60 years ago, U.S. military service was not an option

Sixty years ago this week, just graduated from Pana High School in Central Illinois, I rode the Wabash railroad night train from Taylorville to Chicago, and the next day was at Great Lakes Naval Training Center, north of Chicago.

I remember clearly one part of my pre-induction medical examination in Chicago. The doctor asked me:

“Do you really want to be in the Navy, son?”

I replied, “Yes, sir,” and he instructed me to follow the corpsman.

He told me to lie on a cot and relax. When he returned, I started to get up and he said, “No, no, just lie still.” Then he took my blood pressure and I was medically OK for service in the Navy. A group of new recruits rode the North Shore electric train to Great Lakes and started 13 weeks of boot camp.

I thought of this the other day while watching a television program about Fort Jackson, the U.S. Army’s primary recruit training center.

U.S. military service is voluntary and has been for years, and that’s a good thing. I also believe that several months of public service would be good for most of today’s young men and women. There are options other than the military services, such as the Peace Corps and VISTA; and if you think regionally, there are many possibilities.

During the 1930s, the Civilian Conservation Corps provided jobs for thousands of young men. In Illinois state parks, they constructed buildings still in use. In 1956, males who had reached their 18th birthdays were required by law to register with the Selective Service, which I think is still the case. But 60 years ago, males in good health could depend on being drafted if we were not exempt by reason of attending college or being married.

World War II was not that long ago, and we were aware of the sacrifices of The Greatest Generation, although we did not use that term, in Normandy, France; Germany; and islands in the Pacific, such as Guadalcanal and Iwo Jima, to mention a couple of place names that unfortunately don’t mean much to today’s young people.

My enlistment at 17 years of age required parental permission. It was termed a minority enlistment (a “kiddy cruise” in Navy terms) and meant that one would be discharged from active duty on his 21st birthday.

When I enlisted, I was “guaranteed” a service school and I had my heart set on the Navy Journalist School. At Great Lakes, a counselor explained that the journalist school was filled and offered other possibilities, but I was too hard-headed to accept an assignment to another school. So, I was assigned to the USS Princeton, an aircraft carrier, at Bremerton, Wash. I lucked out because I could type (thanks to high school typing class) and was assigned to the Supply Department.

I was on the Princeton for two years and then on Midway Island (Navy Exchange) until November 1959.

I was out of active duty before I was 21, because of a Navy reduction in force, and started attending journalism school at Southern Illinois University, Carbondale in January 1960.

During college, I stayed in the active Naval Reserves, attending weekly drills, changed my rate to journalist, and re-enlisted. I left the Naval Reserves in 1964, a couple of months after getting married. It was either resign or do two weeks of active duty on an aircraft carrier out of Mayport, Florida.

I had arranged to do the active duty at the Reserve Training Center in Evanston, Illinois, planning to do the Navy thing in the daytime and continue my night shift at The Associated Press in Chicago. That was disapproved and I could either accept the orders or resign. I had completed my overall six-year military obligation, including active duty and time in active or inactive reserves.

I have few regrets (“…too few to mention,” as Sinatra famously sang), but one is leaving the Naval Reserves. After all these years, I relish my time on active duty, on the Princeton and Midway Island, and in the Naval Reserves.

On the Princeton, an anti-submarine warfare carrier, I made two Far East cruises that included Hawaii, (not yet a state), Japan, The Philippines, Okinawa, Guam, Singapore and SCeylon (now Sri Lanka).

It’s a huge understatement to say it was a growing-up experience for a kid from Central Illinois, and I remain thankful to have had the opportunity.

Senior Writer D.G. Schumacher is a member of The Sun News Editorial Board. Contact him at dschumacher@thesunnews.com

This story was originally published July 12, 2016 at 2:53 PM with the headline "60 years ago, U.S. military service was not an option."