Cipriano Griego US Navy USS Richard E Crouse Vietnam Interview recorded September 11, 2014
A: My name is Cipriano Griego. I was born in Albuquerque, New Mexico on December 5th, 1944. I lived in Albuquerque, New Mexico for the first 17 years of my life. I went to Lew Wallace Elementary School, I went to Washington Junior High and I graduated from Albuquerque High School. I was born in the Valley. If anyone knows about Albuquerque, there’s a valley and then there’s a heights. My family’s Hispanic. In those days, we call it Mexican-American. We – my dad was a contractor. He built homes. He built various kinds of things. My mother was mostly a stay-at-home mom but she did clean. She cleaned people’s houses. When I was younger, I remembered that she cleaned one lady’s house whose husband was an attorney which later on made me think about that profession. And a very interesting wife.
When I was young, we – our family was normal extended family which means that my father had, I believe, eight brothers and sisters plus himself. My mother had seven brothers and sisters plus herself. Her mother raised her. Her dad was killed at a young age. He was in an accident. He worked for the railroad and was killed then. My father’s family, my uncles and aunts are very close, always having functions together as well as having so many children around when I was young. Every time we had an event, there was always kids around and we would always celebrate different kinds of events. Basically, holidays and things like that.
Where I lived, it was, in the beginning, basically, Latino, Hispanic, Mexican-American community. And when I moved on to – my dad bought a home in downtown Albuquerque. We were the only Latino, Mexican-Americans in that community and our neighbors didn’t quite like us being there so it was a hard time.
Q: How so?
A: Well, one lady next door, she would not allow us to get on her property, things like that. But basically, it was a very uneventful life, I guess you would say. I just lived a normal thing. I went to high school and I went to Albuquerque High which is an interesting school because in those days, you had two options: you could either go on to the service or get a job. I was 17 years old when I graduated from high school so my brother-in-law who was in the Navy indicated that it would be a nice thing for me to look into getting into the Navy.
Q: So you didn’t have any college prospects at that time?
A: No, no, I never even thought of college. So I joined the Navy and in those days, they called it “Kiddie Cruise”. If you’re under 18 and you joined, you only have to serve three years instead of four. So I joined on a buddy program. A friend of mine went with me to boot camp. So we went to San Diego and went to a boot camp there and a very interesting experience; first time being away from home, first time ever flying in an airplane. And in those days, they were prop jobs. It was funny because we flew from Albuquerque to Flagstaff, Arizona, Flagstaff, Arizona to I think it was somewhere in Nevada, from Nevada to San Diego.
By the time we got there, it was about two in the morning. So we were unloaded. A bunch of us were in a bus. They unloaded us into boot camp at two in the morning and we’re all nervous, scared. The people there acted like they – that we were nothing. They'd tell us to do something and we'd do it and somebody else would tell us to do something, we’d do it. We didn’t know what their ranks were or anything. But anyway, by the time we got everything settled, we had our bedding given to us and it was like four in the morning by the time we were able to get into our bunks. And lo and behold, at six o'clock, I believe it was, reveille. So I just had my head on the pillow and I had to get up again and they didn’t care whether you slept or not. So that told me that the Navy wasn’t as exciting as I thought it would be. But I did learn a lot while I was in the service. I learned how to discipline myself, I learned how to study for the first time in a long time, which was very helpful to me because I advanced in the ranks quickly.
Out of boot camp, I went to San Francisco to school. One thing about the – when I joined, it was choice, not chance. That was their motto. In other words you could pick, whatever school you wanted to go to and you were assured one of the things that you’d picked, you’d get. So I looked at the catalog, I guess if you call it that, and decided I wanted to be a nuclear submarine sailor. So that was my number one pick.
Q: What was the attraction to that?
A: My brother-in-law was a submariner and I thought it sounded cool to be a nuclear- powered submarine. Well obviously, I didn’t have the education or experience to get into that but that was one of my choices. So the top three, I think, was electronics technician and some other thing but mainly around electronics. And finally, the person that I was interviewing with indicated, “Well, you get six choices,” and he said, “Well, you got one left,” and he says, “Here’s something,” he looked in the book and he says, “Radar. Have you ever-” “I’d never heard of Radar,” he said, “Would you like to go to Radar school?” I said, “Well, you said I’m not sure you’re going to get this, you’re going to get one of the top one.” Lo and behold, I got Radar school. So that was in San Francisco and I spent eight weeks in school and about three or four more weeks waiting my orders.
Well, I got my orders and I went from San Diego to Newport, Rhode Island and I was put on board a destroyer. It was called the USS Abbot. What was interesting about that, it was a World War II destroyer and it was a sister ship of the Sullivan’s. I don’t know if anyone heard about the Sullivan brothers, they all got killed. Well, we were the sister ship of the Sullivan’s and what we did was we went out and trained officers how to be officers in terms of a destroyer. And we got a lot of midshipmen on board but we’d go out in the morning and come back at night [inaudible]. And so, I thought that was pretty boring so I put in for a transfer and I got a transfer to the USS Richard E. Kraus DD-849. Can you imagine I still remember that.
Q: When did you join by the way?
A: I joined when I was, well, I was 17 in 1962. So where was I? Richard E. Kraus. I wanted to see the world. Well, that ship never, left port and never came back. For three years, it was around the world. It went around the world twice. It hit every port. I was in Africa, I was in Greece, I was – I got to see everything until the end when we, from Newport Rhode Island, they assigned us to Subic Bay in Philippines for the Vietnam War. We were a support ship. We would do gunfire missions as well as we would chase the carriers for aircraft rescue which we did a couple of. But most of it, we did gunfire missions which means the closest I ever got to Vietnam was a thousand yards but I put a lot of holes in the country.
I don’t know what we hit but as a radar member, I worked in what’s called CIC, that was Combat Information Center and one of my functions was to talk to the spotters that would tell us what our mission was, where were we going to shoot and that was very interesting. They would – I recall one mission where we spent the whole day going back and forth about two miles, back and forth, back and forth, training our guns on a bicycle path I guess it was where they carried their supplies and things like that. And we had a spotter up on a hill looking down at that and when they came through, he’d say, “Shoot!” where we’d just let go. And then after so many shots, he would say, “Target destroyed.” We wouldn’t know what it was, a bike, a car, a truck or whatever, people or anything but that’s – that’s all we got; was “Target destroyed” assuming that there would be human beings that we were hitting.
So we never got face-to-face but what we did was very important as far as – the marines loved us because we had a computerized gun so we could shoot nine miles and hit a target right dead on with some adjustment because that’s what I did. They’d call in and say, “Left 100. Drop 100. Right.” So that’s what - our gunfire crew knew exactly where to put the show and we could be going back and forth and those guys, you could see it moving left or up or down following the target. And then when they say “Shoot”, we do boom, boom, boom, boom. We had two 6-inch cannons – I forgot what they call them now. That’s what we used. Our air protection was a 250-caliber machine gun and that would – we knew that they didn’t have an Air Force but just in case.
One thing about our ship was it’s all aluminum and so the walls were very thin. A 22- bullet could get right through it so we’re always on guard. So any sampan or anything would come by, we would make sure we had our guns ready to go. So that was very interesting up there. And then we went back and forth from the Philippines to Vietnam. They divided the areas into core areas. I think there were five core areas along with Cambodian Border up to the North Vietnam. And so, we would go back and forth. We did some secret missions into Cambodia, as I understand we weren’t supposed to be shooting there but we did and then we rescued some pilots that were coming out of Cambodia or Vietnam in that area.
Q: You guys did? You picked up -
A: We’ll pick up a couple of them, yeah.
Q: Like they were carrier pilots [inaudible]?
A: Yeah, they were trying to get back.
Q: [inaudible]
A: Yes. We’d pick them up. We were trained on that. We also trained in picking up the space capsule. When it landed, we had some equipment that would bring it in. So we were on duty for that in the earlier part of my stay there. We’ve had a lot of interesting things. We had a lot of fun. We had a lot of hangovers. We had – and I was young. I wasn’t even 21 when – in the last few –
I think I turned 21 when I got out but as a result of that, I went to – I decided I wanted to go to college. So I applied to every college I could think around Albuquerque, University of New Mexico, Arizona, all kinds of colleges thinking that well, maybe one will get - I didn’t get one acceptance. Except the University of Albuquerque which is, at that time, was called St. Joseph’s College. It was a Catholic school. They needed money, they needed veterans, they needed the GI Bill so I fit the bill. I went there but the only way they would take me is if I would take some remedial classes. You got to remember back in high school, my grades weren’t that good. They were not – I just passed.
Q: Was it a matter of application?
A: Yeah. So I had to take remedial math and remedial English. However, I did that but I was able to graduate in three years. And while I was in college, there was a little note on one of our bulletin boards that said, “Any Mexican-Americans interested in going to law school see professor so and so.” So I said, that sounds interesting so I went and talked to him and he said, “Well, there’s a little program in Denver. I don’t know much about it but if you get accepted, you get a full tuition scholarship to University of Denver. Well, to a Law school.” So I said, “Wow! Cool.”
I sent in my application. They wanted a photo so we had picture taken of me, sent it in. I never thought much about it afterwards and then at the end of the year, term, I got a letter saying – and at that point, I was used to rejection letters. I’d say, ‘Here comes another one.’ And it says, “Greetings! You’ve been accepted into the Summer Preparatory Institute at University of Denver College of Law. Your tuition will be paid for by the Ford Foundation” and that’s what started my law career.
Q: Is that the only law school you applied to?
A: I’m sorry?
Q: Is that the only law program you applied to?
A: No, I applied to – well, see, if you successfully completed that preparatory program, you can apply to other colleges and if they took you, you go to that school. But if they didn’t, the last resort was the DU so no one - So I went to DU, which was interesting. It’s a very expensive school. We’d wear Levi’s, the old Levi’s as normal clothing. The kids there or the wealthy people wore Levi’s as a status symbol. I remember that torn Levi’s and worn out.
Q: You wore them because you had to, they wore them as a fashion.
A: Yeah. Yeah, they’d come in with their Ferraris and all that. Most of the kids there were – their parents were lawyers one way or the other. That’s how they got -
Q: About ‘68?
A: Yeah, somewhere in the, let’s see, at ’66. And in those days, the first – because it was a minority program, they had blacks, Mexican-Americans in those days, and Indians I think were the people in this class. And it was a preparatory class which meant you took a couple of law school classes and they had tutors and things like that to help you out. And if you successfully completed that thing, you move on to a regular law school which meant that you didn’t have to take the LSAT. So – but we took it as a formality. And I think 600 was – the least you could get on that and I got 399. Good thing they waived it. And so, in any event, we felt it wasn’t a test of your ability to reason and learn, it was kind of a slanted in one direction and it proved to be true because they changed the LSAT after that -
Q: What way was it slanted?
A: It covered more things that – as minorities, they weren’t that much interested in European History and things like that. But in any event, I got through DU Law School. It’s funny, the last year, I thought my scholarship would cover everything so I figured I’ll stay here for about five years then I’ll graduate. Well, it was only good for three years and the last year, I went in to the counseling to see where I was and they said, “Well, you still got 27 hrs left to graduate and you only have one more year.” Well, we were on the quarter system there so I said, “Well, I’ll try it.” So I took – I think I signed up for eight classes and some of them were together. I mean, I’d be in two places at the same time but I did get through it. Thanks to Ved Nanda, who’s an International professor, because he allowed me to do outside course study where I got credit for papers and things like that. But in any event, I got through it.
I went to take the Bar exam. I went to a refresher course and I recall the instructor there. We took some preliminary tests to see how they - and I didn’t do too well on those. So he said, “Well, perhaps you should think about taking the Bar next year,” and I said, “No, I can’t. I’m too old for this.” At that time, I was older than most people. So I took the Bar exam and I said I’m probably not going to be successful here so I looked for some other kind of work. Of course, I had a law degree but I didn’t have the license.
So I took the exam, the results came out and I didn’t even bother to go look. And somebody called me, a friend of mine, Pena, brother of the mayor. He called me and said, “Hey, I heard you did well.” and I thought he was talking about that I got hired by the Denver Public Library to run this Right to Read Program. And I said, “Great,” he says, “Well, what are you going to do with the license now?” I said, “What are you talking about?” he said, “What? You passed the Bar exam,” I said, “What?” So he came and picked me up. We went to the Supreme Court and looked at the results and sure enough, I passed. I don’t know why but I did. Maybe I’m smarter than I think I am. Anyway, 40 years later, I’m now retiring from practice of law. So anything else you want to know?
Q: So are you still practicing right now and you’re about to retire?
A: Yes.
Q: When are you hanging it up?
A: As soon as my wife quits charging things.
Q: What kind of law did you practice primarily?
A: General practice. I had my own office all this time. I – most of the people that I graduated with went into the government. They went into the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission and various other federal programs, or state program. And I decided I didn’t want to do that because part of the CLEO Program which was the one that sponsored this – my scholarship - was that you’re going to give back to the community for them giving you enough funds to go through law school so I felt it was important that I got to work with the community.
So I opened my own little practice and I’d say like 80% to 85% of my clients were Chicano, Latinos, Hispanics and I’d say of that, about 40% are just monolingual in Spanish and everything that follows with that. I was in – in law school, I was involved in Corky Gonzales, in the marches that we had. I felt that because of his efforts, DU felt it was important that they have a program for minorities. We used to have marches and all that. I recall being – they called me their legal advisor. I was in law school, you know, the first thing about law but when they had a march, I carried a clipboard and if anything happened I note what was going on or what a police officer said or whatever, anything like that and there were a lot of confrontations like that during my law school career.
Q: How did you come to be associated with the Chicano movement?
A: It started off with, I was – my friends in law school had friends that were like CU. I don’t know if you’ve ever heard when there was a big movement at CU about enrollment, getting more people involved then through that, I met people that were involved with a Corky Gonzales and I met people that were involved in the movement.
First day, I got – I arrived in Denver and went to my first meeting. The upper classmen in law school indicated to us that we couldn’t eat grapes, we couldn’t eat lettuce, we couldn’t buy lettuce, we couldn’t wear Levi’s, we couldn’t – I said, “What the hell is going on here?” and – because in Albuquerque, we never heard of boycotts or anything like that and then I got the story behind all of these things. Then I started meeting the people that were actively involved in these like the great boycotts and understanding why people needed to have equal treatment and why I want –
I didn’t know but I do now that prisons are full of minorities now and the reasons why, the injustices that prevailed then and prevailed now and that I could use my degree for something – my license for something better than helping people rather than helping myself. And I guess it’s worked out that things – I’ve done a few things that I’m proud of, you know, helping the community. I’ve been involved in all kinds of voluntary programs and I’ve been on boards. I was on the Denver Area Council which is the board for the community colleges and that’s where I met my wife. We managed the $17 million budget. We hired the presidents and all that kind of thing back in those days. That’s about it.
Q: What are some of your charitable organizations that you were involved with and specifically, how did that dovetail with your status as a lawyer?
A: Well, one led to the other.
Q: So I was asking you about how your charitable work and your status as a lawyer.
A: Yeah. Well, I first started off at the – we formed an organization, a nonprofit organization, I believe the name was Colorado Committee on the Mass Media and the Spanish Surname. Back then, about 40 years ago, the term for discrimination for Latinos was anyone that had a Spanish surname. So we threw that in there with the Spanish surname but what we did was, we filed objections to broadcast licenses in Denver against Channel 4 and channel – all the channels – Channel 2. In those days, they had to show that they were meeting the needs of the community and they had to show that they were devoting public service time meeting the needs of the community and that they had programming that was meeting the needs of the community.
Q: And this was as required by the FCC?
A: At that time, yeah. They changed the rules since then but – so that was sort of an in. If you filed complaint saying that they were not meeting the - and what we would do is, we would monitor these and see how many commercials there are or how many public service, how many programs and all that. And then we put together a log. And then filed a complaint and showed that they were not meeting the needs. Well, I was in law school then. And so I was the lawyer. So I had to look for – we were told about his. And people advise us how to fill these complaints out. And so I did it. I’ve never – at that point, I didn't know anything about administrative law or anything like that, but I did my best but anyway. We caught the tiger by the tail. We – next thing we did was we demonstrated in front of the television station saying that they didn’t meet our community needs.
Q: And this was specifically like Spanish language programs?
A: Yes. Ah-huh. I don’t know. Have you been here for all your life?
Q: A while. Yeah.
A: Yeah. Because I don’t know if you’re old enough. But back then, have you heard of Reynalda Muse?
Q: No.
A: She was a news anchor for KOA. I think it was. But anyway, she got hired as a result of our efforts. And then we – but any – and then the event. They sent their presidents from GE who owned that station to meet with us. And this was the theory being that they would meet with the community people and formulate some kind of agreement with them and outline what they’re going to do for the community.
And so we would go into conference room. First time I’ve ever been in a big room like that with, and all of us are looking at each other. And they’re offering us coffee and drinks and all this kind of stuff. And so it's funny because you know, you got to act like you know something. We acted mean and 'you dirty bastards' and that kind of stuff. They said, “I know, I know. Let’s resolve this.”
Finally, they indicated that they would do program. But we just, we had. And do hiring. And these stations that they were all Anglo. Very, very few people other than the people that clean the place were minorities. As a result of that, people like Reynelda Muse, was the black lady that became the anchor for the news, well-known. Her husband, Dan Muse, was a city attorney. They did programming. They had Melinda Raza which was one of my big ones. It was a Sunday. You know, you get all these public service things that were dead time where we got people from the community come on camera and talk about their projects and different things.
And then they had another one. It was a kid’s show. And we had some of our members be like, you know, like Sesame Street, kind of thing. And that’s a productive, fun and we helped a lot of people, I think. Because from then to now, if you look at the stations and see how many Latinos are in news positions and anchor positions, and so on.
And from there, you will also see in the, we have a, I don’t know what they call it. You know, awards like the Academy Awards. We have Music Awards. We have – I like to say that it started there. What the – this was a nationwide project because it was going on in California, New York, and all that other stuff. We just happened to be part of it, which I mean, today you could see what’s going on in terms of movies and things like that. That they’re trying to get more people involved. But any event, I was proud of that.
Then from there, I went on to – as I have mentioned before, I became a trustee for the Community College of Denver. I was a trustee for the United Way. I was – right now, I’m a Board Member for what they called, “SER - Jobs for Progress”, a national organization. And my involvement with the G.I.s. I’ve been involved with the American G.I. Forum. And for the last ten or fifteen years, not longer.
Q: How did you get involved with them?
A: It was funny. I was – they always used to have functions that utilize the hall, their halls. And I went to a function once. It’s – one of the members said, “Hey, you oughta join” you know. “We’ve got a lot of nice guys here. They're veterans. They’re somebody to talk to about your experience.” And so I said, “Well, I will give it a shot.” And my wife wanted to get involved, too. And so we joined. And we’ve been there ever since. And we’ve done a lot of projects. The one that I take pride in is what is this? I can’t think of his name. Ken Burns. Ken Burns, he did a documentary on World War II. And completely left out the Latinos. All right?
Q: I remember.
A: And I decided to write a resolution from the G.I. Forum, American G.I. Forum. And it happened to get adopted by the national. And it became the resolution that caused us to object to this documentary which caused Public Broadcasting to rethink their relationship with Mr. Burns, and which caused him – at first he was very reluctant to do anything. And finally, they just before they released it, they had to edit it a little more. And they put in three Hispanics, their stories. So we thought we did something nice there for the veterans. So I thought, “Wow! That was pretty cool because I did the resolution.” and I heard about it on – it was called – it was on the internet. I read about it. And I’ve decided, “Well, there's something we ought to do about this from the perspective of the American G.I. Forum.” And we got the ball rolling. And took it up. And they finally did something.
Q: Did you see the locally produced one that was [inaudible]?
A: Yeah. Mm-hmm.
Q: I helped him with that.
A: Oh, did you?
Q: Yeah. I introduced [inaudible] little guys [inaudible] footage from our interviews. [inaudible].
A: Okay. Cool!
Q: Awesome!
A: Ah-huh. Yeah.
Q: It's cool!
A: What – that was something I take pride in.
Q: Yeah.
A: Now that I think about it, now you remind me about things I take pride in. I filed a lawsuit when I first year out of – my license, against the City & County of Denver because they were discriminating against women in their toilets. In those days, you had to pay a quarter to use the toilet. And so normally, well men didn’t have to pay a quarter because they didn’t use the toilets. And so – I got together with this women’s group. And we filed a complaint against the City, a civil complaint, in County Court. I’d never do it again. But I didn't know any better.
And as a result of that, they took out you know, at the airport where you had to pay a quarter to use – they took them all out. And all city facilities that had paid toilets, they took them out, which I thought I was pretty cool. I worked with female attorneys. One of them became a Supreme Court Justice. I forget her name though. But in any event, that was – that’s kind of nice. And that other organizations I’ve been involved with – it’s so many, I couldn’t tell you exactly how many.
Q: You mentioned something to me earlier about the library?
A: Yes.
Q: [inaudible]
A: I needed a job. And one of my friends was the Director with the Right to Read Program. He put my name as a candidate for this Directorship. And I didn't know anything about reading or anything like that. But this program was intended for people that could not – that didn’t know how to read, primarily first generation Spanish-speaking people. So what we did is we put together a program that would teach people how to read through. In those days, they had little machines that you – before the computer. And you look at it. [inaudible] the sounds. And follow them on a [inaudible] method. I had my director in charge of the reading program, she had her Master’s Degree in that so she set up the program. But we pulled off children’s books to learn how to read. And there was a process that they developed to teach people how to read. And I was just the administrative director. I didn’t do actual teaching.
Q: Are those mostly adults?
A: Adults. I’m sorry. I didn't say that, did I? These are adults. Yeah.
Q: Right. When you said did children’s literature.
A: Yeah. It’s only for adult.
Q: Accessible.
A: Mm. And it was pretty successful.
Q: Cool. How long did that go for?
A: It went for about five or six years. I think.
Q: What year? Do you remember?
A: Let’s see. I graduated early ‘70s. When I was in law school, it was about ’67 somewhere in there. But that’s a long time ago.
Q: Yeah. So going back to when you were in the Navy. You were in for three years?
A: Three years, eleven months, 29 days, 14 hours.
Q: And what was your serial number?
A: 585 – no, no. 575-40—no I can’t remember.
Q: All right. [inaudible] there.
A: Yeah.
Q: So you went in, so you were what? You got out in ’65 then?
A: I was – yeah.
Q: Okay. So you know, you went in before the Vietnam War took off?
A: Yeah. Ah-huh. It was --
Q: There were Americans in Vietnam and it was escalating.
A: We had a lot of advisors there at that time. But we were one of the, in the beginning.
Q: How much did you know about what was going on with the war when you were in the Service?
A: I didn’t know anything about it. No.
Q: So it was basically when you were doing your fire missions off the coast, that must have been ’65.
A: Somewhere in there. Yeah.
Q: Not too far before you got out and the Marines went in [inaudible].
A: Mm-hmm.
Q: Are you mostly in support of Marines?
A: Yes. Ah-huh.
Q: Gotcha. What were thoughts about the war at the time you were in?
A: Well, we got our newspaper. What was it called? The “Stars and Stripes”. And it showed all these people protesting. And man, we were just – I’d like to get them in my sights. You know? Here we are fighting for them, they're calling us baby killers and all this kind of stuff. We’re just doing our job. When I got out, I became one of those guys. Long haired hippy.
Q: How did that happen?
A: Huh?
Q: How did that happen?
A: Because I started to become educated as to what really was going on there. Just like now, what’s really going on in terms of the Middle East. And it’s crazy. The puppets that we supported as presidents, Vietnam and all, it just wasn’t right. And it wasn’t right that our guys were getting killed for something that they didn’t understand. And then we lost the war, which is even worse. And so that’s a forgettable one. “Forgettable”. And that’s – it’s an ugly thing. But I was Veterans against Vietnam.
Q: [inaudible]?
A: Yeah. Ah-huh.
Q: In Colorado or in New Mexico?
A: New Mexico.
Q: Okay. You got politically active while you were at – what was it? St. Johns?
A: University of – well, it’s St. Joseph College.
Q: St. Joseph then and now University of Albuquerque?
A: University of Albuquerque. It doesn’t exist anymore.
Q: [inaudible] active at that time before you went to law school?
A: Yeah.
Q: And then you carried over at law school?
A: Yeah. Mm-hmm.
Q: How would you – I mean, not everybody becomes politically active even in college. How did that work out for you [inaudible]?
A: It was more so when I came here.
Q: Okay.
A: When I went to the program. And when you’re in law school, you learn a lot of facts. And you learn a lot about inequality. And you learn about – you learn that law is not the answer to changing society. Society is the answer to changing society. Law is an instrument to assist people in developing that change.
Q: A lot of your activism obviously revolves around your Latino identity.
A: Yes. Mm-hmm.
Q: You know, growing up in Albuquerque, in the Latino community. Was it when you went into the Service that you recognize that you became really aware that they were all [inaudible]?
A: Yes. Because you met people from other States, other cultures, other, you know. From – well we were basically southern people. We’d go to San Diego, Texans and things like that. And I only got in two fights. But what you learn is that you need to work together if you want to survive. If you fight each other, it’s not going to be helpful.
Q: What were the fights about?
A: Just general stupid things. But they weren’t, it had nothing to do with – well, some may have race or religion or whatever. Most of [inaudible] alcohol.
Q: Yeah. Sure. So on the ship not in boot camp so much?
A: Yeah. No.
Q: You can have time to fight in boot--?
A: I got at one fight at boot camp because we had what you call “hell week” where you had to go to the where they serve the food? What do they call that?
Q: Mess hall?
A: Mess hall. I was assigned to clean the wash – the plate machine. So I crawled in there, and wiping it down. Somebody turned those on. And I got scalded. So I ran out and I got in a fight with the guy that turned it on. That’s about it. It’s funny.
Q: Did you like living on the ship?
A: Yeah. It was interesting. What was most interesting was that I went up and ranked quickly. So when I was – when I got out, I was E-5. And I’d done that for a year, two years. Maybe a year.
Q: What’s the rating?
A: It’s Radioman Second Class.
Q: Okay.
A: And in that partulcar field, it was easy to – because they needed those kinds of ratings. And plus I wasn’t even twenty-one and I had people that were working for me. Which was – it gave me an incentive on how to be a leader and how to manage people and how to be managed. You know how to work with the system. Don’t buck the system and you get ahead.
Q: You were getting comps for staying in?
A: I was offered $10,000 to ship over as a bonus. And I didn’t take it.
Q: How come?
A: I thought law school – well, not law school. College would be more important because everyone said college is important.
Q: Right. And you’ve said before.
A: And I had the G.I. Bill. That’s --
Q: Yeah. You’ve said before that you had been giving the thought to college. But after being in the Navy, [inaudible] thing.
A: Oh, you see everyone around you that you need to improve. You need to get ahead. If you're going to – there are some people that just can’t get ahead. And you had to – I guess they have a restriction now. You could only serve so many years in the Service without being advanced. But in those days, we had people twenty years in the, that were Third Class Seamen always getting busted. Alcoholism, drugs, everything.
Q: Yeah.
A: So you learn from that, that if you want to get ahead, you got to be like the officers. You got to get an education. You got to think beyond where you came from. Which we did?
Q: Tell me about some places that you’ve visited.
A: I’m sorry?
Q: Tell me about some of the places you visited when you were in Navy?
A: Like I said I went around the world twice. I went clockwise and counterclockwise. I became a shell back I crossed the equator. At one time I crossed it and I got my butt kicked a lot as a pollywog. Then the next time, I was a butt kicker as a shell back.
Q: Right. It hurts to cross the equator. Will you explain that? The process. The first time you crossed the equator [inaudible]?
A: First time you cross the equator, you’re going to meet King Neptune. And you're just a wet behind the ears pollywog, they call you. You didn't know anything about – and those that had crossed the equator would be the ones that would be King Neptune. There would be all this, whatever. And what they did was like a week before, they’d save all the garbage and let it ferment. And then they’d put it in a big plastic tube and you had to crawl through it. And they got these firehoses, they cut them. And they’d tie the ends up. And they smacked you with them. And they made you do all kinds of crazy things, physical, they did beat the hell out of you. And the one – the revolt of the pollywogs where we went against them. But then they got back at us with the whips and all that.
And it was put up with, the captain of the ship went through the same thing. And so you know, this is a tradition. So you had to do these things. And the last thing is you have to kiss King Neptune’s stomach. And it’s usually the fattest guy on board ship would be King Neptune. And you'd grab their stomach and it’s full of this crap all over it. And you stick your head and then you had to kiss it. And then you jumped in this tub full of crap. Oh, it was crazy. But then you got a little card that says you were – you crossed the equator. And then if you ever did again, you became the other side. So I sharpened up my little paddles and things like that. And besides, I was a petty officer then so I could get away with a lot. It was different.
But anyway, we visited – we went through the, one of our cruises, we went to across the Atlantic into the Mediterranean. Visited Spain, Greece, Turkey. And then we went through the Suez Canal. Oh, one thing about that. Oh, that’s the second time. We went to the Suez Canal and went down into Africa and then the Red Sea. Then we went around up into India. From India to Japan, or somewhere like that. Japan. And then we went up to Philippines. Then we crossed over to San Diego. And then went to Hawaii and then San Diego. And then came down and went back to Newport.
The other time we went to the Suez Canal again. But at that time, they were having the war. And so I was assigned to take pictures of all the installations that were, the Israelis had there. They had miles and miles of tents with the soldiers along the Suez Canal. And I was taking pictures. But you had to have a pilot on board for every ship could go to the Suez Canal. So this pilot was in my way. So I said, I pushed him and took a picture. And I said, “Oh, sorry, sir.” You know he worked with – we weren’t supposed to do surveillance. But anyway, he found out.
Q: Who were you taking pictures of? The Egyptians or the [inaudible] or both?
A: The Egyptians that – both. Mm-hmm. They had – oh, they had a lot of people there. A lot of soldiers. Anyway, that was one of my things. You were asking me where we went.
Q: Yeah.
A: That basically the next time we went through the Panama Canal and up to San Diego then across, then into Vietnam. And then back around through India. And then back through the Mediterranean and back over to Newport.
Q: What was your favorite port?
A: Spain, Palma Spain. It’s an island outside of Spain. It was – they called it “The Riviera of the poor people”. There was so many women. It was – they were open twenty-four hours a day, it seemed like. It was fun.
Q: What was your least favorite port?
A: Africa. We – some of – if you want to know poverty, you go down there and we'd be – you pull into a port. And kids, young kids be unloading ships and loading them. And then they sleep under the docks there. And poverty everywhere you go. India is another one where everywhere you go, somebody was asking for handout. And full of cattle. There’s a lot of cattle. They don’t eat them. But they have them all over the town.
Q: What was? What ports where you in India?
A: Sierra. It was – I can’t recall. I can’t recall.
Q: Gola or?
A: I’m sorry?
Q: Was trying to think of where you might have been. Gola maybe?
A: No, no, no.
Q: [inaudible]?
A: Down South.
Q: Okay.
A: Yeah. The [inaudible]. No, no. I don’t know. I don’t remember.
Q: Like horn of Africa?
A: Right in the horn. Yeah.
Q: While you were in African Coast?
A: India. I’m talking about the --
Q: Right.
A: It’s at the bottom part.
Q: Where do you think that being a veteran most significantly influenced other aspects of your life that came after?
A: I couldn’t emphasize more the experience of joining the Service and being where you’re – where – you learn how to take orders and give orders. You learn how to adapt, learn how to learn. And the experience that I’ve never had that before. You know, high school, kind of that. Most of my friends were drop outs. Never got along. And on those days, if you got stopped for marijuana you got twenty, thirty years. So a lot of my friends were in prison. And I told myself, “I don’t want to do that. I want to get ahead.” I didn’t know if I was going to get this far ahead, but. Anyway, that’s my experience.
Q: You mentioned Corky Gonzales earlier.
A: Mm-hmm.
Q: Pretty [inaudible]?
A: Mm-hmm.
Q: How did you meet him?
A: He was the Crusade for Justice. They had a building, they had – you know. We’re more like, ‘Hello! Good bye!” kind of relationship. His daughter and son I know more now. But they named a library after him. That’s cool.
Q: Yeah.
A: But he was, by the press and the government, just set out to be a bad guy. But really he wasn’t.
Q: Were you pretty involved in the Crusade for Justice yourself?
A: No. I just help them in terms of parades and things like that. There were other programs that CU had their Mexican-American group, DU we had ours. I’m more involved with those kinds of people. I was involved with that – what’s his name? His car blew up and killed him, his girlfriend and somebody else. What’s his name? Francisco something. But anyway, those days they actually trying to bomb things.
Q: Right. The Brown Berets?
A: Yeah. Mm-hmm.
Q: What do you think about that?
A: Well, I thought it was pretty – the goal is okay. The means is what I didn’t agree with. So I think education is more important than anything else. And their time would be better to serve being educated and working through our system.
Q: Is that pretty contiguous at that time?
A: Oh, yeah.
Q: [inaudible] the movement?
A: Mm-hmm.
Q: Yeah.
A: Yeah. Everybody was the enemy.
Q: Some of the veterans have expressed frustration with the Brown Berets. And I think that’s kind of interesting, a response by the vets.
A: Yeah. They were pretend soldiers. That’s how I think of it. They had all the trappings and uniform or whatever you call it. And the rhetoric and the ability to speak loudly. Whoever speaks the loudest gets heard. Yeah.
Q: Is there anything you would like to add to what we talked about today [inaudible]?
A: I think of anything else right now. No.
Q: Okay.
A: If you have any questions, I’ll be glad to answer them.
Q: I think I’ve [inaudible] for the moment. I’m going to come back to you.
A: Okay.
Q: And check out a few more things about what you were talking about. Now that I know you a little better. I can come back and ask some more [inaudible]?
A: Great! Yeah
Q: [inaudible] all right?
A: Mm-hmm. As long as it’ll help.
Q: [inaudible]?
A: If it helps somebody, that’s fine.
Q: It's fascinating. I guarantee you, my friend [inaudible] talk to you [inaudible]?
A: Mm-hmm. Okay.
Q: Thank you!
A: Mm-hmm.