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This blog was updated on a daily basis for about two years, with those daily entries ceasing on December 31, 2013. The blog is still active, however, and we hope that people stopping in, who find something lacking, will add to the daily entries.

The blog still receives new posts as well, but now it receives them on items of Wyoming history. That has always been a feature of the blog, but Wyoming's history is rich and there are many items that are not fully covered here, if covered at all. Over time, we hope to remedy that.

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Use 2013 for the search date, as that's the day regular dates were established and fixed.

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Showing posts with label Vietnam War. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Vietnam War. Show all posts

Sunday, December 15, 2013

Sidebar: The Vietnam War In Wyoming

Just below I posted an item on the Vietnam War, and reconsidering it in context.  Indeed, enough time has passed now that the war can probably properly be put in context, which would, in my view, require pretty much tossing out all the existing histories and starting afresh.  Not that this is that unusual.  I've long thought that no accurate history of an event can be written until at least 40 or 50 years have passed since it occurred.  the Vietnam War ended 40 years ago for the United States, and a little under that for North and South Vietnam.



What did this controversial war mean for Wyoming? 

It's easy to think that it wasn't an event that impacted us in any special way, but every world event impacts a region in its own unique way. the Vietnam War is not an exception.

In many people's recollections, the Vietnam War at home is remembered in terms of civil protest.  This isn't really the case for Wyoming.  Volunteer rates for the service in Wyoming were remarkably high, keeping a tradition in Wyoming that goes back to statehood and which continues on today.  Even for wars where public enthusiasm was high country wide, such as World War Two, volunteering for service occurred at a higher rate in Wyoming than elsewhere.

This doesn't mean, however, that everyone in Wyoming was uniformly for the war.  Indeed, I can recall the house of a friend of mine where the parents had put up an antiwar poster on their front door, in a very suburban neighborhood, but that was very much an exception to the rule.  For the most part, Wyomingites support the war, if not always enthusiastically.  This too was the case with Wyoming's representation in Washington, which supported the war throughout its course.

Wyoming actually contributed to the war effort in a bit of a unique, if somewhat hidden and now mostly forgotten manner.  The Wyoming Air National Guard's 187th Aeromedical Transport Squadron flew missions in and out of Vietnam in support of the war.  The widely held belief that Guardsmen and Reservists didn't serve in the war is in error, and it is particularly in error in regards to the Air National Guard, which saw short deployments and missions of this type.  The Wyoming Army National Guard, however, like most (but not all) Army National Guard units was not called up during the war.  It was over capacity during the war, like all Guard units, which did in part reflect a desire by some of its members to fulfill an anticipated military service requirement which was unlikely to send them overseas.  In sharp contrast to this, however, following the war every Wyoming Army National Guard unit would have a very high percentage of Vietnam War combat veterans.

Wyoming's Vietnam veterans did well in Wyoming following the war, figuring as significant figures in every walk of life.  The war did change Wyoming in subtle ways, but they were subtle indeed.  Never a state that opposed the war, the influence the general atmosphere had on the state's youth never deterred them from volunteering for military service at any point, but it did make such things as mandatory high school Junior ROTC sufficiently unpopular that Natrona County High School, which had that requirement throughout its history, abolished it just after the war.  By and large, however, the view of Wyoming to the war was cautious, but cautious support.

Thursday, September 5, 2013

September 5

1836     Sam Houston was elected president of the Republic of Texas.

1866  Fort John Buford was renamed Fort Sanders.  Attribution:  On This Day.

1867  The first head of Texas Longhorns shipped from Abilene Kansas,giving birth to the long cattle drive era and the expansion of the cattle industry in  the West.

1877  Crazy Horse is fatally bayoneted by a U.S. soldier after resisting confinement in a guardhouse at Fort Robinson, Nebraska.  The wound wasn't instantly fatal as he lingered for hours after the incident while Indian leaders and officers worked to avoid a violent outbreak occurring as a result.

1879   The Delmonico Hotel and Washington Market collapsed in Cheyenne, killing several people.  Attribution:  On This Day.

1885  U.S. Army troops arrive in Rock Springs following anti-Chinese rioting.  Attribution:  On This Day. 

1894  The first Jewish wedding to occur in Wyoming, occurred in Cheyenne.   Attribution:  Wyoming State Historical Society.

1910  August Malchow fought again at the Methany Hall in Thermopolis, defeating challenger Patsy McKenna.  The victory was technical as the fight was stopped after brawls in the audience commenced and the victory given to the title holder, Malchow.  McKenna had won more rounds. This was McKenna's last recorded professional fight.

1913  Fire destroyed the main part of Upton.  Attribution:  Wyoming State Historical Society.

1916  Sheridan Enterprise for September 5, 1916. Big Labor Day celebration in Sheridan, riots in El Paso.
 


The Casper Record for September 5, 1916: "School has started--Have you got that uniform?"
 


Something we've addressed here before, but which would seem alien to many locals today. The era in which the local high school required uniforms.

For girls, anyhow.

Boys had a uniform they couldn't avoid, as we've already noted, but one which their parents, relieved of buying school clothes, were often glad to have imposed. The military uniform of JrROTC.  Girls, on the other hand, had a prescribed uniform.  What exactly it was in 1916 I'm not sure, but a basic blouse and dress is likely what was required.

In other news current residents of Natrona County would be shocked to see that the county fair was, at that time, held in late September.  Gambling with the weather?   And the tragic death of Mildred Burke, front page news in Cheyenne, had hit the Casper paper.
This photograph of the Omaha Stockyards, where many head of Wyoming beef went through, was taken.   Note the boxcar with some beer name on it, although I can't really make that all out.

1917   September 5, 1917. The draftees begin to report
 

September 5, 1917, was a big day for a lot of younger men as they began to leave their homes to report to Army training camps.  Eleven, we learn from the Casper paper, were leaving booming Casper.


And 35 were leaving from much larger Cheyenne, whose paper was also reporting that the Japanese were mustering to come to the aid of the Russians.


In the university town of Laramie the paper reported on the total numbers of the first contingent of draftees in its headlines, 34,450.

There would be a lot more following.

1969  The 116th Engineer Battalion (Combat), Idaho Army National Guard was mustered out of Federal service after active duty in Vietnam. This marked the sixth time in 70 years that the battalion served on active duty.  The Idaho National Guard unit is the only Guard unit, Army or Air, to officially serve in theater during both the Korean and Vietnam wars.  During it's tour in Vietnam six unit members lost their lives, over 100 were wounded, and two members received Silver Stars.

Monday, July 22, 2013

July 22

1890  A marble quarry opened near Rawlins.  Attribution:  Wyoming State Historical Society.

1894   The first ever motorized racing event is held in France between the cities of Paris and Rouen.

1897   The Hole In The Wall Fight between ruslters and ranchers happened near the Hole In The Wall.

1916  In San Francisco, a bomb at a Preparedness Day parade on Market Street kills ten people and wounds forty.

This item is particularly notable on this date in this current year, 2012 (when first posted), as we've just seen somewhat similar casualties in an act of violence in Denver Colorado.  In the 1916 event, the attack was no doubt politically motivated, but clearly by a person who had a complete disregard for human life.  In the Colorado act the disregard for human life is likewise evident, but it lacks even the cover of a political motivation which, at least, would provide the thin camouflage of deluded justification for such an act.

Now, in the US, there will be, and indeed already are, endless efforts to try to deduce the cause of the senseless act.  Was the perpetrator insane?  Was he motivated by some warped political or social goal? Was it the implements, and not the man, that was the cause.

None of this will serve in the end to reveal anything.  And next to none of it, if any of it, will address a simple fact which, in the modern world, is a fact that cannot be stated.

That fact is is that Evil is in the world, and some people are motivated by Evil.

That Evil is in the world should be self evident.  Hitler, Himmler, Stalin and a host of similar tyrants were not insane.  They were servants of evil.  Likewise, thousands of people in this era are simply evil.  Evil people have always been around. What hasn't always been around, however, is a denial that evil exists. And we're paying for it, and will continue to do so, until we realize that evil is an antiquated concept, but a reality.

1967  Cpt. William B. Graves shot down while piloting a OV-1C in Vietnam.

1922 Mount Moran ascended for the first time.  the climb was made by LeGrand Hardy, Bennet McNulty and Ben C. Rich of the Chicago Mountaineering Club via the Skillet Glacier route.

1937 The Senate rejected President Franklin D. Roosevelt's proposal to add more justices to the Supreme Court.

1942 US initiates gasoline rationing 

1950 The Department of the Army asked reserve officers to volunteer for active duty due to the Korean War.

1966  Six people were injured when a category two tornado struck Gillette.  Attribution:  On This Day.

1967   Capt. William B. Graves of Douglas is killed when his OV 1-C  Mohawk aircraft crashes in Vietnam.  Attribution:  Wyoming State Historical Society.

Friday, May 3, 2013

May 3


1836  Wyoming Illinois founded. 

1881  Grounds of Camp Stambaugh transferred to the Department of the Interior.

1885 Post hospital opens at Ft. Fetterman.

1898  All of the Wyoming units mustered for service in the Philippines assembled in Laramie County.  Attribution:  On This Day.

1917  

The Casper Daily Tribune for May 3, 1917: Lazy men and soldiering, and the start of a Casper landmark


There are a couple of items in this May 3, 1917 issue of the Casper Daily Tribune that are relevant for later eras.
For one thing, the boom in the town was now reflecting itself in the new professional appearance of the newspaper.  Gone was the small town appearance of purely local news.  Casper, for the first time, now had a paper that was starting to rival the big established papers in other regions of the state.  This paper doesn't even resemble the appearance of the Casper papers of just a couple of months ago.


The church, as can be seen above, is of substantial size and that also points to the change in Casper's economic fortunes in this period. 
Finally, from the various news articles I've seen, I've sort of taken it to be the case that Casper, which was a tiny town prior to 1917, did not have a National Guard unit up until this time.  I could be in error, however, as Casper's newspapers were of a fairly poor quality and they aren't all available by any means.  Douglas had one, however, and its small papers reported on that unit extensively.  Over the last couple of issues, however, its clear that the National Guard, which was actively recruiting for new units in the opening weeks of American participation in World War One, was recruiting for just such a unit to be formed in Casper.
Earlier we noted that 1917 was the year that really made Casper. This newspaper, in and of itself, provides some pretty good examples of how that is true.

1918  The News. May 3, 1918.
I don't point these papers out today for the war news, although there was plenty of it.  No, I'm pointing them out for the local goings on in Cheyenne and Casper.

Let's look at Cheyenne:


This issue is remarkably similar to an issue of this Cheyenne paper that ran a year ago.  We learn here that, once again, a bevy of Cheyenne high school beauties were the "sponsors" of the Annual Cadet Show, an even that no doubt took on more meaning in 1917 and 1918 than it ever had before.

And once again, oil prospects near Cheyenne were in the news.  Those prospects were real, but it wasn't until the 2010s that they'd be developed.  New technology made that possible.

A school nurse was recommending something that was fairly radical at the time. . . but as this came at the tail end of the Progressive Era, it was a somewhat radical age.

Around the state 167 men were called to the colors.  Elsewhere, a terrible military balloon tragedy had occurred.

And in Casper:



Casper's newspapers, now larger with a larger reading audience, continued to improve and at least this issue of the Casper Daily Press was real news. . . not all optimistic petroleum boosterism.

A real city improvement, sanitary and storm sewers were being put in. And that was big news.

William Ross, who would become governor. . . as would his wife, was rising in the Democratic ranks.

And the balloon tragedy also made the front page news in Casper.

1933   Nellie Tayloe Ross becomes the Director of the Mints, an office she would hold until 1953.

1944  The Soviet Union decorated a Wyoming officer with the "Order of the Fatherland's War".  Such awards by the Soviets to Western servicemen were not uncommon.  Attribution:  Wyoming State Historical Society.

1946         Military Tribunal in Tokyo begins war crimes trials.  One of the principal Japanese defendants was defended by Cheyenne lawyer George Guy.

1968   Colorado Air National Guard 120th Tactical Fighter Squadron, flying F-100Cs, becomes the first Air Guard unit to arrive in Vietnam.

1980  First Wyoming History Day.  Attribution:  Wyoming State Historical Society.

Friday, March 29, 2013

March 29

1879  The Laramie County Stock Growers Association changed its name to the Wyoming Stock Growers Association.  The WSGA was to be a major political force early in the state's history.

1887  The following soldiers, stationed at posts in Wyoming, earned the Congressional Medal of Honor for action on this day:

Second Lieutenant Lloyd M. Brett, 2d U.S. Cavalry. Place and date: At O'Fallons Creek, Mont., 1 April 1880. Entered service at: Malden, Mass. Born: 22 February 1856, Dead River, Maine. Date of issue: 7 February 1895. Citation: Fearless exposure and dashing bravery in cutting off the Indians' pony herd, thereby greatly crippling the hostiles.

 Brett in later life.

Captain Eli L. Huggins, 2d U.S. Cavalry. Place and date: At O'Fallons Creek, Mont., 1 April 1880. Entered service at: Minnesota. Birth: Illinois. Date of issue: 27 November 1894. Citation: Surprised the Indians in their strong position and fought them until dark with great boldness.

1888  State Capitol completed. Attribution:  Wyoming State Historical Society. 

1906  Construction at Pathfinder Dam suffered a set back due to flood damage.  Attribution:  Wyoming State Historical Society.

1916   The Punitive Expedtion: The Casper Daily Press, March 29, 1916
 


I think one of the most interesting items in this edition was the addition of extra train service, showing how extensive it really was at the time.

1917   The Cheyenne State Leader for March 29, 1917: More Guardsmen needed
 

The Cheyenne State Leader ran a story about the national mobilization of Guardsmen.  No way Wyoming could have mustered four regiments.

There was a tragic reminder, as well, that April and March are winter months in Wyoming.
The Laramie Daily Boomerang for March 29, 1917. Laramie's Guardsmen ordered to Ft. D. A. Russell as, maybe, the Kaiser makes a peace move?
 

The Medical Company of the Wyoming National Guard, based in Laramie, was ordered to Ft. D. A. Russell outside of Cheyenne. At the same time, the Laramie paper was hoping against hope that entry into the war might not be necessary.  Who could blame them?

The Connor Hotel, by the way, still stands in Laramie, although I don't think it's a hotel anymore.

1918   Wyoming State Tribune, March 29, 1918. The Germans in control of the breweries?
 

Lots of grim war news.

And a report that the Germans were in control of the breweries to the tune of, a fellow from the Anti Saloon League claimed, 75%. That is, he said, 75% of all the stock owned in breweries was owned in Germany.

Hmmm. . . . .

And a draft evader was shot in the Seminoes after fighting to contest his arrest.  As this shows, there was opposition to the draft during the Great War and it was sometimes pretty determined, even if most people accepted it readily.

1943  Monday, March 29, 1943 Meat and fat rationing commences in the U.S.

On this day in 1943, rationing in the US of meats, fat and cheese commenced, with Americans limited to two pounds per week of meat.

Poultry was not affected by the order.

This must have been a matter of interest in my family, engaged in the meat packing industry as they then were.

Contrary to popular memory, not everything the US did during the war met with universal approval back home, and this was one such example.  Cheating and black marketing was pretty common, and there were very widespread efforts to avoid rationing.  Farmers and ranchers helped people to avoid the system by direct sales to consumers, something the government intervened to stop and only recently has seen a large-scale return.

While wholesale inclusion of a prior item in a new one is bad form, here's something we earlier ran which is a topic that needs repeating here:

Lex Anteinternet: So you're living in Wyoming (or the West in genera...So what about World War Two?

Some time ago I looked at this in the context of World War One, but what about World War Two?
Lex Anteinternet: So you're living in Wyoming (or the West in genera...: what would that have been like? Advertisement for the Remington Model 8 semi automatic rifle, introduced by Remington from the John Bro...
 Wisconsin deer camp, 1943, the year meat rationing began.

Indeed, a person's reasons to go hunting during World War Two, besides all the regular reasons (a connection with our primal, and truer, selves, being out in nature, doing something real) were perhaps stronger during the Second World War than they were in the First.  During WWII the government rationed meat.  During World War One it did not, although it sure put the social pressure on to conserve meat.

Indeed, the first appeals of any kind to conserve food in the United States came from the British in 1941, at which time the United States was not yet in the war. The British specifically appealed to Americans to conserve meat so that it could go to English fighting men.  In the spring of 1942 rationing of all sorts of things began to come in as the Federal government worried about shortages developing in various areas.  Meat and cheese was added to the ration list on March 29, 1943.  As Sarah Sundin reports on her blog:
On March 29, 1943, meats and cheeses were added to rationing. Rationed meats included beef, pork, veal, lamb, and tinned meats and fish. Poultry, eggs, fresh milk—and Spam—were not rationed. Cheese rationing started with hard cheeses, since they were more easily shipped overseas. However, on June 2, 1943, rationing was expanded to cream and cottage cheeses, and to canned evaporated and condensed milk.
So in 1943 Americans found themselves subject to rationing on meat.  As noted, poultry was exempt, so a Sunday chicken dinner was presumably not in danger, but almost every other kind of common meat was rationed.  So, a good reason to go out in the field.

But World War Two was distinctly different in all sorts of ways from World War One, so hunting by that time was also different in many ways, and it was frankly impacted by the war in different ways.

For one thing, by 1941 automobiles had become a staple of American life.  It's amazing to think of the degree to which this is true, as it happened so rapidly.  By the late 1930s almost every American family had a car.  Added to that, pickup trucks had come in between the wars in the early versions of what we have today, and they were obviously a vehicle that was highly suited to hunting, although early cars, because of the way they were configured and because they were often more utilitarian than current ones, were well suited as a rule.  What was absent were 4x4s, which we've discussed earlier.

This meant that it was much, much easier for hunters to go hunting in a fashion that was less of an expedition.  It became possible to pack up a car or pickup truck and travel early in the morning to a hunting location and be back that night, in other words.


Or at least it had been until World War Two. With the war came not only food rationing, but gasoline rationing as well.  And not only gasoline rationing, but rationing that pertained to things related to automobiles as well



Indeed, the first thing to be rationed by the United States Government during World War Two was tires.  Tires were rationed on December 11, 1941.  This was due to anticipated shortages in rubber, which was a product that had been certainly in use during World War One, but not to the extent it was during World War Two.  And tire rationing mattered.


People today are used to modern radial tires which are infinitely better, and longer lasting, than old bias ply tires were.  People who drove before the 1980s and even on into the 80s were used to constantly having flat tires.  I hear occasionally people lament the passing of bias ply tires for trucks, but I do not.  Modern tires are much better and longer lasting.  Back when we used bias ply tires it seemed like we were constantly buying tires and constantly  having flat tires.  Those tires would have been pretty similar to the tires of World War Two.  Except by all accounts tires for civilians declined remarkably in quality during the war due to material shortages.

Gasoline rationing followed, and it was so strict that all forms of automobile racing, which had carried on unabated during World War One, were banned during World War Two.  Sight seeing was also banned.  So, rather obviously, the use of automobiles was fairly curtailed during the Second World War.

So, where as cars and trucks had brought mobility to all sorts of folks between the wars in a brand new way, rationing cut back on it, including for hunters, during the war.

Which doesn't mean that you couldn't go out, but it did mean that you had to save your gasoline ration if you were going far and generally plan wisely.

Ammunition was also hard to come by during the war.

It wasn't due to rationing, but something else that was simply a common fact of life during World War Two.  Industry turned to fulfilling contracts for the war effort and stopped making things for civilians consumption.

Indeed, I've hit on this a bit before in a different fashion, that being how technology advanced considerably between the wars but that the Great Depression followed by the Second World War kept that technology, more specifically domestic technology, from getting to a lot of homes. Automobiles, in spite of the Depression, where the exception really.  While I haven't dealt with it specifically, the material demands of the Second World War were so vast that industries simply could not make things for the service and the civilian market. 

Some whole classes of products, such as automobiles, simply stopped being available for civilians.  Ammunition was like that.  With the services consuming vast quantities of small arms ammunition, ammunition for civilians became very hard to come by.  People who might expect to get by with a box of shotgun shells for a day's hunt and to often make due with half of that.  Brass cases were substituted for steel before that was common in the U.S., which was a problem for reloaders. 

So, in short, the need and desire was likely there, but getting components were more difficult. And being able to get out was as well, which impacted a person to a greater or lesser extent depending where they were.

And, as previously noted, game populations are considerably higher today than they were then.

New Zealanders entered the Tunisian city of Gabès.

Hitler rejected the recommendations of the German Army to place V-2 rockets on mobile launchers and opted instead for them to have permanent launching installations at Peenemünde.

Life issued a special issue on the USSR.

Nevada joined those states, such as Wyoming, which would no longer recognize Common Law Marriage.

Chapter 122 - Marriage

NRS 122.010 - What constitutes marriage; no common-law marriages after March 29, 1943.

1. Marriage, so far as its validity in law is concerned, is a civil contract, to which the consent of the parties capable in law of contracting is essential. Consent alone will not constitute marriage; it must be followed by solemnization as authorized and provided by this chapter.

2. The provisions of subsection 1 requiring solemnization shall not invalidate any marriage contract in effect prior to March 29, 1943, to which the consent only of the parties capable in law of contracting the contract was essential.

John Major, British Prime Minister from 1990 to 1997, was born, as was English comedian Eric Idle.


1973  The United States completes it's withdrawal from Vietnam.

By odd coincidence, this is also the day that Lt. William Calley was sentenced in 1971 in a courts martial for his role in the My Lai Massacre, although his prison sentence ended up not being a long one.

Thursday, March 29, 1973. Collapse.


Today In Wyoming's History: March 29: 1973  The United States completes it's withdrawal from Vietnam.

U.S. Army General Frederick C. Weyand, for the U.S. forces, stated: "Our mission has been accomplished," 

General Cao Văn Viên, for South Vietnam, stated to the departing U.S. troops: "We are going to do everything we can to see that your great sacrifices were not in vain."

The sentiments were no doubt sincere, but the mission had not really been accomplished and the sacrifices would have to be qualified.  We took a look at the war in that fashion here:


General Cao would go into exile in 1975 with the fall of South Vietnam, and died in 2008 at age 86 in the United States.  Gen. Weyland died in 2010 at age 93.

The war effectively destroyed the combat capabilities through moral decay of the U.S. Army and the U.S. Navy. The Marines and the Air Force came through it much less impaired.  The lessons learned caused the post Vietnam War military to abandon conscription, something it had relied upon since 1940, and a wholesale return to the pre World War Two volunteer/National Guard based force, something that has been a success.  It would take several years for the Army and Navy to return to combat effective, but it happened much quicker, with the volunteer force, than might have been guessed.  By the early 1980s, the service had been effectively restored and the damaging impacts of the Vietnam War largely put behind it.

The war would have a lingering effect on the military in other ways, of course, perhaps one of the most visual being the adoption of the M16 to such an extent that it has obtained record longevity, in spite of being a widely hated weapon by troops of the era.

On the same day:
Today In Wyoming's History: March 29 By odd coincidence, this is also the day that Lt. William Calley was sentenced in 1971 in a courts-martial for his role in the My Lai Massacre, although his prison sentence ended up not being a long one.

Also on that day, the second to last group of US POWs left Vietnam.  The last POW to board the aircraft out of North Vietnam was U.S. Navy Lieutenant Commander Alfred H. Agnew.

Somehow oddly emphasizing the spirit of defeat at the time, the well regarded television drama Pueblo, about the North Korean capture of the USS Pueblo, aired on television.  Only tangentially related to the war, it was impossible not to notice that North Korea of that era felt that the US was so impaired that it could get away with this, which it did. 

It would not, now.

And making the day all the worse, President Nixon set a maximum for prices that could be charged for beef, pork and lamb.  This was in reaction to a consumer revolt in which consumers, mostly housewives charged with home economics, to boycott the same in reaction to rising prices.

Oddly, of course, this is the day that rationing had commenced on the same items in 1943.

You'd think that I'd remember some of this, but I don't on a personal level.

1999     The Dow Jones industrial average closed above 10,000 for the first time.

2016   Waiting for the Storm
 
We're supposed to be getting a huge storm today and tomorrow.

I sure hope so.

These photographs were taken on March 20 in the foothills of the Big Horns:

Foothills of the Southern Big Horns

Elk carcass in the foreground.

Should be snow this time of year.  Not a good sign.
There should be snow everywhere in the photos.  And right now maybe there is, it's snowed since them. But we sure need more.

2017  By and act of Congress and as signed into law this day was designated National Vietnam Veterans Day.

Wyoming had the highest volunteer rate of any state for service in the Vietnam War.  This was not unusual.  It also had the highest volunteer rate for World War One and the highest Marine Corps enlistment rate for World War Two.