Marines

Posted by John Crandall Apr 24, 2007

Although I am the Transportation History Feature Writer, I am now allowed to post to other topics I feel qualified to write about, so I have done several articles about the U.S. Marine Corps. I served for 5 years, and was discharged honorably. I was an "airwing Marine", one of those aircraft technicians infantry Marines really enjoy making fun of. I worked on F/A-18 Hornet Jets, and I loved it sometimes and hated it others. There's something about the Corps that makes you forget the bad times, and remember your service however humble you may have been in the big picture with pride.

It all starts in bootcamp where they take your cigarettes and candy bars away from you and whip you into shape to run 8-10 miles whenever they tell you too, and to march 25 miles in a day with a full pack weighing somewhere in the nieghborborhood of 75 lbs. While all that is going on they shave all your hair off, and call you a recruit. They then inform you that recruits are among the lowest lifeforms on the planet. Along with invaluable new perspective you learn that there have been great Marines in the past. Men like Dan Daly who killed over 200 Boxer Rebels in one night almost singlehandedly, Smedley Butler who had the Eagle Globe and Anchor (EGA), the symbol of the Marine Corps tatooed larger than life on his chest, Chesty Puller who led his Marines to many victories in WWII, and Korea, including the now famous fighting withdrawal of the Marines at the Frozen Chosin (Chosin Reservoir), and about Tun Tavern and the Marine Corps Birthday.

You learn about the Devil Dogs who fought so bravely at Belleau Woods, about Archibald Henderson, the Grand Old Man of the Marine Corps who served from the early 1800's until his death just before the Civil War, about A.A Cunnigham who was the first Marine pilot, Gaudacanal, Iwo Jima, and much much more. Every Marine knows a lot of this History, and it is important to remember these men and their deeds and lives, and the many who died fighting for American Liberty.