A thing happened on this day 9 years ago. Any number of reference sources are available on-line if yer Google-Fu is good.<\/p>\n
Some \u2018Nam vets, and others,\u00a0 decided to stand up and be counted. ANSWER was gonna do some protesting at The Wall in DC. A coupla geezers decided to organize a counter effort. Captain Bailey and Colonel Riley managed to get the word out and The Gathering of Eagles was born.<\/p>\n
I hope I can be forgiven for personalizing this post rather than dealing with the event in more generic terms. The latter has been done by many, and arguably better than I might offer.<\/p>\n
The event marked my first trip to The Wall and my second trip to DC.<\/p>\n
I, somehow, wound up being in charge of on-site communications. There were folks doing \u201csecurity\u201d that needed to be able to talk to each other and Captain Bailey made me his commo Petty Officer so I bought encrypted walkies-talkies and some (then) cheap cell phones as back-up. The day before the event we scouted the site and I picked the highest point for my headquarters. While technically the right thing to do, it had one significant downside. It snowed and the temps dropped. We were ready technically, but not so ready for the weather. We were \u201cunder\u2019 a canopy on poles that both threatened to blow away AND periodically dumped snow on us.<\/p>\n
Still\u2026 it was the first time I\u2019d felt proud to be a \u2018Nam Vet. I could see The Wall from my spot, and the thousands who had joined us. Needless to say\u2026 ANSWER didn\u2019t get close to The Wall.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
Category<\/strong>: Geezer Alert!<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"