It was the time of the Viet Nam War. The Army drafted me. It wasn’t a bad time for me. It became a great time. In I made some good friends in Basic Training and later. ED, the schoolteacher linked to my later life. A little destiny working. Paul Nick. Poor Paul. He graduated from college with a PHD, served two years in the Peace Corps, then he gets drafted. Barry Hammerberg, who we named Hamburger,’ and his wife. Gary Fido, who became mayor of Duluth MN. Dave Hippie and his wife Nancy. Yikes, a good last name to have in the military. I had many more, not so much friends but I’ll call them ‘fascinating encounters.’
I’m about a week into Basic and I get another assignment in addition to ‘driver.’ A trainee named Madison, should never have been drafted. He barely passed the intelligence test and was notably a little behind. Madison was a gentle soul with great attuite and wanted desperately to be one of the guys. Madison wanted to be anna my cook so he could get a Fry cook job when he got out of the army. Before he got drafted, the best he did was a job as a dishwasher. He didn’t have a high school diploma or much physical coordination.
One day at mess, I overheard my Drill Sergeant, Awcky, talking to another drill sergeant. Awkie said he was considering washing Maddison out. The problem was it would become a black mark on Awcky’s record.
One other drill sergeant glanced at me, then back atAwkie. “I have a great idea.”
“What,” Awkie asked.
“Have Blumer tutor him.”
“I like that idea,” Awkie said then called me over. “Blumer, you’re now Maddison’s tutor. You do whatever it takes so Maddison graduates with our platoon.”
“But…” I started to complain.
Awkie cut me off. “That’s an order Blumer.
I wasn’t too thrilled, but there wasn’t any way I could think of to get out of this. Some of the draftees, teased Madison, calling him ‘Gomer,’ after the movie character Gomer Pile. Now that I was Maddison’s tutor, I spread the word to stop calling Maddison, Gomer. I learned my first lesson from Maddison when he told me he liked having a nickname. It made him feel like he fit in and that he was becoming popular. So, Gomer it was.
We had to get the barracks super clean for an Adjutant General’s (AG) annual inspection. My buddy Ed the teacher, saw this as another opportunity to look good and get that coveted promotion out of Basic.
Normally when a volunteer was needed for anything, Gomer raised his hand and bounce up and down. He was never picked and was usually ignored. The same happened with the cleaning assignments. Gomer was disappointed. The trainee assigned to clean the latrine complained and said the fool, Gomer, should do it. I was about to say something about calling Gomer a fool, when Gomer stopped bouncing and said, “yes, yes, yes.”
Gomer used his dining knife to scrape wax out of the corners of the latrine. He rolled up his sleeves and used a rag to clean inside the toilet bowls. Lesson number two for me. Gomer was so happy to feel included.
Tutoring did have challenges. One sunny day we marched out to the weapons range for M16 assault rifle training. We crowded into multi-tier bleachers. Between us and the firing range stood a Second Lieutenants holding a rifle. He was our instructor.
The “Lewie,” as we called lieutenants. was a cocky guy in his mid-twenties. He signaled to us to calm down and spoke as he praised back and forth.
“I’m going to pick a volunteer assistant. That soldier is going to come down here, hold tis weapon against his jaw, and fire a clip.”
We were all looking back and forth between the Lewie and each other. He held his hand to quiet our general murmur.
“Then,” he continued, “My assistant will then put the riflebut against his crotch and fire. So, who wants to be my assistant?”
Only one hand rose. A chant rang from the bleachers. “Gomer. Gomer. Gomer!”
“Gomer, no! Put your hand down,” I said and tried to grab Gomer’s sleeve.
“Where’s this Gomer?” the lieutenant called. “Get yourself down here.”
Gomer grinned and moved down the seat tiers. At the second tier, he tripped and grabbed the shoulder of trainee to keep from falling. When he got to the lieutenant, the officer spun Gomer around three or times, tossed him the rifle and said, “Point that thing down range.” The officer snapped in a clip, gave Gomer another spin, then said, “Make sure you have the safety on.”
The safety switch on an M16 is a small lever by the trigger. Its positions are ‘off, semi-automatic (single shot) and automatic (machine gun).
Gomer put his finger on the trigger and thumb on the safety switch. Still dizzy from the spin, he flicked the switch to automatic and pulled the trigger. The 30 round clip empties in less than 3 seconds. Thankfully, at that speed the rifle was empty when Gomer swept the muzzle past where the lieutenant’s chest had been. The lieutenant had dropped to the ground. Gomer, with a look of panic faced the bleachers, calling, almost crying, “Blumer. Blumer.”
Half the bleachers had emptied in those short seconds. Two trainees broke their ankles. One broke his arm. Several had wet spots on their pants, like lieutenant. The drill sergeants helped the lieutenant up, pulled the magazine from the M16 and had the unit form up. Later that week, we retook the training. This time we had a new instructor and no assistant.
Blind Man’s Bluff
Gomer passed most tests. For a couple, my demonstration to Gomer was what the drill sergeant instructor used as Gomer’s test. They turned a blind eye. Usually, the blindness was associated with some sort of ordinance, like a hand grenade,
To pass Basic Training you have to throw a hand grenade. There’s really no grading. You throw one and live and you pass. You throw one and die, or don’t throw one at all, you don’t pass.
Emagine this. Dig a square pit about ten feet deep and ten feed square. You line the pit with steel reinforced foot-thick concrete walls. Now you form a solid concrete cube ten feet high but only eight feet square on each side. You slope the top from the center, downward to the sides. Put the center of the cube in the pit.
You just made a hand grenade testing pit. The principle is, you stand at the center of the cube and drop a live grenade. Give it a kick and it rolls down the sloped roof and drops into the gap in the wall. You hit the deck. The blast goes straight up. You’re safe (in theory.)
At the range, a drill sergeant stands with you on the safety pit. Twenty feet away is a concrete blast wall about six feet high, three feet thick and twenty feet long, left to right.
You and the drill sergeant wear helmets and padded jackets. The drill sergeant gives you a grenade and talks you through arming it and the throw. You throw it behind the blast wall, get down on your face and wait for the blast.
At the range, I threw my grenade and passed. Gomer was next in line. The two drill sergeants argued about which one of them would stand with Gomer out on the cube. In the middle of the discussion, they both stopped and looked at me,
In unison, they both said, “Blumer, come back here.”
“No,” I said, anticipating what they wanted. “You’re the instructors. You’re the ones who sign off on test. I’m not doing this.”
“Aw… too bad, sergeant Collins said to sergeant Dudley. “Blumer didn’t pass. We’ll have to recycle him. When he goes through Basic the second time he might pass or might not.”
“And he won’t be a driver the next time,” Dudley said.
Both drill sergeants slowly shook their heads, shrugged their shoulders and gave me fake sad looks.”
“Okay, okay!” I said and put my helmet back on. “Common, Gomer!”
Dudley gave me a grenade. Gomer and I stepped out on the concrete safety cube.
A little frustrated, I looked around. Over at the blast wall I saw something that gave me an idea. I jumped the gap of the safety cube and ran to the blast wall. I grabbed a potato sized rock and ran back to Gomer. I stood beside him and told him to follow the orders I’d call out.
Gomer scowled and gave me a buzzling look when I handed him the rock.
“Ready!” I yelled. Gomer held the rock against his chest with one hand and from his other arm, placed his clenched fist alongside. He crouched.
“Pull!”
Gomer pretended to pull the arming pin from the rock grenade. Holding the rock in his throwing hand, he drew his arm back.
“Throw!”
With an overhand lob, Gomer tossed the rock past the blast wall.
“Drop!”
Gomer flattened out on the concrete.
I dropped to my knees and cupped my hands around my mouth. “BOOM!” I shouted as loud as I could. I stood and looked at the drill sergeants. “Did he pass?”
Dudley looked at Collins, nodded and scribbled something on his clipboard. “Looks like it to me,” he said.
“Yup, sure did. Nice throw but I didn’t have my earplugs in,” he said. “My ears are still ringing. NEXT!”
At graduation for that “Cycle” a total of about 500 draftees stood in formation, wearing starched dress uniforms. Dignataries sat at a table on the reviewing stand.
We looked pretty sharp, all at attention. Two drill sergeants stood cloce together. Their combined bodies blocked a clear view of a soldier behind them. Gomer stood, somewhat between attention and at ease. He had a small gold colored nail clipper that he used to clip his nose hairs with. He was oblivious to the world around him.
