After graduation from electronics school in Chicago in 1966, Zenith in Sioux City wanted to hire me, but wanted my military obligation out of the way. I was told they had contacts with the local National Guard unit, and would get me in if I would go to work for them. Of course, I did, as the other choice would be to get drafted. So, after working for Zenith for a little over a year, the notice came out that our unit would be activated for duty in Viet Nam. I thought at the time that I may as well have been drafted, but this way allowed me to go with people I knew. My training in basic was in light vehicle driving, from jeeps all the way to 5 ton trucks. But at Ft Carson, me being one of the new people in the unit, I was usually picked upon to do what no one else wanted to do. One day while training in the field, a big fat Master Sargent came out and asked for a volunteer. And as usual, my hand was raised for me, and off I went. It turned out to be the best job one could hope for. I was exempt from all extra duties (KP, guard duty, etc). I was to go to school to become a TAERS clerk, or The Army Equipment Record System clerk. I had learn how to dispatch vehicles, order and receive parts for the vehicles, and make sure maintenance was done on time. The CMMI inspections were the most dreaded of all inspections, as they had regular army inspectors doing the inspections, and we always knew the regular army had it in for the National Guard units. They tried, but could find very few problems when they inspected us. Anyway, it was my bookkeeping records that earned us the high CMMI (command maintenance management inspection) scores for Headquarters company. Of course, there were clerks for the three other companies in our battalion who also participated. If parts were missing off vehicles, all I had to do was show the parts were on order, and that the maintenance was being performed, and we were covered.
Most of the unit except for maybe 40 or 50 of us went to Viet Nam. The rest of us stayed at Ft Carson and trained in a program called "Garden Plot". Where they come up with the names for programs, who knows, but we trained to put down riots, which were common during the Viet Nam conflict. We were outfitted with M-16 rifles, bayonets, and live ammo, tear gas and shock grenades, and were told if we were called to go put down a riot, that is exactly what we would do. Thankfully, we were never called.
In the unit's annual Command Maintenance Management Inspection last year, the 69th Brigade passed with exceptionally high ratings. No unit failed. The brigade averaged 84.8 percent for material and 86.3 percent for maintenance operations. Passing was 70 percent.
