Parley Boyd Hales, Reid Hales, Ray Hales Military
Ok. I'll start with a post about my dad, Parley Boyd Hales. When dad graduated from High School lots of kids were getting drafted into the military. Dad decided that if he was to be drafted he would rather be an officer so he went to Utah State University and joined the Reserve Officer Training Corp (ROTC). He was in the ROTC for two years before he left on a mission for the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints (1956 - 1957). He played the clarinet in the army ROTC band. He worked in the summer of 1957 to get money for his mission and then went on his mission to Taiwan in September 1957. After his mission dad decided to join the National Guard, again so he wouldn't be drafted. That was 1960.
After his mission, at boot camp, dad met my Uncle John (mom's brother). Dad was in the office a lot because of his office skills. Uncle John met him in the office. John wrote my mom and told her about a guy named Parley that was teaching him Chinese. Mom heard Lee and Chinese and thought that John's friend was Chinese. When John and dad got off the bus after boot camp mom was pleasantly surprised. She fell head over heels in love and the rest is history! :-) Actually I don't know when she actually fell in love with dad officially. I think I need to call my parents. Apparently I don't know this iconic story as well as I thought I did :-)
At boot camp they would go to a movie once a week and get coke and popcorn. That's where dad claims he got hooked on Coke. I always thought he got hooked in China when they went to teach english.
Dad stayed in the National Guard/Reserves for six years. After boot camp his commitment was to go to a meeting every weekend and to attend camp for two weeks every summer. When he went to California to go to Stanford he transferred to the National Reserves so he could fulfill his six year commitment. He continued with the National Reserves when he went to Chicago. His unit was never called up except for once in Chicago when there was a bad tornado type storm. They were called up for one week. Their job was to protect places so they wouldn't be looted. The pay was good and in the six years he served he became a sergeant first class.
Just a side story about my Uncle John. Apparently John loves guns. At boot camp dad remember that John loved learning how to shoot howitzers. Mom says he already knew how :-) Anyhow, when John went on his mission for the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints apparently he took his gun. When Grandpa Cox went to check his gun case he found John's gun missing. He told John his gun was missing. John said not to worry because he had it with him. Grandpa said, "You can't take a gun on a mission!" and he made John give the gun back. John complained and said that he would only use it on PDay (Pday is a day off from missionary work when missionaries can relax, do laundry etc.) but Grandpa Cox prevailed. Not surprisingly Uncle John went on to have a career in the National Guard.
Apparently John could have also become a seamstress. On his mission a lady needed a wedding dress and mom says John told the lady, "I've seen my mom do a lot of sewing. I'll make you a dress." And he did. He is definitely a talented guy.
The next military man in our immediate family is my brother Reid. He served in the military after college. He had the military pay for his medical school. I remember Reid telling me about boot camp. As an officer they had it pretty easy in boot camp. He told me that he felt so sorry for the guys that went straight into the military. Apparently boot camp is super hard if you don't have the cushy rank of officer!
The next military guy I think of is my Uncle Ray. My dad's brother. I never met Ray. He died in Vietnam a couple months before I was born. Ray was married and his wife was expecting my cousin, Raylyn, when he was sent to Vietnam.
I've been thinking a lot about Ray lately. That's kind of how this whole blog started. So many questions. Anyhow. Uncle Ray joined the ROTC just like dad did. He too wanted to avoid the draft and join as an officer. Apparently though to be an officer you had to sign up for an extra year. Instead of doing that Ray decided to just sign up as a regular army person and skip officer training. He was a dog handler. His first dog malfunctioned so he trained a new dog in Vietnam. The first time Uncle Ray and this dog went out they were both killed. Ray got four medals including a purple heart. You can read about the medals on Family Search.
I remember being told a story about Ray's death. When he died, apparently Grandpa Hales woke up in the middle of the night and knew something was wrong. He told Granny that something was wrong with Ray. A little while later they got the news that Ray was dead. Does anyone else remember that story? Did I get that right?
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DeleteThis is Merrill. I did not have a great military career, in fact, none really at all. But I will relate just a couple of telling stories about my time in Basic Training that will demonstrate how things went for me in the military.
ReplyDeleteLike Boyd, I also joined the National Guard just after graduating from high school. My best friend, Wayne Johnson, and I went into Basic Training together at Fort Ord, California to begin our 6-months active duty assignment. After arriving at the base, we were hauled in “cattle trucks” (that’s what they reminded me of) to some barracks for assignment to our training units. We were lined up in front of four very mean looking men and names were read out assigning us to one of them as our new “mothers” for the next 8 weeks. I remember noticing one sergeant in particular and said to myself, “I don’t care which one I am assigned to as long as it is not him.” Just then my name was called out and, sure enough, I was part of his platoon. His name was Sgt. Johnson, no relation to Wayne, though. Fortunately, Wayne was also assigned to him. Our first week under Sgt. Johnson was as miserable and difficult as I had feared. However, our squad leader (picked from the recruits) messed up that week and was “fired”, and, to my surprise and dismay, I was selected to replace him. Where before, I thought I would just try to get past the 8 weeks under Sgt. Johnson, now I was going to have to work with him. But another surprise. I grew to respect and love this great man. I found that he wasn’t mean, just tough and strict in wanting to teach us survival skills. Lesson learned—be careful of first impressions.
But all did not go smoothly as a squad leader. Second story. Each morning we would fall out in front of the barracks before breakfast for roll call. One morning Wayne was still in the shower when the bugle blew. As I did not want him to get into trouble, when time came for me to report on my squad I called out “All present and accounted for, Sir.” Just then, at the worst timing ever, Wayne came bursting out of the barracks. Well, he was accounted for, just not present. That cost us dearly. We were confined to the barracks area for the weekend. That would not have been so bad, except that weekend Mom, Blaine & LaVonne and Boyd & Lyona were traveling up from Southern California to Stanford where Boyd was in school and were stopping in to see us and take us to lunch or something. So, we ended up just visiting at the barracks. We would have been okay if Wayne had just waited inside the barracks until the formation was dismissed. But then a valuable lesson would not have been learned—whatever it was.
After my 6-month active I duty I spent another six years in the reserve, with a mission inserted during that time.
That's a great story Uncle Merrill! Great lessons.
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