If you’ve never heard of a Platoon Commander while in Boot Camp, it’s not my fault. I didn’t write the book, I didn’t publish the book. I simply purchased the book sometime during my internment at MCRD San Diego. The Marine Corps, or the Navy, recorded my experience for me during those two plus months. I was much too busy to take pictures. My book clearly shows the Senior Drill Instructor listed as “Platoon Commander”. I don’t recall the Senior DI wearing a different style belt than the other Drill Instructors except while drilling toward the end of training, preparing for “final drill”. Then he wore a black leather belt with scabbard, otherwise it was the standard canvas cartridge belt with first aid pouch. SF
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During my vacation at Parris Island, 2nd Bn, C Co Plt 2091 in 67/68, I never saw any Senior D.I. wear anything but his glossy black belt and the Jr D.I.’s wore the green web belts with gold buckle with the EGA. This old Sgt would never forget any detail about the DI…. They were God……and we saw them enough to have details etched in my brain housing group.
I agree Bill. The Senior D.I.always wore the “Spit Shined Belt”. I’ll never forget our Sr. D.I. S/Sgt Williams. He approached me the afternoon of our graduation and, informed me that he grew up in a town very near to where I grew up and,played football at one of our rival High Schools. He never let on to that fact during training but I do recall one time when He was walking around the squad bay choosing people to attend the dreaded “Motivation” He pulled me out,looked at me and then pushed me back, not to be chosen.Another memory Thanx Bill Harry 3rd Bn Plt. 3056 Oct-Dec ’67
I got out my Plt. book from P.I.The chain of command was as follows :Bn. Commander,Co. Commander, Series Commander,Chief Drill Instructor, Series Gy/Sgt,Senior Drill Instructor (SDI) and two Assistant Drill Instructors (ADI) Harry
Harry, Same with my platoon 3106 book from 1966 except we had 4 ADIs as a couple switched out during training.
SSGT Ponder was my platoon commander with platoon 2060, August 1967. He was assisted by Sgt Barefoot and Sgt Newby.
I also was in platoon 2060. MOS 2531 Field Radio operator. I remember Ponder puting the reins on Barefoot, who was a little sadistic . I joined the Marines with my high school friend Bob Becker. We both were in 2060. Bob died in the 90’s due to cancer. Ed Peters in uniform 1967-71.
Started out Nov 1, 1967 in 2207. We were in GP tents. S/Sgt Ponder was the Platoon commander. We did have a Sgt. Barefoot, but for some reason he left the platoon before I did. I went to PCP after 10 days. After 2 weeks I left PCP and joined 2217.
PCP Phycial Conditioning Platoo
Platoon I meant
Hey Ed, Here’s a S/Sgt Ponder story. While waiting outside of a sick bay to get shots, wearing only skives and t-shirts, S/Sgt Ponder walked up and down the platoon telling us to watch out for the corpsmen. He told us that if any of them started any kind of grab ass, one of us had to run out of the building and tell him. He never explained why. A few months later, back at MCRD for Comm school, the latest court marshal was read off. It was a Corpsman who was grab assing with another Corpsman and had an air needlegun in his hand. The next boot in line got hit with a shot that cut his upper arm to the bone, about an inch long. The boot got a medical, and the Corpsman got 6 months at Portsmith, 6 months pay loss, reduced to E-2, and a kick. That must have been what Ponder was warning us about.
Sgt. Newby was our junior Drill Instructor, Plt-2019) during my stay at MCRDSD, initials G.H. Sgt. Newby became SSgt Newby shortly after we began training. Re, the black belt; Upon further review I discovered a platoon picture taken at the armory in Edson Range. We were having our rifles inspected prior to live firing, and GySgt Ponder, the Senior Drill Instructor, aka, Platoon Commander, can be seen wearing his black spit shined leather belt. And, I found one picture of our Junior Drill Instructor, where he is not wearing the cartridge belt. I believe though we were still checking in and receiving our initial equipment draw.
My boot was in June 61 !! My three DIs were addressed as ( Senior Drill Instructor SDI, and Junior Drill Instructor JDI ), Platoon Commander belongs in the FMF and other organizations as he is usually a 2ndLT or 1stLT !!! Also referred as Platoon Leader. As far as I know, DI’s were always through even today known as SDIs and JDIs and of course to US they were SIR!!!!
I was in PI jul 7, 1961 Plt# 339. S/DI was S/Sgt Rushing, who I have always wondered how he made out after I left Boot. One A/DI sgt Fox left our platoon late in our training, was apparently promoted and became S/DI to a new platoon. A/DI Sgt Patterson who joined us about a third of the way through boot I seen went on to become Master Sgt (although I forget what his duty became). He was fair and laid back sort of person who saved my butt twice. Without him, I don’t think I’d have graduated when I did. I had just missed being house mouse and being of “slight frame,” as the Corps described me physically, even though I had lifted weights for a couple of years before PI, my wrists, hands and forearms were not big. Having exercises that pointed to them was difficult to say the least as I had always used my full physique to do anything heavy. Like pull ups. The Corps then had us limited to French grips, wrists facing forward. I could maybe do three. To curl as I did when warming up lifting weights, I would do one handed curls with free hand grasping the pull up arm. Somehow I was able to do more that way then French pulls. I went into boot weighing 134#. I left boot weighing 174#, but still had trouble with my hands and wrists. I never saw a Corporal DI. They were all E5 Sgts. And Rushing always wore a black belt and the ADIs wore the green belt with the bright gold buckles. (Those really became guides for shining anything brass with the Brasso. It gave you the idea what was expected of you.) We also wore the three pointed utility covers and not the five. As for my grad book, a huge thanks to Sgt. Grit for forwarding my need for to add my pic to my Dad’s and my son’s. And thanks to Wheeler for providing all he did to make that possible. And he did one hell of a job at his expense.
Plt 2079, E Company, 2nd Bn, RTR, MCRDSD. Granuated 1 Nov 73. No Plt Commander that I remember, but we had (or were had by) Senior Drill Instructor SSgt Copp, Drill Instructors SSgt Anderson and SSgt Cyr. We also had a sadistic Hispanic Sgt who enjoyed beating Pvts. Don’t remember his name. They gave him his own Plt in our Series have way through training. He beat them too. At graduation I saw him sitting in a car wearing LCpl stripes. Yes, Virginia, there is a Santa Claus.
Plt 2090 MCRDSD 7/70-9/70 SSgt. M.J. Spiller Platoon Commander, Black leather belt, regular brass buckle (both shined to mirror like shines) with both utilities and tropical. Sgts Q.L. Brown , J. S. Slawson Drill Instructors, web belts with M-Nued snaps and grommets. (Sgt. Slawson became Corporal Slawson and departed during phase three; related to an incident where a recruit was sent down two flights of stairs in a garbage can, way beyond the necessary level of correction needed and the Corps acted swiftly.) Spiller and Brown were as different as two people could be but both seemed to share a strong desire to turn out good Marines while at the same time shaking their heads at some of the SNAFU’s that only Marine Corps boots could preform. Slawson was sadistic and we all felt he got what he deserved and no one who was interviewed about the garbage can (and other’s that came to light) incident suffered memory loss or loss of vision.
Platoon Commander is a “Hollywood Marine” thing. I have researched a lot of red Platoon books to recover photos of our Vietnam dead over the last two decades. The PI books list instructors as SDI for Senior Drill Instructor and JDI or ADI, depending on what years, for Junior Drill Instructor or Assistant Drill Instructor. SD Senior Drill Instructors were listed as Platoon Commander followed by his Drill Instuctors. Just how it was, East Coast-West Coast. And the Black belt told the difference between Senior and Junior, one of my Seniors first things to remember, just so we knew the difference and who was in charge!
Agree with this. Once out of boot camp I learned that the PI Marines had SDIs, while we Dego Marines had PCs, Platoon Commanders. The PCs wore a polished black belt. The DIs wore a cartridge belt with first aid pouch. Some kept their smokes in the pouch.
Plt. 354 of MCRD 1965 Senior DI was always listed as Platoon Commander and always wore a spit shined black belt. The DI’s wore web belts. He always remembered our plt. and I believe we never forgot him either. That plt. would have charged into hell for that Marine.
That’s how I observed in 65 Feb Plt 119 senior Drill instructor Truman JUnior DI Sloan Carter and Sanchez I remember the shined blk belt I’m 71 yrs old and have never seen these men during my 4 yrs in the Corps one thing for sure I’ll never forget them
DSI’s at MCRD San Diego were addressed as Plt Commander, Plt 111 Grad Date April 1963 .
I meant to say SDI’s addressed as Plt Commander.
I had the “pleasure” of going thru San Diego in Platoon 328 of March/1964 Or Senior DI was a S/SGT yes he had the black spit shined duty belt until while at Camp Matthews Rifle range he had the misfortune of breaking the back of our right/guide while jumping up and down on him because he had tripped while running down the stairs of the wooden hard backed tents at Camp Matthews and letting our platoon colors and ribbons hit the ground. The following day we had a new Senior DI a Gy/SGT he was a change as he wouldn’t reach and touch you (if you know what I mean) he had the Jr. DI do it instead.
sept, 1967. platoon 3052, honor platoon with no streamers. ssgt. aguilar was our platoon commander, and was addressed as such. sgt, brown and sgt smith were addressed as drill instructors. platoon commanders wore the polished black belt, other drill instructors wore the web belt.
Bob this is from a graduate of Parris Island Plt 3052. I also started in September 67. My Drill Instructors were S/Sgt Hunt, S/Sgt Fulk and S/Sgt Lamoureux. Were you at San Diego.
Platoon 262, 2nd BN .,MCRD ,Parris Island ,1962. SR. Drill Instructors wore shined black belt. Our SDI was SSGT Schmit , very professional Marine, Sgt. Stiltner was very tough, and a Cpl. Who’s name I can’t remember,he left the platoon very early in our training. Our SDI WAS a fair but very strick DI. Sgt. Stiltner was sadistic,but kept himself under control (barely) he made us count cadence in German,leading us to believe he was a former Nazi veteran,LOL. When we graduated,he loosened up and spoke to us as fellow Marines,and said well ,you Maggots have made it,you are Marines ! Which we forgave every lousy thing that he ha done.I believe our SDI was promoted or went to Quantico, and for the last 4 weeks we got SDI SSGT Macallister, he was a Father like figure and took us to graduation!
I graduated on Sept. 11, 1963 from MCRD San Diego, as the Right Guide for Regimental Honor Platoon 242, meritoriously promoted to PFC, Platoon Honorman and Series Honorman. Our Platoon Commander with the polished black belt was SSgt Rancatti along with SSgt West, Cpl Costa and Cpl McClymonds. Many of our friends went to Vietnam from the 240 Series (Plt. 240, 241, 242 and 243) after completing ITR at Las Pulgas and the training schools we attended based on our MOS. Great memories and I maintain contact with some of these Marines from MCRD until this day. Lost contact with the Platoon Commander and the drill instructors who prepared us to be tough, good, physically in shape Marines! Semper Fi!
May or may not be an update on your S/Sgt West. In fall of 67, my Series Gunnery Sgt was GySgt., L. West.
I graduated from PI, Platoon 215 on 9 March 1966. Our DI’s were a Senior Drill and instructor and Junior Drill Instructors as shown in our Platoon Book. On our Platoon Picture the are just identified by name and rank. Also, the Senior DI wore the black belt with brass buckle and the Junior DI wore a cartridge belt with a solid brass buckle with the EGA on it.
Well said Gunny Marso!! I graduated from MCRD, San Diego and was an 8511 in 3rd Bn, Parris Island in ’70 and ’71. As regards SSgt Ponder, he might have been an ADI when he was assigned or the rules may have changed. When I went thru D.I. School we had more than one Staff NCO in my class. When a SSgt was assigned he would typically work at least one platoon as an ADI, then be assigned SDI duties. Because of the Vietnam War we sometimes found ourselves jammed up and shorthanded for D.I.’s, sometimes working back to back platoons (but there’s nothing like a Series D.I. party when we caught a break and rarely saw one where the Series Commander wasn’t invited, and those of us that have been there know that’s a damn fact). The point being, more than once we were caught with 2 or 3 ADI’s holding things down for a few days or a week until we got our SDI assigned or one of the ADI’s was made the SDI. Favorite SDI to work for: Al Montenguise; best Series Guns: Gunny Beuchler.
All I know,as a PI Marine, is the pictures of those DIs’ instantly turned into pictures of my DIs’.A cold shiver ran down my spine.Anyone else.Semper Fi.
SSGT Hernandez was our Platoon Commander with 2 Sgt Drill Instructors I was in Platoon 2080 E Company 2ND Battallion at MCRD 1970
On 8 May 1967 (at 07:30) I stepped into The Customs House on Canal Street in New Orleans and my life forever changed. By about 17:00 that day, I met my first Campaign Cover at San Diego International Airport and along about 21:00 I met my second. He wore the Campaign Cover and a highly polished black belt (the same as was used to carry the frog used to support the NCO Sword). The other two Maniacs along with him wore the webbed cartridge belt with the first aid pouch attached. The S/Sgt. with the Black belt was the Platoon Commander. The other two S/Sgts. were Drill Instructors, and we were Platoon 373 of 3rd. Bn. – L Co. If we fast forward to 1 May 1970 I steps out of Drill Instructor School and into 3rd. Bn. – K Co. as a brand new Drill Instructor wearing that same webbed cartridge belt with the first aid pouch attached. The Platoon Commanders still wore that highly polished Black Belt. I never heard of anyone referred to as Senior Drill Instructor during my time in the Marine Corps.
iwas in regimental honer plt 164 mcrd sd sept 1962 to dec 1962 i had di that was particurly hard on me gysgt e-6 rodgers we had a sadistic cpl di at the time was cpl. david h. smith. 4yrs later i was sgt under 4 ran into cpl smith who made sgt after me not because of the sadistic ways he treated recurits i made sgt under 4 because og gunny rodgers one of the chosin few silver star and two bronze stars, gunny rodgers you are my hero david h. smith you suck dick sgt vance and sgt danner were othernd.idi anyone befor or after me have any ofthese great marins