GITMO 62

L/Cpl 1927106 Gwiazdon JD Was with C-1-11 in Oct 62 All of a sudden was transfered over to B-1-11  105s . To bring them up to strength . Did the regular things , shot card , will , personnel effects to storage etc. No one knew where we were going. B Battery was part of  the BLT team. Assign to Gun # 4 . Was the ammo truck driver with C Batt , gun goon with B Batt. Damm It !! Any way took or guns and Prime movers up to El Toro. Then we sat on the runway for a few days , slept there too. And then one night a Delta airline   plane landed  and a Lt.Col was showing him where to park. Started thinking the could be for real. Next thing on the plane and away we go, still no poop. Lots of guessing. Knew we were heading southeast but to where ?? Come morning pilot on intercomm , we will be landing at GITMO Hoped you enjoyed your flight with us. Oh OH !! Got the scoop then. Waited till all our guns and truck arrived , then headed out to our position, took awhile to get there , was darker then you know what. Ocean to our left hills behind us., road in front. Dug in and there we sat . Boy did we dig deep, The all we did was fill sandbags and improve our position. LP out front back side everywhere. Just got the M 60 MG  so we got to Fam fire those and the M 14 we had not had for very long. No one had fired them before. Consensus was 60/40 to get out M 1s back. No battle sights etc. Then we were given grenades , Oh boy what next. . Got to say the squids were really happy to see us. And they help us with what ever we needed. Silly boys , we might have taken a bit of and advantage of them , go figure. Listen to Cuban radio every day all day. Castro " send us your 10,000 Marines and we will send you 10,000 dogtags "  Mmmmmm. Next we heard  JFK . We were ready as we could be and willing. Guess ya know the rest. Come Dec. the CO said he wanted to put and end to the scuttlebutt CSMO  ( close station march order )  Yahoo. Came back on the LPH Iwo Jima with a 2 day stop in Panama.  Thats another story from PFC Gwiazdon. Was worth it. Docked at SanDiego  Bussed back to Camp Pendelton And could ya belive it the civilians in Oceanside were  glad to see us. Talked to the 1st shirt and he let me go back to C Batt.  and my ammo truck. Yahoo !!~  Plus our CO Capt. Petterson gave me my L/Cpl stripes back.  Semper Fi  read more

Recruiters Appreciation

As promised here is the write up of our Recruiters Appreciation Day in Bismarck.  Thanks for helping us make it a success. I wasn't able to tag the photos but here they are in order.  SSgt Steve Woodke (unassigned) and Sgt Adam Miller RSS Bismarck;  2nd photo various Marines and a token Army guy interspersed.  3rd photo-  RSS Bismarck Sgt Gilbertson, Sgt Miller and RSS Minot Sgt Goggans modeling their Sgt Grit rank shirts.  Sgt Miller had to leave for an appointment.  4th photo Sgt Randy Lehmann (unaasigned) Grill Instructor and finally RSS Bismarck SNCOIC  SSgt John Dupnik with his SSgt rank shirt. read more

USMC Gate

This is Marine Joe Bryans new place overlooking the Missouri river in Jefferson City MO, just several blocks from the state capitol. Joe had a local steel shop make the fence and the shop owner wanted to make an EGA. Joe has built a clubhouse w/ an antique bar for all Marines, including an extra bedroom for those brothers in need. We've collected the old copper plumbing from the remodel to scrap and plan on buying some sign age from your catalog when we start decorating. I'll send more pictures of the project. read more

Art from Nat

Nat is a WWII Marine, Guadalcanal, Tarawa, Saipan. (Old Corps, Hard Corps, the real deal) He is also something of an artist. We have a basketball team in little 'ol OKC that is having some success. They are currently playing the LA Lakers. Nat is from LA. See the art work he included on the outside of the envelope that included the other two pictures below.  read more