
I do remember that when we
first went on the hill one of the senior medics, from the rear, was there with the Captain
and he actually went out there and there was a guy wounded out there on Ripcord, and
Ripcord had no barbed wire, had nothing, and they just got onto it and he went out and he
heroically went out and took care of that guy. I was very impressed on his heroism as a
medic and I liked the guy, but later on he had a lot of emotional problems and stuff and
he was not—he went back to the rear and actually, before the end of my time there, he
actually shot himself, but he lived by the grace of God the bullet did not kill him, but he
lost an eye, 18:06 One of the Captains, Burnside I think, Burnside or something,
Captain, Dr. Burnside, a Charlie med saved his life.
Interviewer: Now, do you remember the first real firefight you got caught up in?
One of the first firefights that I did get caught up in was the one with Whalen Norris. We
were around there and Norris was with another platoon and because we stood down, the
platoon stood down, that we actually—the battalion commander said, Lieutenant Colonel
Lucas, "We need somebody to walk point. Is there anybody in the company that will
walk point?‖ 19:01 Wieland Norris did raise his hand and his slack man was another
guy from his other platoon and they started going up the hill and, of course, there was an
actual ambush up there and he was shot. There wasn’t anything that anybody could do,
he needed an immediate operation and I was the medic, supposed to be the medic, but
28
�because he came from the other platoon, the other platoon medic said, ―I will take care of
him, he was my man‖, and the other medic went over there.
Interviewer: Now, off camera you had filled in a little bit of context to the story.
How was it that the battalion commander had to go and ask for somebody to go and
take the lead? Where was he operating? Where were they going?
The battalion commander, he had a—he was in a Loach going back and forth watching
and looking at the hill and he was a pilot and he did that every once and a while. 20:03
He would do things like that, drop off grenades for us and things like that. He was very
hand on, a hand on--Lieutenant Colonel Lucas was very hands on, he had his pilot’s
license and he could go out there and search things out.
Interviewer: Where was he sending these men and what kind of problem was there
with that?
He was sending them up to the top of the hill, which I believe was Hill 1000 and there
was a lot of cover so he couldn’t see anything, you know, but he wanted to send the men
up there and so then that’s what happened. The squad went up there and they got
wounded. The second guy got wounded in his chest, another guy got wounded just
through his chin and I still remember him just showing me his little wound on his chin
because the bullet just grazed his chin, the third guy. 21:02 But, the second guy got it
on the side, but it wasn’t life threatening, but Wieland Norris’s was life threatening and
within five minutes he was gone.
Interviewer: Was your platoon following them in, or were you back around
Ripcord?
29
�My platoon was set back—I remember we were behind a log and somewhere just waiting
to go up. Had they went to the very top, we had of went up there right behind them all.
Interviewer: Did people expect that there was going to be an ambush set up, up
there?
Yes, many of the guys that had been out there six months or more they did. They thought
for sure, without a shadow of a doubt, and that’s why they stood down and they didn’t go.
Interviewer: So, basically they were—normally, I guess, when you talk about a
stand down, it’s when a unit is brought back from the field and are resting, but now
did Colonel Lucas try to send them right back out again? 22:02
That, or was it
that he was just looking around for volunteers at that point?
He was looking for volunteers when the first group wouldn’t go.
Interviewer: Okay, but you have a group that’s saying, “We don’t want to go”.
Yes, because we know that there’s an ambush out there. That’s what was happening.
Interviewer: At this point you do have ordinary soldiers, at some point, kind of
challenging the orders they are getting from higher levels on the ground because
they can get them killed?
Yes
Interviewer: It was a little bit different situation than what you would have had a
few years earlier in Vietnam, and they were aware of some change going on?
Yes, but there were still some men in the company that did go up, so even though these
guys---sometimes when a soldier gets short time and they know they only have a month
left, they don’t want to go and do things like this, and some of these guys were like that.
23:00
30
�Interviewer: Then, basically Ripcord goes on and it’s May, June, July. What is
your—before things get really ugly in July, what kind of a pattern was there to your
activity or what things stand out in your mind about what went on in that middle
phase?
Well, I remember one time, I think it was Hill 805 that we were security for one of the
other companies, I believe Delta Company, and they were going up and they were
continually getting hit. We were on the other side, another hill over watching it and the
enemy didn’t know we were there. So we were the ones that helped them out a lot that
night, in that ambush, you know. And the enemy was shocked that we were over there,
shooting at the enemy, so they backed down. I remember that and that was probably in
May. In June is when, I believer, when Whalen Norris was killed, in June. 24:07
Interviewer: Now, in that period there, in May and June, what kinds of loses was
your platoon or your company taking?
My particular platoon was not taking as many as the other companies. Charlie company
took a whole lot, Bravo Company, they had their time, Alpha Company, Delta had their
time. Alpha company was the last one to have a major contact, which was July 22nd, the
day before they pulled out. We were surrounded by four hundred NVA soldiers.
Interviewer: While you were out there were you spending a lot of nights just out in
the field, or were you normally on a hilltop or in the firebase? Where were would
you be? 25:00
We would be—we would find a night defensive position and then the battalion
commander and the CP, I mean the actual Captain, would be conversing with the
battalion commander which way he wanted us to go and he would say it’s okay to go this
31
�way and so, the Captain would say, ―Okay, this company go forth, you go first‖, this
platoon, I mean, go first and, that’s the way it was. Then I believe it was on July 20th or
21st, is when we found the commo wire, and then the commo wire was linked into, from
the transistor radio and we had an interpreter, a Vietnamese interpreter, that was, I
believe, his last name was Hoang and he actually had a lot of intel that he actually gave to
the battalion commander, which caused him, the battalion commander, feel, I believe,
that it’s time to back off. 26:08 We knew it was time to back off after, I believe, the
Chinook took the big round into the motor and it knocked it down on top of the ammo
dump on the 18th of July, and they knew, and they think---and they couldn’t get ammo
back in there, so they were probably thinking that it’s time to leave. When they heard the
communications they tapped into it, and the enemy did send somebody back to check the
commo wire because they heard the scratching noise and one of the men in our company,
and was in my platoon even, it was either Sparkie Jornell or it was Schultz. They had
gotten the one guy, the one NVA, and then the other one was sent with a blood trail,
which they tried to follow, but they never found the guy. 27:06 The NVA, he probably
made it back and everything was fine, but the first one was killed, the NVA, and I
remember that.
Interviewer: The North Vietnamese are running communication wire through the
jungle between the different units, all right, and so you got an unusual piece of
intelligence there now, did anything happen when you were out at night camped out
in the jungle someplace around Ripcord? Did the enemy try to probe your
positions?
32
�The NVA was probing our positions, especially when the commo wire was in, and during
this time I was really praying a lot. 28:07 My friend, Bill Molvey, he prayed and read
the bible out there, and I started reading the bible and I read it all through. I made a
commitment to god, to Jesus, you know, and so I believe that helped me through this
because it helped me focus on-- and gave me some strength. That night, before the big
battle, they were probing our positions and I actually said to the sergeant that got shot
through the jaw the next day, I said to him, ―I smell the enemy out there‖, and he said,
―Doc, you’ve been out here too long, you’ve been out here too long‖, and I said, ―No, I
really do small them‖, because they had a specific small. They smelled like rice and also,
chicken and they had shrimp and they mixed things in and you could smell it. 29:09 He
didn’t believe me, but the next day we did get surrounded by NVA soldiers and I knew
they were probing us that night and I was on night guard for an hour and a half or so, or
two hours and I knew that they were, but they didn’t come.
Interviewer: Did you ever actually get attacked during the night?
We, particularly, did not get attacked during that night.
Interviewer: Or earlier nights?
A couple of the platoons got a few NVA coming in, but not really, not really. We had the
special mines out, which were with the thousand BB’s.
Interviewer: Were they claymores?
Claymore mines and the enemy, they were very, very afraid of that because they
definitely put some men wounded and killed on their side, that they didn’t want to get
near those things. 30:06 We put them out all around our night defense positions.
33
�Interviewer: Now, were these set up so that the American soldiers would trigger
them?
Yes, they would just click it and it would go off.
Interviewer: Did you ever have anybody kind of get jumpy and blow off a claymore
when he didn’t need to?
I think that happened once or twice, yeah.
Interviewer: What was the experience level of the soldiers in your platoon, do you
think?
Many of them were draftees, some of them were like Lieutenant Lee, he was a West
Pointer. A few of them were sergeants, they came in E3’s, and there were a few ―shake
and bakes‖ too. ―Shake and bake’, they put them through real quick and brought them
over to Vietnam real quick and actually, I think that Sergeant Brown was a ―shake and
bake‖, the one that said that to me. 31:07
Interviewer: Now, were these mostly men who hadn’t seen combat yet?
Yes, they were mostly men who didn’t see combat, that is correct.
Interviewer: Now, as you’re kind of—did you get to spend much of ant time,
actually, on the base at Ripcord itself?
We spent about two or three weeks on Ripcord, yes we did.
Interviewer: And what were you doing while you were up there?
We were just being night defensive, and we would be around the bunker and around the
circle, and just kind of keeping it safe for the night. Checking the jungle for movement
and things like that.
Interviewer: Would you send patrols out during the day or listening posts?
34
�Sometimes they would, they would, yes. At that time, though, they had a new thing
where they would actually put a sensor out and they started putting sensors out all the
way around them, so they knew when somebody was walking near it or something like
that. 32:08 And then they would give the intel to the chief commander and things like
that.
Interviewer: Now, while you were on Ripcord, were you taking much incoming
fire?
The incoming fire at Ripcord while we were there was minimal to starting July 1st, 1970
to July 23rd. Every night, every day, they got fire. 51 Cal fire, they got AK-47 fire, they
got mortars every single day, and it was constant for twenty three days, and the twenty
third day is when they left.
Interviewer: Now, did you prefer to be down there in the jungle or up on the base?
After July 1st I would rather have been in the jungle to be honest with you. The jungle
had more cover and they just didn’t—if we moved around they didn’t—usually it was a
little safer, actually. 33:08 But the firebase was being watched and they were going to
overrun it, you know, it was just a matter of time.
Interviewer: Did you have that feeling at the time that things were getting worse, or
were you just focusing on your job and staying alive?
I was focusing on my job as a medic, mainly, and trying to stay alive of course, that’s
what everybody tried to do. On the 22nd, when we got attacked, that’s when fifty one
were wounded and twelve were killed in a five hour battle.
Interviewer: Before that did you have a sense that the battle was not going the right
way, or were you not thinking about it?
35
�Well, we were thinking when the Chinook fell on the ammo dump that was it, you know.
It was probably not going the right way. Fortunately the enemy didn’t know that. 34:03
They didn’t realize that it fell on the ammo dump, and we found this out from General
Harrison, who went to talk to the opposing general, and they said that they did not know
that it fell on the ammo dump. Had they known, he told General Harrison, they probably
would have attacked that night, but they did not know that it was the ammo dump. They
thought that particular Chinook, it was just an explosion from the Chinook and that the
Chinook might have been bringing in something that they didn’t realize it was on the
ammo dump.
Interviewer: I suppose they were used to having the American having mountains of
ammo anyway, so what’s one big explosion and that sort of thing.
Right, right
Interviewer: They didn’t actually attack the perimeter of the base either. They
didn’t try to get up into it.
No, there was—a few times they tried to get up, but they never got very far, never got
very far in the wire. They never got through the wires. 35:01
Interviewer: The defensive position its self, was well laid out.
Right
Interviewer: Were there other incidents, or things, that kind of stand out in your
memory before your big attack? Things that happened that set that up?
Well, I remember one thing that stood out. I remember when we left O’Reilly and we
were going to—toward the place where we found the combo wire. One night—this is
how it was, we knew that we were going to get attacked. Everybody knew that we were
36
�going to get attacked and honestly, I even stopped eating a little bit. I ate one meal a day.
I remember it was almost like I was fasting, and I was hyper vigilant, and I kid you not,
this one day, between the time we left O’Reilly and we were at the commo spot, or it was
the day after the commo spot, that I heard a voice say, ―Your company is going to be
wiped out‖. 36:13 I don’t know if it was an imaginary voice or the devil telling me that,
or whatever, you know, but I heard it and I still remember it and it’s been forty years, and
I still remember that. So, I said, ―Okay‖, and I even turned around because I thought
somebody was saying something, but it was a voice, you know, so everybody knew that
we were going to get it. And that one, I remember this one guy, he—we were setting the
night defensive position and he actually shot himself in the foot to get out of the jungle.
We had to pull in a medevac to get him. It was about three days before we got
surrounded, so the enemy knew we were there when that medivac came in. 37:03 They
knew we were out there in the jungle someplace. They were watching us, but we moved
around every night.
Interviewer: Tell me about, kind of, the climax of the battle, what led to that and
what happened that day.
Well, I remember the morning of July 22nd and that we were supposed to leave at eleven
AM or so, eleven in the morning, ten thirty or eleven, and go to the one hill that Captain
Hawkins felt was the best extraction point for us to get out. So, what happened was the
Lieutenant Commander [Lieutenant Colonel] on Ripcord, which was Lucas, said, ―No,
we want you to go a different direction‖, and I remember, I don’t know if it was—
somebody was talking and saying, ―Well, the commander is trying to get us to go a
different direction and Captain Hawkins wants us to go to a night defensive position, the
37
�place going a different way from the night defensive position‖. 38:11 There was some
bickering going on the morning we were supposed to leave. Early in the morning
Captain Hawkins sent a squad out to go and check out that night defensive position.
Nothing happened, so they thought it was going to be secure and good, but actually the
enemy probably saw them and it probably would have been even worse than what
happened. When he got back and Captain, I mean Lieutenant Lucas, no Lieutenant
Colonel Lucas told him to go a different direction, he finally said, ―Yes, we’ll go the
other direction‖, and so, my company, my platoon, 2nd platoon, was chosen to go first as
point. Always the point element gets hit the worst. 39:00 So, we were sort of walking a
different direction and actually, we started walking out of it and when we actually saw an
NVA soldier. We hunkered down and he told the Lieutenant and the Lieutenant said,
―Well, why didn’t you shoot?‖ I don’t know who that was that did that, but probably
Lieutenant Widjeskog will be able to tell you more information about that one.
Interviewer: Basically it was probably a new guy, or , who hadn’t had that happen
before.
Yeah, and that morning I remember, of July 22nd, right before we went out that other
direction, I know that I made—I opened up my Gideon New Testament and I wrote my
name down and I said, ―I’ll do whatever you want God. I’ll do whatever you want. I just
want to get out of here alive. Get me out of here, Lord‖, so it was kind like a deal I did
with God and I accepted Jesus’s plan for my life. 40:04 I became a Chaplain later and
that’s what I’m doing now, I’m a Chaplain for veterans. But, actually after the battle
started, the other two platoons were swamped with the enemy and they were just creeping
up on us and we didn’t know it.
38
�Interviewer: So, they sort of let your platoon pass through the ambush and so they
went after the rest of the company?
Yes, they went through and they actually got between my platoon, the 2nd platoon and the
two other platoons and they were working on those other two platoons, but my platoon
was up a little knoll, a little bit higher ground, so every time they tried to come up on us,
we just threw a grenade down the side when we heard anything. 41:00 I remember that
one time during that five hours where they tried to swamp my platoon over there and
Lieutenant Lee said, ―Everybody get in a circle‖, and everybody got in a circle and then,
―Get your M16 in front of you. If you see anything or hear anything then we’re going to
shoot‖, and then we all got in a circle and then the sappers, the sappers came up. They
had these satchel charges, and we had, I don’t know, ten satchel charges thrown in our
group, so it was pandemonium, but when that happened everybody opened up in a circle
around us. It was like a protective shield and they all backed out. No NVA got up, no
sappers got in our little circle. 42:00 They didn’t get-- but I remember one was fighting
with Sparky Jornell, who was killed, Sparky Jornell was killed by shrapnel or a bullet
during that time, and he was behind a big stump and every time he’d come out Sparky
would shoot and then he’d go back behind the stump and the other guy would come out
and it was going back and forth, back and forth for a half an hour or forty minutes. So, I
actually lost it a little in the beginning of the battle and I kind of like started saying ―Jesus
help me, Jesus help, help‖, and Tom Schultz was on the corner, maybe about twenty feet
away from me, or twenty-five, and he came back to me and he said, ―Martin, I think
we’re going to make it, we’re going to make it, I think we’re going to make it through
this, don’t worry about it, you’ll be okay, we’ll be okay‖. 43:04 I said, ―Okay Tom,
39
�you’re right‖, and I calmed down. Then he went to the edge of the perimeter and we
never saw him until the next day and he was shot and killed later on, Tom Schultz, I’ll
never forget that, he calmed me down and it was probably one of the last things he did
before he died, and God bless him. He helped me to refocus, you know, ―We’re going to
make it, yes‖, and then my other friend, who was a radio man was Bill Molvey, Bill
Molvey’s from Pennsylvania, I just met him at the forty year reunion just now, and he
actually—I’ve been trying to find him for forty years and I finally found him, and he
came to the reunion and he remembered that. 44:01 His radio went out, they were
trying to bring in jets with 250 pound bombs, and everybody’s radio went out in my
platoon, so we couldn’t do it. We couldn’t even communicate with the other two
platoons for at least forty minutes, forty-five, or fifty minutes. But, they were trying to
work with these radios and one of them was shot up and his wasn’t working well and
finally he got it working, and I’ll tell you we were praying hard. He was right next to me,
and I still get calls from him every week, and I talked to him yesterday, you know, Bill
Molvey, he’s really a good guy, and he was the other radio man. The Lieutenant
Widjeskog had one and Bill Molvey was one for I believe it was Brown, Sergeant
Brown, he had one, and maybe there were two or three in it, but one of the radios was
down and the others got messed up. 45:02
Interviewer: Now, did you ever find out what happened to the sapper that Sparky
was having the shootout with?
I believe that he was killed and they pulled back his body because we never found his
body. To be honest with you, the only bodies that we found the next day, of the NVA,
were those that were so close that the NVA night people that were supposed to pull back
40
�the bodies, they couldn’t go that close because they were in our wire, but that one time I
wasn’t there at the other two platoons, some of the other men will probably tell you this,
at one time the enemy came so close on the other two platoons, that they came up and
were starting to shoot our guys, and one guy was on top of another guy, and the guy, I
remember, had a sapper throw a satchel charge and it blinded him and the other two
platoons, what I understand. 46:03 And he actually had a body on top of him. The
body on top of him was the guy that was dead and then the NVA shot that body.
But, he was underneath, but he kicked him, he was underneath and he kicked him, but he
didn’t move, and they probably thought, ―Okay, that guy's dead too‖, but he wasn’t, he
was alive, but he was blinded by a satchel charge and he made it through that and he
told—I remember him telling me that and it was really something.
Interviewer: Now, what ended the fight? You said it was going on something like
five hours, did you get to call in any air strikes, or what was it that broke it?
What broke it, I believe, was the F4’s started dropping 250 pound bombs, and the F4
actually came in and that’s when the radio started working, and we started saying, ―Okay,
pop smoke‖, and we popped the smoke to show them our position. 47:05 We said, ―Get
in as close as possible‖, and Captain Hawkins was saying the same thing. His was
working and ours finally started working, our radio started working and then they popped
the smoke and then they brought in 250 pound bombs that actually shattered—I
remember this one guy, I forgot his name right now, but I know what his face looks like
and everything, but he actually came to me and he said, ―Doc, I’m bleeding‖, and it was
on his ear because his eardrum was perforated because of the 250 pound bombs. But,
they taught us always to open our mouth when we knew that bombs were coming.
41
�Everybody said, ―Open your mouth‖, it’s some kind of thing, ―open your mouth because
they’re going to drop 250 pound bombs‖, so I did that myself and I didn’t have that, but
this other guy on the edge of the perimeter did have that and came down to see me.
48:01 I remember this guy named Swain, he was somewhat wounded and he was on the
edge of the perimeter, and this other guy, and I can’t remember his name, but he’s the
one, the other guy with the bleeding in the ear.
Interviewer: Now, were you treating them during the firefight or did you--?
As much as I could, I was treating men during the firefight, and then Captain, I mean
Sergeant Brown stood up and he got a bullet through his cheek. It went in one side and
out the other and took out some teeth, but it missed his jugular vein and he was very
fortunate. I gave him dextran and he wrote me a full letter on the 28th of July that he
thanked me for being like an angel that helped him, so he made it through that.
Interviewer: Now, did you get hit yourself in that action?
Yeah, when they threw in the satchel charges I got a piece of shrapnel that just grazed my
temple. 49:05 It hit me and it’s still there today, and it never—nothing ever happened,
but I do set off at the airports, these things. ―You got something on you don’t you, you
got something on you?‖ I said, ―No, it’s shrapnel‖.
Interviewer: So, the enemy eventually pulls back after the bombing strike. Did you
then go down and try to help the other platoons or what did you do then?
Yes, after that we were all hurting and we went back to rejoin the other two platoons, and
the first time we tried there was one NVA in between us. They got in between us and we
couldn’t get back two hours late before that, three hours before that. They wanted to
separate us. 50:03 So, what happened was, the one guy was between us and we had
42
�tried and then we tried a half hour later and he was gone, he pulled back. All the NVA
pulled back after the five hours. So, we were able to get back with them and I was
walking around putting patches on everybody. I still remember this one guy named Rick,
he had been shot through the lung, and I had this Vaseline thing that they taught us in San
Antonio, ―Put the Vaseline thing on, hold it and don’t let the air come through on both
sides‖, so that’s what I did and then I had to have another trooper—I said, ―Look, you
hold this because I have to go and take care of the other men‖, and he lived, that guy, and
I remember it.
Interviewer: How did they get you out of there?
Well, the next morning we were—if they would have attacked us that night it would have
been terrible because everybody—51:06 But I think the enemy, the NVA, were also
very, very wounded themselves and many killed. So, they backed off totally and they
gave us a night. We gave them a night and they gave us a night. I remember during the
night they were constantly shooting the flares over us to show light and one of the, one
guy that wasn’t wounded, ironically, when they shoot these flares, this little metal thing
comes down and it hit this guy on the skull and he said, ―I can’t believe this, I was
wounded by one of these things and I wasn’t wounded during the battle‖. So, he got hit
and got a little wound because of this thing that fell on top of him. 52:00
Interviewer: Do you have a sense of how many men were medevaced out while you
were still there?
Nobody was medevaced until the next morning. We all had to stay and one man was so
wounded that he was bleeding in his abdomen and all I could do was tell him, ―Look, we
just got to keep pressure on it, and in the morning we’ll get you out‖. Nobody could be
43
�moved out that night, nobody, the night of July 22nd to the 23rd. But, the next morning,
the 23rd, Delta Company walked in towards us and the Captain from the Delta Company,
and I forgot his name right now [Captain Rollison], he was very, very, a good friend of
the Captain Hawkins, and since then has passed away of liver problems and he was a
really good Captain, Delta Company Captain, and he came in with a sawed off shotgun, I
still remember that. 53:00 He came in with his men with a sawed off shotgun. About
two platoons came with him, or something like that, maybe one and a half platoons, but
these guys walked in from probably a mile away and they said they couldn’t find us, so
we had to take our M16’s and shoot. One guy took a M16 and shot. The Captain said,
―Shoot the M16 one time‖, and then they heard us, from the hearing of it they came to us
and they cut a LZ. They had—they were able to cut a LZ, they had those lumberjack
things and they cut the LZ and got it ready for---and there was twenty or twenty one
Hueys that came in and got us all out.
Interviewer: How many men in the company were still able to function and stay in
the field at that point?
Everybody was—fifty one were wounded and twelve killed and the next day another guy
died of wounds, I remember. 54:03 the guy that had the wound on the intestines, he
died, I remember. Actually the—some of the platoons that was wounded, some of them
weren’t wounded bad enough to be sent back, so they stayed in the base camp and got
fixed up for a month or so, or a month and a half and then some of them went out again.
Interviewer: What happened to you at the end of this?
At that end I was in the jungle six and a half months. The medics were told, ―You’re
going to be in the jungle six months and then we’re going to pull you back and you’ll be
44
�in the base camp‖. I said, ―I’ve been in there six and a half months‖, I told the guy at the
medical thing and he said, ―Martin, we don’t have any replacements, you might have to
go back‖, and I said, ―I can’t go back, I can’t go back anymore, this is too much for me to
handle‖, and they said, ―Okay Martin, we’ll see what we can do‖. 55:05 So, actually I
got transferred to Charlie Company, 2nd of 326 Charlie, which actually was on Camp
Evans and then I worked at the base camp in a little dispensary hospital where they
brought guys in that had cellulitis and stuff, and took care of them, and had minor
wounds. Some of those guys that were wounded went on that camp 326 hospital and
some of them went to Da Nang too.
Interviewer: So, did you stay there then for the rest of your tour?
I stayed there for the rest of my tour until December of 1970. So, I was out of the jungle
the end of July.
Interviewer: What was daily life like now that you’re back at Camp Evans with
sort of a regular job?
At Camp Evans my rotation was, I had—I was like an orderly at the hospital, at the camp
hospital at Camp Evans 326. 56:09 And Charlie 326 and that’s where the medevacs
came in at. Anything that was minor stayed at Camp Evans and anything more major
went to someplace else. We had at least thirty beds and during that time they were
almost always filled or at least half filled or three quarters filled, and that’s what my job
was every day.
Interviewer: Would you meet the medevacs where they landed or did you stay back
at the ward?
45
�No, we stayed back at the ward. There were other medics that would take care of that
portion and bring them over to the ward if they went to us, otherwise they took them on
to Da Nang, or even to Japan. Japan had a big hospital, or if they had to be shipped out,
to Japan or to Germany or the U.S. 57:03
Interviewer: All right, did you get to work a regular schedule now?
Yes, I started working a regular schedule just like an orderly, or like a nurse. We did
IV’s and all that, which the nurses would do in the states, we did. We filled the—we
took the cellulitis, we gave them Penicillin for it, and we had to clean those things out
every day and put in this special medication in those holes. I remember one guy came in,
he cellulitis, and honestly, his neck, the next day, was like a bulls neck. That’s how big it
got and we had to give him double Penicillin. We had to take that all out and clean that
out and put this special gauze in there and sometimes it got in there and we had to clean it
twice a day and it was a dirty job, but this was our job and we did it.
Interviewer: What did you do when you were off duty? 58:04
Before I go there I want to make a tribute to one soldier and his name is Eric DeVille,
Eric DeVille was from the other company. He was one of the other company men and
2nd of the 501st, or whatever. He came in and I found out that he was from my home
town in Indiana, and I didn’t even know him before that and I didn’t know he was in the
101st Airborne, and in actuality he was a grunt, he was a point man, God bless him, and
he went through a heck of a rough time. He came in for cellulitis and then later when we
got back in the states we got back together, had a meal, and talked and stuff. But he had
an addiction problem and unfortunately and he actually robbed the Highland Bank.
59:02 The Highland Bank and they brought—he said, ―Put in money‖, and he had a big
46
�sack with fifty thousand dollars, and when he went out the police were all around and
they said, ―Drop it, Eric DeVille, drop it, we know you had some problems, but you can’t
do this‖, and unfortunately he picked his pistol up like that and they shot him through the
heart and he died. God bless him, he had PTSD and he could have been helped had the
VA at that time known how to help people, but they’re a lot better at it now and they’re
doing a wonderful job now, but at that time—I, myself, had PTSD.
Interviewer: Now, in the base camp area were there problems with people using
drugs or other issues that you were aware of? 60:00
Okay, I’m going to tell you a story. When I was in the base camp, I was on the ward, and
one of the men that was in the platoon, or he was in another platoon, came to me and
said, ―Hey Doc, I got something for you‖, and I said, ―What?‖ I said, ―What are you
talking about?‖ He said, ―I got this special Marijuana, it’s laced with Opium, and you’ll
never have anything like it‖, and he said, ―Try it Doc, here‖, and I did try it and that’s the
first time I ever tried anything like that, and to be honest with you, that night I did not
sleep well. I woke up in a sweat. I was sweating from the top of my head to the bottom
of my feet and I had a dream that the devil came through the back of the hooch and was
wanting to knock me out, and that was the last day I ever took anything like that. 1:02 I
just threw it away and said--I ran to the ward and I said, ―Please watch me over this
night‖, so I slept on the ward that night. Then in the morning I had a headache and I
never did anything like that again, that was terrible.
Interviewer: Was there a lot of it kind of going on around?
Yeah, it was going on around base camp a little bit, but actually there was a lot of
drinking to because we had a little—we started like a little club and it was a dugout down
47
�under there. It was like hooch that was underneath the ground, so it was our special place
we would go to and we had people who would shift work, working down there at night.
2:03
Interviewer: When you’re out there in the field with a line company like that—now
when you’re out with a line company like that, you mentioned briefly in the first
interview, if you’re out there nobody’s going to light up or something like that.
Right, on the front line, because it’s detrimental to the security of the company and of the
platoons. Sergeants, you know, all of the guys backed off, you know, when we really
were in an area that was very, very volatile, they all backed off. There’s no doubt about
it, I never saw any of them do anything, and they would always say, ―You got to be
alert‖.
Interviewer: Now, when you’re living on the base camp, would you have
Vietnamese civilians there with you or what were they doing?
On the base camp there were Vietnamese civilians like you saw in that picture. 3:02
The would come and they would clean and they would do thing, and the only thing is,
that some of the time those were VC too, so you didn’t know, you really didn’t know for
sure.
Interviewer: Did you have a curfew system or something on the base?
Yeah, a curfew system, they left at a certain time. Six or seven o’clock was there time to
go and they went back to their village and came back the next day. They had their own
security, little badge or whatever, the next day.
Interviewer: Did men from the base go into the village too or did they stay?
48
�Men have told me they went into the villages, and I went to the village a couple times
with the battalion nurse and four or five other people to do what they call the
Vietnamization. They said, ―Okay look‖, they would have an interpreter say, ―We’re
here to help. Does anybody have some physical problems? We have Penicillin, we have
different stuff that can help you‖, so they would get village people coming all the time to
have us look at this, and look at that. 4:13 So, we would bandage it up and we would
give them a shot, or whatever they needed. We did that as Vietnamization, and I did that
between—when I came out of the Ripcord situation to when I left, for those three
months. It was for about three or three and a half months. I got a thirty day drop, so I
left thirty days short.
Interviewer: As far as you can tell, what kind of attitude did the Vietnamese people
have toward you or how did they act?
The Vietnamese people were—I would say that they were a little bit—it was to us, it’s
like you can’t trust them. 5:07 They could be NVA, they could be Viet Cong at night,
we don’t know, so to be honest with you, but I remember there were some girls,
Vietnamese girls that came in, and they sold things in the camp. Now, those girls—all
the guys were in line to get to their village, to get to their house, you know. I know I
struck out every time I tried. I wasn’t no Don Juan or I wasn’t John Wayne or nothing.
Interviewer: It was probably healthier that way.
Yeah, right, exactly so, but I remember my friend, which my friend Jake Jacobs, he’s a
Marine from Hammond. Jake Jacobs, he told me a story. He was going into a village
and he was actually having a relationship with this one girl, a Vietnamese girl. 6:05
And he told me that he was in bed with her, or something and then all of a sudden the
49
�NVA or the VC in the village came in and started knocking on the door and said, ―You
have someone there, or something?‖ So, he had to get in the closet and put stuff on him
and hope that this guy didn’t find him, or that he might have been shot, you know, and
the girl covered for him, fortunately, but he said he still remembers it and he was scared
to death that he was going to be shot, or something, and so he told me that story.
Interviewer: The time comes and you get to leave. What’s the physical process for
getting you back to the U.S.?
Well, they would tell us, ―Okay, you guys are going to ship out this certain day‖, so we
would go to the air, you know where the planes come in on Camp Evans, or the
helicopters take us. 7:14 Then we went from there to Da Nang, and in Da Nang they
had a big jet that took us, all one hundred or so, a hundred, a hundred and fifty or so, that
day.
Interviewer: Now was this a chartered commercial jet or was this a military one?
I think it was a military, yeah, it was military one.
Interviewer: There were no stewardesses?
There might have been a few, but we all were holding our breath until we got off, and
then everybody started saying, ―Yeah, you’re out‖, you know, and yeah, when we got up
in the air, everybody cheered, everybody cheered.
Interviewer: When you were at the airport waiting to get out, did you see anybody
coming in? Were there new guys coming in when you were leaving, or did you not
see them? 8:04
Yeah, well over there, there were new guys coming in, not in Da Nang, we didn’t see it,
but when we got into the United States we saw them. We were coming off, going out and
50
�they were coming in, and they were all saying, ―How was it, how was it?‖ Some of were
looking down like that. ―Don’t worry about it‖, or ―Watch your back‖.
Interviewer: Where did you land in the states?
Oakland, Oakland, California
Interviewer: Did you land on the airbase, or did you come right to the airport?
Right to the airport, right to the airport
Interviewer: Now, when you got there did you see any war protestors or things like
that there?
In 1970 there were not as many, but when I was going out then there were some there.
9:02
Interviewer: So there were actually more, and you saw more in 1969 than in 1970?
Late 1969 and early 1970
Interviewer: By the time you were coming back they weren’t sending as many over.
They weren’t sending as many over, they stopped.
Interviewer: At this point did you still have time left in the service, or were you just
about done?
At this time I had six and a half months left. When I got back I got my orders to go to
Fort Knox in two weeks after that. So, what I actually did was I went to Fort Knox after
that and for six and a half months I was at Fort Knox.
Interviewer: What did you do at Fort Knox?
At Fort Knox I worked in a ward. I was like an orderly, taking people's name down, and
then giving them shots for whatever they needed. Giving some Penicillin and things like
that. 10:01
51
�Interviewer: Did you have any sense of what the mood or morale was like at Fort
Knox while you were there?
At Fort Knox it was great, it was just like a regular job, to be honest with you. After we
were done with our shift we had free time, and at that time I got a car, so I drove there, to
fort Knox, and back, so it was pretty good. I actually got a car when I was on my leave,
because I had saved up money and they put it in the bank for me and everything.
Interviewer: Now, who were you—were you just dealing with, sort of, the hospital
personnel on your own little part of the base, or did you work with just a lot of
recruits in training they were going through during that time?
At Fort Knox they didn’t do recruiting or training. The only thing they did at Fort Knox
was train people for tank warfare, so there was an artillery unit there and there might
have been some other things. Now, recently I heard they are training in Fort Knox, even
for basic training, which I didn’t know. 11:04
Interviewer: Fort Knox was a big basic training camp all through the Vietnam era,
it was also a very big base with different parts to the base.
Yeah, I was on a different part of the base and I didn’t have any basic training people,
none. All these guys, most of them were the tank people and mechanized unit people.
Interviewer: Were there a lot of guys there who had already been to Vietnam?
There were a lot of guys that were Vietnam people, yeah. I remember the first time I saw
real conflict between black and white was on Fort Knox. At Fort Knox there were black
guys, black soldiers there and white soldiers and some of these guys were from the Deep
South and they did not get along. 12:00 It was like oil and water, and I remember this
one guy , this one black guy was smarting off to the one white guy from the south and the
52
�white guy from the south took, you know, one of these things, these scrub thing with
things this long and he just hit the guy. The other guy started hitting him back and they
both had bad wounds and they both were bleeding, and it was just terrible. We had to go
in and I think the campus police came, you know.
Interviewer: The MP’s come in.
Yeah, they took care of it, but I remember also, that was the first time I realized, ―I really
got to watch my wallet‖, because I had, at Fort Knox, I took a shower and in the middle
of my shower I said, ―Did I shut my shower door, shut my locker? Did I lock it?‖ 13:05
I said, ―No‖, so I ran back there in my skivvies, and sure enough my wallet was missing.
There was this one black guy, short, kind of thin, black guy, walking down the stairs and
I went up to him and I said, ―You took my wallet didn’t you?‖ I said, ―You took my
wallet, I know you did‖, and he said, ―I don’t know what you’re talking about. I don’t
know what you’re talking about‖, but I said, ―I really don’t care about the money. All I
care about is my driver’s license and my important other things in there‖, because I only
had two hundred dollars, or something, in there. So, a couple days later, in the shower,
somebody told me, I was in the barracks, and they said, ―Martin, when we cleaned the
bathroom, behind the show, I mean on the window sill, was your wallet‖, and it had my
driver’s license and my important stuff, but my money was gone. 14:14 I knew it was
that guy, I knew it was him, but I couldn’t prove it.
Interviewer: Did anybody, at any point, try to get you to re-up, to stay in?
At the end of my tour at Fort Knox, two E6 sergeants, one of them working there and
there was an E8 guy, he was in there like eighteen or sixteen years, he said to me,
―Martin, do you know what, it’s really not that bad staying in. I’ve been in here for‖, I
53
�don’t know, ten or fifteen years, I can’t remember exactly what he said, ―It’s not that bad
if you’re not on the front lines‖. 15:04 ―It’s just like a regular job, you get time off‖,
and I said, ―I know that it’s like that, but I do not want to go back to Vietnam. The only
way‖— see, I tried to re-up in Vietnam and that’s something I forgot to tell you about. I
tried to re-up when we were in O’Reilly. I went back to Camp Evans and I talked to
them and I said, ―I’m willing to re-up for some more years if I can get the next step up‖,
which was 91 Charlie. 91 Charlie is like a glorified registered nurse, right below a
registered nurse, and you would do almost everything that a registered nurse would do,
but you’re not a registered nurse. They said, ―Martin, there is this 91 Charlie, you can go
into it if you want to, but I’ll be honest with you, you’re going to have to go back to the
states and train and there’s no guarantee that you’re not going to come back here‖, and I
said, ―I’m not going to do it then‖. 16:11 They had all the papers set up and I remember
this sergeant the next day I came in he started cussing at me and he said, ―I did these
papers and are you saying no?‖ I said, ―No, I’m sorry you can’t guarantee me that I’m
not going to come back here‖, and I said, ―I can’t sign then‖, and he cussed me out and he
said, ―Get back to the blankity, blank field then‖, but I never really went back in the field,
I just stayed in the base camp with the 326 Charlie.
Interviewer: So, when do you finally get discharged?
I got discharged in August of 1971.
Interviewer: What did you do then once you were out?
Once I was out, my father was in insurance and he said I could work with him as long as
I wanted to, and I did a little bit. 17:11 I got a job at the steel mill being a laborer, I got
that job. It was good money, but it was real hot. They gave me the base job, and I
54
�remember going and cleaning underneath the gas furnace. It was so hot and I said, ―Man,
what am I doing this for? Do I really want to do this?‖ So, then I made a decision soon
after that, that I would go back into insurance with my father. So, I went and finished in
insurance, and stuff, and I started going to this church, a deliverance church, where they
prayed for you and cast out evil spirits on stuff off of you, and I went to that church for
ten years, and that’s where I met my wife too. 18:01 Actually that church helped me
out a lot. Even the VA said, ―Well, you’re not taking tranquilizers and stuff, you’re
doing okay there, I guess, just keep going‖. Then I redid my vow. I made my
commitment and me and my wife went to Bible College. I wasn’t married when I went
to Bible College, but we married within a year of me going to Bible College.
Interviewer: Since then you became a Chaplain?
Yes
Interviewer: How did that happen?
Well, I got my license; I got my license for ministry, being ordination from the bible
college I went to. I went three years and I did the GI Bill, the GI Bill paid for that. So,
after that—the first year I asked my wife to marry me and she okayed it and I said,
―Unless I have the pastor okay it, your parents say okay, and my parents say okay, then it
will happen, otherwise it’s not going to happen‖. 19:06 So, all of them said, ―Okay,
Martin, you should get married‖, so I did. Then the rest is history. Me and my wife
finished school down there and then my first two children were born in Pensacola,
Florida. So then, after college, I decided that I was going to start a church, or something
in Gary, Indiana, which was one of the roughest parts of Indiana, Gary. So, I did, I
started it and it was just a flop. It was a terrible flop. I was sent people that threw me
55
�pennies from—while I was preaching and things like that happened. One guy actually
committed a rape, you know, and it was just a big mess. 20:00 It was like, ―Lord, do
you really want me doing this? Do you really want me doing this?‖ It was a depression
and it seemed like the economy was down. I lived in a small section of Gary that did not
have an insurance agency, in Black Oak, Gary, which is like ten thousand people, but
no—it was like a small town, but no insurance agency. Nobody wanted to be there
because it was too rough. So, I opened up an insurance agency. I felt like the lord said,
―Okay, go ahead and open up an insurance agency, you have your license‖. After the
first year it was really a rough year to a year and a half, but after that it went off like a
rocket. So, I’ve been doing insurance to provide for my family. I continued the ministry
with doing things and being Chaplin for, and now I’m the Chaplin for the Vietnam
Veterans of America, VVA, all of the veterans, so that’s what I do. 21:06
Interviewer: All right, and thanks for a good story and taking the time to tell it to
me.
Sure
56
�
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Title
A name given to the resource
Veterans History Project
Creator
An entity primarily responsible for making the resource
Grand Valley State University. History Department
Description
An account of the resource
The Library of Congress established the Veterans History Project in 2001 to collect memories, accounts, and documents of U.S. war veterans from World War II and the Korean War, Vietnam War, and conflicts in the Middle East and elsewhere, and to preserve these stories for future generations. The GVSU History Department interviews are part of this work-in-progress, and may contain videos and audio recordings, transcripts and interview outlines, and related documents and photographs.
Coverage
The spatial or temporal topic of the resource, the spatial applicability of the resource, or the jurisdiction under which the resource is relevant
1914-
Rights
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<a href="http://rightsstatements.org/page/InC/1.0/?language=en">In Copyright</a>
Subject
The topic of the resource
Afghan War, 2001--Personal narratives, American
Iran Hostage Crisis, 1979-1981--Personal narratives, American
Korean War, 1950-1953--Personal narratives, American
Michigan--History, Military
Oral history
Persian Gulf War, 1991--Personal narratives, American
United States--History, Military
United States. Air Force
United States. Army
United States. Navy
Veterans
Video recordings
Vietnam War, 1961-1975--Personal narratives, American
World War, 1939-1945--Personal narratives, American
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
Grand Valley State University. University Libraries. Special Collections & University Archives
Contributor
An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource
Smither, James
Boring, Frank
Relation
A related resource
Veterans History Project (U.S.)
Identifier
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RHC-27
Language
A language of the resource
eng
Source
A related resource from which the described resource is derived
<a href="https://gvsu.lyrasistechnology.org/repositories/2/resources/455">Veterans History Project interviews (RHC-27)</a>
Oral History
A resource containing historical information obtained in interviews with persons having firsthand knowledge.
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Title
A name given to the resource
Glennon, Martin (Interview transcript and video), 2011
Creator
An entity primarily responsible for making the resource
Glennon, Martin
Description
An account of the resource
Martin Glennon, born in Hammond, Indiana in 1946, served in the U.S. army as a medic from 1969 to 1971. He went to Vietnam in January, 1970. For the six months of his service in Vietnam, he was a field medic with A Company, 2/506 Infantry, in the 101st Airborne Division. While in this unit, he served in the Ripcord Campaign and survived the most costly firefight of the campaign. He was then stationed at Camp Evans working at a field hospital for the remainder of his time in country. When returning to the U.S. he spent another six months at Fort Knox working as an orderly. He was discharged in 1971 and is now a Chaplain for the Vietnam Veterans of America.
Contributor
An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource
McGregor, Michael (Interviewer)
Subject
The topic of the resource
Oral history
Veterans History Project (U.S.)
United States--History, Military
Michigan--History, Military
Veterans
Video recordings
United States. Army
Vietnam War, 1961-1975--Personal narratives, American
Language
A language of the resource
eng
Rights
Information about rights held in and over the resource
<a href="http://rightsstatements.org/page/InC/1.0/?language=en">In Copyright</a>
Type
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Moving Image
Text
Relation
A related resource
Veterans History Project (U.S.)
Date
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2011-10-08
Identifier
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GlennonM1270V
Source
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<a href="https://gvsu.lyrasistechnology.org/repositories/2/resources/455">Veterans History Project Collection, (RHC-27)</a>
Format
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application/pdf
video/mp4
Publisher
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Grand Valley State University. University Libraries. Lemmen Library and Archives
-
https://digitalcollections.library.gvsu.edu/files/original/445543a2f323aa861202abbe64d85553.mp4
de96cb6861b30f561b6cd219055a3737
https://digitalcollections.library.gvsu.edu/files/original/81a629312f3d7cdc09c6c0b42d15d15d.pdf
10ac9cd759e51823a3a45e0e140fb3c9
PDF Text
Text
Grand Valley State University
Veterans History Project Interview
Name of War: World War II
Interviewee name: Gerald Gless
Length of Interview: 19mins. 51secs.
Pre‐Enlistment (00:12)
•
Childhood (00:20)
o
•
Gless was born on February 6th, 1927 in Elkton, MI. He mentioned that he was drafted
and served with the U.S. Army as a corporal. (00:25)
Education (02:15)
o
Backs up and mentions that he graduated from Caledonia High School. (02:15)
Enlistment/Basic Training (00:38)
•
Where he went and what company he served with (00:47)
o
Served his first 16 weeks in basic training upon getting inducted into the service once he
completed high school. (01:01)
o
Briefly describes his daily routine and what he learned in basic. (01:16)
In about the 5th week of basic training he was injured due to an exploding booby
trap and was hospitalized for 3 days. All the while they were preparing for the
invasion of Japan (01:47) Was sent back to a heavy weapons company who he
trained with for the rest of basic training. (02:01)
Active Duty (02:29)
•
Italy (02:30)
o
Upon completing basic training, he was deployed to Naples, Italy. Mentions that their
Atlantic Ocean crossing took them 12 days. (02:32)
o
By this time it was November, 1945 and upon staying a short time in Naples, he was
redeployed to Florence where he was responsible for the handling of German POWs at
Camp 334. (03:00)
o
After his time here, he was stationed at Camp 339 near Pisa, Italy where he spent some
time about a year there. (03:15) Was stationed here until October, 1946. (03:46)
�o
Briefly discusses some of his traveling throughout Europe and other deployments in Italy
and in Rome. (03:42)
o
Job/Duties (04:13)
o
Gless mentions that he worked in records outside of the German POW camp.
His job was to help with the processing, organization, and handling of soldiers’
documents and other miscellaneous documents such as casualty lists and where
soldiers were buried. (05:06)
Other activities (05:35)
Maintained a regular correspondence by letter with family. (05:40)
Entertainment for soldiers usually involved going by private truck to the night
clubs on the weekends. (06:20)
Briefly mentions an instance where with the coming of replacements from the
88th Division come down from Trieste, N. Italy and come to his camp one night
that there was a German prison break. (07:16) Apparently, the German POWs
had dug a tunnel near the latrine and under the fence to escape. (08:05)
Afterwards, some Allied soldiers from the camp went and hunted them down.
(08:27)
Briefly discusses his impressions of concentration camp staff officers. (08:50)
The day his service ended in December, 1946 he left Europe by boat and arrived
in New Jersey where he boarded a train which took him to Fort Sheridan, IL the
day before Christmas. (09:22)
Upon arriving he boarded another train from Chicago and traveled to Grand
Rapids, MI where he called his folks to come and pick him up. (10:12)
Tells a brief story of what happened to him upon arriving in Grand Rapids.
(10:21)
After the Service (10:40)
•
Adjusting to Home (11:01)
o
After being discharged, he spent 3 years cutting logs. (11:08)
o
Briefly tells some other stories of friends that he kept in contact with after his time in
the service was over. (11:25)
o
Briefly discusses his involvement with various veteran organizations and other career
pursuits in some detail. (12:26)
�•
Reflection (13:11)
o
Gless describes what he learned from his time in the military and the life lessons he took
out of that has impacted his life since then. (13:40)
o
Wraps by discussing that the 11 week battle of Okinawa cost American soldiers 38,000
wounded and 12,000 killed while the Japanese causalities came to 107,000 killed during
the taking of the island. (15:11)
�
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Title
A name given to the resource
Veterans History Project
Creator
An entity primarily responsible for making the resource
Grand Valley State University. History Department
Description
An account of the resource
The Library of Congress established the Veterans History Project in 2001 to collect memories, accounts, and documents of U.S. war veterans from World War II and the Korean War, Vietnam War, and conflicts in the Middle East and elsewhere, and to preserve these stories for future generations. The GVSU History Department interviews are part of this work-in-progress, and may contain videos and audio recordings, transcripts and interview outlines, and related documents and photographs.
Coverage
The spatial or temporal topic of the resource, the spatial applicability of the resource, or the jurisdiction under which the resource is relevant
1914-
Rights
Information about rights held in and over the resource
<a href="http://rightsstatements.org/page/InC/1.0/?language=en">In Copyright</a>
Subject
The topic of the resource
Afghan War, 2001--Personal narratives, American
Iran Hostage Crisis, 1979-1981--Personal narratives, American
Korean War, 1950-1953--Personal narratives, American
Michigan--History, Military
Oral history
Persian Gulf War, 1991--Personal narratives, American
United States--History, Military
United States. Air Force
United States. Army
United States. Navy
Veterans
Video recordings
Vietnam War, 1961-1975--Personal narratives, American
World War, 1939-1945--Personal narratives, American
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
Grand Valley State University. University Libraries. Special Collections & University Archives
Contributor
An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource
Smither, James
Boring, Frank
Relation
A related resource
Veterans History Project (U.S.)
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
RHC-27
Language
A language of the resource
eng
Source
A related resource from which the described resource is derived
<a href="https://gvsu.lyrasistechnology.org/repositories/2/resources/455">Veterans History Project interviews (RHC-27)</a>
Oral History
A resource containing historical information obtained in interviews with persons having firsthand knowledge.
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Title
A name given to the resource
Gless, Gerald (Interview outline and video), 2005
Creator
An entity primarily responsible for making the resource
Gless, Gerald
Description
An account of the resource
Gerald Gless is a World War II veteran who served in the U.S. Army from approximately 1945 to December 1946. In this account, Gless discusses his pre-enlistment, enlistment, training, and active duty. He mentions his brief postings at various POW camps in Northern Italy and describes a prison break by German POWs.
Contributor
An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource
Patterson, Mike (Interviewer)
Caledonia High School (Caledonia Mich.)
Subject
The topic of the resource
Oral history
Veterans History Project (U.S.)
United States--History, Military
Michigan--History, Military
Veterans
Video recordings
United States. Army
World War, 1939-1945--Personal narratives, American
Language
A language of the resource
eng
Rights
Information about rights held in and over the resource
<a href="http://rightsstatements.org/page/InC/1.0/?language=en">In Copyright</a>
Type
The nature or genre of the resource
Moving Image
Text
Relation
A related resource
Veterans History Project (U.S.)
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
2005-05-17
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
GlessG
Source
A related resource from which the described resource is derived
<a href="https://gvsu.lyrasistechnology.org/repositories/2/resources/455">Veterans History Project Collection, (RHC-27)</a>
Format
The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource
application/pdf
video/mp4
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
Grand Valley State University. University Libraries. Lemmen Library and Archives
-
https://digitalcollections.library.gvsu.edu/files/original/52798d3df65105ac626f6e4bc3fd5121.mp4
690e1d9345af6a3bbf7ca245425e4901
https://digitalcollections.library.gvsu.edu/files/original/b4d2ffa3a54ee0908b16fd575ea77ab2.pdf
f7d655f3f3d8b741fc4d17f28983c64f
PDF Text
Text
Grand Valley State University
Veterans History Project Interview
Korean War Era
Harold Gless
28:07
Introduction (00:24)
Harold was born on February 6, 1927 on a farm near Alto, Michigan.
He was drafted into the United States Army; the highest rank he achieved was corporal.
He graduated from high school in Caledonia, Michigan and went to work for the State
Bank of Caledonia in 1946.
Harold remained there until June 1951 when he was drafted.
Growing up, he had three brothers, all three of which served in the Army. His oldest
brother fought in the Battle of the Bulge during World War II.
He also had a younger sister who was killed in a car accident in December 1951. (03:45)
All his brothers were drafted. They were required to sign up for the draft and when men
were needed, they were sent a letter telling them they were being called up.
Harold was 24 years old when he went in the service.
Military Service (05:02)
At basic training, he learned to not talk and to listen. He also learned to never volunteer
for anything. They spent time on the rifle range and also hiking for four or five miles at a
time.
His basic training was at Fort Leonard Wood, Missouri.
The food was great while in, and he maintained a positive attitude through his service in
the Army.
When asked who wanted to be a truck driver, the people who volunteered had to push a
wheel barrow around all day. (07:25)
After basic training, Harold attended eight weeks of clerk typist school where he learned
about typing and how to be a clerk.
He was chosen to stay on base, while other men were sent to Korea.
Monthly pay was $37, which was good money back then because the food was furnished
and so was mostly everything else.
During basic training, they lived in a barracks with about two hundred other soldiers.
They were two stories with two rows of bunks. Around 5:30am someone would play a
bugle and wake everybody up.
He learned how to do everything the Army’s way, like making your bed and keeping
your footlocker organized. (10:02)
When caught doing something that they weren’t supposed to be doing, the punishment
was often push-ups.
Another punishment would be unloading the food trucks and KP duty.
Each group or company had a captain in charge and several sergeants that would run the
unit.
�
Basic training was 8 weeks long, and his advanced training was an additional 8 weeks.
(13:28)
After Harold completed both phases of his training, he became a company clerk. He
moved into a company and became permanent party, which consists of an officer, some
sergeants and the company clerk.
As the clerk, he did a lot of typing, record keeping, and creating the morning report. The
morning report kept track of each man in the company; this was done by name and serial
number. (15:18)
After basic training, Harold spent his entire two years at Fort Leonard Wood doing the
same job.
On occasion, he had to go pick up some prisoners and bring them back to base. He
would travel by train, once to Chicago, to pick up soldiers that had gone AWOL (Away
Without Leave). (17:52)
After thirty days of being AWOL, men were considered a deserter, which was a very
serious crime.
Harold worked for the 506th MP Company. After being there for six months, they
changed the name to the 506th Replacement Company. They would have troops
constantly coming and going.
After a while, they stopped getting new troops and only had a cadre of a lieutenant, first
sergeant, other sergeants, corporals and Harold as the clerk. (19:59)
As soldiers would come back from Germany, they would be sent to Fort Leonard Wood
awaiting new orders.
The morning report had to be completed and submitted by 10 am each day.
Everybody had to do training, even the cooks. (21:22)
Harold has an Army buddy that lives in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, and over the 58 years
since he was in the service with him he’s only seen him once but gets a Christmas card
and a birthday card from him every year.
Civilian Life (23:51)
Harold was discharged from the Army in June 1953, and he had a job that he went back
to at the State Bank of Caledonia. He stayed there for fifty years.
His military service made him enjoy life, and it was a great experience. He also learned
teamwork and that helped build lasting friendships.
In a very short time, each man had to become more mature than they were before. (26:10)
�
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Title
A name given to the resource
Veterans History Project
Creator
An entity primarily responsible for making the resource
Grand Valley State University. History Department
Description
An account of the resource
The Library of Congress established the Veterans History Project in 2001 to collect memories, accounts, and documents of U.S. war veterans from World War II and the Korean War, Vietnam War, and conflicts in the Middle East and elsewhere, and to preserve these stories for future generations. The GVSU History Department interviews are part of this work-in-progress, and may contain videos and audio recordings, transcripts and interview outlines, and related documents and photographs.
Coverage
The spatial or temporal topic of the resource, the spatial applicability of the resource, or the jurisdiction under which the resource is relevant
1914-
Rights
Information about rights held in and over the resource
<a href="http://rightsstatements.org/page/InC/1.0/?language=en">In Copyright</a>
Subject
The topic of the resource
Afghan War, 2001--Personal narratives, American
Iran Hostage Crisis, 1979-1981--Personal narratives, American
Korean War, 1950-1953--Personal narratives, American
Michigan--History, Military
Oral history
Persian Gulf War, 1991--Personal narratives, American
United States--History, Military
United States. Air Force
United States. Army
United States. Navy
Veterans
Video recordings
Vietnam War, 1961-1975--Personal narratives, American
World War, 1939-1945--Personal narratives, American
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
Grand Valley State University. University Libraries. Special Collections & University Archives
Contributor
An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource
Smither, James
Boring, Frank
Relation
A related resource
Veterans History Project (U.S.)
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
RHC-27
Language
A language of the resource
eng
Source
A related resource from which the described resource is derived
<a href="https://gvsu.lyrasistechnology.org/repositories/2/resources/455">Veterans History Project interviews (RHC-27)</a>
Oral History
A resource containing historical information obtained in interviews with persons having firsthand knowledge.
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Title
A name given to the resource
Gless, Harold (Interview outline and video), 2013
Creator
An entity primarily responsible for making the resource
Gless, Harold
Description
An account of the resource
Harold was born on February 6, 1927 near Alto, Michigan. He graduated from Caledonia High School and began working at the State Bank of Caledonia in 1946. Harold was drafted into the United States Army in June 1951 and served for two years at Fort Leonard Wood, Missouri as the company clerk for the 506th Replacement Company. He was discharged in June 1953.
Contributor
An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource
Patterson, Taylor Lee (Interviewer)
Caledonia High School (Caledonia, Mich.)
Subject
The topic of the resource
Oral history
Veterans History Project (U.S.)
United States--History, Military
Michigan--History, Military
Veterans
Video recordings
Korean War, 1950-1953--Personal narratives, American
United States. Army
Language
A language of the resource
eng
Rights
Information about rights held in and over the resource
<a href="http://rightsstatements.org/page/InC/1.0/?language=en">In Copyright</a>
Type
The nature or genre of the resource
Moving Image
Text
Relation
A related resource
Veterans History Project (U.S.)
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
2013-05-21
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
GlessH1504V
Source
A related resource from which the described resource is derived
<a href="https://gvsu.lyrasistechnology.org/repositories/2/resources/455">Veterans History Project Collection, (RHC-27)</a>
Format
The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource
application/pdf
video/mp4
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
Grand Valley State University. University Libraries. Lemmen Library and Archives
-
https://digitalcollections.library.gvsu.edu/files/original/1997ccd779088848d5ee3e7c1a512e9c.pdf
89da600912df516561d5c629a0602251
PDF Text
Text
MANISTEE TOWNSHIP
MANISTEE COUNTY, MICHIGAN
PERMANENT ZONING ORDINANCE
Drafted by:
GOCKER.""tAN, WILSON, BROBERG &
SAYLOR, P.C.
By: RICHARD M. WILSON, JR.
Attorneys at Law
414 Water Street
Manistee, MI 49660
(616) 723-8333
�•
FRpM THE LIBRARY OF .
Planning & Zoning Center~ Inc:·
MANISTEE TOWNSHIP ZONING MAP
1986
Q
D
Wetlands
Big Manistee River Corridor
Multiple Use
High Density
Residential Rl
Resort
Residential R2
Cou,1t;:-y
Residential R3
Multi-Family
ReLiidcr,Lial R4
CommerciaJ.Restricted
:t
/LU, eJt Va. -
14
" tion ·
Ut,e.
•
•
..
High Veruilty
Re.6 id e.ntiai.
1
u
�INDEX
ARTICLE I - Preamble
SECTION 1.1 - Title
SECTION 1.2 - General Purpose
SECTION 1.3 - Authority
ARTICLE II SECTION
SECTION
SECTION
SECTION
SECTION
SECTION
SECTION
SECTION
SECTION
SECTION
SECTION
SECTION
SECTION
SECTION
SECTION
SECTION
SECTION
SECTION
SECTION
SECTION
SECTION
SECTION
SECTION
SECTION
SECTION
SECTION
SECTION
SECTION
SECTION
SECTION
SECTION
SECTION
SECTION
SECTION
SECTION
SECTION
SECTION
SECTION
SECTION
SECTION
SECTION
SECTION
SECTION
SECTION
SECTION
Definitions
2.1 - Introduction
2.2 - Accessory Buildings or Structure
2.3 - Accessory Use
2.4 - Agriculture
2.5 - Airport
2.6 - Airport Hazard Area
2.7 - Airport Hazard
2.8 - Alter
2.9 - Basement or Cellar
2.10- Bluffline
2.11- Boathouse
2.12- Buildings
2.13- Bulk Storage Facility
2.14- Cabin
2.15- Cabin Court or Cabin Park
2.16- Campground
2.17- Central Production Facility
2.18- Day Care Centers
2.19- Driveway
2.20- Dwelling
2.21- Erect
2.22- Erosion Control Device
2.23- Existing Building
2.24- Family
2.25- Farms
2.26- Farm Buildings
2.27- Floor Area
2.28- Forestry
2.29- Garage
2.30- High Risk Erosion Area
2.31- Highway
2.32- Home Occupation
2.33- Industrial Building
2.34- Institutional Building
2.35- Land Use Permit
2.36- Lodge
2.37- Lot Lines
2.38- Mineral
2.39- Mining
2.40- Mining Permit
2.41- Mobile Home
2.42- Mobile Home Park
2.43- Motel
2.44- Moveable Structure
2.45- Neighborhood
1
l
2
2
2.
3
3
3
3
3
3
3
4
4
4
4
4
4
5
5
5
5
5
6
6
6
6
6
7
7
7
7
7
7
8
8
8
8
8
8
8
8
9
9
9
9
9
9
�SECTION
SECTION
SECTION
SECTION
SECTION
SECTION
SECTION
SECTION
SECTION
SECTION
SECTION
SECTION
SECTION
SECTION
SECTION
SECTION
SECTION
SECTION
SECTION
SECTION
SECTION
SECTION
SECTION
SECTION
SECTION
SECTION
SECTION
SECTION
SECTION
SECTION
SECTION
SECTION
SECTION
SECTION
SECTION
2.462.472.482.492.502.512.522.532.542.552.562.572.582.592.602.612.622.632.642.652.662.672.682.692.702.712.722.732.742.752.762.772.782.792.80-
Non-conforming Lot
Non-conforming Uses
Ordinary High Water Mark
Operator
Parcel
Park
Principal Structure
Private and Industrial Pipe Lines
Public Meeting Place
Public Utilities
Recession Rates
Reclamation Plan
Retail, Commercial & Wholesale Stores
River
Roadside Stand
Service Institutions
Setback Lines
Setback Requirement
Shoreland
Shoreline
Site Plan
State Licens~d Residential Facility
Street
Sign
Structure
Sweetening Plant
Tourist Home
Trailer
Trailer Court or Park
Tree
Use
Waste
Water's Edge
Wetland
Yard
10
10
10
10
10
10
11
11
11
11
11
11
11
11
12
12
12
12
12
12
12
13
13
13
13
13
13
13
13
13
14
14
14
14
ARTICLE III - Land
SECTION 3.1 SECTION 3.2
SECTION 3.3 SECTION 3.4 SECTION 3.5 SECTION 3.6 SECTION 3.7 SECTION 3.8 -
Use Districts
Land Use Districts
Identification of Official Zoning Map
Authority of Official Zoning Map
Changes to Official Zoning Map
Replacement of Official Zoning Map
Rules of Interpretation
Purposes
SIC References
15
15
15
15
16
16
17
17
ARTICLE IV - Residential Districts, Rl-R4
SECTION 4.10 - High Density Residential, Discrict R-1
Use Regulations
SECTION 4.11 - Minimums
SECTION 4.20 - Resort Residential, District R-2
Use Regulations
SECTION 4.21 - Minimums
SECTION 4.30 - Country Residential, District R-3
Use Regulations
9
17
18
18
18
18
�SECTION 4.31 - Minimums
SECTION 4.40 - Multi-Family Residential District R-4
Use Regulations
SECTION 4.41 - Minimums
19
19
19
ARTICLE V - AG-Forest Preservation District, AP-1
SECTION 5.1 - Use Regulations
SECTION 5.2 - Minimums
SECTION 5.3 - Additional Special Use Criteria
SECTION 5.4 - Seasonal Help Housing
19
20
20
20
ARTICLE VI - Multiple-Use District, M-1
SECTION 6.1 - Use Regulations
SECTION 6.2 - Minimums
21
21
ARTICLE VII - Restricted Commercial District, CR-1
SECTION 7.1 - Use Regulations
SECTION 7.2 - Minimums
22
23
ARTICLE VIII
SECTION
SECTION
SECTION
- Connnercial District, C-1
8.1 - Use Regulations
8.2 - Minimums
8.3 - Manistee Lake Regulations
23
24
24
ARTICLE IX SECTION
SECTION
SECTION
Wetlands District, W-1
9.1 - Use Regulations
9.2 - Minimums
9.3 - Additional Special Use Criteria
26
26
26
ARTICLE X - Industrial District, I-1
SECTION 10.1 - Use Regulations
SECTION 10.2 - Minimums
SECTION 10.3 - Maximum Floor Area
ARTICLE XI SECTION
SECTION
SECTION
SECTION
SECTION
Big Manistee River Corridor District, BM-1
11.1 - Use Regulations
11.2 - Minimums
11.3 - Add~tional Requirements
11.4 - Natural Vegetation Strip
11.5 - Removal of Logs and Debris
from the River
SECTION 11.6 - Earth Changing Activities
SECTION 11.7 - Dredge and Fill Activities
SECTION 11.8 - Use of Pesticides, Herbicides
and Fertilizers
ARTICLE XII - Airport Overlay Zone District, OZ-1
SECTION 12.1 - Area Affected
SECTION 12.2
Height Limitations
SECTION 12.3
Unlawful Land Uses
Conflicting Federal or
SECTION 12.4
State Regulations
27
28
28
28
29
29
30
30
30
31
31
31
31
31
32
�ARTICLE XIII
SECTION
SECTION
SECTION
SECTION
SECTION
SECTION
- High
13.l 13.2 13.3 13.4 13.5 13.6 -
Risk Erosion Overlay Zone District, OZ-2
Purpose
Area Affected
Boundaries of High Risk Erosion Areas
Schedule of Regulations
Accessory Structures
Disclaimer of Liability
ARTICLE XIV - General Provisions
SECTION 14.l - Compliance with County Sanitary Code
SECTION 14.2 - Essential Public Services
SECTION 14.3 - Advertising Signs
SECTION 14.4 - Height
SECTION 14.5 - Temporary Dwellings
SECTION 14.6 - Mobile Homes
SECTION 14.7 - Vehicular Parking Space,
Access and Lighting
SECTION 14.8 - Waste Accumulation and
Outside Storage
SECTION 14.9 - Access to Public Roads
SECTION 14.10 - Private Roads
SECTION 14.11 - Traffic Visibility at Corners
SECTION 14.12 - Bulk Regulations
SECTION 14.13 - Location of Accessory Buildings
and Structures
SECTION 14.14 - Other General Provisions
SECTION 14.15 - Additional Residential District
Regulations
ARTICLE XV SECTION
SECTION
SECTION
SECTION
SECTION
SECTION
Non-Conforming Uses, Buildings and Structures
15.l - Continuance
15.2 - Involuntary Destruction
15.3 - Discontinuance
15.4 - Extension
15.5 - Substitution
15.6 - Condemnation
ARTICLE XVI - Permits
SECTION 16.l - Land Use Permits
SECTION 16.2 - Special Use Permits
SECTION 16.3 - High Risk Erosion Areas
ARTICLE XVII
SECTION
~
SECTION
SECTION
SECTION
SECTION
- Administration
17. l - Manistee Township Zoning Administrator
17.2 - Zoning Board of Appeals
17.3 - Duties of the Zoning Board of Appeals
17.4 - Variances
17.5 - Interpretation of Ordinance Text
ARTICLE XVIII - Amendments, Validity, and Penalties
SECTION 18.l - Amendments
Validity
SECTION 18.2
Penalties
SECTION 18.3
SECTION 18.4
Conflicting Provisions and Transition Rules
SECTION 18.5
Captions
Effective Date
SECTION 18.6
32
32
33
33
34
34
34
34
35
37
38
38
40
41
41
41
42
42
43
43
44
44
45
45
45
46
46
46
48
62
63
64
65
66
68
69
69
69
70
70
70
�MANISTEE TOWNSHIP
MANISTEE COUNTY, MICHIGAN
PERMANENT ZONING ORDINANCE
ORDINANCE NUMBER
ARTICLE I
Preamble
SECTION 1.1 - Title
This Ordinance shall be known as the "Manistee Township Permanent
Zoning Ordinance".
SECTION 1.2 - General Purpose
The purposes of this Ordinance are:
A.
To promote the public health, safety and general welfare.
B.
To encourage the use of lands in accordance with their character and capabilities and to limit the improper use of the land.
c.
To conserve natural resources and energy.
D.
To meet the needs of the state's residents for food, fiber,
and other natural resources, places of residence, recreation, industry, trade, service and other uses of land.
E.
To ensure that uses of land shall be situated in appropriate
locations and relationships.
F.
To avoid overcrowding of population.
G.
To provide adequate light and air.
H.
To lessen congestion on the public roads and streets.
I.
To reduce hazards to life and property.
J.
To facilitate adequate provisions for a system of transportation, sewage disposal, safe and adequate water supply, education,
recreation and other public requirements.
K.
To conserve the expenditure of funds for public improvements
and services to conform with the most advantageous uses of land,
resources and property.
L.
To reasonably consider the character of each Land Use
District, its peculiar suitability for particular uses, the conservation of property values and natural resources, and the general and
appropriate trend and character of land, building and population
development.
-1-
�M.
To prevent economic and ecological damages due to unwise
development within environmentally sensitive areas and to prevent the
degradation of the shorelands.
N.
To prevent unwise patterns of development.
O.
To assure proper reclamation of mining sites and facilities
relating to the production, processing and storage of oil and gas.
P.
To create Land Use Districts which conform to the po licies
established in the Land Use & Development Component of the Manistee
Township Master Plan.
SECTION 1.3 -
Authority
This Ordinance is adopted pursuant to the authority granted by
the Township Rural Zoning Act, Act 184 of the Public Acts of 1943, as
amended.
ARTICLE II
Definitions
SECTION 2.1 - Introduction
For the purpose of this Ordinance certain terms and words are
herein defined.
Words used in the present tense include the future,
words in the singular number include the plural number and words in
the plural include the singular number.
The word "shall" is always
mandatory and not merely directory.
The word "person" shall mean an
individual, partnership, corporation, or other association or their
agents.
Terms not herein defined shall have the meaning customarily
assigned to them.
SECTION 2.2 - Accessory Buildings or Structure
A. General:
A supplementary building or structure on the same lot
or parcel of land as ~he main building or buildings or part of the
main building, the use of which is incidental or secondary to that of
the main building or structure, but such use shall not include any
building used for dwelling, residential or lodging purposes, or
sleeping quarters for human beings.
Accessory buildings and structures include, but are not limited to private garages• boathouses,
storage
sheds,
playground
equipment,
sports
courts,
children's
playhouses, doghouses or similar pet accommodations, fallout shelters,
swimming pools, gazebos, barbeque pits and stoves, satellite receiving
dishes, television and radio antennas and towers, parking lots,
loading docks, signs and fences.
B. High Risk Erosion Areas: A structure which is clearly subordinate
or incidental to a principal structure or principal land use. Accessory structures include, but are not limited to tents, sheds, storage
structures or recreational vehicles and travel trailers which are
clearly not permanent and are easily removed.
Under no circumstances
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�•
•
•
•
shall a septic system and tile field be considered an accessory
structure. Private garages, boathouses with permanent foundations and
any other similar permanent or substantial structures shall be located
landward of the minimum setback from the bluffline.
SECTION 2.3 - Accessory Use
A use naturally or normally incidental or subordinate to,
devoted exclusively to a permitted use of the land or buildings .
and
SECTION 2.4 - Agriculture
A use of land or structures which entails the art and science of
cultivating the ground for the production of food and forage crops,
including forestry, and livestock.
SECTION 2.5 - Airport
Manistee County Blacker Airport and all appurtenances used or
acquired for airport buildings or other airport facilities, and all
other appurtenant rights-of-way or other interests either heretofore
or hereafter established.
SECTION 2.6 - Airport Hazard Area
An area consisting of all the lands within Manistee Township
lying beneath the approach, transitional, 149 feet horizontal, conical
and 500 feet horizontal surfaces, and being located within a circle
having a radius extending horizontally six point thirty-two (6. 32)
miles from the established center of the usable landing area of the
airport.
SECTION 2. 7
Airport Hazard
Any building, structure or tree within the · Airport ·overlay Zone,
District OZ-2, which exceeds the height limitations established by
this Ordinance, or any use of land or of appurtenances thereto within
the Airport Overlay Zone District OZ-2 which interferes with the safe
use of the airport by aircraft.
SECTION 2.8 - Alter
To change, add or modify the location, use or structure or the
structural members of a building such as bearing walls, columns,
beams, posts, girders, and similar components, or in the size or location of the roof or exterior walls.
SECTION 2.9 - Basement or Cellar
A basement or cellar is that portion of a building partly below
the average grade of the parcel.
A basement is so located that the
vertical distance from the average grade to the floor is not greater
than the vertical distance from the average grade to the ceiling.
A
cellar is so located that the vertical distance from the average grade
-3-
�to the floor is greater than the vertical distance from the average
grade to the ceiling.
SECTION 2.10 -
Bluffline
The line which is the edge or crest of the elevated segment of
the shoreline above the beach which normally has a precipitous front
inclining steeply on the lakeward side. Where there is no precipitous
front indicating the bluff line, the line of perennial vegetation or
the location of the bluffline on adjacent properties may be considered
as indications of the location of the bluffline.
SECTION 2.11 - Boathouse.
Any structure or building designed or used for the temporary or
permanent storage of a boat for private use and located on the water's
edge of Bar Lake or Lake Michigan. A boathouse shall not exceed 18
feet in height from average grade to its peak.
SECTION 2.12 - Buildings
Any structure, either temporary or permanent, having a roof and
used or capable of being used for the shelter or enclosure of persons,
animals, chattels, or property of any kind and including principal
structures.
SECTION 2.13 - Bulk Storage Facility
One or a series of tanks, buildings or other storage facilities
of whatever type, including all related pumps, machinery, buildings,
equipment and other appurtenances associated therewith, whether above
or below ground or partially above ground and partially below ground,
used or designed for use for the storage, distribution and/or transportation of oil, gas or other liquid or gaseous_ hydrocar_bo_n products,
including propane gas, extracted from an oil or gas well and whether
or not the same has been treated, sweetened or otherwise refined. A
bulk storage facility shall not include storage facilities located at
retail gasoline stations, airport fuel storage facilities, fuel oil
storage facilities located at a residential dwelling or any other
facility with a maximum storage capacity of 500 gallons or less.
SECTION 2.14 - Cabin
Any building, tent or similar structure which is maintained, offered, or used for dwelling or sleeping quarters for transients, or
for temporary residence, but shall not include what are commonly
designated as hotels, motels, lodging houses or tourist homes.
SECTION 2.15 - Cabin Court or Cabin Park
Any tract or parcel of land on which two or more cabins as herein
defined, are maintained, offered or used for dwelling or sleeping
quarters, for transients.
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�•
SECTION 2.16 -
Campground
A parcel or tract of land under the control of a person on which
sites are offered for use by the public or members of an organization
either free of charge or for a fee, for the establishment of five or
more temporary living quarters or temporary dwellings used for recreational purposes.
SECTION 2.17 - Central Production Facility
One or a series of tanks, heater treaters, and/or other equipment
of whatever type used or designed for processing or treating the
natural hydrocarbon products extracted from an oil or gas well, or the
later products thereof but which does not involve the removal of
sulfur or other impurities from natural gas unless the operation is
designed to remove small quantities of sulfur by use of a sponge
scrubber or similar type equipment.
A central production facility
shall not include a facility which is both located at a wellhead and
designed to service only one oil or gas well.
SECTION 2.18 - Day Care Centers
A facility, structure or residence used for the care and housing
of children between the hours of 7:00 o'clock a.m. and 6:00 o'clock
p.m. Each facility, structure or residence so used shall be licensed
according to the laws and statutes of the State of Michigan and shall
be operated according to the rules and regulations of the Michigan
Department of Social Services which shall be applicable to child day
care centers.
SECTION 2.19 - Driveway
The access to parcel of land used by motor vehicles.
SECTION 2.20 - Dwelling
A building, mobile home, pre-manufactured or precut s true ture
designed and used for _the complete living accommodations of a family
and which complies with the standards given in this Ordinance, and
which meets or exceeds the requirements of all other applicable laws
and regulations, including but not limited to the Manistee-Mason
County Sanitary Code, as amended, and the Michigan State Construction
Code.
A.
Single-Family Dwelling:
A dwelling occupied by one (1)
family, and so designed and arranged as to provide living,
cooking and kitchen accommodations for one (1) family only.
B.
Two-Family Dwelling:
A dwelling designed to provide for
separate living, sleeping and kitchen facilities for two (2)
families living independently of each other.
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�C.
Multi-Family Dwelling:
A dwelling designed to provide for
separate living, sleeping and kitchen facilities for more
than two (2) families living independently of each other.
D.
Temporary Dwelling:
Cabins, tents, trailers,
basements, if used for human occupancy.
E.
Partial or Complete Underground Dwelling:
Any dwelling
other than a basement or cellar designed and built with a
majority of the structure below ground level and designed so
as not to be built upon.
garages
and
SECTION 2.21 - Erect
To build, construct, reconstruct, move upon or conduct any
physical operations on the land required for the building, including
excavations, fill, and drainage.
SECTION 2.22 - Erosion Control Device
Any structural or physical method used to control shoreland
erosion processes.
Erosion control devises include, but are not
limited to, structures such as groines, seawalls, revetments or
beachwalls and may include any type of beach nourishment by filing approved by the Zoning Administrator.
SECTION 2.23 - Existing Building
A building existing in whole or whose foundations are complete,
and whose construction is being diligently pursued on the effective
date of this Ordinance.
SECTION 2.24 - Family
One or more persons living together as a single housekeeping unit
and related by bonds of consanguinity, marriage or legal adoption or a
group of persons living in a dewelling unit as a single housekeeping
unit and intending to . live together as a group for the indefinite
future.
A family shall be deemed to include domestic servants and
gratuitous guests but shall not include any fraternity, sorority,
club, hotel, or other group of persons whose association is temporary
or commercial in nature .•
SECTION 2.25 - Farms
All of the contiguous, neighboring or associated land operated as
a single unit and upon which agriculture is being carried on directly
by the owner, operator, manager or tenant farmer, by his own labor, or
with the assistance of members of his household or hired employees.
Greenhouses,
nurseries,
orchards,
apiaries,
poultry
hatcheries,
poultry farms, and similar specialized operations may be considered as
farms; but establishments keeping or operating fur bearing animals,
game, fish hatcheries, dog kennels, stock yards, slaughter houses,
stone quarries, gravel or sand pits, shall not be considered farms
-6-
�hereunder, unless combined with and constituting a minor part of bona
fide agricultural operations on the same tract of land.
Nor shall
premises operated as fertilizer works, boneyards, or for the reduction
of animal matter, for the disposal of garbage, sewage, rubbish, offal
or junk constitute a farm hereunder.
SECTION 2.26 - Farm Buildings
Any building, other than a dwelling, erected, or maintained on a
farm, which is essential and customarily used on farms in the pursuit
of agricultural activities.
SECTION 2.27 - Floor Area
The habitable first floor area of a
exclusive of garage, breezeway, or porches.
building
or
structure,
SECTION 2.28 - Forestry
The use of land for the management and harvesting of trees from
their natural setting for purposes of producing lumber, pulp or firewood.
SECTION 2.29 - Garage
A.
Private: Any building or part thereof, accessory or otherwise, for storage of motor vehicles, or trailer coaches, or recreational vehicles, where no servicing or storage for a fee is conducted.
A private garage which is accessory to a dwelling shall not
be more than 30 feet in width, 30 feet in length, and 12 feet or one
story in height.
B.
Commercial:
Any building, other than a private garage, or
garage operated by a municipality, used for sto1=age, repair, greasing,
washing, rental, sales, servicing, adjusting, or equipping of automobiles, cars, motor driven vehicles, trailers, trailer coaches, or
recreational vehicles, for remuneration, hire, or sale or where any
such vehicle or engine may be fueled, repaired• rebuilt, or reconstructed, and including undercoating, or over-all painting when
conducted in an enclosed booth.
SECTION 2.30 - High Risk Erosion Area
An area designated as a high risk area due to shoreland erosion
by the Department of Natural Resources pursuant to the Shorelands
Protection and Management Act, Public Act 245 of 1970 as amended.
SECTION 2.31 - Highway
A roadway, street or thoroughfare, public or private, contained
within the limits of a right-of-way dedicated or maintained for the
operation of vehicular traffic.
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�SECTION 2.32 - Home Occupation
A gainful occupation or service conducted by members of a family
within its place of residence; provided, that the space used is incidental or secondary to residential use, and provided, that there is no
external evidence of such occupation or service except a name plate
not more than four (4) square feet in area, without illumination, and
in character with the neighborhood; and providing further, that said
occupation or service does not require nor effect any change in the
external dimensions of the building. No services shall be rendered or
articles displayed outside the dwelling.
SECTION 2.33 - Industrial Building
A building or structure housing a manufacturing, assembly, chemical, or processing operation or transportation facilities.
SECTION 2.34 - Institutional Building
A building occupied by a municipal or non-profit corporation and
open to the public.
SECTION 2.35 - Land Use Permit
A standard form issued by the Manistee Township Zoning Administrator or his agent upon application by an owner or his agent, for the
proposed construction of a building or structure and/or the use of
land in compliance with the provisions of this Ordinance.
SECTION 2.36 - Lodge
A building used as a meeting place by members of private clubs,
service clubs, veterans organizations, and other fraternal or religious organizations and owned or leased by such0 group.
SECTION 2.37 - Lot Lines
The property lines bounding a parcel.
"Front lot line", in
case of a parcel abutting upon one public or one private street
highway means the line separating such parcel from such street
highway right-of-way.
A "rear lot line" is that lot line which
opposite and most distant from the front lot line of the parcel.
"side lot line" is any lot line not a front lot line or a rear
line.
the
or
or
is
A
lot
SECTION 2.38 - Mineral
A naturally occurring element or combination of elements
occur in the earth in a solid state, but shall not include soil.
that
SECTION 2.39 - Mining
All or part of the processes involved in the extraction and processing of mineral materials, including but not limited to sand and
gravel.
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�SECTION 2.40 - Mining Permit
A special use permit for mining, whether on a regular or temporary basis, which is required by Section 16.2 of this Ordinance. It
does not replace or otherwise eliminate the need to apply for any
state mining permits otherwise required by law.
SECTION 2.41 - Mobile Home
A dwelling, residence or structure, transportable in one o r more
sections, exclusive of any tongue or hitch assembly, and designed to
be used as a dwelling with a permanent foundation, when connected to
the required utilities, including plumbing, heating, and/or air
conditioning and electrical systems contained therein and which is
installed by a Michigan licensed mobile home dealer or Michigan
licensed mobile home installer as required by Michigan Public Act 419
of 1976 and the administrative rules promulgated thereunder.
SECTION 2.42 - Mobile Home Park
A parcel or tract of land under the control of a person upon
which two (2) or more mobile homes are located on a continual, nonrecreational basis and which is offered to the public for that purpose, regardless of whether a charge is made therefore, together with
any building, structure, enclosure, street, equipment, or facility
used or intended for use incidental to the occupancy of a mobile home.
SECTION 2.43 - Motel
A building or group of buildings having units containing sleeping
accommodations which are available for temporary occupancy primarily
for automobile transients.
SECTION 2.44 - Moveable Structure
A building certified for the purpose of this Ordinance to be
moveable by a registered engineer or architect or a structure which is
of such a design and s~ze that facilitates moving. The structure must
be of sufficient structural design to withstand the stress associated
with moving and no structure shall be considered moveable if the
parcel on which it is placed is not accessible to moving equipment.
SECTION 2.45 - Neighborhood
A number of persons forming a loosely cohesive community within a
larger community, such as a town or village, and living close or
fairly close together in more or less familiar association with each
other.
SECTION 2.46 - Non-conforming Lot
Means a parcel of record or a parcel described in a deed or land
contract executed and delivered prior to the effective date of this
Ordinance, or an amendment thereto, which does not meet the minimum
requirements of the Land Use District in which it is located, and also
-9-
�•
means parcels which become substandard due to natural processes
provided such parcel was created with sufficient depth to accommodate
a principal structure and meet Ordinance setback requirements after
this Ordinance or amendment became effective.
SECTION 2.47 - Non-conforming Uses
A use which lawfully occupied a building or land at the effective
date of-iliis Ordinance or amendments thereto, which does not conform
after passage of the Ordinance or amendments thereto with the re quirements of the Land Use District in which it is located.
SECTION 2.48 - Ordinary High Water Mark:
The line between upland and bottomland which persists through
successive changes in water levels below which the presence and action
of the water is so common or recurrent that the character of the land
is marked distinctly from the upland and is apparent in the soil
itself, the configuration of the surface of the soil and the vegetation. Consistent with the Great Lakes Submerged Lands Act, Public
Act 247 of 1955 as amended, the ordinary high water mark for Lake
Michigan shall be deemed to be 579.8 feet above sea level.
SECTION 2.49 - Operator
Any person or an agency either public or private, engaged or who
has applied for a special use permit to engage in mining or the
operation of a central production facility, sweetening plant, or bulk
storage facility, whether individually, jointly, or through subsidiaries, agents, employees, or any person engaged in managing or
controlling such operation.
SECTION 2.50 - Parcel
A description of land. as identified by a property tax parcel
number on the Manistee County tax roll and on which one (1) principal
building and its accessory buildings may be placed, together with the
open spaces required by _this Ordinance.
SECTION 2~51 - Park
Any non-commercial recreational area.
SECTION 2.52 - Principal Structure
The main building or permanent structure on a lot or parcel which
may include but is not limited to a residential, commercial, industrial, institutional or mobile home building, and garages, permanent
accessory structures and attached buildings, including a septic
system, tile field or other waste handling facility. A non permanent
structure or easily removeable structure such as a tent, travel
trailers, recreational vehicle or similar structure shall be considered as accessory structures for the purposes of this Ordinance
even if no other permanent principal structure is on the parcel.
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�SECTION 2.53 - Private and Industrial Pipe Lines
Any type of pipe line of any size used for private or industrial
purposes.
SECTION 2.54 - Public Meeting Place
Buildings and outdoor areas where numbers of persons congregate
from time to time for educational, religious, social or recreatj_onal
purposes, including churches, schools, community buildings, clubs,
lodges, theaters (indoor and outdoor), places of amusement and similar
assemblages.
SECTION 2.55 - Public Utilities
Any person, firm or corporation, municipal department or board,
duly authorized to furnish under government regulation, to the public,
transportation, water, gas, electricity, communication, steam, or
sewage disposal and other services.
SECTION 2.56 - Recession Rates
Means a quantitative measure of the landward movement of the
bluffline determined on the basis of the Shoreland Erosion Studies
conducted under Public Act 245 of 1970 as amended, and expressed in
terms of an annual average rate.
SECTION 2.57 - Reclamation Plan
The owner or operator's proposal for the reclamation of a project
site which is submitted under this Ordinance prior to the issuance of
a special use permit or where otherwise required by the terms of this
Ordinance, including any orders or decisions of the Zoning Board or
Zoning Board of Appeals requiring an owner or operator to provide
additional site plan information.
SECTION 2.58 - Retail, Commercial & Wholesale Stores
A store, market or shop in which commodities are sold, or offered
for sale, in small or large quantities at wholesale or retail.
SECTION 2.59 - River
In District BM-1 means the Big Manistee River, its tributaries,
bayous, and estuaries which drain into or are connected with the Big
Manistee River.
SECTION 2.60 - Roadside Stand
A structure used or intended to be used solely by the owner or
resident tenant of the land on which it is located for the sale of
seasonal products of the immediate locality.
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�SECTION 2.61 - Service Institutions
A store, market or shop in which services are sold or offered for
sale to the public, including, but not limited to, gasoline stations,
garages, repair shops, laundries, warehouses, printing houses, undertaking establishments, barber shops and beauty parlors.
SECTION 2.62 - Setback Lines
Lines established adjacent to streets, highways or lot lines for
the purpose of defining limits within which no building or structure
or any part thereof shall be erected or permanently maintained.
"Within a setback line" means between the setback line and the nearest
lot line, street or highway right-of-way.
Setback lines define the
area needed to maintain the minimum yard requirements established by
this Ordinance.
SECTION 2.63 - Setback Requirement
Means the minimum distance required by this Ordinance between the
bluffline and the most lakeward edge of a principal structure.
SECTION 2.64 - Shoreland
Means the land which borders or is adjacent to Lake Michigan
which may extend up to 1,000 feet landward of the ordinary highwater
mark.
SECTION 2.65 - Shoreline
Means that area of the shoreland where the land and waters of
Lake Michigan meet.
SECTION 2.66 - Site Plan
One or more documents, drawings, statements, exhibits or other
written material containing all of the information required by this
Ordinance to be submitted to the Zoning Administrator, Zoning Board or
Zoning Board of Appeals in connection with an application for a
regular land use on special use permit, an appeal or a request for
variance,
including
all
additional
information
the
Zoning
Administrator, Zoning Board or Zoning Board of Appeals may require of
the applicant or appellant, by order or decision, under this Ordinance
prior to issuing a permit, deciding an appeal, or granting a variance.
SECTION 2.67 - State Licensed Residential Facility
A structure constructed for residential purposes that is licensed
by the State of Michigan pursuant to Act 287 of the Public Acts of
1972, as amended, being Sections 331.681 to 331.694 of the Michigan
Compiled Laws, or Act 116 of the Public Acts 9of 1973, as amended,
being Sections 722.111 to 722.128 of the Michigan Compiled Laws, which
provides services for six (6) or less persons under twenty-four (24)
hour supervision or care for persons in need of such supervision or
care.
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�SECTION 2.68 - Street
A thoroughfare, public or private,
means of access to abutting property.
which affords
a
principal
SECTION 2.69 - Sign
An inscribed board of space serving for advertisement and information.
SECTION 2.70 - Structure
A structure is any production or pieces of material artificially
built up or composed of parts joined together in some definite manner;
any construction, including dwellings, garages, buildings, signs and
sign boards, towers, poles, antennas, standpipes or other like objects, including principal structures.
SECTION 2.71 - Sweetening Plant
A facility or plant and all related equipment and appurtenances
associated therewith which is designed to remove sulfur compounds or
other impurities from natural gas from gas wells.
SECTION 2.72 - Tourist Home
A facility where lodging with or without meals is furnished for
compensation, chiefly on an overnight basis, and mainly to transients.
SECTION 2.73 - Trailer
A vehicle which can be drawn on a highway and is used exclusively
for recreational or camping purposes. Includes the terms Motor Home,
Pole-trailer, Trailer Coach, Travel Trailer, Mobile Home., .as defined
in the Michigan Motor Vehicle Code (Public Act 300 of 1949, M.S.A.
§9.1801-9.1882) and includes camping units, tents, or any other temporary dwellings.
SECTION 2.74 - Trailer Court or Park
Any site, lot, field, tract or parcel of land on which are
situated two (2) or more inhabited trailers, either free of charge or
for revenue purposes, and shall include any building, structure, tent,
vehicle, or enclosure located therein, and used or intended for use as
a part of the equipment of such park.
SECTION 2.75.
Tree
Any object of natural growth.
SECTION 2.76 - Use
The purpose for which land or a building thereon is designed,
arranged or intended to be occupied and used, or for which it is
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maintained.
The uses of land permitted in the several land use
districts established by this Ordinance shall be further defined by
the Standard Industrial Classification Manual of 1972, which is
incorporated herein by reference.
SECTION 2.77 - Waste
All accumulation of waste mined material and overburden placed on
the land surface, whether above or below water.
SECTION 2.78 - Water's Edge
'
The surveyed property line or meander line along the shore of a
body of water or the term "water's edge" in its usual and ordinary
sense and usage being that area of the shoreline where land and water
meet, in the event there is no surveyed property line or recorded
meander line along the shore at the water's edge.
When used in
reference to the Big Manistee River, the term "water's edge" shall be
deemed to apply to all tributaries, bayous, and estuaries which drain
into or are connected with the Big Manistee River.
SECTION 2.79 - Wetland
For purposes of this ordinance, a wetland shall be in conformity
with the definition set forth in the Goemaere-Anderson Wetland Protection Act, being Section 2(g) of Act 203 of the Public Acts of 1979;
MCLA 281.702(g); MSA 18.595(52)(g).
SECTION 2.80 - Yard
A space open to the sky, and unoccupied or unobstructed except by
encroachments specifically permitted under this Ordinance, on the same
parcel with a building or structure. Yard measurements shall be the
minimum horizontal distances.
A.
Front Yard:
A yard extending across the full width of a
parcel between the front lot lines and the nearest line of
the main building.
B.
Rear Yard:
A yard extending across the full width of a
parcel between the rear lot line and the nearest line of the
main building.
C.
Side Yard: A yard extending from the front yard to the rear
yard between the side lot line and the nearest line of the
main building or of accessory building attached thereto.
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�I
•
•
ARTICLE III
Land Use Districts
SECTION 3.1 - Land Use Districts
The unincorporated portion of the Township of Manistee is hereby
divided into eleven (11) land use districts and two (2) overlay zones,
as follows:
A.
B.
C.
D.
E.
F.
G.
H.
I.
J.
K.
L.
M.
High Density Residential, District R-1.
Resort Residential, District R-2.
Country Residential, District R-3.
Multi-Family Residential, District R-4.
Ag-Forest Preservation, District AP-1.
Multiple Use, District M-1.
Restricted Commercial, RC-1.
Commercial, District C-1.
Wetlands, District W-1.
Big Manistee River Corridor, District BM-1.
Industrial, District 1-1.
Airport Overlay Zone, District OZ-2.
High Risk Erosion Overlay Zone, District OZ-3
SECTION 3.2 - Identification of Official Zoning Map
The land use districts and overlay zones are bounded on a map
entitled "Official Zoning Map", which zoning map and the contents
thereof are incorporated herein by reference. The Official Zoning Map
shall be identified by the signature of the Township Supervisor,
attested by the Township Clerk, and bear the seal of the Township
under the following words:
"This is to certify that this is the
Official Zoning Map referred to in the Manistee Township Permanent
Zoning Ordinance", together with the effective date of this Ordinance.
SECTION 3.3 - Authority of Official Zoning Map
Regardless of the existence of copies of the Official Zoning Map
which may from time to _time be made or published, the Official Zoning
Map, which shall be located in the Manistee Township Hall, shall be
the final authority as to the location of all land use district and
overlay zone boundaries.
SECTION 3.4 - Changes to Official Zoning Map
In the event of an amendment to this Ordinance which has the
effect of changing the location of a Land Use District boundary, the
Township Supervisor shall promptly make, or cause to be made, such
change on the Official Zoning Map immediately after the effective date
of the amendment and shall affix his signature thereon, attested by
the Township Clerk, under the following words:
"This is to certify
that this Official Zoning Map was amended on
(date)
in accordance with Amendments to the Manistee Township Permanent
Zoning Ordinance adopted on
(date)
by the Manistee
Township Board."
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�SECTION 3.5 - Replacement of Official Zoning Map
In the event that the Official Zoning Map becomes damaged, destroyed, lost or difficult to interpret because of the nature or
number of changes made thereto, the Township Board may adopt a new
Official Zoning Map which shall supersede the prior Official Zoning
Map. The new Official Zoning Map may correct drafting or other errors
or omissions on the prior Official Zoning Map, but no such correction
shall have the effect of amending this Ordinance or the prior Official
Zoning Map, unless it shall have been adopted in accordance with Act
184 of the Public Acts of 1943, as amended.
The new Official Zoning
Map shall be identified by the signature of the Township Supervisor,
attested by the Township Clerk, and bear the seal of the Township
under the following words:
"This is to certify that this is the
Official Zoning Map referred to in the Manistee Township Permanent
Zoning Ordinance adopted on
(date)
which replaces and
supercedes
the
Official
Zoning
Map
which
was
adopted
on
(date)
"
SECTION 3.6 - Rules of Interpretation
A.
All questions concerning the exact location of
lines of any land use district or overlay zone not clearly
the Official Zoning Map shall be determined by the Zoning
Appeals, consistent with the purposes of this Ordinance and
of interpretation set forth in this section.
boundary
shown on
Board of
the rules
B.
Unless otherwise indicated, the boundary lines of land use
districts shall be interpreted in accordance with the following rules
of interpretation.
(1) A boundary indicated as approximately following the
centerline of a highway, street, alley or easement
shall be construed as following such centerline as it
existed on the date of enactment of this Ordinance or
the amendment which created the boundary.
(2) A boundary indicated as approximately following a recorded lot line or the line bounding a parcel shall be
construed as following such line as it existed on the
date of · enactment of this Ordinance or the amendment
which created the boundary.
(3) A boundary indicated as approximately following the
corporate boundary line of a city, village or township
shall be construed as following such line as it existed
on the date of enactment of this Ordinance or the
amendment which created the boundary.
(4) A boundary indicated as following the water's edge
shall be construed as following such water's edge, and
in the event of change in the location of the water's
edge, shall be construed as following the actual
water's edge at the time of interpretation.
(S) A boundary indicated as following the centerline of a
stream, river, canal, lake or other body ot water shall
be construed as following such centerline as it exists
at the time of interpretation.
-16-
�(6)
A boundary indicated as parallel to, or an extension
of, a feature indicated in Paragraphs A through E above
shall be so construed.
SECTION 3.7 - Purposes
The purposes for each of the Land Use Districts and Overlay Zones
created by this Ordinance include the General Purposes set for in
Section 1.2 of this Ordinance and, in addition, the specific purposes
identified in the Land Use and Development Component of the Manistee
Township Master Plan, particularly Section IV, Land Use and Development Policies, which is incorporated into this Ordinance by reference.
SECTION 3.8 - SIC References
The numbers appearing in parenthesis following the permitted and
special uses set forth in this Ordinance refer to the classification
numbers in the Standard Industrial Classification Manual, 1972, (SIC)
prepared by the Executive Office of the President, Office of Management and Budget, which is incorporated herein by reference.
Uses
listed in this Ordinance which are identified with a two-digit number
(XX) refer to the Major Groups in the SIC.
Except where otherwise
indicated, a use which is identified by reference to a Major Group
includes all uses listed in the SIC under that Maj or Group, if any,
with a three-digit (XXX) or four digit (XXXX) number, the first two
numbers of which are the same as the Maj or Group numbers.
Except
where otherwise indicated, a use which is identified with a three
digit (XXX) number includes all uses listed in the SIC, if any, with a
four digit (XXXX) number, the first three numbers of which are identical to the use in question, but does not include other uses in the
same Major Group.
Except where otherwise indicated, a use which is
identified with a four digit (XXXX) number includes only that use
referenced in the SIC and does not include other uses in the same
Major Group with two or three digits.
ARTICLE IV
Residential Districts, Rl-R4
SECTION 4.10 - High Density Residential, District R-1 - Use
Regulations
A.
Permitted uses by permit authorized pursuant to Section 16.1.
1.
2.
3.
4.
B.
Single family dwellings (88).
State Licensed Residential Facilities.
Home Occupations.
Accessory uses and buildings.
Special uses by permit authorized pursuant to Section 16.2.
1. Parks
-17-
�SECTION 4.11 - Minimums
A.
B.
C.
D.
Minimum parcel width - 100 feet.
Minimum parcel size - 15,000 square feet.
Minimum Floor Area - 900 square feet
Minimum setback or yard requirements including all accessory buildings and structures.
1. Front
- 25 feet.
2. Side
- 10 feet.
3. Rear
- 25 feet
4 .• Water's edge
- 50 feet.
SECTION 4.20 - Resort Residential, District R-2 - Use Regulations.
A.
Permitted uses by permit authorized pursuant to Section
16 .1.
1. Any permitted uses in District R-1
2. State Park Campgrounds.
3 .• Erosion Control Devises.
B.
Special uses by permit authorized pursuant to Section
1. Party stores (549, 592)
2. Parks
16.2.
SECTION 4.21 - Minimums
A.
B.
C.
D.
Minimum parcel width - 100 feet.
Minimum parcel size - 25,000 square feet.
Minimum floor area - 1,000 square feet.
Minimum setback or yard requirements, including all
accessory buildings and structures.
1. Front
- 25 feet
2. Side
- 10 feet
3. Rear
- 25 feet
4. Water's Edge
- 50 feet except in High Risk
Erosion Areas where the regulations set forth in
Article XIII shall apply.
SECTION 4.30 - Country Residential, District R-3 - Use Regulations:
A.
Permitted Uses by permit authorized pursuant to Section
16.1.
1.
2.
3.
B.
Any permitted uses in District R-2
Two-family dwellings (88).
Churches and religious organizations (8661)
Special Uses by permit authorized pursuant to Section 16.2.
1.
2.
Hulti-family dwellings (88)
Commercial nurseries and greenhouses (078)
-18-
�SECTION 4.31 - Minimums
A.
B.
C.
D.
Minimum parcel width - 100 feet
Minimum parcel size - 20,000 square feet
Minimum floor area - 900 square feet
Minimum setback or yard requirements, including all
accessory buildings and structures.
1. Front
- 25 feet
2. Side
10 feet
3. Rear
- 25 feet
4. Water's Edge
- 50 feet
-
SECTION 4.40 - Multi-Family Residential District R-4 - Use
Regulations:
A.
Permitted Uses by permit authorized pursuant to Section
16.1.
1. Erosion Control Devices.
B.
Special Uses by permit authorized pursuant to Section 16.z.
1. Any permitted use in District R-3.
2. Multi-family dwellings (88)
3. Hotels, motels and tourist courts (701).
4. Parks
SECTION 4.41 - Minimum
A.
B.
C.
D.
Minimum parcel width - 100 feet for single family dwellings;
300 feet for all other uses.
Minimum parcel size - five (5) acres.
Minimum Floor area - 900 square feet for single family
dwellings; 700 feet for two and multi-family dwellings;
400 feet for all other uses.
Minimum setback or yard requirements, ·including all accessory buildings and structures.
1. Front
- 25 feet
2. Side
- 25 feet
3. Rear
- 10 feet
4. Water's Edge
- 50 feet, except in High Risk
Erosion Areas where the regulations set forth in
Article XIII shall apply.
ARTICLE V
AG-Forest Preservation District AP-1
SECTION 5,1 - Use Regulations
A.
Permitted uses
by permit authorized pursuant
16 .1.
(1)
(2)
(3)
(4)
Agriculture production - crops (01)
Agriculture production - livestock (02)
Agriculture services - (07)
Forestry - (08)
-19-
to Section
�(5)
(6)
(7)
(8)
(9)
(10)
(11)
(12)
(13)
B.
Fishing, hunting and trapping (09) - except
commercial fishing (091)
Lumber and wood products (24) - except millwork,
plywood and structural members (243), wood containers (244), wood buildings and mobile homes
(245), and miscellaneous wood products (249)
Maple Syrup rendering facilities
Roadside stands for the retail sale of farm products
produced on an adjoining farm
One single-family or two-family dwelling (88), provided
the same is occupied by the owner or operator of
an adjoining farm.
Riding stables, riding and hiking trails
Home occupations
Accessory uses and buildings
Farm buildings.
Special Uses by permit authorized pursuant to Section 16.2.
(1) Any permitted or special uses in District R-3
SECTION 5.2 - Minimums
A.
B.
C.
Minimum parcel size - 40 acres
Minimum floor area for all dwellings - 900 square feet
Minimum setback or yard requirements including all accessory
buildings and structures
1. Front
- 50 feet.
2. Rear
- 25 feet.
3. Side
- 25 feet.
4. Water's Edge - 50 feet.
SECTION 5.3 - Additional Special Use Criteria
In addition to the criteria for special us~ approval contained in
Section 16. 2, the following standards shall be applied in considering
an application for a special use permit in the AG-Forest Preservation
District AP-1.
A.
The proposed use shall be situated upon lands which are less
suitable for agricultural production or forestry uses than other lands
within the AG-Forest Preservation District. This determination shall
be based upon a comparative analysis and evidence considering natural
as well as economic factors.
B.
The proposed use shall be situated in a manner so as to
reduce to a minimum the amount of productive agricultural or forestry
land which is converted to the proposed use.
SECTION 5.4 - Seasonal Help Housing
Dwellings for the use of seasonal and itinerant farm employees
and migratory workers shall be exempt from the minimum parcel size and
minimum floor area requirements of this Section, but shall comply with
all provisions of the Michigan Public Health Codes and all federal
regulations.
-20-
�ARTICLE VI
Multiple-Use District M-1
SECTION 6.1 - Use Regulations
A.
Permitted uses by permit authorized pursuant to Section 16.1.
(1)
(2)
(3)
(4)
(5)
(6)
(7)
(8)
Any permitted or special use in District AP-1.
Any permitted use in Districts R-1, R-2, R-3, and R-4.
Residential building construction (152)
Non-residential building construction (154)
Plumbing, heating and air conditioning (171)
Painting, paper hanging, decorating (172)
Electrical work (173)
Carpentry and flooring (175)
(9) Roofing and sheet metal work (176)
(10) Water well drilling (178)
(11) Airports
B.
Special uses by permit authorized pursuant to Section 16.2.
(1)
(2)
(3)
(4)
(5)
(6)
(7)
(8)
(9)
(10)
(11)
(12)
(13)
(14)
(15)
(16)
(17)
(18)
(19)
(20)
(21)
(22)
Hotels, motels and tourist (cabin) courts (701)
Facilities for the exploration and production of oil,
gas and other minerals, including but not limited
to, central production facilities,
sweetening
plants,
bulk storage facilities,
exploration
facilities (1382) and field services facilities
(1389),
Mining (14)
Masonry, stone work, and plastering (174)
Concrete work (177)
Wrecking and demolition work (1795)
Meat products manufacturing (201.)
Dairy products manufacturing (202)
Preserved fruits and vegetables manufacturing (203)
Grain mill products manufacturing (204)
Lumber and wood products manufacturing (24)
Petroleum refining (291)
Paving and roofing materials manufacturing (295)
Concrete, gypsum and plaster products manufacturing
(327)
Instruments and related products manufacturing (38)
Trucking and warehousing (42)
Transportation services (47)
Communications (48)
Facilities for the pressure treatment of wood, lumber
and poles.
Mobile Home Parks
Cabins
Any permitted use in Districts CR-1 and C-1
SECTION 6.2 - Minimums
A.
Minimum parcel size - 5 acres
-21-
�B.
C.
D.
Minimum parcel width or road frontage - 300 feet.
Minimum floor area for all dwellings - 900 square feet.
Minimum setback or yard requirements, including all
accessory buildings and structures.
(1) Front
- 50 feet.
(2) Rear
- 25 feet.
(3)
Side
- 25 feet.
(4) Water's Edge - 50 feet.
ARTICLE VII
Restricted Commercial District, CR-1
SECTION 7.1- Use Regulations.
A.
Permitted uses by permit authorized pursuant to Section 16.1.
(1)
(2)
(3)
(4)
(5)
(6)
(7)
(8)
(9)
(10)
(11)
(12)
(13)
(14)
(15)
(16)
(17)
(18)
(19)
(20)
(21)
(22)
(23)
(24)
(25)
(26)
(27)
(28)
(29)
(30)
B.
Any permitted or special use in Districts R-1, R-2, R-3
and R-4
Air Transportation Services (45)
Communications (48)
Beer, wine and distilled beverages, wholesale or retail
(518)
Paint, glass and wallpaper stores (523)
Hardware stores (525)
Retail nurseries and garden stores (526)
General merchandise stores (53)
Food stores (54)
New and used car dealers (551)
Boat dealers (555)
Recreation and utility trailer dealers (556)
Eating and drinking establishments (58)
Liquor stores (592)
Banks (60)
Credit agencies other than banks (61)
Security commodity brokers and services (62)
Insurance carriers (63)
Insurance agents, brokers and services (64)
Real es~ate agents, brokers and services (65)
Holding and other investment offices (67)
Health services (80)
Legal services (81)
Educational services (82)
Social services (83)
Membership organizations (86)
Miscellaneous services (89)
Executive, Legislative and general public
administration offices (91)
Correctional institutions (9223) provided the same are
owned and operated by Manistee County.
Airports
Special uses by permit authorized pursuant to Section 16.2.
-22-
�(1)
(2)
(3)
(4)
(5)
(6)
(7)
(8)
(9)
Printing and publishing (27)
Instruments and related products manufacturing (38 )
Public warehousing (422)
Hotels and other lodging places (70)
Personal services (72)
Business services (73)
Motion pictures (78)
Amusement and recreation services (79)
Museums, botanical and zoological gardens (84)
SECTION 7.2 - Minimums
A.
B.
C.
Minimum parcel size - 15,000 square feet
Minimum parcel width or road frontage - 100 feet
Minimum setback or yard requirements including all accessory
buildings and structures.
(1)
Front
- 25 feet
(2) Side
- 20 feet
(3) Rear
- 25 feet
(4) Water's Edge
- 50 feet
ARTICLE VIII
Commercial District, C-1
SECTION 8.1 - Use Regulations
A.
Permitted uses
by
permit
authorized
pursuant
to
Section
16. l.
(1)
(2)
(3)
(4)
(5)
(6)
(7)
(8)
(9)
(10)
(11)
(12)
(13)
(14)
(15)
Any permitted use in District CR-1.
Trucking and warehousing (42)
U.S. Postal service facilities _ (.~3) _
Transportation services (47)
·
Wholesale trade-durable goods (50) except metals and
minerals (505) and miscellaneous durable goods
(509)
Wholesai"e trade non-durable goods (51) provided that
drugs, proprietaries and sundries (512); chemicals
and allied products (516); petroleum and petroleum
products (517); grain (5153); and farm supplies
(5191) are packaged and are not sold or stored in
unpackaged bulk quantities. Also except livestock
(5154) and poultry and poultry products (5144)
Building materials and garden supplies (52)
Automobile dealers and service stations (55)
Apparel and accessory stores (56)
Furniture and home furnishing stores (57)
Miscellaneous retail stores (59)
Hotels and other lodging places (70)
Personal services (72)
Business services (73)
Auto repair services and garages (75)
-23-
�(16)
(17)
(18)
(19)
(20)
Miscellaneous repair shops (76)
Motion pictures (78)
Amusement and recreation services (79)
Museums, botanical and zoological gardens (84)
Justice, public order and safety (92) except
correctional institutions (9223)
(21) Churches and religious organizations (8661)
(22) Marine craft, charter, repair or storage facilities and
marinas.
B.
Special used by permit authorized pursuant to Section 16.2.
(1)
(2)
(3)
(4)
(5)
(6)
(7)
Residential building construction (152)
Non-residential building construction (154)
Textile mill products manufacturing (22)
Apparel and other textile products manufacturing (23)
Bags, except textile bags, manufacturing (2643)
Printing and publishing (27)
Instruments and related products manufacturing (38)
SECTION 8.2 - Minimums
A.
B.
c.
Minimum parcel size - 15,000 square feet
Minimum parcel width or road frontage - 100 feet
Minimum setback or yard requirements including all accessory
buildings and structures
1. Front
- 25 feet
2. Side
- 20 feet
3. Rear
- 25 feet
4. Water's Edge
- 50 feet
SECTION 8.3 - Manistee Lake Regulations
A.
Every parcel of land which lies in whole or in .part within
the Lakefront Multiple Commercial DistFict as established in the
Manistee Lake Management Plan (October, 1982) as amended or extended,
is subject to the additional regulations and conditions set forth in
this Section 8.3. to the extent it lies within such Lakefront Multiple
Commercial District.
B.
Any permitted use specified in Section 8.lA which involves
alteration of the Manistee Lake or Channel shoreline by dredging, fill
or channelization shall be authorized only by a special use permit
granted pursuant to Section 16.2.
C.
A five (5) foot wide greenbelt along the Manistee Lake or
Channel shoreline shall be maintained with trees or vegetation characterized by having a wooden stem or trunk (as opposed to a fibrous or
grass stem).
D.
Parking lots and loading facilities designed for truck or
motor vehicles shall be located ou the landward side of the principal
structure or use. The general parking requirements of this Ordinance,
Section 14.7, shall apply.
E.
In addition to the requirements of Section 16. 2 of this
Ordinance, the following additional criteria shall apply to all
special uses located in whole or in part within the boundaries of the
-24-
�Lakefront Multiple Commercial District established by the Manistee
Lake Management Plan.
(1) The proposed use shall be carried out entirely within
an enclosed building so no external evidence of the
activity , in the form of sight, sound, or smell, is
apparent except for external parking, lawn or garden
landscaping, and signs as provided in Section 14.3 of
this Ordinance.
(2) The proposed use shall be of such a nature that
waterfront access and/or aesthetic views of Ma11istee
Lake and the Big Manistee River delta are a necessary
or an integral part of the nature of the proposed land
use.
The Manistee Township Zoning Board may require,
as a condition of approving the special use permit,
that proposed uses not requiring waterfront or aesthetic views of Manistee Lake be located as far back from
the water as possible on the parcel so the portion of
the parcel closest to Manistee Lake is available for
future development, sale, or open space.
Conditions
may be imposed to protect views from adjacent property
of Manistee Lake and the Big Manistee River delta. The
Manistee Township Zoning Board may, in placing conditions, increase or decrease minimum parcel size or
setback requirements of this Ordinance.
(3) No polluted discharge, treated or untreated, shall be
introduced into Manistee Lake or Channel.
(4) No particulate or chemical matter shall be discharged
into the air.
(5) An environmental assessment and fiscal impact
assessment may be required by the Manistee Township
Zoning Board.
In the case of filling, dredging, or
channelization, an environmental assessment or impact
shall be required.
(6) A Pollution Incident Prevention : Plan as specified in
Part V of the rules of the Michigan Water Resources
Commission Act (Act
245, P.A. 1929, as amended),
approved by the Michigan Department of Natural Resources., shall be required if the proposed use includes
handling or storage of materials included in
the
Michigan Department of Natural Resources Critical
Materials Register.
(7) Prior to application for a special use permit, the
proposed use shall be approved or tentatively approved
by the U.S. Army Corps. of Engineers;
the Soil and
Sedimentation
Control
Agency;
the
Manistee-Mason
District Health Department;
Michigan Department of
Natural Resources (Inland Lakes and Streams Act, Great
Lakes Submerged Lands Act, and/or Water Resources
Commission); and any other state or federal agencies
responsible for administration and enforcement of
applicable state or federal statutes.
(8) Requirements and changes required by the agencies
-25-
�listed in preceding paragraph shall be shown on the
site plan or included in material submitted with the
application for special use permit under Section 16.2.
(9) Appropriate corrective measures shall be proposed to
eliminate or minimize identified undesirable or negative impacts on, and to insure compatibility of the
proposed use with, the other uses of Manistee Lake and
land uses in this District C-1.
(10) Land uses located on riparian property to Manistee Lake
and Channel may be site-designed and arranged with
buffering, screening, and landscaping to take advantage
of aesthetically pleasing views, and shall be sitedesigned to avoid blocking the views by neighboring
establishments or parcels of land, to provide a stabilized shoreline for pedestrian use, marina use, open
space, greenbelt or related activities.
ARTICLE IX
Wetlands District W-1
SECTION 9.1 - Use Regulations
A.
Permitted uses by permit authorized pursuant to Section 16.1.
(1)
(2)
B.
Grazing of livestock
Non-motorized recreational and sports activities
Special uses by permit authorized pursuant to Section 16.2.
(1)
(2)
(3)
(4)
Single family dwellings (88)
Home occupations
Accessory uses and buildings
Cabins.
SECTION 9.2 - Minimums
A.
B.
D.
Minimum parcel size - 5 acres
Minimum floor area - 600 square feet
Minimum setback or yard requirements including all accessory
buildings and structures
(1) Front
- so feet
(2) Side
- 50 feet
(3) Rear
- 50 feet
(4) Water's Edge
- 50 feet
SECTION 9.3 - Additional Special Use Criteria
In addition to the criteria for special use approval contained in
Section 16.2, the following standards shall be applied in considering
an application for a special use permit in the Wetlands Districts W-1.
A.
All special use permit applications for a building or
structure used or designed for use for human habitation on a permanent
or temporary basis shall be accompanied by a permit for a septic
-26-
�system or other approved waste treatment system
Manistee-Mason County District Health Department.
issued
by
the
B. No filling, dredging, channeling, draining, dam construction
or earth changing activities shall be permitted in the Wetlands
District W-1 without prior written approval from the Michigan Department of Natural Resources. All permits issued by the Michigan Department of Natural Resources shall be exhibited to the Zoning Administrator as site plan material in addition to the site plan material
required by Section 16.2.
C. No special use permit shall be granted with respect to any
lands consisting of a wetland as that term is defined in this Ordinance until all requirements of Act 203 of the Public Acts of 1979,
MCL 281.700 e t ~ ; MSA 18.595(50) e t ~ • have been complied with.
ARTICLE X
Industrial District 1-1.
SECTION 10.1 - Use Regulations
A. All uses in the Industrial District 1-1 are special uses and
shall be allowed only by a special use permit authorized pursuant to
Section 16.2.
B.
Special uses by permit authorized pursuant to Section 16.2.
(1)
(2)
(3)
(4)
(5)
(6)
(7)
(8)
(9)
(10)
(11)
(12)
(13)
(14)
(15)
(16)
(17)
(18)
(19)
(20)
(21)
(22)
(23)
(24)
(25)
(26)
Forestry Activities (08)
Fishing, hunting and trapping activities (09)
Metal mining (10)
Oil and gas extraction (13)
Non-metallic minerals (mining) except fuels (14)
General building contractors construction .(15)
Heavy construction contractors (16)
Special trade contractors (17)
Food and kindred products manufacturing (20)
Textile mill products manufacturing (22)
Apparel and other textile products manufacturing (23)
Lumber and wood products manufacturing (24)
Furniture and fixtures manufacturing (25)
Paper and allied products manufacturing (26)
Printing and publishing (27)
Chemicals and allied products (28)
Petroleum and coal products (29)
Rubber and miscellaneous plastics products (30)
Leather and leather products (31)
Stone, clay and glass products manufacturing (32)
Metal industries (33)
Fabricated metal products (34)
Machinery except electrical (35)
Electrical and electronic equipment (36)
Transportation equipment (37)
Instruments and related products (38)
-27-
�I
(27)
(28)
(29)
(30)
(32)
(33)
(34)
(35)
(36)
I
Miscellaneous manufacturing industries (39)
Railroad transportation (40)
Bus terminal and service facilities (417)
Trucking and warehousing (42)
Pipelines except natural gas (46)
Transportation services (47)
Communication services (48)
Electrical, gas and sanitary services (49)
Any permitted or special uses allowed in the Restricted
Commercial District CR-1 or the Commercial District C-1
SECTION 10.2 - Minimums
A.
B.
Minimum parcel size - 5 acres
Minimum setback or yard requirements including all accessory
buildings and structures
(1) Front - 60 feet
(2) Side - 30 feet, except when the side lot line
abuts the boundary of the Industrial District
1-1 in which case the side yard shall be 60
feet
(3) Rear - 60 feet
SECTION 10.3 - Maximum Floor Area
All buildings and structures located in this land use district
shall occupy not more that 60% of the area of the parcel of land for
which the special use permit has been granted.
ARTICLE XI
Big Manistee River Corridor District BM-1
SECTION 11.1 - Use Regulations
A.
Permitted uses by permit authorized pursuant to Section 16.1.
(1)
(2)
(3)
(4)
(5)
(6)
Single family dwellings (88)
Hunting,· fishing and trapping
Hiking and riding trails and stables
One pump house per parcel
A single dock per parcel
Erosion control devices or bank protection structures
designed and installed in accordance with a valid
permit issued by the Department of Natural Resources
(7) Non-motorized trails and pathways
(8) Agricultural pasture land, livestock raising, cropland
and cultivated tree farms.
B.
Special uses by permit authorized pursuant to Section 16.2.
(1)
(2)
(3)
Two and multi-family dwellings
Campgrounds and tourist (cabin) courts
Canoe liveries
-28-
�(4)
(5)
(6)
Parks, picnic areas and interpretive nature centers
Non-commercial camping and other recreational
activities which do not require the construction
permanent facilities
Farm buildings.
of
SECTION 11.2 - Minimums
A.
Minimum parcel sizes - 20 acres
Minimum floor area - 600 square feet
D.
Minimum setback or yard requirements including all accessory
buildings and structures
(1) Front
- 50 feet
(2) Side
- 50 feet
- 50 feet
(3) Rear
200 feet
(4) Water's Edge
B.
SECTION 11.3 - Additional Requirements
In addition to the requirements of Sections 16.1 and 16.2, the
following additional conditions shall be satisfied prior to the
issuance of a regular land use or special use permit for any type of
dwelling in this District BM-1:
A.
Any parking, camping, playground, dwelling or any other
permitted or special use, or any other use or other
structures shall be located on existing dry land within
portions of the district.
B.
The proposed use shall not require fill in wetland
portions of the district, but may include fill on dry
land portions of the district.
C.
Prior to application for a permit under this Ordinance,
the proposed use shall be approved or tentatively
approved by the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers; the
Michigan Department of Natural R~sources (Inland Lakes
and Streams Act, Great Lakes Subm.e rged La~ds Act and/or
Water Resources Commission); the Soil and S~dimentation
Control agency; the Manistee-Mason District Health
Department; and any other Michigan agencies responsible
for administration and enforcement of applicable state
statutes.
D.
Requirements and changes required by the agencies
listed in subsection (C) above shall be clearly shown
on the site plan or included in material submitted with
the application for a permit under this Ordinance.
E.
Minimum land area for the use shall be under one
ownership and large enough to accommodate the proposed
uses and structures without endangering or compromising
the intent and purpose of this district.
F.
Adequate measures shall be shown in design and site
plan to insure protection of any wetland area in
accordance with the purposes and int,mt of this district.
G.
The dwelling shall be designed to be compatible and
-29-
�H.
I.
harmonious with the wild, scenic, environmental, health
and safety concerns within the Big Manistee corridor.
The dwelling shall be designed and located so it is not
seen by boaters and other users of the surface waters
of the Big Manistee River except that a filtered view
from a dwelling structure to the river may be cleared
so the view is oriented to look downstream, and
The dwelling shall be located landward of the natural
vegetation strip.
SECTION 11.4 - Natural Vegetation Strip
A natural vegetation strip shall be maintained on each parcel
between the water's edge and a line each part of which is 200 feet
horizontal from and perpendicular to the water's edge of the river.
Within the natural vegetation strip, trees and shrubs may be selectively pruned or removed for harvest of merchantable timber to achieve
a filtered view of the river from the principle structure and for
reasonable private access to the river.
All pruning and removal
activities (1) shall ensure that a live root system stays intact to
provide for stream bank stabilization and erosion control, and (2)
shall ensure that any path to the river is no greater than 3 feet in
width, which shall meander down to the edge of the river in a manner
which protects the soil and vegetation from erosion while also screening the principle structure and vehicles from a direct view of the
river. Dead, diseased, unsafe or fallen trees and noxious plants and
shrubs, including poison ivy, poison sumac, and poison oak, and other
plants regarded as a common nuisances in Section 2 of Act 359 of the
Public Acts of 1941, as amended, may be removed.
SECTION 11.5 - Removal of Logs and Debri8 from the River
The owner of land situated within District BM-1 may clear dead,
fallen logs and other debris from the river to m~intain a · safe, clean
and free-flowing river when, after permits have been issued by the
Michigan Department of Natural Resources and/or the U.S. Army Corps.
of Engineers, as required, removal is undertaken in a manner which
will least disrupt fish and wildlife habitat, shore vegetation and
limit sediment disruption on the river.
SECTION 11.6 - Earth Changing Activities
All earth changes, including dredging, cutting, filling and
grading within five hundred (500) feet of the water's edge of the
river shall be done in accordance with the requirements of a permit
issued by
the Manistee County Building and
Soil Erosion and
Sedimentation Control Department pursuant to Act 34 7 of the Public
Acts of 1972, as amended and such other permits as may be required by
law for the activity undertaken. This Section shall not be deemed to
authorize mining.
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�SECTION 11.7 - Dredge and Fill Activities
The provisions of Act 346 of the Public Acts of 1972, as amended,
shall apply to all dredge and fill activities and construction of
permanent structures, including docks, lying below the ordinary high
water mark of the river.
SECTION 11.8 - Use of Pesticides, Herbicides and Fertilizers
The use, application or other utilization
herbicides and fertilizers is prohibited.
of
pesticides,
ARTICLE XII
Airport Overlay Zone District OZ-1
SECTION 12.1 -
Area Affected
Every parcel of land which lies in whole or in part within the
Airport Overlay Zone as depicted on the Official Zoning Map is subject
to the regulations of this Overlay Zone OZ-1 to the extent the parcel
lies within this Overlay Zone OZ-1. The regulations of this Overlay
Zone OZ-1 are in addition to any regulations in the underlying Land
Use Districts• however these regulations supersede all conflicting
regulations of the underlying Land Use District to the extent of such
conflict but no further.
SECTION 12.2 - Height Limitations
No person shall erect any building or structure or permit any
tree to grow to a height in excess of 25 feet.
SECTION 12.3 - Unlawful Land Uses
It shall be unlawful to put any parcel within the area affected
by this Overlay Zone OZ-1 to any use which would:
A.
Create electrical interference with radio communication
between the airport and aircraft or create interference with
navigational aids employed by the airport or by aircraft;
B.
Make it difficult for aircraft pilots to discinguish between
airport lights and other lights or result in glare in the
eyes of aircraft pilots using the airport;
C.
Create air pollution in such amounts as to impair the
visibility of aircraft pilots in the use of the airport;
D.
Would endanger the landing, taking off or maneuvering of
aircraft;
E.
Be noise sensitive to aircraft noise while taxing, taking
off and/or landing.
F.
Attract birds.
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�G.
Would otherwise create an airport hazard.
SECTION 12.4 - Conflicting Federal or State Regulations
The regulations of this Overlay Zone OZ-1 are not intended to
conflict with existing or future approach protection regulations
promulgated by the United States, the State of Michigan or any
agencies thereof, including but not limited to the giving of notice of
any construction, erection or alteration of a building or structure
that:
A.
Would be more than 149 feet above ground level at its site;
B.
Would be above an imaginary surface extending outwards and
upwards at 100: 1 slope within 20,000 feet of the nearest
point of an airport runway more than 3200 feet in length; or
C.
Would be above an imaginary surface extending outward and
upward at 50:1 slope within 10,000 feet of the nearest point
of an airport runway less than 3200 feet in length.
ARTICLE XIII
High Risk Erosion Overlay Zone, District OZ-2
SECTION 13.1 - Purpose
The purpose of this Article is to prevent the placement of
structures in areas of high risk erosion consistent with the
Sho~elands Protection and Management Act of 1970, P.A. 245 of 1970, as
amended. In addition to the purposes set forth in Sections 1. 2 and
3.6, it is the purpose of this Article to:
A.
Establish a minimum setback line fo~ principal structures
from an eroding bluff which, based on the erosion studies prepared by
the Department of Natural Resources pursuant to the Shoielands Protection and Management Act, P.A. 245 of 1970, as amended, is designed
to provide a minimum of thirty (30) years protection from shoreland
erosion.
B.
Minimize the economic hardships which individuals and the
Township of Manistee may face in the case of unanticipated property
loss due to severe erosion.
C. The standards and requirements contained in this Article and
the Official Zoning Map are intended to further the purposes of the
Shorelands Protection and Management Act, P.A. 245 of 1970, as amended.
SECTION 13.2 - Area Affected
The boundaries of those stretches of shoreland affected by the
High Risk Erosion Overlay Zone District OZ-2, shall be consistent with
the affected properties described in Section 13.3 of this Article and
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�this area extends landward from the ordinary high water mark to the
minimum setback line for principal structures.
For the purpose of
this Overlay Zone District OZ-2, the minimum setback requirement shall
be measured from the bluffline and shall be construed as running
parallel to the bluffline.
In the event the bluffline recedes (moves
landward), the setback line of the high risk erosion area shall also
be construed as to have moved landward a distance equal to the
bluffline recession.
SECTION 13.3 -
Boundaries of High Risk Erosion Areas
The end points of the High Risk Erosion Areas provided below
coincide with descriptions provided in the shoreland erosion studies
of the Department of Natural Resources, and are as follows:
A. High Risk Erosion Area A.
(1)
The north end of Area A lies at the northern boundary
of the Township at the intersection of Section 32, T23N,
Rl6W, and Section 5, T22N, Rl6W, and the shoreline.
(2) The south end of Area A lies at the northern border of
Orchard Beach State Park, 2,800 feet south of the intersection of Sections 24 and 25, T22N, Rl7W,
and the
shoreline.
B.
High Risk Erosion Area B.
(1)
The north end of Area B lies at the intersection of
Sections 25 and 36, T22N, Rl7W, and the shoreline.
(2)
The south end of Area B lies 2,150 feet north of the
intersection of Section 2, T21N, Rl7W, and Section 35, T22N,
Rl7W and the shoreline.
SECTION 13.4 - Schedule of Regulations
Within the boundaries of the High Risk Erosion Areas established
by this Article, no principal structure shall be located between the
ordinary high water mark and the line defining the minimum setback
distance indicated on · the table below.
The setback requirement
provided for in this Section shall be measured in a landward direction
horizontal from and perpendicular to the bluff line.
For e a ch High
Risk Erosion Area described in Section 13.3, the minimum setback for
any principal structure shall be as follows
Designated High Risk
Erosion Area
Minimum Setback Requirement
from Bluffline
Area A
Area B
55 feet
35 feet
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�SECTION 13.5 - Accessory Structures
Accessory structures which can be easily and economically removed
prior to erosion damage are exempted from the principal s true ture
setback requirements of the High Risk Erosion Overlay Zone, except
that no accessory structures which are permanent in either construction or location may be placed in the High Risk Erosion areas.
To the fullest extent practical, permitted accessory structures which
are placed in high risk erosion areas shall be removed prior to
erosion damage.
SECTION 13.6 - Disclaimer of Liability
The provisions of this Article are considered the minimum necessary for reducing erosion hazards and property loss for a 3O-year
period based upon current engineering and scientific methods of study.
Faster or slower rates of erosion occur.
Erosion rates may be increased by natural causes such as high lake levels or major storms or
man-made causes such as the construction of erosion control devises or
by increasing the amount of runoff from the land. Placing a structure
landward of the minimum setbacks established by this Article is not a
guarantee or warranty of safety from erosion damage.
Individual
property owners concerned with erosion hazards are encouraged to
consult with local building officials and personnel of the Department
of Natural Resources to arrive at site design plans which may use a
greater setback to maximize protection from erosion damage.
ARTICLE XIV
General Provisions
SECTION 14.1 - Compliance with County Sanitary Code
Every structure or device hereinafter ere~ted or ~oved upon any
premises and used, designed or intended for human habitation shall
conform to the requirements of the Manistee-Mason County Sanitary
Code, as amended.
No land use permit shall be issued by the Zoning
Administrator, the Zoning Board of Appeals, or the Township Zoning
Board for such use until the Sanitary Code permit has been issued.
SECTION 14.2 - Essential Public Services
The erection, construction, alteration, or maintenance by public
utilities or municipal departments or commissions of overhead or
underground gas, electrical, or water distribution or transmission
systems, collection, communication, supply, disposal or sewer systems,
including mains, drains, sewers, wires cables, traffic signals,
hydrants,
towers,
poles,
electrical substations,
gas regulation
stations, and similar equipment and accessories in connection therewith reasonably necessary for furnishing adequate service by such
public utility or municipal department or commission or for the public
health or safety or general welfare, shall be permitted as authorized
or regulated by law or other ordinances of the Township, in any land
use district, it being the intention hereof to exempt such erection,
construction, alteration and maintenance from the application of this
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�Ordinance; provided, that the erection or construction of any or all
new above-grade construction is designed and erected to conform
harmoniously with the general architecture and plan of such district
in which it is be located; and provi<led, further, that no towers for
the transmission and/or receiving of micro-wave radiation shall be
erected in any residential district R-1, R-2, R-3 or R-4; and provided
further that any and all new construction above or below ground in the
Airport Overlay Zone District OZ-1 complies with the provisions of
that District OZ-1.
SECTION 14.3 - Advertising Signs
A.
Advertising signs, billboards, advertising displays, outdoor
displays and other advertising media may be permitted within a front
yard area in the Restricted Commercial CR-1, Commercial C-1, and
Multiple Use M-1, Land Use Districts, provided that they comply with
the following conditions:
B.
1.
The advertising sign or display complies with
statutes and regulations of the State of Michigan.
all
2.
The advertising sign or display shall not be more than
two hundred fifty (250) square feet in area and dimensions not greater than ten (10) feet in height and
twenty-five (25) feet in width. Such signs or displays
shall not be erected within five hundred (500) feet of
any dwelling existing at the time said sign or display
is erected or moved to such location, provided such
dwelling is used exclusively for residential purposes
and, provided further, should a dwelling be erected at
any time within the five hundred (500) feet limitation,
the permit shall be revoked and the owner of the sign,
or his authorized agent, shall be notified of the
revocation and such sign shall then be r _emoved within
ninety (90) days.
3.
The advertising sign or display, except directional
signs within one hundred (100) feet of intersections,
shall not be erected within three hundred (300) feet of
an existing sign or display.
4.
The advertising sign or display shall not be less than
fifty (50) feet from the highway right-of-way line
measured by a line perpendicular to the highway rightof-way line.
The provisions of Section 14.3A shall not apply to the
following signs which may be placed in any Land Use
District appropriate to the signs authorized herein, under
the regulations specified.
1.
Temporary sale, lease or rent signs, provided:
(a) No more than two (2) signs are displayed.
(b) Such signs are located on the lot or structure for
sale, lease or rent.
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�(c)
(d)
Such sign does not contain an area of more than
ten (10) square feet.
Such sign is removed following the sale, renting
or leasing of the property.
2.
Temporary signs on residential premises, provided:
(a) Such temporary signs (non-illuminated) shall be
limited to the lease, hire, or sale of the building or premises, and provided further that such
signs shall be removed as soon as the premises are
leased, hired or sold.
(b) Such signs shall not exceed six (6) square feet in
area and shall not be located on the front half of
the required front yard as measured from the front
lot line or right-of-way.
3.
Bulletin boards of churches, schools, libraries, and
public buildings, provided:
(a) Such bulletin board is located on the premises
thereof.
(b) Such board is not located as to obstruct the view
of traffic from the sidewalks, driveways, roadways
and adjoining property.
4.
Roadside stands, agricultural displays and other sales
stands, provided:
(a) Such display is located on a farm and limited to
the sale of the products thereof.
(b) Such display or stand is temporary and will not be
located for more than six (6) consecutive months
of any one (1) year.
(c) Such displays or stand is located at least twentyfive (25) feet from the highway right-of-way line.
(d) A parking area is available for prospective
customers off the highway right-of-way· line.
5.
Advertising signs and displays of a commercial enterprise, business, industry or professional person, but
not inciuding home occupations, provided:
(a) Such sign is located on the premises or adjacent
premises rented or leased for such purpose.
(b) Such sign or display is limited to the products or
services of the enterprise.
(c) Such sign does not obstruct the view of traffic
from the sidewalks, roadway, driveways or exits
and adjoining property.
(d) The operation of such sign does not constitute a
nuisance to an adjacent residential district or
residential neighborhood, by reason of glare,
intermittent action, or other action.
6.
Signs which support or oppose a candidate for public
office or a ballot proposal, provided:
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I
I
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I
The candidate for public office or ballot
proposal is included on the official ballot for
the next upcoming general or special election,
including primary elections.
(b)
Such signs do not obstruct the views of traffic
from the sidewalks, roadway, driveways or exits of
adjoining property.
(c)
c.
All of such signs are removed within thirty (30)
days of the election at which the candidate for
public office or ballot proposal is finally
determined.
Sign Approval:
Advertising signs, billboards, advertising display, outdoor
displays, and other advertising may be erected and maintained
within the Township by first obtaining a Land Use permit therefor
from the Zoning Administrator who shall, pursuant to Section
16.1, grant approval for any advertising media which conforms to
the provisions of this Section.
Such approval shall be for an
initial period of one (1) year and may be extended thereafter by
the Zoning Administrator upon the payment of an annual fee.
The
fee for the permit shall be set by resolution of the Township
Board.
Any state or federal regulations to the contrary shall
supercede any determination or rules of the Zoning Administrator
concerning signs , and any contrary provision of this Ordinance.
D.
I
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I
(a)
Sign Restrictions:
1. No advertising signs, billboards, advertising displays,
outdoor displays or other advertising media shall be placed or
illuminated in such a fashion as to create a traffic hazard or
reduce the effectiveness or visibility o_f highway . directional
signs or other signs or equipment erected or placed by the
Department of Transportation or the Manistee County Road Commission in furtherance of highway safety.
2. No advertising signs, billboards, advertising displays,
outdoor displays or other advertising media containing fifty (50)
square feet or more shall be stacked on top of or placed over or
under another such sign or display, whether or not such sign or
display is already in existence.
SECTION 14.4 - Height
No building or structure or part thereof shall be erected or
altered to a height exceeding two and one-half (2½) stories, or
thirty-five (35) feet, except that non-dwelling buildings or structures other than accessory buildings or structures, may be erected or
altered to a height not exceeding fifty (50) feet if approved by the
Zoning Board of Appeals, pursuant to its power to grant variances, or
the Township Zonin g Board in connection with
the issuance of a
special use permit pursuant to Section 16.2, provided that such
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�approval shall be granted only if the building or structure has
built-in fire fighting systems on its upper floors and has alternate
power and water delivery capabilities during a fire.
SECTION 14.5 - Temporary Dwellings
No person shall use or permit the use of any temporary dwelling
or trailer as defined in this Ordinance as a principal or seasonal
dwelling except after full compliance with Section 14 .1 Compliance
with County Sanitary Code, and further except:
A.
As a temporary dwelling quarters during the construction and
installation of any dwelling conforming to the provisions of
this Ordinance, when the following conditions are met:
1.
2.
3.
4.
The location of the temporary dwelling shall comply
with all setback requirements of this Ordinance.
The physical condition of the temporary dwelling shall
not deteriorate to the extent that its continued use
threatens the public health, safety or welfare.
The
temporary dewelling shall be deemed contrary to the
public health, safety or welfare if it fails to comply
at any time with any provision of the Manistee-Mason
District Sanitary Code or any applicable building or
fire code.
The use of the temporary dwelling shall be limited to
four (4) months, beginning with the issuance of a land
use permit in accordance with Section 16.1. The permit
may be renewed for not more than two (2) months upon
approval of the Zoning Administrator for good cause
shown.
"Good cause" shall be limited to reasonable
delays in the construction of the permanent dwelling
beyond the control of the owner such as unavailability
of materials, labor strikes, inc~ement weather or fire.
A county building permit shall be required for the
temporary dwelling prior to the installation and use of
the temporary dwelling.
B.
As part of a campground licensed and operated in accordance
with the rules and regulations of the Michigan Department of
Public Health.
C.
As temporary recreation on a non-commercial/no-rental basis
by tourists, campers and sportsmen on public land where such
activity is allowed by state or federal regulations or land
owned by the user and for a period not to exceed four (4)
weeks in a calendar year.
SECTION 14.6 - Mobile Homes
No person shall use, occupy or permit the use or occupancy of a
mobile home as a dwelling within any land use district within the
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�Township and not located in a licensed mobile home park,
hereinafter provided:
A.
It complies with the minimum square footage requirements of
this ordinance for the land use district in which it is
located.
B.
It has a minimum width across any front, side or rear
elevation of 12 feet.
c.
It is firmly attached to a permanent foundation constructed
on the site in accordance with the Michigan State Construction Code and shall have a wall in the same perimeter
dimensions of the dwelling and constructed of such materials
and type as required in the applicable building code for
single family dwellings.
In addition, it shall be installed
pursuant to the manufacturer's set up instructions and shall
be secured to the premises by an anchoring system or device
complying with the rules and regulations of the Michigan
Mobile Home Commission.
D.
Each mobile home shall be installed with the wheels removed
and shall not have any exposed towing mechanism, undercarriage or chassis.
E.
It shall be connected to a public sewer and water supply or
to such private facilities as are approved by the local
Health Department.
F.
The mobile home shall contain no additions or rooms or other
areas which are not constructed with similar quality workmanship as the original structure including permanent
attachment to the principal structure and construction of a
foundation as required herein.
G.
The mobile home shall comply in all respects with (1) the
Michigan State Construction Code as promulgated by the
Michigan State Construction Code Commission under the
provisions of . Act 230 of the Public Acts of 1972, as Amended, or (2) the "mobile home construction and safety standards" as promulgated by the United States Department of
Housing and Urban Development (HUD) under the provisions of
24 CFR 3280, and as from time to time such standards may be
amended.
Additionally, all mobile homes shall meet or
exceed all applicable roof snow load and strength requirements.
Compliance with the applicable codes shall be shown
prior to the issuance of a land use or special use permit by
a certificate or affidavit of inspection by a certified or
licensed building inspector in the case of the Michigan
State Construction Code or by a HUD seal affixed to the
mobile home in the case of the "mobile home construction and
safety standards".
If a mobile home is required by law to
comply with the aforementioned federal standards then such
standards shall apply.
I
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,.
,
r
except as
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�H.
The foregoing standards shall not apply to a mobile home
located in a licensed mobile home park except to the extent
required by State or Federal Law or otherwise specifically
required in this ordinance pertaining to such parks.
I.
All construction required by this section shall be commenced
only after a building permit has been obtained in accordance
with the applicable construction code provisions and requirements.
SECTION 14.7 - Vehicular Parking Space, Access and Lighting
'
A.
For each dwelling, commercial, industrial, manufacturing,
retail or service business or establishment hereafter erected or
altered and located on a public road in any land use district, including buildings and structures used principally as a place of public
assembly, there shall be provided and maintained suitable space off
the public right-of-way which is adequate for the parking or loading
of motor vehicles in the proportions shown as follows.
The parking
spaces called for hereunder shall be considered minimum requirements
under this Ordinance.
1.
Dwellings: Two (2) parking spaces for each family unit
occupying the premises or for which the dwelling was
designed.
2.
Motels, Hotels and Similar Establishments Offering
Lodging:
One (1) parking space for every three (3)
spaces of legal sleeping capacity.
3.
Hospitals, Rest Homes, Convalescent Homes and
Institutions -of a Similar Nature:
One (1) parking
space for each four (4) beds, plus one ( 1) space for
each doctor.
4.
Theaters, Churches, Auditoriums, Public and Private
Halls, Amusement and Recreation Establishments, and all
Places of Public Assembly:
One ._ (1) park_ing space for
each four (4) seats of legal capacity.
5.
Offices and Professional Buildings: One (1) parking
space for every two hundred (200) square feet of floor
area;
provided, however, that doctors' offices and
clinics · shall be provided with three (3) spaces for
each doctor.
6.
Restaurants and Other Public Food Service
Establishments:
One (1) parking space for each three
(3) seats of legal capacity.
7.
Retail Stores and Shops: One (1) parking space for
each one hundred (100) square feet of floor area.
8.
Personal Service Shops, including Barber or Beauty
Shops:
One (1) parking space for each two hundred
(200) square feet of floor area.
9.
Taverns: One (1) parking space for every sixty-six
(66) square feet of floor area.
B.
In addition to the above requirements, parking space in the
proportion of one (1) space for every two (2) persons employed at the
establishment shall be provided.
Where no specific requirement is
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�designated for other business, parking space which is adequate according to the above standards shall be provided for employees and patrons.
C.
A parking space shall be a minimum area of 10 feet by 20
feet, with center and cross aisles being a minimum of 20 feet wide.
D.
All parking space required in this Section, except that
required for a dwelling, shall be provided with adequate artificial
lighting between the time from one-half ( D hour after sunset, to
one-half (¼) hour before sunrise, when the non-dwelling establishment
is open to the public.
E.
Approval for location of all exits and entrances shall be
obtained from the State Highway Department for all state trunkline
highways and from the County Road Commission for all other roads,
streets or highways in the Township. Such approval shall also include
the design and construction thereof in the interests of safety,
adequate drainage and other public requirements.
SECTION 14.8 - Waste Accumulation and Outside Storage
I
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It shall be unlawful for any person to accumulate rubbish or
waste materials of any kind on any land in Manistee Township except in
a permitted junk yard or licensed sanitary landfill. No sewage, waste
water or water containing foreign substances shall be deposited or
drained into any open ditch, creek, stream, lake, pond, or other body
of water unless the same has first been approved by state and county
heal th authorities.
The provisions of this Section shall not be
deemed to prohibit the temporary storing or spreading of manure,
fertilizers, or other soil conditioners as part of a permitted farm,
forestry or home garden or lawn operations.
SECTION 14.9 - Access to Public Roads
In all land use districts every use, building or structure
established after the effective date of this Ordinance shall be on a
parcel which adjoins a public or private easement for access to a
public road, such public road right-of-way or public or private
easement to be at least sixty-six (66) feet in width unless a lesser
width was duly established of record prior to the effective date of
this Ordinance.
SECTION 14.10 - Private Roads
'
,
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Every private road which provides or may provide access to and
from a public road for two (2) or more dwelling units or principal
buildings shall meet the following conditions:
A.
Be constructed in a good and workmanlike manner upon and
parallel to the centerline of an easement which is duly established of
record and which is not less than sixty-six (66) feet in width.
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�B.
Be constructed so as to sufficiently control storm water
runoff and permit effective storm water drainage by such means as cwo
foot deep ditches constructed parallel to and on either sid~ uf the
road, by sloping the sides of the road from the center thereof, or by
other effective methods.
C.
Have a sand and gravel base of not less that eighteen ( 18)
inches in depth of which not less that the top six (6) inches in depth
shall be only process road gravel.
D.
Have a road bed not less than twenty (20) feet wide.
E.
Be constructed over adequate culverts where necessary
ensure the continuance of existing storm or water flow courses.
F.
Other standards as may be adopted by
Road Commission.
to
the Manistee County
SECTION 14.11 - Traffic Visibility at Corners
On parcels of land that border two or more intersecting roads or
streets no vehicle shall be parked, and no fence, hedge, planting of
shrubs or any similar structures over thirty (30) inches in height
above the elevation of the nearest road surface, shall be located,
erected or maintained, within a distance of forty (40) feet from the
point of intersection of the front lot line and the side lot line
adjacent to the intersecting roads or streets.
SECTION 14.12 - Bulk Regulations
A.
The maintenance of setback, floor area, yard, greenbelt, and
parcel area requirements for one (1) use, parcel, building
or structure shall be a continuing obligation of the owner
of such building or structure or of the parcel on which such
use, building or structure is locateu.
No setback, floor
area, yard, greenbelt or parcel area allocated to or
required about or in connection with one parcel, use,
building or structure may be allocated to any other parcel,
use, building .or structure.
B.
The setback and yard requirements established by this
Ordinance shall apply uniformly in each land use district to
every parcel, building or structure except that any of the
following may be located anywhere on any parcel except as
otherwise expressly prohibited by this Ordinance:
erosion
control devices, trees, plants, shrubs, hedges and fences,
subject to the requirements of Section 4.SOC.
C.
No more than one (1) principal building with accessory
buildings and structures shall be erected on any lot or
parcel of land unless such parcel of land is held in single
ownership and is used for multiple family dwellings, mobile
home parks, or for agricultural, commercial, or manufacturing purposes.
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�SECTION 14.13 - Location of Accessory Buildings and Structures
All accessory buildings and structures shall be in the side yard
or rear yard, except when built as part of the main building and
except in land use districts where land abuts a body of water, in
which case accessory structures and buildings necessary for the
enjoyment of the water, such as boathouses, docks, and erosion control
dt:!vices, may be placed in the waterfront yard and within the waterfront setback line. An accessory building attached to the principal
building shall be made structurally a part thereof, and shall comply
in all respects with the requirements applicable to the principal
building.
An accessory building and s true ture, unless at cached and
made a part of the principal building, shall not be closer than ten
(10) feet to the principal building, and shall meet all setback
requirements of the land use district in which it is to be erected,
moved, altered or used unless otherwise expressly provided in this
Ordinance.
SECTION 14.14 - Other General Provisions
No parcel, building or structure in any land use district shall
be used or occupied in any manner which creates any dangerous, injurious, noxious or otherwise objectionable element or condition and which
adversely affects the surrounding area or adjoining parcels provided
that any use permitted by this Ordinance may be undertaken and maintained if acceptable measures and safeguards are employed to limit
dangerous and objectionable elements to acceptable limits as established by the following performance requirements:
A.
Any activity involving the use or storage of flammable or
explosive materials shall be protected by adequate fire-fighting and
fire suppression equipment and by such safety devices as are normally
used in the handling of any such material. Such hazards shall be kept
removed from adjacent activities by a distance._ which i _s _compatible
with the potential danger involved or as required by _applicable
provisions of the State Construction Code and rules promulgated
thereunder and/or the State Fire Marshal.
B.
No activity shall emit dangerous radioactivity at any point,
or electrical disturbances adversely affecting the operation of any
equipment at any point other than that of the creator of such disturbance.
C.
No vibration shall be permitted which is discernible without
instruments on any adjoining lot or parcel.
D.
No malodorous gas or matter shall be permitted which is
offensive or which produces a public nuisance or hazard on any adjoining lot or parcel.
E.
No pollution of air by fly-ash, dust, vapors, or other
substances shall be permitted in excess of applicable state or federal
air pollution statutes or regulations promulgated by rule thereunder.
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F.
No direct or reflected glare shall be permitted which is
visible from any neighboring parcel or from any public street, road or
highway.
G.
Pollution of water shall be subject to such requirements and
regulations established by state, county or federal water pollution
statutes or regulations promulgated by rule thereunder.
H.
Audible noise shall be subject to such requirements and
regulations as are established by the Manistee County Noise Ordinance,
as amended.
SECTION 14.15 - Additional Residential District Regulations
A.
Scope The regulations set forth in this section shall apply
to all residential districts (R-1, R-2, R-3, R-4) unless otherwise
stated or unless they are clearly inapplicable in the context.
B. Driveways: All buildings and structures shall provide access
to an adjoining highway, street or road by means of a driveway not
less than sixteen (16) feet in width and unobstructed by bordering
trees or other natural growth.
C.
Fences:
Fences not exceeding six (6) feet in height may be
constructed on any portion of a parcel except that portion of a front
yard between the actual front line of the main dwelling unit and the
front lot line of the lot.
For any fence in excess of six (6) feet,
the side yard setback requirements shall apply. Fences located in the
front yard portion of a lot shall be limited to a height of four (4)
feet and be of a decorative type.
D. Satellite Receiving Dishes and Antennas:
1.
No satellite receiving dishes or television or radio
antennas shall be located in a front yard.
2.
All satellite receiving dishes and television or radio
antennas larger than 24" in diameter at the widest point or television
or radio antennas more than 10 feet in height _shall be permanently
affixed to the ground by means of a suitable concrete foundation and
capable of withstanding sustained winds of not less than forty (40)
miles per hour.
In the event the United States, the State of Michigan
or other governmental agency having jurisdiction thereof shall adopt
regulations relating to the means by which satellite receiving dishes
and television and radio antennas are to be affixed to the ground
which are more stringent than those set forth herein, then those regulations shall apply.
3.
In determining the height of a television or radio
antenna, the tower or other supporting structure shall be included in
the measurement.
ARTICLE XV
Non-Conforming Uses, Buildings and Structures
SECTION 15.1 - Continuance
The lawful use of any parcel of land, bu i lding or structure
existing at the time of the enactment of this Ordinance or, in the
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�case of an Amendment of this Ordinance, then at the time of such
Amendment, although it does not conform with the provisions thereof,
may be continued as hereinafter provided.
SECTION 15.2 - Involuntary Destruction
I
I
I
I
I
I
I
I
I
A.
No building or structure damaged by fire or other causes to
the extent of more than seventy-five (75%) percent of its appraised
value shall be repaired or rebuilt except in conformity with the
provision of this Ordinance. Such reconstruction, repair or restoration shall be diligently pursued and, in all cases, commenced within
one (1) year following the damage. Resumption of use shall take place
within ninety (90) days of completion of such reconstruction, repair
or restoration.
"Appraised value" shall mean the value established
pursuant to Section 15.4B.
B.
In the event of an involuntary destruction of any structure
located within the Township in excess of the percentage amount stated
in this Section, the property owner shall within thirty days remove
all rubble, debris or portions of that structure which shall constitute a hazard to the public health, safety or welfare as determined by
the Zoning Administrator.
In the event any open basement or excavation shall exist following an involuntary destruction, the owner
shall within thirty (30) days fill in such open basement or excavation
unless reconstruction is commenced in the thirty (30) day period
following the involuntary destruction.
SECTION 15.3 - Discontinuance
Any non-conforming use, building or structure which has not
been occupied or which has not been used for such non-conforming
purposes for a period of one (1) year or more shall not thereafter be
used or occupied unless it conforms to the provisions .of this Ordinance.
SECTION 15.4 - Extension
A.
A non-conforming building or structure may not be extended,
reconstructed or structurally altered during its life to an extent in
aggregate cost of more than fifty (50%) percent of its appraised
value, unless the building or structure conforms to the provisions of
this Ordinance.
r,
B.
As used in this Article, "appraised value" shall be determined as of the time of the first extension, reconstruction or
structural alteration.
"Appraised value" shall be determined to be
two time (2X) the state equalized value of the non-conforming building
or structure exclusive of land value as determined by reference to the
latest ad valorem property tax bill or Township tax appraisal records.
C. Nothing contained in this Section 15.4 shall be construed as
prohibiting the construction of a detached accessory building or
structure which is accessory to a non-conforming single-family
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�dwelling provided the detached accessory building or structure meets
all requirements of this Section 15.4 and this Ordinance.
D.
No non-conforming use shall be extended lakeward of the
setback requirements established in the High Risk Erosion Overlay
Zone, District OZ-2.
SECTION 15.5 - Substitution
A.
For the purpose of this Section, the permitted uses in the
Land Use Districts R-1 through C-1 shall be considered in the ascending order set forth in Section 3.1 as higher uses with District R-1
containing the highest uses and District C-1 containing the least
highest uses.
B.
With the approval of the Zoning Administrator, a nonconforming use, building or structure may be replaced by or substituted with a higher use, even though such replacement or substitution
does not change the non-conforming status of such use, building or
structure in the land use district in which it is located.
SECTION 15.6 - Condemnation
Nothing contained in this Article shall be construed as preventing Manistee Township from exercising its powers of eminent domain or
condemnation, granted by Act 184 of the Public Acts of 1943, as
amended, or other applicable laws, with respect to non-conforming
uses, buildings, and structures.
ARTICLE XVI
Permits
SECTION 16.l - Land Use Permits
A.
No land shall be occupied or used and no building or structure shall hereafter b~ erected, altered or relocated under the provisions of this Section until a permit authorizing the same shall be
issued by the Zoning Administrator.
B.
The Zoning Administrator shall require in all cases that
plans, specifications and drawings showing the location, design and
size of the proposed land use and the buildings and structures to be
located thereon shall be filed with the Application for permit. The
Zoning Administrator may also require the following information and
such other information as he deems necessary to act on the application
for permit:
1.
2.
The legal seating and/or sleeping capacity of all
buildings and structures, if applicable.
A concise statement of all operations and uses which
will be conducted on the land and buildings.
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�3.
4.
A concise statement of the services, if any, to be offered to the public, if applicable.
Any other information required by this Ordinance.
C.
No permit shall be issued under this Section for any use
which fails to conform to any relevant provision of Article XIV or
which fails to conform to any minimum . requirement established for the
land use district in which the proposed use is to be located, or which
fails to conform to any standard set forth in the definition of tr.e
proposed use, as defined in this Ordinance.
D.
No new use shall be established or excavation or construction begun before such permit is issued, and a copy posted in a
prominent position on the building site.
E.
No permit or fee is needed under this Section for the
following activities provided the same comply in all other respects
with the terms and conditions of this Ordinance:
1.
Exterior or interior repair and improvement which does
not structurally alter the premises or change the
exterior shape or form of any building in any manner.
2.
Relocation or replacement of machinery or equipment
within a building located in the Commercial, Restricted
Commercial or Industrial Districts C-1, CR-1, and 1-1,
conforming to the provisions of this Ordinance and used
for commercial or industrial purposes, nor for any
modification to such building in connection with said
relocation or replacement, unless said modification
structurally alters the premises or changes the exterior shape or form in any manner.
3.
Household pet shelters, such as dog houses.
4.
Treehouses, dollhouses, forts and other structures used
by children for play.
5.
Agricultural uses, except buildings or structures.
6.
Timber harvesting.
·
7.
Hedges, lawns, gardens, trees, plants, and shrubs.
F.
A permit issued under this Section is void if the use is not
commenced within one (1) year. A renewal may be granted by the Zoning
Administrator after a restudy of the permit at no cost to the applicant.
G.
A violation of any condition or specification in a permit
issued under this Section shall void the permit.
H.
Any improper or incorrect information contained in the
application for permit issued under this Section shall void the permit
ab initio and until properly corrected upon the permit application;
provided that, as corrected, the applicant continues to meet all
requirements for a permit.
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I.
A non-refundable fee shall accompany each application for a
permit under this Section. The fee shall be as established from time
to time by the Manistee Township Board.
SECTION 16.2 - Special Use Permits
A.
Introduction:
No land shall be occupied or used and no building or structure
shall hereafter be erected, altered or relocated under the provisions
of this Section until a permit authorizing the same shall be issued by
the Township Zoning Board following an application for review and
approval pursuant to the requirements of this Section.
B.
Application:
(1) An application for the occupation or use of lands or for the
erection, alteration or relocation of any building or structure shall
be made in writing to the Township Zoning Administrator and, in
addition to the fee to accompany the site plan, shall be accompanied
by the payment of a non-refundable fee set by the Township Board to
cover the cost of processing the.application.
(2)
No application for a special use permit shall be submitted
to the Township Zoning Board for review and approval until a site plan
therefore has been reviewed for completeness and accuracy by the
Township Zoning Administrator. To accomplish this purpose, the Zoning
Administrator may request assistance from other governmental agencies
or any educational institution.
C.
Authority to Grant Permits:
(1)
The Township Zoning Board may deny, approve or approve with
conditions the request for special land use approval. ~ny conditions
imposed shall be in accordance with the requirements of the Township
Rural Zoning Act, Act 184 of the Public Acts of 1943, as amended.
(2)
In the case of a special use permit for mining on a regular
basis, the permit shali be for an initial term of not more than five
years and the applicant shall commence significant development of
mining operations within two years of the date of issuance of the permit.
In the case of a special use permit for mining on a temporary
basis, the permit shall be for an initial term of not more than six
months and, subject to the requirements of Section 16.2F, the Zoning
Board may extend the effectiveness of a temporary permit for an additional six month period upon request of the applicant.
(3)
Upon disapproval of the application, the Zoning Board shall
notify the applicant in writing stating the reasons for disapproval as
well as the necessary action, if any, that the applicant may take to
complete the application in an acceptable form.
No application which
has been denied, in whole or in part, may be resubmitted for six
months from the date of denial, except for new evidence, change of
conditions, or other such reason as the Zoning Board may accept.
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D.
Site Plans:
1.
The
clude:
(a)
(b)
(c)
(d)
(e)
(f)
(g)
(h)
(i)
(j)
(k)
(1)
site
plan required under
this
Section
shall
in-
Plans, specifications and drawings showing the
location, design and size of the proposed land use
and the buildings and structures to be located
thereon; all abutting roads and streets; and the
location of all existing structures.
The legal seating and/or sleeping capacity of all
buildings and structures.
A concise statement of all operations and uses
which will be conducted on the land and buildings.
A concise statement of all services, if any, to be
offered to the public.
Information concerning the intensity of use,
including hours and times of operation and use,
and the density of population which will occupy
and use the premises.
Information concerning the generation of traffic
and traffic movements.
Information concerning the requirements of the
special land use for public services and utilities, including the number of sewer hook-ups,
generation and disposal of solid and liquid waste,
and the amount of fresh water to be consumed.
The amount of soil, dirt, sand or gravel to be
excavated and removed from the site, or the amount
and composition of all fill to be placed on the
site.
The applicant's name and address in full and the
principal offices and resident agent of the
business if other than a so._le proprietor; a statement that the applicant is the owner of the land
involved in the application or is acting on the
owner's behalf; and the address and legal description of the land involved in the application.
The names and addresses of all owners of property
which is assessed within 300 feet of the boundary
of the property involved in the application, and
the names of all occupants of all structures
within 300 feet of the boundary of the property
involved in the application.
Information showing all set-back distances for
proposed structures from the front, side and rear
lot lines, rivers, lakes, streams, or other bodies
of water.
For special uses in the Ag-Forest Preservation
District AP-1 and Multiple Use District M-1:
(1) Location of past and present mining and land
areas held for future extraction by operators.
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(2)
(m)
The presence, location, extent and quality of
potentially valuable mineral deposits both
known and inferred.
For a special use permit for mining on a regular
basis, the following additional information:
(1) A map and/or aerial photograph of the property which shall indicate:
(a) Boundaries of the affected and adjacent
lands;
(b) Surface drainage of the affected land;
(c) Location and names of all streams,
roads, railroads, utility lines, and
pipelines on or immediately adjacent to
the area;
(d) Location of all structures within one
thousand feet of the outer perimeter of
the area, present owners and occupants
of such structures, and purposes for
which each structure is used;
(e) Proposed location, aerial extent, and
depth of intended mine excavation;
(f) Proposed location of the mine, waste
dumps, tailing ponds, sediment basins,
stockpiles, structures, roads, railroad
lines, utilities or other permanent or
temporary facilities used in mining.
(g) Estimated depth to groundwater.
(2) A description of the mining and processing
equipment to be used;
(3) A description of measures to be taken to
control noise and vibrations from the operation;
(4) A description of measures to be taken to
screen the operation f~om view; _ .
(5) Proposed primary travel routes to be used to
transport the mined material to processing
plants or markets away from the property;
(6) A description of the plans
for
topsoil
storage;
(7) A reclamation plan which shall include:
(a) A map or plan and description of the
proposed reclamation including grading,
final slope angles, highwall reduction,
benching and terracing of slopes, slope
reduction, benching and terracing of
slopes, slope stabilization and revegetation where applicable, and erosion
control, and alternative future land
uses;
(b) Description of topsoil stripping and
conservation during storage and replacement;
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�'If
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(c)
(d)
(e)
(f)
(g)
Plan and description of
anticipated
final topography, water impoundments,
and artificial lakes on the property;
Description of plans for disposition of
surface structures, roads, and related
facilities after cessation of mining;
A plan for disposal or treatment of any
harmful or toxic materials found in any
formations penetrated by the mining
operation or produced during the p ocessing of minerals on the affected
land, and of chemicals or materials used
during the mining or processing operations;
The estimated cost of completing the
Reclamation Plan within one (1) year of
cessation of mining operations based on
the anticipated costs for the year in
which the reclamation would take place.
A statement of the proposed form of the
performance guarantee, equal to two (2)
times the estimated cost of the Reclamation Plan, which may be required by the
Zoning Board.
(8)
(n)
(o)
A statement in writing and adequate evidence
to indicate the duration of the lease in
years;
(9) A timetable of the commencement, duration and
cessation of mining operations;
(10) Any and all mining permits held by the applicant within the state;
For a special use permit for ruining on a temporary
basis:
.
(1) As may be required by the Zoning Board, a map
and/or aerial photograph of the land with any
or all of the information as listed in
D(l) (m) (1)
of
this section,
relating to
requirements for maps and/ or aerial photographs for regular mining special use permits;
(2) As may be required by the Zoning Board, any
or all of the information listed in part
D(l)(m)(l) through (10) inclusive of this
section, relating to requirements for information for regular mining special use permits.
For a special use permit for a central production
facility, sweetening plant or bulk storage plant,
the following additional information:
(1) A map and/or aerial photograph of the property which shall indicate:
(a) Boundaries of the proposed project site
(b) Surface drainage of the project site
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(c)
'I
(2)
(3)
(4)
(5)
(6)
(7)
(8)
(9)
Location and names of all streams,
roads,
railroads,
utility lines and
pipelines or on immediately adjacent to
the project site
(d) Location of all buildings and structures
within two thousand six hundred forty
(2,640) feet of the boundary of the
project site
(e) estimated depth to groundwater
A description of the production, sweetening
or storage machinery and equipment to be
used.
A description of the measures to be taken to
control noise, vibrations, and odors from the
operations.
A description of measures to be taken to
screen the project from view.
Proposed
primary
travel
or
transmission
routes to be used to transport the raw
materials to the property and the processed
materials away from the property, including
the proposed location of all pipelines.
A description of the plans for
topsoil
storage if the project will disturb the
topsoil on the property.
A Pollution Incident Prevention Plan which
has been approved by the Michigan Department
of Natural Resources, the fire chief of the
Manistee Township Fire Department, and the
Manistee County Emergency Services Director
and which sets forth in reasonable detail,
the applicant's contingency plans in the
event of fire, plans for the evacuation of
surrounding areas and_ neighborhoods,
the
communication and warnings to be given in the
event of a fire or pollution incident and the
procedure to be followed for periodic updating of such plan in consultation with the
Manistee Township Fire Department and the
Manistee County Emergency Services Department.
In addition, such Plan shall include
all other information required by the Department of Natural Resources or other governmental agencies having jurisdiction over the
project.
A letter showing (a) approval, (b) tentative
approval or (c) an understanding for concurrent approval of the project by the Department of Natural Resources,
the Manistee
County Soil Erosion and Sedimentation Control
Department and any other governmental agency
whose approval is required.
A statement of any changes or modifications
in the project required for approval by any
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governmental
agency
whose
approval
is
required.
(10) A reclamation plan which shall include:
(a) A statement of the maximum life
expectancy of the project and all plant
and
equipment
associated
with
the
project.
(b) Plans for the disassembly, removal, or
other disposition of all plant and
equipment, including pipeline, at the
project
site
at
the
expiration of
operations.
(c) Plans for the replacement of topsoil and
restoration of
the property
to its
original grade and contours.
(d) Plans for the restoration of all access
roads to original condition unless at
the time of reclamation an agreement is
reached among the Township Zoning Board,
the owner/operator of the project and
the affected landowner(s) for some other
disposition.
(e) Plans for the identification, disposal
or treatment of all harmful or toxic
materials found on the property, including any contaminated topsoil.
(f) The estimated cost of completing the
Reclamation Plan within on~ (1) year of
cessation of operations on the property
based on anticipated costs for the year
in which the reclamation would take
place.
(g) A statement of the proposed form of the
performance guarantee, equal to two (2)
times the estimated cost of the Reclamation Plan, which may be required by the
Zoning Board.
2.
3.
4.
The Township Zoning Board as a condition to granting a
special use permit under this Section, may require the
applicant to submit such additional or further information and material, including but not limited to an
environmental assessment study, environmental impact
statement, reclamation plan and/or a fiscal impact
statement as it deems necessary to make an informed
decision on the request for special land use approval.
The site plan, as approved by the Zoning Administrator
and any supplementation required by the Township Zoning
Board under the provisions of this paragraph shall
become a part of the record of approval.
The site plan shall be in writing and accompanied by a
non-refundable fee established by the Manistee Township
Board to cover the cost of processing.
The Zoning Board may vote to waive or modify any
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�5.
requirements for information requested under the terms
of this section.
Unless the Zoning Board votes to waive or modify any
requirements of this section, the application shall not
be accepted or deemed to be accepted unless all the
information required by this section is supplied by the
applicant.
In the case of an incomplete application,
the review and decision on the application shall not
commence and no special use permit shall be issued.
E.
Transmittal to Township Zoning Board:
Upon completion of review of the site plan by the Zoning Administrator, the Zoning Administrator shall transmit the same to the Township Zoning Board:
F. Notice and Hearing:
Within thirty (30) days of receipt of the approved site plan from
the Township Zoning Administrator, the Township Zoning Board shall
give the public notice required by the Township Rural Zoning Act, Act
184 of the Public Acts of 1943, as amended, and thereafter, shall hold
a public hearing in accordance with the Township Rural Zoning Act, Act
184 of the Public Acts of 1943, as amended. The date set for review
of the application for a special land use permit may be either the
date of a regular meeting of the Township Zoning Board or a special
meeting called for the purpose of reviewing the request. The public
hearing may be recessed for a reasonable period of time, as determined
by the Zoning Board if it feels that additional information or study
is needed.
G.
Required Standards:
No permit for a special land use shall be issued for any use,
building or structure which:
1.
fails to conform to any applicable provisions of
Article XIV; or
2.
fails to conform to any minimi:im requirements established for the land use district in which the proposed
special land use is to be located; or
3.
fails to conform to any standard set forth in the
definition of the proposed special land use, as defined
in this Ordinance.
4.
Fails to conform to any standard or requirement of an
applicable overlay zone, Districts OZ-1 and OZ-2.
H.
Required Findings:
The Township Zoning Board shall review the particular facts and
circumstances of each proposed special land use and shall find and
record adequate data, information and evidence, showing that such
proposed use:
will be consistent with and promote the intent and pur1.
pose of this ordinance;
will be designed, constructed, operated, maintained and
2.
managed so as to be compatible with adjacent uses of
land and harmonious and appropriate in appearance with
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�3.
4.
5.
6.
7.
the existing or intended character of the general
vicinity;
will be served adequately by essential public facilities and services such as highways, streets, police
and fire protection, drainage structures, and solid and
liquid waste disposal methods;
will not disrupt the orderly and proper development of
the district as a whole or be in conflict with or
discourage the principle permitted uses of adjacent or
neighboring lands or buildings;
will not unnecessarily diminish land used to meet the
needs of the State's citizens for food, fiber, energy
and use of other natural resources;
will not be more objectionable to nearby properties by
reason of traffic, noise, vibrations, dust, fumes,
smoke, glare, flashing lights or disposal of waste,
than the operation of any principle permitted use.
In the case of a special use permit for mining, whether
on a regular or temporary basis, will result in no very
serious consequences, which may be shown by meeting or
exceeding the standards and requirements listed below,
in addition to the required findings listed above:
(a) That the establishment, maintenance, or
operation of the special use will not
substantially affect the existing use of
adjacent property,
and will not have a
substantially adverse effect on the long-term
future use of the adjacent property;
(b) That the special use shall conform to all
governmental regulations pertaining to the
activity itself;
(c) That the mining operation shall conform to
applicable air and water quality standards;
(d) That the noise, vibration, and dust levels at
the property lines shatl be within the levels
determined by the Zoning Board;
(e) That an undeveloped buffer zone• commencing
not less than 20 feet from the property line
of the mining site or such other distance as
the Zoning Board finds necessary for the protection and safety of adjacent property from
mining, with a stable angle of slope repose
shall be provided along property lines;
(f) Where deemed practicable and necessary by the
Zoning Board• an earth bank or vegetative
screen is erected and/or maintained to screen
the mining operation from view from any
residential district located within one-half
mile of the operation;
(g) Where deemed necessary by the Zoning Board•
the mining operation is enclosed by at least
a single-strand barbed-wire fence, maintained
at all times• with warning signs spaced no
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�more than 200 feet apart to indicate the
presence of a mining area.
(h) That an application shall not be of a speculative nature, nor shall the mining cause
harm to adjacent property;
8.
In the case of a special use permit for a central
production facility,
sweetening plant or bulk storage
facility, the following findings shall be made in addition
to the required findings listed above.
(a) That the central production facility or bulk
storage facility will not be located less
than 600 feet from an existing dwelling,
commercial or ind us trial use, wetlands, or
surface water and a sweetening plant will not
be located less than 1300 feet from any such
uses, wetlands or surface water.
(b) That the proposed project will not be located
less than 2640 feet
from any developed
residential subdivision, multi-family dwelling, mobile home park or other land use with
a dense population.
(c) That upon completion of the project the
density of all central production facilities,
sweetening plants and bulk storage facilities
will not exceed one per square mile section
of land.
(d) The project will not be located within two
miles of another central production facility,
sweetening plant or bulk storage plant and
shall be designed to service all oil and gas
wells that are expected to need such services
over the maximum life expectancy of the
project within a two mile radius of the
proposed project site.
1£ upon a showing by
the applicant that:
(i)
an existing central production
facility, sweetening plant or bulk
storage facility within the same
section of land or within a two mile
radius is being operated at capacity
and cannot be feasibly expanded, or
(ii)
the existing facility cannot be
expanded or modified to accept oil or
gas from the applicant's well, or
(iii) the owners of the existing facility,
after reasonable offers and
negotiations of terms, refuse to share
their facility to service the
applicant's oil or gas wells,
the Zoning Board may waive the
density requirements of this
subsection.
(e) The project, in the case of a central production facility, or bulk storage facility, will
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(g)
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be located on a parcel not less than for (4)
acres in si~e, and in the case of a sweetening plant, will be located on a parcel not
less than ten (10) acres in size; provided,
however, that in all cases,
the minimum
parcel size shall not be less than the
minimum parcel size established for the Land
Use District in which the project is proposed
to be located.
In the case of a central production facility
or sweetening plant, all buildings, plant,
equipment and machinery will be screened from
view from all nearby roads, dwellings and
commercial uses by vegetation or berm, or a
combination of both, placed near or at the
perimeter boundary of the property.
In the case of a bulk storage facility, all
tanks or other storage facilities, pumps and
other equipment are completely enclosed in a
berm.
All lights or other illumination devices will
be shaded and/or screened by the vegetation,
berm and/or by apparatus such that direct
glare is not visible beyond the boundary of
the property.
The project will be made secure to prevent
pedestrians or other unauthorized persons
from gaining access to the property.
All emissions or effluent from the project
will meet or exceed all applicable state and
federal air pollution, surface and groundwater quality standards and all solid or
liquid will be transported by a Michigan
licensed waste hauler _to licensed Type I or
Type II landfill or other approved disposal
site.
Odors from the project will not be detectable
by normal human senses under normal operating
conditions at a distance of 600 feet in the
case of a central production facility or bulk
sales facility and at a distance of 1300 feet
in the case of a sweetening plant.
Noise and vibration levels will not exceed
100 decibels at a distance of 600 feet in the
case of a central production facility or bulk
storage facility and at a distance of 1300
feet in the case of a sweetening plant.
The applicant's reclamation plan will be
completed within one (1) year of the cessation of operations of the project.
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Other Informational Considerations:
The Township Zoning Board, in reviewing an application for special use permit, may consider:
1.
2.
3.
the present use of the land involved in the application;
the number and location of similar uses in the land use
district in which the proposed special use will be
located; and
the comments received following the public notice and
hearing;
provided, however, that such information shall be considered only as
it may affect the standards and findings required in the previous two
subsections and shall not, alone, be sufficient grounds for the denial
of a special use permit.
J.
Voiding of Permits:
Any improper or incorrect information contained in the application for a special use permit or the site plan submitted in connection
therewith shall render the special use permit void ab initio and
thereafter the violation of any condition or standard imposed by the
Township Zoning Board in the issuance of a special use permit or by
this Ordinance shall immediately void the special use permit.
A
special use permit is also void if the use is not commenced or construction is not begun within one (1) year of the date of issuance.
K.
Performance Guarantees:
(1)
In granting a special use permit, the Township Zoning Board
may require that a cash deposit, certified check, irrevocable
bank letter of credit, or surety bond acceptable to. the Township
Zoning Board and covering the estimated cost of improvements
associated with a special use project and/or the estimated cost
of reclamation of all areas disturbed by mineral extraction
operations, central production facilities, sweetening plant or
bulk storage facilities be furnished by the applicant to ensure
compliance with an approved site plan and the special use requirements. Such bond shall be deposited with the Township Clerk
at or before the time of the issuance of the special use permit.
(2)
In fixing the amount of such bond for special use permits,
other than for a special use permit which requires completion of
a reclamation plan, the Township Zoning Board shall limit it to
reasonable improvements required to meet the standards of this
Ordinance and to protect the natural resources or the health,
safety and welfare of the residents of the Township and future
users or inhabitants of the proposed project or project area
including, but not limited to, roadways, lighting, public utilities, sidewalks, screening, waste disposal, and drainage.
The
term "improvements" does not include the entire project, nor
improvements for which a performance guarantee has been deposited
pursuant to Act 288 of the Public Acts of 1967, as amended.
In
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fixing the amount of such bond for a special use permit which
requires completion of a reclamation plan, an additional amount
shall be added to such bond or a separate bond may be posted
which shall be not less than one (1) time and not more than two
(2) times the estimated cost of completing the reclamation plan
within one (1) year, less that amount deposited for reclamation
purposes with other governmental agencies, if any.
(3) The Township Zoning Board and the applicant shall establish
an agreeable procedure for the rebate of any bonds required under
this section, in reasonable proportion to the ratio of the work
completed on the required improvements as work progresses.
Said
agreement shall be written as an element of the conditions of
approval of the special use permit.
(4)
In the case of a special use for m1.n1.ng on a regular or
temporary basis, a central production facility, sweetening plant,
bulk storage facility or other special use which requires completion of a reclamation plan:
(a) Any owner/operator who obtains a permit from the Zoning
Board for t"7o or more project sites within Manistee
Township may elect, at the time the second or any
subsequent site is approved, to post a single bond in
lieu of separate bonds on each site.
Any single bond
so posted shall include the total amount previously
posted for completing the reclamation plan for all
sites the owner/operator has under each of his permits
issued in Manistee Township.
When an owner/operator
elects to post a single bond in lieu of separate bonds
previously posted on individual sites, the separate
bonds shall not be released until the new bond has been
accepted by the Zoning Board.
(b) At the termination of each bonding period, the Zoning
Board shall review the bond amount,compliance with the
permit and/or reclamation progress and shall either
maintain the existing bond, return all or a portion of
the existing bond, or request the owner/operator to
increase the amount of the bond.
(c) The owner/operator may file with the Zoning Board a
request for release of bond at such time as the owner/operator feels that all reclamation has been satisfactorily completed or is in progress in accordance
"7ith the approved reclamation plan on any or all of the
affected lands. Such request for release of bond shall
include the name and address of the owner/operator, the
permit number, a legal description of the area, and a
final reclamation report on the area for which the
release of bond is requested.
The final reclamation
report shall contain the following information.
(1) Name and address of the owner/operator, permit
number, and legal description of the land;
(2) A map and/or aerial photograph on which the
operator shall indicate the final contours, slope
angles of
the
affected
land,
surface water
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(5)
drainage and ponds, and the locations of any
remaining structures and roads;
(3) A description of reclamation activities leading to
completion of the approved reclamation requirements including:
topsoil disposition and thickness, revegetation practices, disposition of waste
dumps, tailing ponds, or other harmful or toxic
materials found on the property, disposition of
all plant equipment and pipeline and other surface
structures, haulage and access roads, sediment
control practices, and maximum depth of artificial
lakes or ponds;
(4) Owner/operators of all underground mineral extraction operations shall also submit a complete
plan of all entries, workings, and levels as well
as a description of the sloping and ground support
methods at the cessation of operations;
(5) For underground mining operations, a description
of the stability of lands overlaying the underground workings and a description of methods to be
used for sealing all shafts, adits, inclines, and
other mine entries;
(6) Such other pertinent information and maps as may
be required to evaluate the completion of reclamation and the advisability of returning the owner/operator's bond.
Final release of the bond shall not occur until the
operator files a final reclamation plan under the terms
of this ordinance.
Upon receipt of a request for release of the bond, the
Zoning Board shall:
(a) Inspect the designated lands;
(b) Publish, in accordance with Section 16.2F notice that
the release of bond application is pending and specify
a 30-day period for filing of complaint·s with the
Zoning Board against the release of bond.
(c) Publish, in accordance with Section 16. 2F notice of a
public hearing at such time and place as the Zoning
Board de.termines to consider the request for release of
bond and make a determination on the validity of complaints.
The notice required in (b) of this subsection and this sub-section may be published at the
same time, but in all cases the public hearing shall be
held at least 30 days after the first notice required
in (b) of this sub-section;
(d) In the case of a special use permit for mining, central
production facility, sweetening plant, bulk storage
facilities, or other special use which requires completion of a reclamation plan if the reclamation is
found to be satisfactory and all valid complaints have
been satisfied, the Zoning Board shall release the
appropriate amount of bond JO days after the public
hearing.
If the reclamation is found to be unsatisfactory, so notify the owner/ operator by registered
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(6)
mail setting forth the reasons for denial of release of
bond and the corrective action necessary for release of
bond.
(e) In the case of special use permits other than those
listed in subsection (d) above, if the Zoning Board
finds that the applicant has faithfully performed its
agreement established under 16. 2K(J) above, it shall
release the appropriate amount of bond 30 days after
the public hearing, otherwise it shall so notify the
applicant by registered mail setting forth the reasons
for denial of release of bond and the corrective action
needed to be taken.
Nothing in this section shall be construed to infringe upon
the Zoning Board's authority to take appropriate action on
bonds, including forfeiture of all or part of the bond for
cause. Forfeiture shall not be approved by the Zoning Board
unless there has been publication of notice and a public
hearing held consistent with the terms of this ordinance.
L.
Change, Renewals and Transfer of Special Use Permits:
The holder of a special use permit may at any time apply to
the Zoning Board for amendment, cancellation, renewal,
transfer, or change in the special use permit including a
reclamation plan, provided that this section shall not
include an expansion of a mining operation, central production facility, sweetening plant, or bulk storage facility, a
removal of mined lands from the aerial extent of the approved permit, a release of a bond or other security mechanism, or the renewal of a temporary mining special use
permit.
(2) The application for the amendment, cancellation, or change
shall be submitted to the Zoning Board which shall approve,
approve conditionally, or deny the application subject to
the standards set forth in this Ordinance.
(3) A regular mining special use permit shall be ienewed at the
end of the permit term for successive five-year terms after
public hearing and notice so long as the operator continues
to produce mineral materials from the property, conforms to
the approved reclamation plan, and conforms to the provision
of this ordinance and is within the timetable of operations
as established by subsection D.l. (m) (9) of this Section
16.2.
(4) No holder of a special use permit shall assign, sell, lease
or transfer in any manner any rights granted under the
special use permit until his successor or assigns have
complied with all the requirements of this Ordinance,
including all requirements of a reclamation plan associated
with a special use permit for mining, central production
facility, sweetening plant, bulk storage facility, or other
special use which requires completion of a reclamation plan
and the filing of a bond of like amount with the Zoning
Board.
Upon compliance with the requirements of this
Ordinance, the Zoning Board shall release the first holder
(1)
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(5)
(6)
M.
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(1)
(2)
N.
(1)
(2)
(3)
from the requirements of this Ordinance, including any bond,
and transfer the permit to the successor.
Any permit granted with conditions attached under the terms
of this Section shall have the conditions attached in
writing to the document of approval.
Such conditions may
cover any standard or requirement listed in this Ordinance.
A violation of the conditions shall constitute a violation
of this Ordinance.
Any changes or modification in a site plan or project
required for approval of the project by any other governmental agency having jurisdiction over the project after the
Zoning Board has issued a special use permit shall be made
only in accordance with the provision of this subsection L.
Inspections
Upon issuance of a special use permit, the Zoning Board or
its approved agents may inspect the project site to determine compliance with the requirement of this Ordinance. Inspections may also include the required reclamation records
of a mining operation, central production facility, sweetening plant, bulk storage facility, or other special use
requiring completion of a reclamation plan.
Such inspection shall be at reasonable times with notice
provided to the holder of the special use permit.
Penalties
Whenever the Zoning Board finds a violation of this Ordinance, including but not limited to, an unapproved deviation
from a site plan, reclamation plan, or the standards established by reference to any findings required to be made by
the Zoning Board at the time of the issuance of a special
use permit, it shall be recorded and .the Zoning Board shall
send the holder of the special use ·permit, by· registered
mail, an order specifying the nature of the violation, time
of violation, and corrective steps necessary to achieve
compliance with this Ordinance.
The Zoning Board shall cancel the special use permit of any
holder who fails to comply with the order within 30 days
after the order is served unless the holder named therein,
within 10 days after notice, requests in writing a hering
before the Zoning Board. Failure to show just cause for the
continued violation and lack of compliance with the order
shall result in permit cancellation and immediate cessation
of all activities on the affected property.
The penalties provided for herein shall be in addition to
the penalties provided in Section 18.J of this Ordinance.
SECTION 16.3 - High Risk Erosion Areas
Notwithstanding anything to the contrary contained in this
Ordinance, a Land Use or Special Use Permit, as the case may be, shall
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be required for any construction occurring in the High Risk Erosion
Area Overlay Zone, District OZ-2.
ARTICLE XVII
Administration
SECTION 17.l - Manistee Township Zoning Administrator
A.
The provisions of this Ordinance shall be administered by
the Manistee Township Zoning Administrator. Applicants for the office
of Township Zoning Administrator shall be interviewed by the Manistee
Township Zoning Board. The Manistee Township Zoning Board shall make
its recommendations to the Manistee Township Board regarding the
qualifications of the applicants.
The Township Board shall appoint,
from the list of applicants recommended by the Township Zoning Board,
a Zoning Administrator who shall serve for such term, subject to such
conditions, and at such rate of compensation as the Township Board
shall determine.
B. The duty of enforcement of this Ordinance shall rest with the
Zoning Administrator as shall be authorized by law.
The Zoning
Administrator shall, for the purpose of this Ordinance, have the power
of a police officer.
In addition thereto, the Zoning Administrator
shall:
1.
Issue Land Use Permits when, after inspection, it is
determined that the proposed use, building or structure
complies with the provisions of this Ordinance.
2. Issue violation notices requiring compliance within
thirty (30) days or such other reasonable time as the Zoning
Administrator may determine from the 0 record before him and
initiate any other activities to abate violations as authorized by this Ordinance.
3.
Maintain permanent and current records of this Ordinance, including all permits applied for, issued and denied,
maintain the zoning map and propert y descriptions, maintain
records of applications for variances, appeals, and the
decisions thereon by the Zoning Board of Appeals and determine the location of the bluffline.
4. In the case of a denied Land Use Permit, inform the
Applicant of the right to appeal or seek a variance.
5.
Perform all other duties of the Zoning Administrator as
set forth in this Ordinance.
C.
Elected officials of Manistee Township and/or Manistee
County and/or members of the Manistee Township Zoning Board and Zoning
Board of Appeals shall be ineligible for appointment to the office of
Township Zoning Administrator, except as otherwise provided in Section
17.l(D).
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D. In the event of the resignation, death, disability, disqualification or temporary absence of the Manistee Township Zoning Administrator, the Secretary of the Manistee Township Zoning Board shall
serve as interim zoning administrator until a new zoning administrator
is appointed by the Manistee Township Board, until the disability or
disqualification is removed or until the return of the regular Zoning
Administrator, as the case may be.
E.
In issuing an order, establishing a requirement, or making a
decision or determination on any discretionary matter referred to him
or upon which he is required to pass under this Ordinance, it shall be
sufficient for the Zoning Administrator to reasonably conclude that in
addition to the standards set forth in Section 16. lC, the proposed
order, requirement, decision or determination is compatible with the
present uses of adjacent land, is consistent with and promotes the
intent and purposes of this Ordinance, is compatible with the natural
environment, is consistent with the capabilities of public services
and facilities affected by such order, requirement, decision or
determination and protects the public health, safety and welfare.
SECTION 17.2 - Zoning Board of Appeals
A.
There is hereby established a Zoning Board of Appeals which
shall perform its duties and exercise its powers as provided by Act
184 of Public Acts of 1943, as amended, in such a way that the objectives of this Ordinance shall be enforced, the public health, welfare
and safety secured, and substantial justice done.
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B.
The Zoning Board of Appeals shall consist of five (5) members.
Members of the Zoning Board of Appeals shall be appointed by
the Township Board in accordance with Act 184 of the Public Acts of
1943, as amended, and shall be governed in accordance therewith.
C. In the event of the resignation, death, _disability, disqualification or temporary absence of one or more members of . the Zoning
Board of Appeals, and such resignation, death, disability, disqualification or absence, in the opinion of the Chairman or Acting Chairman
of Zoning Board of Appeals, prevents that body from effectively and
timely discharging its duties under this Ordinance, the Manistee
Township Supervisor shall appoint an alternate member to the Zoning
Board of Appeals, subject to confirmation by the Manistee Township
Board at its next regular or special meeting, who shall serve until a
new member is appointed by the Manistee Township Board, until the
disability or disqualification is removed or until the return of the
regular member of the Zoning Board of Appeals, as the case may be. In
the event such resigned, deceased, disabled, disqualified or absent
member was also a member of the Township Board or the Zoning Board, as
required by Act 184 of the Public Acts of 1943, as amended, such
alternate member shall also be a member of the Township Board or
Zoning Board, as the case may be.
Nothing contained herein shall be
construed as preventing the Manistee Township Board from establishing
a permanent slate of alternate members and providing for their temporary appointment to the Zoning Board of Appeals upon such terms and
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conditions as the Manistee
ordinance, establish.
Township
Board
may,
by
resolution
or
SECTION 17.3 - Duties of the Zoning Board of Appeals
A.
The Zoning Board of Appeals shall act upon all questions as
they may arise in the administration of this Ordinance, including the
interpretation of the Official Zoning Map.
It shall hear and decide
appeals from and review any order, requirement, decision or determination made by the Zoning Administrator.
It shall also hear and decide
all matters referred to it or upon which it is required to pass under
this Ordinance. The concurring vote of the majority of the members of
the Zoning Board of Appeals shall be necessary to reverse any order,
requirement, decision or determination of the Zoning Administrator or
decide in favor of the applicant any matter upon which it is required
to pass under, or to effect any variation in, this Ordinance.
An
appeal may be taken by any person aggrieved by the Zoning Administrator's order, requirement, decision or determination or by any officer,
department, board or bureau of the Township, county or state.
B.
Such appeal shall be taken within thirty (30) days of the
date of the order, requirement, decision or determination to be
appealed by the filing with the Zoning Administrator of a notice of
appeal specifying the grounds therefor.
The Zoning Administrator
shall forthwith transmit to the Zoning Board of Appeals all papers
constituting the record upon which the action appealed was taken.
C.
The Zoning Board of Appeals shall fix a reasonable time for
the hearing of the appeal, but not later than sixty (60) days from its
receipt of the record, unless the time is extended by mutual agreement
with the appellant and shall decide the same within a reasonable time
thereafter. The Zoning Administrator or Secretary of the Zoning Board
of Appeals shall give due written notice of the hearing to all interested parties which shall consist of the appel~ant, the Zoning Administrator, any person who has, in writing, requested notice ' and, in the
discretion of the Zoning Board of Appeals, the owners of the adjoining
or neighboring lands who may reasonably be expected to be substantially affected by the appeal.
In the event of an appeal involving the
High Risk Erosion Area· Overlay Zone, the Department of Natural Resources shall be deemed an interested party.
Notice may be given
personally, by ordinary first class mail, or any other means reasonably calculated to provide notice and shall be given, in all cases,
not less than ten (10) days prior to the hearing.
Upon the hearing,
any person may appear in person or by agent or by attorney.
D.
The Zoning Board of Appeals may reverse or affirm wholly or
partly or may modify the order, requirement, decision or determination
made by the Zoning Administrator and, to that end, shall have all the
powers of the Zoning Administrator and may issue or direct the issuance of a permit.
Upon the hearing of an appeal from any order,
requirement, decision or determination of the Zoning Administrator,
the Zoning Board of Appeals shall limit itself to a review and determination that the Zoning Administrator has correctly applied the
relevant
standards
under
this
Ordinance,
that
the
Zoning
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Administrator's order, requirement, decision or determination is based
upon competent, material and substantial evidence on the whole record
and that the Zoning Administrator's order, requirement, decision or
determination is consistent with constitutional requirements of due
process and equal protection.
Provided, however, that nothing contained herein shall be construed as preventing the Zoning Board of
Appeals from construing an appeal as a request for a variance from the
strict terms of this Ordinance and proceeding in accordance with the
succeeding Section.
E.
An appeal shall stay all proceedings in furtherance of the
action appealed from unless the Zoning Administrator certifies to the
Zoning Board of Appeals that for reasons of fact stated in the certificate, a stay would, in his opinion, cause imminent peril to life or
property, in which case proceedings shall not be stayed except upon
the order of the Zoning Board of Appeals which may be granted for due
cause shown, upon application, and following notice to the Zoning
Administrator •
F.
A fee prescribed by the Manistee Township Board shall be
paid to the Zoning Administrator at the time of filing a notice of
appeal.
SECTION 17.4 - Variances
A.
Where there are practical difficulties or unnecessary hardships in the way of carrying out the strict letter of this Ordinance,
the Zoning Board of Appeals shall have the power in passing upon
appeals to vary or modify any of the rules or provisions of this
Ordinance so that the spirit of the Ordinance is observed, the public
health and safety secured, and substantial justice done.
Specifically, the Zoning Board of Appeals shall find and determine:
1.
That special conditions and circumstances exist which are
peculiar to the land, structure, or __ building involved and
which are not applicable to other lands, structures, or
buildings in the same land use district.
2.
That literal interpretation of th~ provisions of this
Ordinance would deprive the applicant uf rights commonly
enjoyed by other properties in the same land use district
under the terms of this Ordinance.
3.
That the special conditions and circumstances are not the
result of actions of the applicant.
4.
That granting the variance will not alter the essential
character of the area.
The nonconforming use of neighboring lands, structures, or buildings,
in the same land use district, and the permitted use of lands, structures or buildings in other land use districts shall not be considered
grounds for the issuance of a variance.
Additionally, the Zoning
Board of Appeals shall find and determine that the reasons set forth
in the application justify the granting of the variance under the
standards of thi~ Section and that the variance granted is the minimum
variance that will make possible the reasonable use of the land,
building or structure.
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B.
The Zoning Board of Appeals may require the applicant for a
variance from the provisions of this Ordinance to submit such surveys,
plans or other information, in addition to such information already
contained in the record, as is necessary for the Zoning Board of
Appeals to investigate thoroughly the matters before it. The Zoning
Board of Appeals may impose such conditions or limitations in granting
a variance, not contrary to law, as it may deem necessary to comply
with the spirit, intent and purpose of this Ordinance.
C.
A variance from the minimum setback provisions for principal
structures set forth in Article XIII High Risk Erosion Overlay Zone,
District OZ-2, shall be granted by the Zoning Board of Appeals under
the exceptional circumstances described in Subsection (1) only if the
conditions described in subsection (2) are complied with:
1. A variance for substandard parcels of record or parcels
described in a deed or land contract may be allowed where the
lots were:
a.
Established prior to the effective date of this
Ordinance establishing the High Risk Erosion Overlay Zone
but which have inadequate depth to comply with the minimum
setback for principal structures.
b. Created in full compliance with this Ordinance, but
which at the time of application tu establish a principal
structure lack sufficient depth because of natural erosion
processes.
2. Substandard parcels as described in this Section shall
be granted a variance for erection of a principal structure only
if they comply with conditions a. and b. and either c. or d.:
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a. Septic tanks, tile fields or any other onsite waste
handling facility shall be placed lan~ward of _t~e principal
structure.
b.
The proposed structure shall be located as far
landward of the bluffline as is possible while still complying with all other setback and yard requirements in this
Ordinance.
c.
The proposed structure shall be designed and
constructed to be moveable in accordance with accepted
architectural or engineering standards.
To the fullest
extent practical, a structure shall be moved landward co a
safe location prior to erosion damage.
d.
The proposed structure shall be effectively protected by an erosion control device which has been approved
by the Department of Natural Resources. The erosion control
device shall meet Department of Natural Resources' design,
construction and maintenance standards, and shall be built
prior to or concurrently with the construction of the
principal structure. A variance under this subsection (d)
may be granted only if construction of a moveable structure
as provided in subsection (c) above, is impossible.
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D.
Procedures for notice and hearing of requests for variances
shall by governed by Section 17.3C.
SECTION 17.5 - Interpretation of Ordinance Text
A.
Sufficiently Similar Building, Uses or Structures
1.
Interpretation
Pursuant to the requirements of MCL §125.297a; M.S.A.
§5.2963 (27a) nothing contained herein shall be construed as
prohibiting the Zoning Board of Appeals from interpreting the
text of this Ordinance in such a fashion that will allow in a
land use district buildings, uses and structures which are
sufficiently similar to the specifically delineated permitted or
special uses in that land use district, under the same permitted
or special use regulations.
Such interpretation shall not have
the effect of granting a variance but rather shall be deemed only
to be an interpretation of the ordinance text.
2.
In determining whether a proposed building, use or structure
is sufficiently similar to a specifically delineated permitted or
special use, the Zoning Board of Appeals shall consider the relevant policies for the land use district in question as set forth
in the Land Use & Development Component of the Manistee Township
Master Plan, the nature, use and purpose of the proposed building, use or structure and whether or not the proposed building,
use or structure is a permitted or special use in any other land
use district in the Township.
3.
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Standards
Precedent
An earlier determination under this section that · a building,
use or structure is sufficiently similar shall be considered a
precedent for other applications proposing an identical building,
use or structure in the same land use district, provided the
earlier determination was made with respect to a building, use or
structure sufficiently similar to a specifically delineated
permitted use in the land use district and not with respect to a
specifically delineated special use.
An earlier de termination
with respect to an identical, sufficiently similar special use
shall be considered as a precedent only to the extent that such
sufficiently similar special use shall be considered as a
candidate for a special use permit in that land use district, but
shall otherwise be subject to all requirements of Section 16.2 of
this Ordinance.
B.
Ambiguities
Ambiguities in the text of this Ordinance shall be resolved
in favor of the legislative intent of the ManiQcee Township Board
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•
•
by reference to the purposes of this Ordinance and the Land Use
and Development component of the Manistee Township Master Plan
and if doubt still exists, it shall be resolved in favor of
Manistee Township.
ARTICLE XVIII
Amendments, Validity, and Penalties
SECTION 18.l - Amendments
The Township Board may, from time to time, amend, supplement, or
change the regulations and boundaries of land use districts or
provisions of this Ordinance in the manner prescribed by Act 184 of
Public Acts of Michigan for 1943, as amended.
SECTION 18.2 - Validity
This Ordinance and the various parts, sections, subsections,
phrases and clauses thereof are hereby declared to b~ severable.
If
any part, sentence, paragraph, section, subsection, phrase or clause
is adjudged unconstitutional or invalid, it is hereby provided that
the remainder of the Ordinance shall not be affected thereby.
The
Township Board hereby declares that it would have passed this Ordinance and each section, subsection, phrase, sentence and clause thereof irrespective of the fact that any one or more sections, subsections, phrases, sentences or clause be declared invalid.
SECTION 18.3 - Penalties
Any building or structure which is erected, reconstructed, altered, converted, maintained or used, or any use of land or premises
which is begun, maintained or changed in violation of any provisions
of this Ordinance is hereby declared to be a nuisance per se.
Any
person, firm or corporation, or the agent in charge of such building,
structure, or land who violates, disobeys, omits, neglects or refuses
to comply with, or resists the enforcement of · any provision of this
Ordinance, or any amendment thereof, shall be fined upon conviction
not less than One Dollar ($1.00) nor more than One Hundred Dollars
($100.00) together with the costs of prosecution, or shall be punished
by imprisonment in the ·county Jail for not less than one (1) day nor
more than ninety (90) days, for each offense, or may be fined and
imprisoned as provided herein.
Each and every day during which an
illegal erection, construction, reconstruction, alteration, maintenance or use continue shall be deemed a separate offense.
The Township Board, the Township Zoning Administrator, the Zoning Board of
Appeals, the Attorney of the Township, or any owner or owners of real
estate within the land use district in which such building, structure
or land is situated may institute a nuisance, injunction, mandamus,
abatement or any other appropriate action or actions, proceeding or
proceedings, to prevent, enjoin, abate, or remove any said unlawful
erection, construction, alteration, reconstruction, maintenance or
use.
The rights and remedies provided herein are cumulative and in
addition to all other remedies provided by law .
-69-
�I
I
•
•
•
SECTION 18.4 - Conflicting Provisions and Transition Rules
A.
All Ordinances or parts of Ordinances conflicting with the
provisions of this Ordinance are hereby repealed insofar as the same
affect this Ordinance •
B.
The Manistee Township Zoning Ordinance approved by the
Manistee Township Board on December 27, 1956, and all amendments
thereto are repealed in their entirety upon the effective date of this
Ordinance.
All Applications for permits, appeals, and variance
requests pending before the Zoning Administrator, the Zoning Board or
the Zoning Board of Appeals on the effective date of this Ordinance
shall be acted upon only in conformance with the provisions of this
Ordinance.
SECTION 18.5 - Captions
The captions used in this Ordinance shall not be deemed to be a
part of this Ordinance and shall not be construed to enlarge or
restrict the rights and obligations otherwise contained herein.
SECTION 18.6 - Effective Date
The effective date of chis Ordinance shall be
I
•
•
-70-
�
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Title
A name given to the resource
Wyckoff Planning and Zoning Collection
Creator
An entity primarily responsible for making the resource
Planning & Zoning Center (Lansing, Mich.) (Organization)
Wyckoff, Mark A.
Description
An account of the resource
Municipal master plans and zoning ordinances from across the state of Michigan, spanning from the 1960s to the early 2020s. The bulk of the collection was compiled by urban planner Mark Wyckoff over the course of his career as the founder and principal planner of the Planning and Zoning Center in Lansing, Michigan. Some additions have been made to the collection by municipalities since it was transferred to Grand Valley State University.
Coverage
The spatial or temporal topic of the resource, the spatial applicability of the resource, or the jurisdiction under which the resource is relevant
Michigan
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
1960/2023
Source
A related resource from which the described resource is derived
<a href="https://gvsu.lyrasistechnology.org/repositories/2/resources/870">Planning and Zoning Center Collection (RHC-240)</a>
Rights
Information about rights held in and over the resource
<a href="http://rightsstatements.org/vocab/NoC-US/1.0/">No Copyright - United States</a>
Subject
The topic of the resource
Michigan
Comprehensive plan publications
Master plan reports
Zoning--Michigan
Zoning--Maps
Maps
Land use--planning
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
Grand Valley State University. University Libraries. Special Collections & University Archives
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
RHC-240
Format
The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource
application/pdf
Type
The nature or genre of the resource
Text
Language
A language of the resource
eng
Text
A resource consisting primarily of words for reading. Examples include books, letters, dissertations, poems, newspapers, articles, archives of mailing lists. Note that facsimiles or images of texts are still of the genre Text.
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
Manistee-Twp_Permanent-Zoning-Ordinance_1986
Creator
An entity primarily responsible for making the resource
Gockerman, Wilson, Broberg & Saylor, P.C.
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
1986
Title
A name given to the resource
Manistee Township Permanent Zoning Ordinance
Description
An account of the resource
The Manistee Township Manistee County, Michigan Permanent Zoning Ordinance was drafted in 1986 by Gockerman, Wilson, Broberg & Saylor, P.C. with assistance from Richard M. Wilson, Jr., attorneys at law.
Contributor
An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource
Richard M. Wilson, Jr. (consultant)
Subject
The topic of the resource
Zoning--Michigan
Manistee Township (Mich.)
Manistee County (Mich.)
Source
A related resource from which the described resource is derived
<a href="https://gvsu.lyrasistechnology.org/repositories/2/resources/870">Planning and Zoning Center Collection (RHC-240)</a>
Rights
Information about rights held in and over the resource
<a href="http://rightsstatements.org/vocab/NoC-US/1.0/">No Copyright - United States</a>
Type
The nature or genre of the resource
Text
Format
The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource
application/pdf
Language
A language of the resource
eng
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
Grand Valley State University. University Libraries. Lemmen Library and Archives
-
https://digitalcollections.library.gvsu.edu/files/original/e546363cafb3926455df381ed6db9765.pdf
90f7e1eb865b9de24249f693b72d14d9
PDF Text
Text
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e40be6b7bc13ae9405efd8c184c51ca4
PDF Text
Text
Forwarded by the Adams Express Company.
Harper’s Ferry, Va.
Soldier’s Package.
Said to Contain, $30.00
For Mr. Smith, D, Godfrey
Sent By
Jefferson H. Godfrey
6 Mich Cavl
Lowell, Kent Co
Michigan
�Consignees will please open this package on the end, so as to preserve all the seals, and
observe whether they are in good order.
[?] of Adams Express Company are instructed not ot forward this package without its
being sealed as directed.
�
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Title
A name given to the resource
Civil War and Slavery Collection
Subject
The topic of the resource
United States--History--Civil War, 1861-1865
Slavery--United States
African Americans
United States--Politics and government--19th century
Description
An account of the resource
A selection of correspondence, diaries, official documents, photographs related to the American Civil War and to the institution of slavery, collected by Harvey E. Lemmen. The collection includes a selection of documents from ten states related to the ownership of slaves and abolition, correspondence and documents of soldiers who fought in the war and from family members and officials, diaries and letters of individuals, and a collection of mailing envelopes decorated with patriotic imagery.
Creator
An entity primarily responsible for making the resource
Lemmen, Harvey E.
Source
A related resource from which the described resource is derived
<a href="https://gvsu.lyrasistechnology.org/repositories/2/resources/472">Civil War and Slavery Collection (RHC-45)<br /></a><a href="https://gvsu.lyrasistechnology.org/repositories/2/resources/470">John Bennitt Diaries and Correspondence (RHC-43)<br /></a><a href="https://gvsu.lyrasistechnology.org/repositories/2/resources/471">Nathan Sargent Papers (RHC-44)<br /></a><a href="https://gvsu.lyrasistechnology.org/repositories/2/resources/478">Theodore Peticolas Diary (RHC-51)<br /></a><a href="https://gvsu.lyrasistechnology.org/repositories/2/resources/476">Civil War Patriotic Envelopes Collection (RHC-51)<br /></a><a href="https://gvsu.lyrasistechnology.org/repositories/2/resources/479">Whitely Read Diary (RHC-52)</a>
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
Grand Valley State University. University Libraries. Special Collections & University Archives
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
1804-1897
Rights
Information about rights held in and over the resource
<a href="http://rightsstatements.org/page/NoC-US/1.0/?language=en">No Copyright - United States</a>
Format
The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource
image/jpg; application/pdf
Language
A language of the resource
eng
Type
The nature or genre of the resource
Image; Text
Coverage
The spatial or temporal topic of the resource, the spatial applicability of the resource, or the jurisdiction under which the resource is relevant
1804-1897
Text
A resource consisting primarily of words for reading. Examples include books, letters, dissertations, poems, newspapers, articles, archives of mailing lists. Note that facsimiles or images of texts are still of the genre Text.
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
RHC-45_CW1-4852-1
Title
A name given to the resource
Jefferson H. Godfrey correspondence
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
1862
Creator
An entity primarily responsible for making the resource
Godfrey, Jefferson H.
Subject
The topic of the resource
United States--History--Civil War, 1861-1865
United States. Army. Michigan Cavalry Regiment, 6th (1862-1865)
Description
An account of the resource
Correspondence from Jefferson H. Godfrey, company M of the 6th Michigan Cavalry to his family, 1862
Language
A language of the resource
eng
Rights
Information about rights held in and over the resource
<a href="http://rightsstatements.org/page/NoC-US/1.0/?language=en">No Copyright - United States</a>
Source
A related resource from which the described resource is derived
Civil War and slavery collection (RHC-45): http://gvsu.lyrasistechnology.org/repositories/2/resources/472
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
Grand Valley State University. University Libraries. Lemmen Library and Archives
-
https://digitalcollections.library.gvsu.edu/files/original/09bd8dfcdb892c74e6577a9573d4a1e7.pdf
fc1b9c85de4296d8de727f7c63c03172
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Text
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caf8f5502cbf3d60f60c114fe3656654
PDF Text
Text
March the 21 62
Dear Mother,
As I hav a fre mints[minutes] to spar I will ancer you leter I got yeter I was glad to hear
that you was well but was vary sary to hear that Pa was afaid that I had gamble my mony
away I thot he no me beter than that it mad me feail vary bad to I can tel him how the
boys in the 25 Com to send so much home tha dad not git thar bonty before the left tel
him that I hav ben musterd for pa I think that whe shel get it before long
I will send him no more if he want it I haf to ceap som omny with me I shal new[?] all I
can spar for I no that he neades it tel Pa to not wart for I shel sav al of myy mony I will
stop ritin a bout that for it sean that he was vary harsh with me I will tell you whar I am I
am in marlin at rockwil about 18 mils from Washing whe ar [?] whe hetch[?] thre that
had a bout six thouas dolers with them tha was rebels that thot to by som clothing for the
rebel [?] I hav ben vary helty sean I nlist i hav ben able to
do duty evry day last weak I rod 40 mils won day whe hav sent nin rebels to Washing to
Jail the rest of our rigment is after old sturt [J.E.B. Stuart] tha hav got him [?] i hop that
tha will ketch himthe boys stool by thar horses all won nit about thre o clock in the morna
[?] old sturt ran by 2 gey[?] that tha will ketch him when you rit a gain tel me whar
Eliyva[?] is and whar she is a gont stay if she is thar tel hear to rit to me tel [?] that I will
[?]
To hear [?] drow my leter to a close for this[?] rit often and I will direct to Washing [?]
and it will com to me so God by
[?]
�
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Title
A name given to the resource
Civil War and Slavery Collection
Subject
The topic of the resource
United States--History--Civil War, 1861-1865
Slavery--United States
African Americans
United States--Politics and government--19th century
Description
An account of the resource
A selection of correspondence, diaries, official documents, photographs related to the American Civil War and to the institution of slavery, collected by Harvey E. Lemmen. The collection includes a selection of documents from ten states related to the ownership of slaves and abolition, correspondence and documents of soldiers who fought in the war and from family members and officials, diaries and letters of individuals, and a collection of mailing envelopes decorated with patriotic imagery.
Creator
An entity primarily responsible for making the resource
Lemmen, Harvey E.
Source
A related resource from which the described resource is derived
<a href="https://gvsu.lyrasistechnology.org/repositories/2/resources/472">Civil War and Slavery Collection (RHC-45)<br /></a><a href="https://gvsu.lyrasistechnology.org/repositories/2/resources/470">John Bennitt Diaries and Correspondence (RHC-43)<br /></a><a href="https://gvsu.lyrasistechnology.org/repositories/2/resources/471">Nathan Sargent Papers (RHC-44)<br /></a><a href="https://gvsu.lyrasistechnology.org/repositories/2/resources/478">Theodore Peticolas Diary (RHC-51)<br /></a><a href="https://gvsu.lyrasistechnology.org/repositories/2/resources/476">Civil War Patriotic Envelopes Collection (RHC-51)<br /></a><a href="https://gvsu.lyrasistechnology.org/repositories/2/resources/479">Whitely Read Diary (RHC-52)</a>
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
Grand Valley State University. University Libraries. Special Collections & University Archives
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
1804-1897
Rights
Information about rights held in and over the resource
<a href="http://rightsstatements.org/page/NoC-US/1.0/?language=en">No Copyright - United States</a>
Format
The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource
image/jpg; application/pdf
Language
A language of the resource
eng
Type
The nature or genre of the resource
Image; Text
Coverage
The spatial or temporal topic of the resource, the spatial applicability of the resource, or the jurisdiction under which the resource is relevant
1804-1897
Text
A resource consisting primarily of words for reading. Examples include books, letters, dissertations, poems, newspapers, articles, archives of mailing lists. Note that facsimiles or images of texts are still of the genre Text.
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
RHC-45_CW1-4852-2
Title
A name given to the resource
Jefferson H. Godfrey correspondence
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
1862-01-09
Creator
An entity primarily responsible for making the resource
Godfrey, Jefferson H.
Subject
The topic of the resource
United States--History--Civil War, 1861-1865
United States. Army. Michigan Cavalry Regiment, 6th (1862-1865)
Description
An account of the resource
Correspondence from Jefferson H. Godfrey, company M of the 6th Michigan Cavalry to his family, 1862
Language
A language of the resource
eng
Rights
Information about rights held in and over the resource
<a href="http://rightsstatements.org/page/NoC-US/1.0/?language=en">No Copyright - United States</a>
Source
A related resource from which the described resource is derived
Civil War and slavery collection (RHC-45): http://gvsu.lyrasistechnology.org/repositories/2/resources/472
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
Grand Valley State University. University Libraries. Lemmen Library and Archives
-
https://digitalcollections.library.gvsu.edu/files/original/23b53d92f83e3571cf84c2b16d426250.pdf
525108ae5618094b08959ee865eb8498
PDF Text
Text
��
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aea4fbfc28b178984274d8896a24cfa0
PDF Text
Text
Febary the 25 1862
Dear Sisters i tak thy present ostony[?] [?] of in forming you whar i am i am in marlan[?]
at [?] but I shell Haring[?] before long I hav ben to [?] I hav sin sum of them rebelsd who
hav got to of them in the rom whar whe stay tha as durty [?] [?] whe went out to get som
ha [hay] for the hors whe gin [?] sam not i went out and cramp[?] som of old prat tirkes
last nit it is fun[?] whe went out to get the mail whe expected the [?] day or to moro[?]
[?] tel but that I writ he was hear with me wont we hav fun doo?] you have eny [?] with
winter I shel haf to stop ritin to you now for i cant think of eny thing to rit you most bea a
god[good] girl til al of the [?] girls to ceap got cerg til i com hom i will drow ny leter to A
[?] so Got by when you rit direct to Washing D.C. from your brother
P. Th. Godfrey
�
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Title
A name given to the resource
Civil War and Slavery Collection
Subject
The topic of the resource
United States--History--Civil War, 1861-1865
Slavery--United States
African Americans
United States--Politics and government--19th century
Description
An account of the resource
A selection of correspondence, diaries, official documents, photographs related to the American Civil War and to the institution of slavery, collected by Harvey E. Lemmen. The collection includes a selection of documents from ten states related to the ownership of slaves and abolition, correspondence and documents of soldiers who fought in the war and from family members and officials, diaries and letters of individuals, and a collection of mailing envelopes decorated with patriotic imagery.
Creator
An entity primarily responsible for making the resource
Lemmen, Harvey E.
Source
A related resource from which the described resource is derived
<a href="https://gvsu.lyrasistechnology.org/repositories/2/resources/472">Civil War and Slavery Collection (RHC-45)<br /></a><a href="https://gvsu.lyrasistechnology.org/repositories/2/resources/470">John Bennitt Diaries and Correspondence (RHC-43)<br /></a><a href="https://gvsu.lyrasistechnology.org/repositories/2/resources/471">Nathan Sargent Papers (RHC-44)<br /></a><a href="https://gvsu.lyrasistechnology.org/repositories/2/resources/478">Theodore Peticolas Diary (RHC-51)<br /></a><a href="https://gvsu.lyrasistechnology.org/repositories/2/resources/476">Civil War Patriotic Envelopes Collection (RHC-51)<br /></a><a href="https://gvsu.lyrasistechnology.org/repositories/2/resources/479">Whitely Read Diary (RHC-52)</a>
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
Grand Valley State University. University Libraries. Special Collections & University Archives
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
1804-1897
Rights
Information about rights held in and over the resource
<a href="http://rightsstatements.org/page/NoC-US/1.0/?language=en">No Copyright - United States</a>
Format
The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource
image/jpg; application/pdf
Language
A language of the resource
eng
Type
The nature or genre of the resource
Image; Text
Coverage
The spatial or temporal topic of the resource, the spatial applicability of the resource, or the jurisdiction under which the resource is relevant
1804-1897
Text
A resource consisting primarily of words for reading. Examples include books, letters, dissertations, poems, newspapers, articles, archives of mailing lists. Note that facsimiles or images of texts are still of the genre Text.
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
RHC-45_CW1-4852-3
Title
A name given to the resource
Jefferson H. Godfrey correspondence
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
1862-02-25
Creator
An entity primarily responsible for making the resource
Godfrey, Jefferson H.
Subject
The topic of the resource
United States--History--Civil War, 1861-1865
United States. Army. Michigan Cavalry Regiment, 6th (1862-1865)
Description
An account of the resource
Correspondence from Jefferson H. Godfrey, company M of the 6th Michigan Cavalry to his family, 1862
Language
A language of the resource
eng
Rights
Information about rights held in and over the resource
<a href="http://rightsstatements.org/page/NoC-US/1.0/?language=en">No Copyright - United States</a>
Source
A related resource from which the described resource is derived
Civil War and slavery collection (RHC-45): http://gvsu.lyrasistechnology.org/repositories/2/resources/472
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
Grand Valley State University. University Libraries. Lemmen Library and Archives
-
https://digitalcollections.library.gvsu.edu/files/original/81316c519f35351fe8173b80aa30fb50.pdf
e11c16667ac549e9ab7355619272d29e
PDF Text
Text
���
https://digitalcollections.library.gvsu.edu/files/original/62583c558e109f666ce84786894021ab.pdf
c85894f8cfb005d1dfcf0e61cf799490
PDF Text
Text
Camp prol[?] Jul 16, 1863[?]
Dear Father mother brother and sisters
It has ben som tim sens I rot to you I was taken pirionar the next day after i rot to you
from marlin city it was the 20 of Jun that tha sent for of us a Croo the river to stand pack
on [?] and the rebs gobles up tha march us 20 mils the farst day [?] and the next day whe
start for Stanton whe was 6 days a goin 92 mils it was to a bot for me then whe went to
rcihmon to the liby [?] to starve
to death and to be eait up by the little gra bax[?] whe did not hav much to eait thar it was
a little peas of bread and peas of meait a bout as big as my to Thumbs. But i pan for it
when i am[?] tha stol my mony from me i would like som mony if it was saf but i dont no
how long i shel stay hear probly til next month som tim I cant rit much this tim for tho[?]
as drowin clos and I mus stop riten for this tim giv my lov to all the frends and ceap som
for your self so god by
[?]
marlan camp [?]
annaplus[?]
direct hear
�
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Title
A name given to the resource
Civil War and Slavery Collection
Subject
The topic of the resource
United States--History--Civil War, 1861-1865
Slavery--United States
African Americans
United States--Politics and government--19th century
Description
An account of the resource
A selection of correspondence, diaries, official documents, photographs related to the American Civil War and to the institution of slavery, collected by Harvey E. Lemmen. The collection includes a selection of documents from ten states related to the ownership of slaves and abolition, correspondence and documents of soldiers who fought in the war and from family members and officials, diaries and letters of individuals, and a collection of mailing envelopes decorated with patriotic imagery.
Creator
An entity primarily responsible for making the resource
Lemmen, Harvey E.
Source
A related resource from which the described resource is derived
<a href="https://gvsu.lyrasistechnology.org/repositories/2/resources/472">Civil War and Slavery Collection (RHC-45)<br /></a><a href="https://gvsu.lyrasistechnology.org/repositories/2/resources/470">John Bennitt Diaries and Correspondence (RHC-43)<br /></a><a href="https://gvsu.lyrasistechnology.org/repositories/2/resources/471">Nathan Sargent Papers (RHC-44)<br /></a><a href="https://gvsu.lyrasistechnology.org/repositories/2/resources/478">Theodore Peticolas Diary (RHC-51)<br /></a><a href="https://gvsu.lyrasistechnology.org/repositories/2/resources/476">Civil War Patriotic Envelopes Collection (RHC-51)<br /></a><a href="https://gvsu.lyrasistechnology.org/repositories/2/resources/479">Whitely Read Diary (RHC-52)</a>
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
Grand Valley State University. University Libraries. Special Collections & University Archives
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
1804-1897
Rights
Information about rights held in and over the resource
<a href="http://rightsstatements.org/page/NoC-US/1.0/?language=en">No Copyright - United States</a>
Format
The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource
image/jpg; application/pdf
Language
A language of the resource
eng
Type
The nature or genre of the resource
Image; Text
Coverage
The spatial or temporal topic of the resource, the spatial applicability of the resource, or the jurisdiction under which the resource is relevant
1804-1897
Text
A resource consisting primarily of words for reading. Examples include books, letters, dissertations, poems, newspapers, articles, archives of mailing lists. Note that facsimiles or images of texts are still of the genre Text.
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
RHC-45_CW1-4852-4
Title
A name given to the resource
Jefferson H. Godfrey correspondence
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
1862-03-21
Creator
An entity primarily responsible for making the resource
Godfrey, Jefferson H.
Subject
The topic of the resource
United States--History--Civil War, 1861-1865
United States. Army. Michigan Cavalry Regiment, 6th (1862-1865)
Description
An account of the resource
Correspondence from Jefferson H. Godfrey, company M of the 6th Michigan Cavalry to his family, 1862
Language
A language of the resource
eng
Rights
Information about rights held in and over the resource
<a href="http://rightsstatements.org/page/NoC-US/1.0/?language=en">No Copyright - United States</a>
Source
A related resource from which the described resource is derived
Civil War and slavery collection (RHC-45): http://gvsu.lyrasistechnology.org/repositories/2/resources/472
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
Grand Valley State University. University Libraries. Lemmen Library and Archives
-
https://digitalcollections.library.gvsu.edu/files/original/ffad27d6bcc43da6be0c0b9911c034a2.pdf
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PDF Text
Text
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https://digitalcollections.library.gvsu.edu/files/original/b410ed8cc902f8b7737bac11c2ab8703.pdf
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PDF Text
Text
Grat Fals
Marlan Jan. the 9th 1862
Dear Mother,
It is with great plasur that I tak [?] my [?] pen in hand to let you no that I am and hop
when this reachis you it will find you the same I reseve your kind leter and card and was
glad to hear from you it is to a clock and I shal haf to go out on protal at six and I shal haf
to [?] fast & you sed that you got my mony I
hall[?] sent ten darls[?] was wish I [?] you will get befor this reach you & now ma you
sed that you thot of me every time that you eait now don’t you wear a bout me for I hav
enuf to [?] I tel you what [?] drow[?] for ten days & 266 loves of bread to barls of
potans[?] to barrels of poark to barls of beaf 260 pons of fresh beaf 42 pounds of shuga
10 pounds of tea 12 pounch coffa and 20 pounds ris & plenty to eait and drink & you sed
that you went to sea them ponys I think tha ask to mosh for them but if Pa wants them I
will help him all I can you want to no what the nam of the river is it is the potomack river
& ma I am vary much oblids to you for that present & tel [?] to rit to me and Ed to tel me
all the news you rit tel me how the crops looks & it is vary dry hear it[?] hant rain in fiv
weaks tel Pa if he can sel the hors to by the
Ponys if not don’t by them for whe are in det a muf now & [/} [?] shel hav our pay in a
bout seven weaks and i will send him so mor mony but I must stop ritin for it is getin lat
and I shel haf to go and fead my hors so he will bea ready to go & so god by
[?] Godfrey
�
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Title
A name given to the resource
Civil War and Slavery Collection
Subject
The topic of the resource
United States--History--Civil War, 1861-1865
Slavery--United States
African Americans
United States--Politics and government--19th century
Description
An account of the resource
A selection of correspondence, diaries, official documents, photographs related to the American Civil War and to the institution of slavery, collected by Harvey E. Lemmen. The collection includes a selection of documents from ten states related to the ownership of slaves and abolition, correspondence and documents of soldiers who fought in the war and from family members and officials, diaries and letters of individuals, and a collection of mailing envelopes decorated with patriotic imagery.
Creator
An entity primarily responsible for making the resource
Lemmen, Harvey E.
Source
A related resource from which the described resource is derived
<a href="https://gvsu.lyrasistechnology.org/repositories/2/resources/472">Civil War and Slavery Collection (RHC-45)<br /></a><a href="https://gvsu.lyrasistechnology.org/repositories/2/resources/470">John Bennitt Diaries and Correspondence (RHC-43)<br /></a><a href="https://gvsu.lyrasistechnology.org/repositories/2/resources/471">Nathan Sargent Papers (RHC-44)<br /></a><a href="https://gvsu.lyrasistechnology.org/repositories/2/resources/478">Theodore Peticolas Diary (RHC-51)<br /></a><a href="https://gvsu.lyrasistechnology.org/repositories/2/resources/476">Civil War Patriotic Envelopes Collection (RHC-51)<br /></a><a href="https://gvsu.lyrasistechnology.org/repositories/2/resources/479">Whitely Read Diary (RHC-52)</a>
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
Grand Valley State University. University Libraries. Special Collections & University Archives
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
1804-1897
Rights
Information about rights held in and over the resource
<a href="http://rightsstatements.org/page/NoC-US/1.0/?language=en">No Copyright - United States</a>
Format
The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource
image/jpg; application/pdf
Language
A language of the resource
eng
Type
The nature or genre of the resource
Image; Text
Coverage
The spatial or temporal topic of the resource, the spatial applicability of the resource, or the jurisdiction under which the resource is relevant
1804-1897
Text
A resource consisting primarily of words for reading. Examples include books, letters, dissertations, poems, newspapers, articles, archives of mailing lists. Note that facsimiles or images of texts are still of the genre Text.
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
RHC-45_CW1-4852-5
Title
A name given to the resource
Jefferson H. Godfrey correspondence
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
1862-04-26
Creator
An entity primarily responsible for making the resource
Godfrey, Jefferson H.
Subject
The topic of the resource
United States--History--Civil War, 1861-1865
United States. Army. Michigan Cavalry Regiment, 6th (1862-1865)
Description
An account of the resource
Correspondence from Jefferson H. Godfrey, company M of the 6th Michigan Cavalry to his family, 1862
Language
A language of the resource
eng
Rights
Information about rights held in and over the resource
<a href="http://rightsstatements.org/page/NoC-US/1.0/?language=en">No Copyright - United States</a>
Source
A related resource from which the described resource is derived
Civil War and slavery collection (RHC-45): http://gvsu.lyrasistechnology.org/repositories/2/resources/472
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
Grand Valley State University. University Libraries. Lemmen Library and Archives
-
https://digitalcollections.library.gvsu.edu/files/original/28faf71cc2fc43d3afdb53dbbf7450c1.pdf
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Text
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PDF Text
Text
Aprile the 26 1862
Dear cousin
It is with plesur I now sit down with my pen in hand to let you no that I and Dave is both
well hoping these few lines will find you the same now Jeff I must tell you I and Davie is
both in the army you must not think hard of me for not riting soner for I hav [?]
to rite to that I could not rite any sooner now Jeff you better be leav I had some good
times when[?] I got home last winter I went to the Dances and just kict up the Dust I must
tell you that I saw [?] will and jack the other day and they was both [?] wellI hav not
much time to rite this time for it will soon be dusk[?] [?] soon and i will answer F. [?] to
Jefferson Godfrey
Aprile the 26th 1862
[?] com I hav not time to rit much this time but I think I will get to rite a gain befor this
gets to you you said you would lik to hav that money our capt is making ant[?] the pay
roll[?] and we will [?] be paid off now soon and then we will send you
4 Dolars and I will send [?] one Dolar hur[?] likeness to send to me we hav ben in a large
fite I saw Jack and he giv me that [?] rite soon Direct [?] 30 rigiment to [?] [?] in care of
capt white tenesee pitchburg [?] I forgot to giv you the Directions the other time it don’t
ned any po on it F.M.[?] Godfrey to Newcomb Godfrey D Th. R[?] Godfrey
�
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Title
A name given to the resource
Civil War and Slavery Collection
Subject
The topic of the resource
United States--History--Civil War, 1861-1865
Slavery--United States
African Americans
United States--Politics and government--19th century
Description
An account of the resource
A selection of correspondence, diaries, official documents, photographs related to the American Civil War and to the institution of slavery, collected by Harvey E. Lemmen. The collection includes a selection of documents from ten states related to the ownership of slaves and abolition, correspondence and documents of soldiers who fought in the war and from family members and officials, diaries and letters of individuals, and a collection of mailing envelopes decorated with patriotic imagery.
Creator
An entity primarily responsible for making the resource
Lemmen, Harvey E.
Source
A related resource from which the described resource is derived
<a href="https://gvsu.lyrasistechnology.org/repositories/2/resources/472">Civil War and Slavery Collection (RHC-45)<br /></a><a href="https://gvsu.lyrasistechnology.org/repositories/2/resources/470">John Bennitt Diaries and Correspondence (RHC-43)<br /></a><a href="https://gvsu.lyrasistechnology.org/repositories/2/resources/471">Nathan Sargent Papers (RHC-44)<br /></a><a href="https://gvsu.lyrasistechnology.org/repositories/2/resources/478">Theodore Peticolas Diary (RHC-51)<br /></a><a href="https://gvsu.lyrasistechnology.org/repositories/2/resources/476">Civil War Patriotic Envelopes Collection (RHC-51)<br /></a><a href="https://gvsu.lyrasistechnology.org/repositories/2/resources/479">Whitely Read Diary (RHC-52)</a>
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
Grand Valley State University. University Libraries. Special Collections & University Archives
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
1804-1897
Rights
Information about rights held in and over the resource
<a href="http://rightsstatements.org/page/NoC-US/1.0/?language=en">No Copyright - United States</a>
Format
The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource
image/jpg; application/pdf
Language
A language of the resource
eng
Type
The nature or genre of the resource
Image; Text
Coverage
The spatial or temporal topic of the resource, the spatial applicability of the resource, or the jurisdiction under which the resource is relevant
1804-1897
Text
A resource consisting primarily of words for reading. Examples include books, letters, dissertations, poems, newspapers, articles, archives of mailing lists. Note that facsimiles or images of texts are still of the genre Text.
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
RHC-45_CW1-4852-6
Title
A name given to the resource
Jefferson H. Godfrey correspondence
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
1862-05-24
Creator
An entity primarily responsible for making the resource
Godfrey, Jefferson H.
Subject
The topic of the resource
United States--History--Civil War, 1861-1865
United States. Army. Michigan Cavalry Regiment, 6th (1862-1865)
Description
An account of the resource
Correspondence from Jefferson H. Godfrey, company M of the 6th Michigan Cavalry to his family, 1862
Language
A language of the resource
eng
Rights
Information about rights held in and over the resource
<a href="http://rightsstatements.org/page/NoC-US/1.0/?language=en">No Copyright - United States</a>
Source
A related resource from which the described resource is derived
Civil War and slavery collection (RHC-45): http://gvsu.lyrasistechnology.org/repositories/2/resources/472
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
Grand Valley State University. University Libraries. Lemmen Library and Archives
-
https://digitalcollections.library.gvsu.edu/files/original/3f34590eed5b1fd7631ddb00def70fa0.pdf
ea5d828052625137ccdce0ef27d1a834
PDF Text
Text
���
https://digitalcollections.library.gvsu.edu/files/original/7f413980e8646a52b289fe155ff176c1.pdf
a3fbc5d21dcbe13c500e644f9bc43db4
PDF Text
Text
Great Fals, May 24 the 1860
Kind Parents,
It is with plaros[?] that I tak my pen in hand to drop a few lines to you to let you no that I
am well at present and hop when this com to hand it will find you the sam & I went to
carch to day and sean som darks march[?] it was fon fur Jeff I tel you tha smel vary
strong and who had vary good [?] from the western armey
Tha took 10 big guns and lots of prinars[?] & who had good tims hear [?] I hav got to go
22 mil to nit I shel start at ten to nit I will get back at twelve & 6 ma how I wish that you
cod bea hear and sea this fals
It is the offiles sn’t that you ever sean thar is won plas that is not far [?] wlis[?] and the
water is 100 feat deap and the roks is [?] feat in & I sent Pa fiv dorlas and when he gets
that I will send him som mor rit as son as you get it I ges that you hav it before this timIt
is getin vary hot breas now I can go barfooted hear crops look vary nis hear & ma kiss
[?]effia for me & the baby to & it is getin dark and I hil[?] haf to stop ritin for this tim gv
my lov to the old folks that is Ed and Elysa and the rest of the [?] ceap a shar[?] for your
self tel me all the [?] how Pa and Ed gets al ong with the maek and mal & but I must stop
& ritin so ga by
From your dautful son
P. Th. Godfrey
�
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Title
A name given to the resource
Civil War and Slavery Collection
Subject
The topic of the resource
United States--History--Civil War, 1861-1865
Slavery--United States
African Americans
United States--Politics and government--19th century
Description
An account of the resource
A selection of correspondence, diaries, official documents, photographs related to the American Civil War and to the institution of slavery, collected by Harvey E. Lemmen. The collection includes a selection of documents from ten states related to the ownership of slaves and abolition, correspondence and documents of soldiers who fought in the war and from family members and officials, diaries and letters of individuals, and a collection of mailing envelopes decorated with patriotic imagery.
Creator
An entity primarily responsible for making the resource
Lemmen, Harvey E.
Source
A related resource from which the described resource is derived
<a href="https://gvsu.lyrasistechnology.org/repositories/2/resources/472">Civil War and Slavery Collection (RHC-45)<br /></a><a href="https://gvsu.lyrasistechnology.org/repositories/2/resources/470">John Bennitt Diaries and Correspondence (RHC-43)<br /></a><a href="https://gvsu.lyrasistechnology.org/repositories/2/resources/471">Nathan Sargent Papers (RHC-44)<br /></a><a href="https://gvsu.lyrasistechnology.org/repositories/2/resources/478">Theodore Peticolas Diary (RHC-51)<br /></a><a href="https://gvsu.lyrasistechnology.org/repositories/2/resources/476">Civil War Patriotic Envelopes Collection (RHC-51)<br /></a><a href="https://gvsu.lyrasistechnology.org/repositories/2/resources/479">Whitely Read Diary (RHC-52)</a>
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
Grand Valley State University. University Libraries. Special Collections & University Archives
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
1804-1897
Rights
Information about rights held in and over the resource
<a href="http://rightsstatements.org/page/NoC-US/1.0/?language=en">No Copyright - United States</a>
Format
The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource
image/jpg; application/pdf
Language
A language of the resource
eng
Type
The nature or genre of the resource
Image; Text
Coverage
The spatial or temporal topic of the resource, the spatial applicability of the resource, or the jurisdiction under which the resource is relevant
1804-1897
Text
A resource consisting primarily of words for reading. Examples include books, letters, dissertations, poems, newspapers, articles, archives of mailing lists. Note that facsimiles or images of texts are still of the genre Text.
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
RHC-45_CW1-4852-7
Title
A name given to the resource
Jefferson H. Godfrey correspondence
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
1862-07-16
Creator
An entity primarily responsible for making the resource
Godfrey, Jefferson H.
Subject
The topic of the resource
United States--History--Civil War, 1861-1865
United States. Army. Michigan Cavalry Regiment, 6th (1862-1865)
Description
An account of the resource
Correspondence from Jefferson H. Godfrey, company M of the 6th Michigan Cavalry to his family, 1862
Language
A language of the resource
eng
Rights
Information about rights held in and over the resource
<a href="http://rightsstatements.org/page/NoC-US/1.0/?language=en">No Copyright - United States</a>
Source
A related resource from which the described resource is derived
Civil War and slavery collection (RHC-45): http://gvsu.lyrasistechnology.org/repositories/2/resources/472
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
Grand Valley State University. University Libraries. Lemmen Library and Archives