Category: Proud to be a Marine

After WWII

The anniversary of Tarawa is coming up on 11/20 and I thought I'd send some info and photos of my Father, Hawk Rader Jr., D/1/8 2DIV ('Canal and Tarawa) then A/1/8 (Saipan, Tinian). He went to help St. Peter guard the gates of Heaven on 7/12/11 and I still miss him very much. I was lucky enough to hear in great detail of his experiences in all of his battles, including Tarawa. I attended the 2nd Marines' annual Tarawa Day services with him at Lejeune in 2003 and '04 and saw how much the memories of that battle affected him until the day he passed on.
Dad was in 4 major battles before he was 20 and talked about them, he said, to help get over his experiences rather than keeping WWII inside him. read more

Kidnapped Fire Watch

I had a DI that would kidnap the fire watch in the middle of the night and tie him up and put duct tape over his mouth and put him in the showers. it was pretty crazy when lights came on and the DI was screaming WHERES THE FIRE WATCH!!!! WHO GOT FIRE WATCH!!! You woke up quite fast trying to figure out if it was you that missed your watch. then we would find 'em in the head tied up. I still chuckle thinking about that, read more

Our Shared Heritage

In August of this year twenty-one Marines from Platoon 2085, Parris Island 1966, gathered in Washington, DC as guests of The Khe Sanh Vets at their 2012 Reunion. We were honored by the presence of our SDI, First Sergeant Ben Leith (USMC Retired) and his lovely wife Jackie who mustered with us from their home in Arizona. read more

Ooh Rah

A Soldier, Sailor, and Airman walk into a bar. They make a bet with the bartender that they can each drink a keg of beer and make it with the hottest girl in the room in one hour. The Bartender says ok and gives them the key to the back room and one keg each. The Airman goes in with the hottest girl. After one hour the Bartender walks into the room to find the keg bearly touched, the woman untouched, and the Airman blacked out. The bartender says next and the Sailor attempts. This time when the bartender walks in, the keg is half empty and the sailor is blacked out. The woman still untouched. Next up is the soldier, after an hour the bartender walks in to find all three kegs empty, the woman ravished and bearly able to walk, but the soldier is beaten in the corner. The bartender wakes the soldier up and asked him what happened. The soldier responded by saying, A man came in drank everything, beat me silly, and made love to the woman, then jumped out of the window and yelled Ooooh Raaaah!!!!!! read more

Thanksgiving 1962

For Thanksgiving the cooks were able to obtain some frozen turkeys from the Army. The cooks put the turkeys on steel tables, the cooks then sat on the other tables. We gave them all the heavy scrub brush heads we could find. The cooks spent two nights throwing the scrub brushes at the rats to keep them fom getting the turkeys. Worked.  We had a good Thaksgiving… Anyone who was on Okinawa at that time can tell you the size of the rats, like medium sized dogs… No cats on the rock, I guess the rats got them… read more

Before The Days

I served on active duty before the days of "Cammies"… we were  issued and wore "Utilities".    The utilities were an olive drab green with a herringbone design running through the very strong material. We never wore anything else until we finally graduated from basic training. Then, once  a Marine, we wore Marine Greens, Tropicals or Dress Blues…  depending on the "Uniform Of The Day".   Semper Fi, Bob MacGillivray Corporal Of Marines Platoon 63 "C" Company Third Marine Recruit Training Battalion Parris Island SC 1956