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Military Campaign Stories

Service Reflections of SGT Timothy Meltabarger, U.S. Marine Corps (1981-1990)

Service Reflections of SGT Timothy Meltabarger, U.S. Marine Corps (1981-1990)

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When I graduated from High School in 1980, I was about four months away from turning 18. I worked in the Oil Field with my brother through the Summer and decided that I needed to get an education, so I enrolled in a Technical College in Okmulgee, Oklahoma. I entered college as the hostages in Iran were being released. I was in a drafting program and sat at a table in a classroom with about 40 people. About 25 percent were veterans, and none were Marines. We had a radio that played in the classroom, and on March 30, 1981, I listened to the news of Reagan being shot. When the semester was over, I decided to quit college and go back home and do something greater. Exactly what, I had not decided.

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Famous Military Unit: American Forces Network (AFRTS)

Famous Military Unit: American Forces Network (AFRTS)

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In 1984, the first commercially available DynaTAC audio-only cell phone cost just short of $4,000, with each call billed at 45 cents per minute. Forty years later, anyone in uniform accesses audio-visual news from thousands of sources using a personal cell phone throughout the world, wherever a signal and transmission tower can reach. Yet, for eighty years, the most reliable military broadcast remains the Armed Forces Radio and Television Service (AFRTS). AFN Was Founded in 1942 as the Armed Forces Radio Service (AFRS) In 1942 the War Department established the ARMED FORCES RADIO SERVICE (AFRS), followed in 1954 by its first television detachment at Limestone AFB, Maine. American Forces Network global operations are now headquartered at Fort Meade, MD, and emanate from AFN BROADCAST/DEFENSE MEDIA CENTER in Riverside, CA. The modern network was founded in London and later moved to France. Always tying us together has been news from home whether we are assigned to a Tender at sea or an...

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The Patient Was Vietcong by Dr. Lawrence H. Climo

The Patient Was Vietcong by Dr. Lawrence H. Climo

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Thousands of books about Vietnam have been printed. Nearly all of them are memoirs, authored by those who experienced what is scripted. A few are fiction, occasionally written by someone who was in Vietnam at the time of the war while others are creations of fertile minds. Some have been made into Hollywood movies. What makes "The Patient was Vietcong" different than the standard Vietnam War narrative of books and movies and all those memoirs? Because it is about a healer whose remarkable and uncommon and humbling experiences in a strange land with widely different cultures leads to a self-discovery that is both enlightening and satisfying. In the 1960s, Lawrence Climo was opposed to the war but, unlike many other protesters, did not burn his draft card or leave the country. In 1965 the draft caught up with the young physician just out of medical training. When he finished his military training he would be sent to Vietnam. During training, he learned about a unique humanitarian...

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PO3 Robert Eugene Bush, U.S. Navy (1944–1945)

PO3 Robert Eugene Bush, U.S. Navy (1944–1945)

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Robert Eugene Bush wasn't old enough to join the Navy when the Imperial Japanese Navy attacked Pearl Harbor in 1941. He was still in high school. His neighbor in his hometown of Raymond, Washington, was a Fireman aboard the USS Arizona. "He's still on board the Arizona," Bush said in a Veterans History Project Interview. Bush could barely stand the wait to join the war. He wouldn't be old enough until his 17th birthday in the Fall of 1943. He and a friend from school dropped out and enlisted in the U.S. Naval Reserve. "We just wanted to be part of it," he said. "A little of it was adventurous, but the rest of it was to get even." He would only be in the military for one year, six months, and 22 days, the shortest tour of duty of any of the Medal of Honor recipients in World War II. But the battle he would fight to earn the medal would be one of the war's biggest and deadliest: the Battle of Okinawa.  For 98 days, U.S. Army soldiers and United States Marines fought the Japanese...

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Civil War – From Manassas to Appomattox Court House

Civil War – From Manassas to Appomattox Court House

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The Civil War started because of uncompromising differences between the free and slave states over the power of the national government to prohibit slavery in the territories that had not yet become states. When Abraham Lincoln won the 1860 election as the first Republican President on a platform pledging to keep slavery out of the territories, South Carolina legislature passed the "Ordinance of Secession," which declared that "the Union now subsisting between South Carolina and other states, under the name of the United States of America, is hereby dissolved."  Within six weeks, five more Southern states - Mississippi, Florida, Alabama, Georgia, and Louisiana - had followed South Carolina's lead and formed a new nation, the Confederate States of America. Former Union general, Jefferson Davis, was selected as it's first President. Within a few months, five more slave states seceded and joined the Confederacy.  Predictability, the incoming Lincoln administration, and most of the...

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Capt. Kristoffer Kristofferson, U.S. Army (1967-1975)

Capt. Kristoffer Kristofferson, U.S. Army (1967-1975)

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Kristoffer Kristofferson is a retired American singer, songwriter and actor. Among his songwriting credits are "Me and Bobby McGee", "For the Good Times", "Sunday Mornin' Comin' Down", and "Help Me Make It Through the Night", all of which were hits for other artists. But considering his family background and his education, Kristofferson seemed destined to become a military officer. The son of an Air Force major general, he served as a captain and helicopter pilot in the U.S. Army during his own stint in the service. TogetherWeServed follows Kris Kristofferson’s path from his childhood in Texas to his acclaimed career in the entertainment world, and the role his military service played in shaping his values and his music. Kris Kristofferson’s Early Life Kristoffer “Kris” Kristofferson was born in Brownsville, Texas, in June 1936. In his youth, Kristofferson showed a fondness for country music and a talent for writing, penning his first song at age 11. Kris was a Golden Gloves boxer...

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Heroes From the Wall by John Douglas Foster

Heroes From the Wall by John Douglas Foster

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When the author John Douglas Foster was wounded while serving in Vietnam during the 1968 Tet Offensive, he received more than a piece of metal in his body - haunting memories of comrades opened his soul in a quest to learn more about those who didn't return. Sketching a fascinating portrait of the lives of those who fought and died valiantly, Foster pens a riveting and gut-wrenching read in Heroes from the Wall, ensuring that these heroes will never be forgotten by future generation who didn't know them on the battlefield. Foster seamlessly captures their quirks of personality, playful antics, heroic actions, compassion and care for others, their caring and sharing with their comrades, tender caring for their family and affirmation of life while engulfed in places of death. Foster writes with candor and resonating tone. Reader's Reviews on Heroes From the Wall An unknown name on a gravestone is as dead as the person in the grave. John Foster has brought dead names on the Vietnam...

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Capt Bobbie Evan Brown, U.S. Army (1918-1952)

Capt Bobbie Evan Brown, U.S. Army (1918-1952)

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The 21st of October 1944 saw the first city inside Nazi Germany to fall to the Allies. U.S. troops captured Aachen, the historical capital of Charlemagne, in 19 days of fighting. The Wehrmacht took a beating at Aachen, losing two divisions and taking irreplaceable losses from eight more. The Americans also had a corridor into the Ruhr Basin, the Third Reich’s industrial nerve center. Among the Americans who captured Aachen was Lt. Robert E. Brown (Bobbie Evan Brown), a longtime Army veteran who first enlisted in 1918. The Army knew him officially as Bobbie Brown because he’d signed his name that way when joining at age 15. When the United States entered World War II, he was a unit First Sergeant, but as a talented athlete and leader, he was ready to go. He had no idea he would become a one-man bunker buster.  Bobbie Evan Brown Became Company Commander Brown had fought in North Africa with Gen. George S. Patton’s 2nd Armored Division, landed on Omaha Beach on D-Day, and fought his way...

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PO2 Jeff Bridges, U.S Coast Guard Reserves (1967-1975)

PO2 Jeff Bridges, U.S Coast Guard Reserves (1967-1975)

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Jeff Bridges is an Academy Award-winning actor, a musician, a photographer, and a philanthropist. He served in the US Coast Guard Reserves between 1967 and 1975, but he was a showbiz presence before he ever put on a uniform. The son of renowned Hollywood actor Lloyd Bridges, both his brother Beau and Jeff made appearances with their father on the TV series Sea Hunt between 1958 and 1960. Perhaps it was his father’s Coast Guard Auxiliary experience, combined with the Coast Guard role Lloyd played on the show, that influenced young Jeff’s choice to enlist as a young adult. The Beginning of Jeff Bridges’ Military Career Born in Los Angeles, California, on December 4, 1949, Jeffrey Leon Bridges would go on to become one of his generation’s best-loved actors. A child of privilege, with mother Dorothy and father Lloyd both successful actors, he grew up in the wealthy Holmby Hills neighborhood, and was on film before he was even a year old, in The Company She Keeps (1951). However, in his...

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Famous Veterans Who Died in 2022

Famous Veterans Who Died in 2022

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Honoring Famous Veterans Who Passed Away In 2022 As 2022 draws to a close, we have a lot of memorable losses to reflect on. When a celebrity dies, we go through the cycle of public mourning. Experts say that the loss of a celebrity is personal and undeniably real. It is a sadness that transcends missing their acting, their voice, or comedic timing. At TogetherWeServed, we would like to take a few minutes to remember three famous veterans whose passing was a loss to the entertainment community and their U.S. Military family. Vin Scully: Beloved Dodgers Icon and Navy Veteran Vin Scully, a sportscaster best known for his 67 seasons calling games for Major League Baseball's Los Angeles Dodgers, served in the Navy after graduating high school prior to attending Fordham University. He grew up in the Washington Heights section of Manhattan and fell in love with the game of baseball at the age of eight, becoming a fan of the New York Giants. Scully began his career as a student broadcaster...

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The Civil War Began and Ended at the Same Guy’s House

The Civil War Began and Ended at the Same Guy’s House

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When a war breaks out on your front lawn, and your chimney explodes from enemy fire, it’s time to find a new place to live. Neighborhoods like those are no place to raise children. That was Wilmer McLean’s opinion in the Civil War, anyway. That’s exactly what he did when the Battle of Bull Run erupted in front of his property.  The Confederate Army and the Union Army in the Civil War The real fighting didn’t break out until three months later when the Confederate Army and the Union Army met in the first real engagement of the Civil War at the First Battle of Bull Run… or the First Manassas, depending on which side you were on. They’re the same battle.  Confederate Gen. P.G.T. Beauregard commandeered the house of a local man named Wilmer McLean as a headquarters during the battle. As the general and McLean sat in his dining room during the battle, a Union cannonball hit McLean’s chimney, the shot falling right into the fireplace. Beauregard thought it was comical. McLean didn’t...

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