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TI: Okay, so why don't you talk about the type of training you received once you joined.

EW: Well, I'd like to say I received some really advanced training, but most of the training I got on the job, the really good training. I went through basic training, which all officers are required to go through. I'm sorry, not all officers, but all officers going to OCS go through basic training. And that was pretty, pretty normal for most recruits as they go through and pretty...

TI: I'm sorry, OCS, I'm trying to figure what OCS --

EW: Officer Candidate School.

TI: Okay, Officer Candidate School.

EW: So I went through two-and-a-half months of basic training. That's, we were in this, we were just thrown in with all the rest of the recruits, all the rest of the enlisted. Once we graduated from basic training, then we went to Officer Candidate School, so we, so they flew us all the way to, I was flown all the way to South Carolina for basic training. And you know, they teach you the normal things, how to do a pushup, how to shoot the rifle, and obstacle courses, and how to use all the different weapons and things like that, military protocol, indoctrination, the normal things. And then, then you go to Officer Candidate School, which I thought would be --

TI: Now, before we move on, so basic training, you, because you had graduated from college, you were older than most of the people there?

EW: Right, and that was probably the most difficult thing, because I was twenty-five at the time. I think that there was a guy older than me who was twenty-eight, and we became good friends, he was from Texas. But the rest of the guys there, the majority, I would say, are eighteen, nineteen, twenty, twenty-one, so the maturity level, there was a huge gap in there. And it's very frustrating because basic training is not hard, and you're not going to get yelled at that much by the drill sergeants if you do what you're supposed to do. But if you fool around, which a lot of these young kids do, because they just, they felt like it was, hey, summer camp, and they'd never been around a lot of discipline or responsibility before. And so the military is really into mass punishment -- [laughs] -- so these guys fool around, and then the whole unit pays for it. And that was the most frustrating thing, 'cause you just want to tell these guys, "Hey, why are you doing this? Just do what they tell you to do, and behave, and we'll all get through this." But for some reason or another, there were just five, six or seven guys who just didn't get it. I think towards the end they kind of understood, but it took a long time.

TI: So did you and the other older guys try to, try to advise them in terms of what they should or shouldn't be doing?

EW: Yeah, but it's, you know, it's difficult. It's very difficult. These guys come from all walks of life, from everywhere in the country.

TI: And yet these were the, the men that you would be, would be serving...

EW: In charge of one day.

TI: In charge of, yeah.

EW: Uh-huh, yeah.

TI: So that was kind of a, perhaps, an eye-opener for you in terms of what you were getting yourself into.

EW: Perhaps, yeah.

<End Segment 13> - Copyright © 2006 Densho. All Rights Reserved.