Author: SgtGrit

Mounted Color Guard

I had the extreme pleasure of serving for one of the finest Marine Commanders – LtGen William M. Keys when he was a LtCol Commanding 3rd Battalion 5th Marines  in 1977-1979.  He was also a horseman and allowed me to participate on the Camp Pendleton Mounted Color Guard in a TAD status.  While on the Color Guard I came under the Command of another great man – Major Jim DiBernardo (deceased 2009) who spent 62 months as a POW in Viet Nam.  The Mounted Color Guard came under Joint Public Affairs MCB Camp Pendleton.  After saying all that, here is my OOORAH story …. read more

Legend Has It

SIR… In reply to some of the questions about where the word Ooorah may have originated… After a lot of research this explanation seems to be very good possibility… If anyone reads this and knows these facts not to be true please feel free to correct me…    It seems 1st Amphibious Recon can be credited with introduction of Ooorah sometime around 1953… Shortly after the Korean War Recon. Marines were serving aboard the USS Perch, a WW11 diesel Submarine retrofitted to carry Navy UDT and Recon Marines…   Whenever the Sub was to dive the 1MC would announce "Dive Dive"  followed by the AHUGA-AHUGA of the ships diving horns…    In 1953 or 54 while on a conditioning run Sgt. Major John R.  Massaro serving with the 1st Amphibious Recon Battalion simulated the AHUGA as part of the cadence… Legend has it he took it with him when he went to serve as Instructor at Drill Instructor School at San Diego, there he passed it on to the student D.I.s who in turn passed it on to their recruits where it eventually became part of Recon cadence…    Overtime the AHUGA sound morphed into OOORAH… Today the Official Marine Corps Reference Manual on the history of the Corps is titled… AHUGA…    Howard W.Kennedy USMC 1956 1962

Honoring His Buddies

Again, many thanks for the great job that you guys did for my Marine Corps running suit. I cannot wait to start wearing it. I will also contact you next week to talk to you about my son’s shadow box. I have enclosed a picture of a tattoo my son got in the past 2 weeks honoring his buddies that were killed in Afghanistan. Again, thank you and the staff at Sgt. Grit for all your help! Thanks, Mike Chambers read more