Pride of Obligation

In the early days of America, drafting the nation’s young male populous into the military was not unheard of; in fact, the generations that soon came of age in the year 1950 and 1960 never knew a time that drafting citizen soldiers wasn’t an option. With the essence of the horrors that was World War II and Pearl Harbor still encompassing the nation’s heart and mind, it became a normality for young men to enlist in the military forces after high school to serve the betterment of their country as well as themselves. Gary Taylor was no exception to this tradition. He enlisted in the United States Air Force only weeks after graduating from high school in 1960. He, like most his age, yearned for the ability to see the world and do more than the “average Joe,” but his mere 18 years of age had not prepared him for the discipline necessary to thrive in such a harsh dynamic of men. Taylor found himself in several troublesome situations that seemed to always lead him into more and more calamity.

            Taylor recalls the beginning days of his new life while going through boot camp, he, as well as several other boys, were assigned to Flight 773. Although boot camp was a fond memory for Taylor, he remembers the days being filled with failure and repercussions. His flight never seemed to be able to complete their duties adequately enough to survive the inspections, which in turn, resulted in their imprisonment in their barracks until the job could be done successfully.

 Taylor remembers his flight scrambling to clean their barracks from top to bottom. They wanted the place to be so clean that there was no possibility that they would fail, but of course, calamity seemed to follow the young airman regardless. “Everything was perfect; there were no buttons out of place, or dust on shelves, it looked like everyone was going to pass this inspection together for the first time,” Taylor thought to himself as their First Sergeant passed through the corridor without a second glance. His flight relaxed their brows all too soon; someone in the flight forgot to empty out and clean the razor dispenser in the restroom so when the first sergeant stuck his finger down in the dispensary�"his finger returned in rivets, while blood dripped along the floor. The flight was once again remanded to their barracks.

A series of misfortunate events continued to hover over Flight 773. Taylor and his fellow flight members ran into a few complications with their Junior TI’s, which were men who had gone through basic training and were waiting to get dental work or eye work done so they were put in charge of the new recruits. Sadly, the two Junior TI’s put in charge of Flight 773 had a talent with sticky fingers. When the flight would go out on maneuvers, the two slippery TI’s would tap into the back of the airmen’s footlockers and pull out any valuables or money the young recruits had stashed away for safe keeping. The flight complained about the two snakes in their midst several times to no avail. Until finally, their First Sergeant set a trap and found that their “honorable” basic training graduates were nothing more than sticky fingered snakes. Both Junior TI’s were dishonorably discharged from service immediately after for their offences against the force.

As the days passed, Taylor and the flight soldiers were subjected to more basic training exercises. He remembered the smell of dirt and smoke while crawling under barbwire with his pack on only to have to rip it off to crawl back through the dirt on his back under wet barbed wire. “There were landmines erupting all around us and we had to go through a gas chamber to fully understand the effects of gas,” he recalls in a serious tone of voice as the sun began to descend below the horizon.

Through the darkness, as God would have it, a light seemed to show through for the airmen of Flight 773. Recruits had the opportunity to go to Base Liberty as a reward for their hard work and accomplishments. Only two men were able to attend Base Liberty as a reward for such accomplished deeds in their barracks and base duties, Taylor was one of those lucky recruits. While visiting the base, he was able to see the 1950’s musical sensation Fats Domino in concert while the performer was a guest on the premises. Soon after, Taylor and a few other airmen decided to go bowling during the free time they had. Taylor was on the verge of bowling a 300 game when his superiors told him his mother called. “I’ll be there in a minute,” he said in a determined voice, but his superiors demanded his presence immediately spitting fire in the words “you’ll come now,” causing Taylor to respond with several unpleasantries in the direction of his superior officers. Unfortunately, this act was not tolerated in the military. Just as dogs were trained to sit when told, soldiers were trained to obey without question when ordered, but Taylor would not be so easily won by this tradition of respect.

The days of basic training had come to an end and Taylor was assigned to the Motor Pool in Sacramento, California, at Major Air Force Base. He became a driver, which is often associated with a taxi driver of sorts, for Motor Pool. It seemed as though Taylor had evaded his usual shuffle with trouble; he felt as though he was doing quite well on base at Sacramento, until he found himself behind the wheel in fender bender with a lieutenant’s personal vehicle. “I, of course, got busted on the spot, but it bothered me because other men were taking the trucks out on the back of the runway and racing them, sometimes even flipping the vehicles completely, but nothing seemed to ever happen to them,” he said in a disheartened fashion.

Taylor’s constant rumble with trouble began to discourage him about his potential in the military. When he was busted for backing into the lieutenant’s vehicle, the Sergeant took one look at Taylor and said, “That’ll be all.” As Taylor started to walk away, he slammed the car door in response to the Sergeant’s words, which caused the officer to fly out of the door yelling, “Did you slam that door, airman?” Taylor quickly responded in a rather sarcastic way of tone, “No, sir, I did not, must have been the wind sir.” After the incident, Taylor fell into a pattern of losing his stripe and then waiting awhile to gain it back creating a routine.

More troublesome incidents soon followed the airman’s days of service. One particular afternoon, Taylor found himself a little “homesick,” so he decided to go down to the Los Angeles area to visit some old friends while he was there, but of course wherever he went trouble followed him. Taylor was given weekend duty; after being transferred to communications due to his accident with the lieutenant’s vehicle, he was in charge of setting up a microphone for Johnny Weismiller and Bob Steele. “Johnny Weismiller starred as the first Tarzan in the movies and Bob Steele was a TV western cowboy,” Taylor explained proudly. He figured if he could get all his work done and ready for the hosts at the golf course where it would take place, he could sneak off to Los Angeles for a small while to visit friends. Taylor found a few of his comrades to help him in his escapade: one was to get the microphones set, and the other was to do the “trouble tickets” for him. After the plan was in motion, Taylor took off on a bus to downtown Sacramento where he would later catch the Greyhound to Los Angeles, but as the bus began to pull off it began to rain. “If you’re in communications, you know that rain is your worst enemy,” he said in a low voice. Taylor still went and sure enough electrical problems ensued. Upon Taylor’s return, his roommate greeted him with “The commander wants to see you.” Taylor asked “Why?” His roommate quickly followed up with, “He wants to know where you were this weekend.” Taylor’s stomach tightened as he walked down the corridors to visit the commander. The commander quickly baited the recruit with questions in regards to his whereabouts and the reason that he broke the guidelines for leaving. Taylor lied through his teeth and told the commander that his mother was sick. He was punished for not communicating with his commander and stripped of his stripe as well as restricted to base for two months. Taylor took his punishment graciously and walked out the door smiling.

Unfortunately, Taylor couldn’t keep himself on base for longer than three days. He soon started sneaking off; no one ever questioned the airman so he kept living like normal and having fun as he was prior to his restriction. In just a few weeks’ time, Taylor had earned his stripe back and had returned to his ways of mischief only too quickly. On one evening after his restriction was lifted, Taylor escaped the base with a few of his Mexican friends to go cruising on the city streets, but sadly what was to come the men would never have expected to ensue. Coming to a stop light, the military men were found alongside a car full of civilians that decided to throw things and verbally attack the men of honor purely because they were of the military persuasion.

Noticing the base sticker on the military man’s vehicle, they began throwing cans and whatever they could get their hands on out their windows at Taylor and his friends. “So like any manly guy would do, we gave the civilians a couple of single fingered salutes and thought that was going to be the end of it,” Taylor said, but unfortunately it wasn’t. The civilians soon drove off to an old drive-in to recruit some of their friends, two more car loads to be exact, and they began chasing the military vehicle up and down the roads of Sacramento. Taylor and his fellow military men found themselves caught on a one-way street as the civilian gang began attempting to pin them in against the parked cars. “One guy got in front of us, slamming on his brakes, while the other guy came screeching up behind us, and another guy came up to the driver’s side�"completely boxing us in against the parked cars,” Taylor said in an excited tone, but it wasn’t over yet. The man who came up to the driver’s side of the military vehicle was driving a brand new modified vehicle and Taylor’s friend Rodriguez was driving an old beat up Ford. Rodriguez leaned over and said, “I sure hope he likes his car more than I like mine,” and cranked his wheel into the other vehicle only for the civilian to notice what was about to happen to his precious new car. The civilian tried to react quickly, but his car jolted too fast for him to control, causing the car to jump into a parking meter.

One of the civilian vehicles was done for; however, the other two still tried to pursue Taylor and his friends while throwing things at them along the way. Thankfully, Taylor spotted a cop car just a few blocks up, so with full speed they ran through every red light and stop sign they saw to get to their target. As they approached the police officer’s vehicle they pulled in behind it and waited for their captors to peel off in either direction to avoid the flashing lights of justice. The civilians peeled off right, so Taylor and his group fled to another friend’s house, hiding the old beat-up ford in a dark alleyway, to wait it out until it was safe to return to the busy lit streets of Sacramento.

Around 2 a.m., they left the house to drop off a few of the Navy guys that were with them at their vehicle at a dance club where they had been earlier that night in downtown and as they were going back they saw all the cars that were chasing them. “We thought it would be fun to cause a little problem with their vehicles,” Taylor said amusingly, “So we stopped, snuck up to where their cars were, cut a bunch of valve stems, scratched a bunch of cars and could have gotten completely away with no problem, except there was a party going on inside with smoke just billowing out while the door was cracked open. We were all about four sheets to the wind and one of my buddies decides it would be a good idea to throw a big rock inside the door.” The rock ricocheted off the door, the door hit the wall, and the rock went flying in causing everyone to scream. Taylor and his friends booked it back to their car while the genius with the rock came flying in through the car window as they sped away from the scene. “We saw them all run outside and get in their cars, but the funny thing was that they couldn’t chase us because they had a bunch of flat tires,” Taylor laughed. The boys got away scot free, only to get a flat tire on the way back to their base. Luckily for them, an old farmer was coming up the road on a tractor. He took the boys up to a repair shop, helped them get their car fixed, and they were on their way. By the time they returned to base, it was almost 6 a.m. “After we got back, Rodriguez, the guy who was driving, immediately went upstairs and made a ‘For Sale’ sign for his car,” Taylor scoffed, “I don’t know whatever happened to the guy that bought it.” Taylor found himself in several other predicaments while in Sacramento, but before his service progressed into a bad conduct discharge, he began to clean up his act and accepted a position in Anchorage, Alaska, after being redlined or denied for a position in France with only 18 months left of service.

A few days before Taylor would be shipping out for his new position in Anchorage, he decided to help the NCO Club get their phones set up for their facility with the understanding that he would receive a meal in return for his services. The head of the organization agreed that Taylor would indeed receive a meal after he had set up the phones, so he spent three days of his own personal time moving the phones and resetting them based on a key system for the NCO Club. After finishing the job, Taylor came back the following week for his meal and asked the Sergeant running the organization “How about if I come in for my meal?” The Sergeant coldly replied “You ain’t getting no meal here.” Confused by his reply, Taylor inquired as to why their end of the bargain was not being held up and the Sergeant met his inquiry with the same answer. “You are not getting a meal here,” he said in an icy voice. Feeling rather defeated in his attempts, Taylor retreated back to his base and awaited his time to ship out for Alaska.

The night before Taylor left for his new position, he noticed that he still had the keys to the NCO Club’s storage room where the telephone equipment was stored. So in an effort to say goodbye to his old ways of mischief, Taylor would complete one final prank. He went back to the facility, took all of their phone equipment, and changed the entire number system on the phones. The NCO Club never reported in until after 10 o’clock, which would be all too late to catch Taylor for his “misconduct” against their organization, for he would be long gone on a plane to Anchorage, Alaska, by that time.

A while passed in Anchorage, allowing Taylor some time on leave to go back home to California. His plane landed in, coincidentally, Sacramento. Upon his arrival in Sacramento, Taylor went to his old barracks to visit some of his friends only to be met by Sergeant Biddings at the door. The Sergeant greeted him with, “Gary, you know the day you left, we had to spend about five hours straightening out the phones at the NCO Club�"you wouldn’t happen to know what happened to those phones now would you?” The Sergeant knew full well that Taylor was pretty bent out of shape about the incident with the organization. Once again, Taylor lied through his teeth. “No I have no idea, what’re you talking about? What happened?” he asked all too innocently. “Oh, well, if you don’t know, we had a lot of problems,” Sergeant Biddings said in a suspecting voice, “When you picked up some of the phones, they would set off alarms and things of that nature.” It would seem as though Major Air Force Base was the root of Taylor’s military shenanigans.

After that awkward encounter and a few familiar ones, Taylor’s leave came to an end and he was soon shipped back to Anchorage, Alaska, where he endured the cold and customs that were very unfamiliar to a native Californian such as himself. Upon his arrival back, he soon began venturing out of the base to the local bars and hang outs. At one particular bar, he noticed men carrying around riffles on their shoulders, guns on their hips, and large knives all out in the open. Anchorage was new territory for the young airman; he was unaccustomed to the low temperatures and snowy weather in the month of March.

During Taylor’s stay in Alaska, he, as well as many others, suffered through the Great Alaska Earthquake of 1964. On March 27, 1964, around 5:36 p.m. the great earthquake with a magnitude of 9.2 occurred in the Prince William Sound region of Alaska. The epicenter of the earthquake was almost 10 km east of the mouth of College Fiord, roughly 90 km west of Valdez and 120 km east of Anchorage where Taylor was stationed. This earthquake was the second largest earthquake ever recorded in the world. The rupture lasted for almost four minutes or 240 seconds, which can seem like a life time to anyone having the ground beneath their feet shook so hard that the buildings around them are collapsing with ease like mere sand castles on the beach. Once the quake had subsided, the number of deaths caused by the shake totaled to a 131 people; 115 in Alaska and 16 were taken in Oregon and Taylor’s home of California. Although the death toll was minuscule for an earthquake of that size, the lives lost were honored none-the-less.

The earthquake opened Taylor’s eyes to what military men were capable of in times of disaster and peril. He gained a new respect and attitude for the men he served with as well as for himself. “I watched buildings crumble before my very eyes like toys while the ground shook angrily beneath my feet,” he shuttered, “We lost one man on our base that day, he just panicked so deeply that he jumped out of a third story window in what he thought was a large pile of snow, but was actually a large pile of rocks hidden by the white of the snow which in turn broke his neck.” Taylor suffered through four more earthquakes in Anchorage after that day.