Do you have a funny or weird story about how you got assigned in the military?

[Griff Murphey]

Ok here is mine. I was in Newport RI in the summer of 1974 in dental officer indoctrination. Which was somewhat unnecessary as I had 7 years of Army ROTC and had interservice transferred to the navy. My dad mailed me my ACDU orders which had come to my house and they said the 3rd Marine Division at Naha. I asked the CDR who was teaching the class about it I was thinking "Naha, California" had a ring to it. He laughed his ass off and informed me I was headed to Okinawa "...out with the troopies." My assumption was I was sent to the Marines because I was an ex-Army 2Lt. Okinawa and the Cambodia and Vietnam evacuations and the making of many great USMC friends came and went and my next assignment was to be "Navy Jax" in Florida, normally considered a plum. But I liked shooting so I wrote the detailer Captain Wilkie and asked for Camp Pendleton. He agreed, writing me back and recalling we had met at Admiral Vaughn's home in Dallas when he had come out to meet the Navy seniors at Baylor Dental.

He reminded me that I had brought a collection of 1/1200 waterline ships and displayed them. He wrote: "When I saw those ships I knew you were the right man for the 3rd MarDiv!"

Go figure.

[Griff Murphey]

Ok nobody is jumping in on this so I will add a story my uncle James G. Taylor, M.D., liked to tell. He graduated from medical school and was assigned in 1942 to San Antonio Army Aviation Cadet Center as one of "a half dozen wet behind the ears doctors who met the troop trains." He told the story about the burn victim whose eyelids were replaced by his Colonel utilizing the man's foreskin. But that's not the funny part.

When the war ended on VJ Day he was serving at San Marcos Army Airfirkd and when the hospital was closed the admin master sergeant remarked, "You know, Dr. Taylor, you've been the best doctor we had here. That's why we kept you on here instead of sending you overseas."

Officers must never forget that the senior nco's actually run the Army, or at least did back in the days before computers.

[IditarodJoe]

What can we say, Griff . . . it's the military. As a naval reservist I was trained as a Radioman. I went on active duty as a "designated striker", indicating that upon achieving NCO status I'd be a fully qualified Radioman. When I went on active duty and reported to my ship, a PO2 in the Personnel Office glibly said "We don't need Radiomen - how fast can you type?" I honestly responded "About 13 words per minute." He said "fine, you're a Quartermaster. Report to Navigation." When I got to the division, the LPO - a good ole boy from North Carolina - put me on notice that there were three things in this world he couldn't stand . . . "damned yankees, college boys, and hippies", and he had me pegged as all three. True to his word, I got every TAD assignment that came along until he was transferred out. Hmmmm . . . it's not just a job, it's an adventure!

[Griff Murphey]

��If you think you're good enough to get on the team - a proud new future can be yooours!!��

[Dan Shapiro]

I enlisted in the US Army Security Agency. When I arrived at the training center at Ft. Devens, Mass., the CO of the school, Col Lewis Millet (MOH), met with us the first week. As part of his "welcoming speech", he urged us to do our best in training, cautioning us that if we failed to make the grade, well.....the army was currently experiencing a shortage of cooks.

Only later did I learn that he made the whole thing up. Seems the Colonel had quite a sense of humor.

[alibi]

When I was drafted on the lottery I had been going to college taking criminology courses, but wasn't the best of students. When I was interviewed at reception station I requested Air Defense Missiles, because I thought there was a good chance of being stationed on the west or east coast. The "career counselor" asked what I had been doing and when I told him studying criminology he said he thought I would have requested military police. At the end of the interview I said perhaps put down MP as a second choice, to which he replied he already had. After I graduated from military police AIT I had a chance to see the work sheet the career counselor had been working on. As I had requested he had recorded 16F as my requested MOS, and had written in 95B in the box marked RECOMMENDED MOS. I also found out that the GT score for MP school was higher than for officer candidates, so the Army didn't send everyone that requested MP to the course.

[Andouille]

Well not strictly an assignment story, but I was already in Viet Nam when I got a letter from my father, which was unusual. He considered that to be Mother's job. Anyway, the envelope only contained a newspaper clipping showing the results of the draft lottery for my age group.

My number was eight.

Dad had scribbled "HA-HA your Father" on the clipping, and that was it.

When I got home I asked him what was so funny about that and he just laughed.

[S.A. Boggs]

Got to tell this about our son. Back at the turn of the century he was in the 1/504 ABN at Bragg and he had not written or called for 3 weeks, Mom was getting worried. Use to have a poster on this forum who was at Bragg, a Col. in JAG. I PM him and asked him to check up on our son, he said the unit was out in the field but was going to chopper out anyway. That evening we got an irate call from our wayward son wanting to know why I had got a JAG Col. involved. His Company Commander and First Sgt. was also involved now as well. Seems when JAG comes around people have a way of getting "concerned" about things. His CO gave orders for our son to call NOW! I told him I had another friend I could have contacted as well...a Major General!
Sam

[JohnMOhio]

One saturday a good friend and I went to the local bowling alley on base for a pitcher of beer and their first class chilli. Halfway though lunch two girls came in and sat down two rows over in a booth. My friend was one that always managed to say something to the ladies that would fluster them. He gets up from our booth and tells me to watch this. He walks over to the girls, says hello. They say hello back. My friend tells the one on the right, does your mother know your drinking beer? She fires back: This is mother. With that, he walked back kind of sheepishly. He finally met his match.

[Dan Shapiro]

Got to tell this about our son. Back at the turn of the century......

My Grandfather enlisted in the Corps in 1900. He was 15. About 2 years in, he gets called to the Company office. The CO shows him a telegram from the Commandant, wanting to know why my Grandfather is not sending money home to support his mother. Seems "someone" in his mother's house wrote the Commandant. Grandpa told his CO that his mother did not speak, read, or write in English. Further, his mother owned and ran two apartment houses in Washington, DC and was not hurting for money. Grandpa suspected the letter had been written by his youngest brother......who was living off Momma.

[stefor]

I joined the Army in 1972. My basic training was at Ft. Ord, CA. I attended 96B (Intelligence Analyst) courses at Ft. Huachuca, AZ. As our schooling was winding down, we were visited several times by members of Special Forces attempting to recruit us. Now, I had enlisted for this MOS because I had the thought that if I ended up in Vietnam (not likely at this late date), I would at least work in an air-conditioned environment. It really was no surprise that no one volunteered. Soooo, when our assignments were posted, four of us were assigned to the Repo Depot at USAJFKCMA, Ft. Bragg. I called my father that evening, a recently retired Sergeants Major. He told me that I was going to be in Special Forces whether I liked it or not and that I should report before the other three got there. I did and it was fortunate, I did get the best assignment. I was assigned to the 801st MI Detachment, 5th SFG and detailed to work in G2 Plans, 5th Group. It did cause a minor stir when I showed up, due to the Army wide promotion freeze of 72-73, instead of being an E4, I was still and E2 and my unit had never had one. Nor had they ever had a leg in the unit. I had to do all the same stuff as the SF qualified guys did, PT etc., with the minor exception of jumping out of aircraft. However, I was told by my buddies, my pals, my honorable co-workers that they would throw me out of the plane with them if we ever got sent somewhere. So, when nine months later, a chance to work on a special project came up, this dedicated leg “jumped” at it. It was at the Army Intelligence Agency, Ft. Meade MD. I worked on this classified project for about 9 months when a good friend told me of a new office being created and them needing an E4/5 to fill out the staff. It seems that the Intelligence Agency was creating an Operations Center from scratch. On my lunch break, I found the office with door ajar. Looking in, it was a tiny office, with two desks, a Colonel, LTC and a MSGT. I found out later that they were having a suite of rooms being made for the Operations Center. The Colonel asked what I needed. I told him I was there to interview for the E4/5 position. He invited me in, and then asked where I had served before. I nervously thought to myself that I should start at the beginning and responded, “801st MI, 5th Special Forces”. The Colonel abruptly said “Stop, your hired”. I am sure that was close to the shortest job interview on record. He told me I no longer worked on my project and put me to work on the spot (remember, I am on my lunch hour). As I started work, it suddenly became clear why he hired me with such a short interview. I saw three dress green jackets on the coat stand and all three had the snake eater (Special Forces) patch on the combat side (crap, back in SF land). My Warrant Officers from my old project were very unhappy and tried to throw some crap at me and my new boss. What they didn’t realize was that he was the Deputy Director of Army Intelligence and easily handled their attempts. It turned into a great job, working with great gentlemen. I know they are gone now, but thanks to Colonel Edward Bort, LTC Connie O’shea and Master Sergeant Joseph J. D. Callahan (who taught me all about chicory and coffee). I left active duty after my 3 years were up, joined the Guard, went to college and took ROTC and a commission. I do wish that those three gentlemen could have seen me pinned with my silver oak leaves.

[fjruple]

This did not happen to me but a very dear friend. While attending AIT at Ft. Ben Harrison, IN. My friend had the habit of getting drunk on the weekends and would go to the top of the fire escape on the old WWII barracks and climb on to the roof and threaten to jump like a paratrooper. Of course, a crowd would form with calls of "fly birdy fly" and "jump paratrooper". The first shirt would show up who had a real bad speech impediment in which he would stammer when he got excited. After trying to get him down he would jump! and land on both feet on very soft dirt. (My friend planned his jump). The course we were attending at AIT made it quite clear if you failed you were on your way to Ft. Benning and the Infantry School. My friend on his second go round from the roof came to me later in the week and said that somehow he had volunteered for the Infantry and paratrooper school but could not remember ever volunteering and signing his name to the request. I suspect the first shirt had enough of his jumping from the roof of the barracks and signed his name to the requests. LOL!!

--fjruple

[Major Tom]

I was assigned to cooks school at Ft. Bragg, NC. I didn't know how to boil an egg.