Oral History Interview with Larry A. Reed

[Interview Begins]

SPRAGUE: Today is August 5th, 2021. This is an interview with Larry A. Reid, who served in the United States Navy from 1961 to 1966. This interview is being conducted by Luke Sprague at the veterans home in Cooksville, Wisconsin. This interview is for the Wisconsin Veterans Museum Oral History Program. No one else is present in the room. Okay. Larry, tell me about where you grew up.

REED: I grew up in Green Bay, Wisconsin, home of the Packers, and I was young enough to know of a wooden fence around City Stadium. Those boards could be slid aside and all of us kids could sneak into the Packer games. I'm talking about a long time ago, but that was a fun part, was living in Green Bay. The Green Bay Packers back in the 1950s when I was in grade school and then high school, graduated high school in 1957 and then went on to Northwestern University on a 00:01:00NROTC Naval Reserve Officer Training Corps scholarship. That's why I could afford that wonderful university at Northwestern and spent four years there as a midshipman with summers cruising with the Navy, the Marines on ships and land and airplanes, and the wonderful time for a young man from Green Bay.

SPRAGUE: Yeah. So before we get into your service, what else can you tell me about growing up in Green Bay and sneaking into the Packer games?

REED: Well, it's a great place to grow up. As I look back on it and hear what's going on these days. But back then, it was it was wonderful. I think the education was great. The opportunities were great for young men like myself and my neighborhood kids. And we could roam the entire city of Green Bay as teenagers or even younger than that on our bicycles. It was such a safe, secure place to grow up. The movie theaters, the, the woods, the creeks, we could go 00:02:00fishing. We could go rafting on the rivers around Green Bay and in Green Bay. It was a marvelous place. I had a wonderful high school education, Green Bay East High School. I went back for a few reunions, which were fun too, and I graduated in 1957, as I said, and then on to college. But Green Bay was probably a perfect place in the Midwest in that era, not just because the Packers were there, but because the community was so cohesive. We even have Native American students in our high schools in Green Bay. We didn't have any African-Americans. So it was pretty much, you know, the Belgians, the Germans, the Irish, as usual, up in that part of Green Bay. But it was it was just super fun. And I have had friends that I'm still in touch with to this day. So that meant we had close relationships and a good time.

SPRAGUE: Oh, okay. And if you don't mind sharing with us, what did your family do in Green Bay?

REED: A number of different things. My father was a welder at the end of his 00:03:00life. He had welded ships during World War Two, I think in Two Rvers and maybe in Sturgeon Bay. I'm not sure where. And he became a welder in the rest of his life, really. He did sell newspapers before he became a welder. I remember that dad was distributing newspapers, the Green Bay Press-Gazette around the city. My mother was a housewife. She grew up near Green Bay in the Hillman family, good German family, nearby, in Calumet County. And those are the relatives that really related to because they were nearby the Hillman family and my mother's side of the family. My dad's family grew up in Missouri and Colorado and Iowa, so we didn't associate too much with them, but they were large families, great people, great. I learned a lot from my relatives, especially growing up. My mom was did odd jobs too. I remember as a little kid she would take me to her grocery store and I'd sit there and play with everything in the grocery store, while she worked, or the bakery. She would take me to the bakery as a 00:04:00pre-kindergartner and I could just squirt frosting all over myself and had a good time. So vivid memories of growing up as a youngster in Green Bay, Wisconsin.

SPRAGUE: So what did your family say to you when you decided or you got NROTC scholarship? What was that like?

REED: Well, they very pleased because we were a lower middle class family, couldn't afford much in college, really. And the opportunity came along and I could choose Northwestern University, which was an expensive school to go to back then. And I had friends that were also going to go to Northwestern so that the peer pressure and the peer friendships made that easy decision. But the only concern I had, the Naval Reserve officer, too, is that I had never been on an ocean, I'd never been sailing on the Great Lakes, maybe fishing or swimming in the Green Bay or sometimes Lake Michigan. And I would get carsick and I would get the very merry-go-round sick and Ferris wheel sick and motion sickness and 00:05:00oh God, what am I in for? But the good news is I never suffered from seasickness. In fact, I enjoyed the ocean and the ships I served on, both in the Atlantic and the Pacific Oceans. So it was a, I think I was the first one to graduate from college in my family that I knew of. My brother, older brother went to UW Green Bay for a while but didn't graduate. So I think it was the first graduate. They were very proud of my ability to go on from 306 students in the senior class at East High School, a large class on the Northwestern and get a scholarship which paid my way really through Northwestern. I did work some part time jobs while I was at college to earn a little extra cash. The payment, I think, was $100 a month for an these students at the time, as well as tuition being paid for. So I did work some jobs in fraternity house and sorority houses 00:06:00and music distribution center in Evanston, in Evanston, Illinois. So I managed to get through college very easily in terms of the finances. It was a great opportunity.

SPRAGUE: So you get to college, you graduate. What's your first training experience or your entry into the Navy like?

REED: Well, it really started in the four years I was at Northwestern. Each summer for three summers between freshman, sophomore, senior of the first summer as a midshipman, which I was, I went sailing on a destroyer out of Virginia, Norfolk, Virginia, up to New York City, and then up the new St. Lawrence Seaway to Montreal. And as a midshipman, then we were like the young, foolish teenager sailors. that's what we were, scrubbin' the decks and chippin' the paint and painting. You know, I think we learned what it was to be a sailor for those few weeks in that summer on the destroyer. So that was a great experience. And then 00:07:00the next summer I played Marine in Quantico, learned how Marine's training was conducted, and then also flew down to Pensacola, flew in some airplanes with pilots, learned about the Naval Air Force, at the time, and even took the controls of one plane. And the pilot allowed me to steer the airplane up there, which was really exciting, except when I wanted to make a turn to the right, he said, after a while you better stop turning because they're going to be upside down pretty soon. So we had a lot of fun. It was really a great experience. And the last year was on an aircraft carrier, aircraft carrier out of Long Beach, California, the USS Kearsarge. Again, there was more serious learning in that ship about radar and and navigation and, of course, aircraft carrier requirements. And that was a really a tough job, I think, and learning the real Navy on a big ship. And I learned that, first of all, I probably wasn't going to 00:08:00be a pilot and I wasn't going to join the Marines. I was going to be a good old naval officer at sea, which I was looking forward to, because I knew now I wasn't going to get seasick thanks to my trials in the Atlantic of the Pacific. So I was looking forward to where they're going to send me.

SPRAGUE: How long were those sessions in the summer? How many weeks or months would you say?

REED: I don't remember exactly, but it was almost of the whole summer, other than a maybe a week at the beginning, and a week at the end. So, I think it was at least probably six to eight weeks, especially the summer where we also went to Quantico as well as to Pensacola. We took a lot of time transport between those two places. It was enough to give a very strong taste of all of those aspects of the Navy. And I didn't have to go back and work at a job in Evanston, Illinois, I just went back to college, jumped back into the fraternity, which I 00:09:00belonged to at the time, and get ready for putting on the midshipmen uniforms and marching in the meadows of Evanston, Illinois, learning how to be a good sailor.

SPRAGUE: Do you happen to remember that first summer, the name of that destroyer that you were on for a short time?

REED: No, it's escaping me. Although I have it in my my notes, in my, my folder of my activities in the Navy. Can't think of it, the USS. It will probably come to me a little bit later. But I do remember the USS Kearsarge, an aircraft carrier, and I can't remember the name of the destroyer.

SPRAGUE: That's okay.

REED: All I remember is sleeping in the bunks. I don't know, three or four or five high in the depths of the destroyer was very tight and very uncomfortable, but all new and different. And of course, it was very interesting.

SPRAGUE: So we, I talked to you a little bit or did some homework on you and 00:10:00your pre-interview. Tell me about your your first duty station or your first posting on ship.

REED: Yes, I was assigned to the USS Wilhoite, DER-397, destroyer Radar picket ship destroyer out of Pearl Harbor. But before I got to Pearl Harbor, I was sent to school in San Diego to learn several important aspects of what I was going to become, what my duties would be on the USS Wilhoite. And those were an air control. I went to air control school, right off the bat I became an air controller because the DER, basically protecting America from any Russian missiles or anything flying through the air. So I went to Air Control School and became an Air Controller. Also went to school at the same time before I went to the Wilhoite, on the weapons, especially in anti-submarine warfare, because I 00:11:00was going to be involved in that on the Wilhoite. And those two schools took in a number of maybe at least eight weeks, possibly that long in San Diego. And then I finally flew to Pearl Harbor, Honolulu, and visited the USS Wilhoite for the first time, as an ensign. And my first job was as first lieutenant, which is about as low as you can get on the scale of officers on a ship. And that was to take care of the maintenance of the ship, painting, making sure things are operating, working with the guns and the depth charges and so on. I didn't have to use my skills as an air controller very often, just wasn't called for. But I was prepared to direct our airplanes against any other invading aircraft. So after a year or less, I was advanced to weapons officer. So, that was my final 00:12:00job. Head of the gunnery department and a weapons officer basically a three-inch weapons, which were all from World War Two, worked. We could almost hit the targets when we went outy target practicing around the islands of Hawaii and also our other depth charges and some anti-submarine warfare. But mostly we were a radar picket ship. We'd go up and down the North Pacific, up to Alaska, to the Bering Straits, and then back down to Pearl Harbor. Occasionally we would go a little bit south to try to the basically track Russian ships that were in near Hawaii waiting for Russian missiles to be tested in the Pacific Ocean. And we'd go and watch the Russian ships and eventually we would see the missiles land in the Pacific Ocean. We were trying to photograph them and get the bearings, and we would have intelligence officers assigned to our ship just for that purpose to keep track of what the Russians were sending our way in terms of missiles 00:13:00testing them into the Pacific Ocean. And at one point, the captain of our ship has to be I don't think I had the artistic skills to draw a picture, a drawing of the missile entering the Pacific Ocean. And, of course, it happened so quickly, there was no way to actually get an image, let alone to put it down on paper as a drawing. That was one of my jobs as weapons officer. He insisted I draw a picture of it, but I didn't, couldn't. But we had other intelligence officers. I don't think there are any photographs taken at that time, but it was all electronic information and radar information. So, we did follow Russian ships around occasionally, but mostly we just cruised up and down the North Pacific.

SPRAGUE: So. Tell me what a typical day was, going through a day and doing that.

REED: Well, at sea, it's a small ship. And the destroyer escort radar. Top heavy 00:14:00ship with lots of antennas and equipment. So we, thank God, I was not, I was immune to seasickness because some officers as well as sailors were not very rough seas in the North Pacific. Sometimes the waves are higher than the ship frankly and we ride up and down those waves. It's kind of exciting to be an officer in the deck and in control of the ship and knowing we have to sail into the waves and go up and down and up and down. And you'd hear the creaking of that old ship. But as young officers, it was a thrilling ride, really. And if you didn't get seasick, sometimes it was very calm and we would cruise in the sun and occasionally stop to pick up fishing balls and big glass balls that the fishermen would use to float their nets on, usually from Japan and China in the Pacific Ocean, and we'd stop and pick up those glass balls. That was the only exciting, nonmilitary chore that we pick up those souvenirs. But it was about a 00:15:00three week journey up and down the Pacific. And then we come back to Pearl Harbor and spend a week or two in port on Waikiki Beach or in the officers club or traveling around those lovely islands. The overlap and especially where we were at Pearl Harbor. But it was a wonderful place, obviously, to be stationed when you're not out at sea. But, thank God I love the ocean and the ride, the thrill of it, and to be in charge of an important task. Unfortunately, the the USS Wilhoite had a problem with its water pipes and they've often flood to the after officers quarters, the AOQ. We were not up on the main part of the ship. We were down in the bowels of the back of the ship at the AOQ, the officer's after quarters and that would flood, get up for the watch and you jump in a little puddle on the floor, maybe a foot of water occasionally, and go into the 00:16:00men's room, so to speak. The water closet, that would be flooded as well, trying to shave, get ready for watch. That was a miserable part of that old ship. I don't know when it was decommissioned, but eventually it was, of course.

SPRAGUE: Did you have anything to do with Operation Deep Freeze and resupplying our Antarctic or anything like that?

REED: No, not while I was on board. I think out of Pearl Harbor, there were ships that did go down and they were destroyer escorts of smaller ships, maybe DERs with all their good radar and so on. They were very valuable in terms of that kind of navigation. Also following all the other ships and knowing who was who else was down there doing whatever they were doing. But on the other hand, we still navigated by shooting stars. I wasn't a navigator then. I became a navigator on my second ship, but my first ship, the Wilhoite, I was not involved in navigation, but it was all shooting the stars on the moon and planets and so 00:17:00on because the LORAN, the long range radio assisted navigation was not that accurate. So we depended on the stars. It was very old fashioned stuff too, especially when I was on my second ship. I became the navigator and crossed the Pacific Ocean navigating, which was very exciting, very thrilling, was very pleased to be able to do it. Although I had a lot of help with the quartermaster who was very talented and helped me learn how to navigate.

SPRAGUE: And that'll be on your next ship, right?

REED: That would be on my next. Okay. First ship, I was the weapons officer mostly concerned with weapons and anti-submarine warfare and Air Controlling that sort of aspect of the ship or not, the communications and and not the any of the other intelligence operations that we conducted.

SPRAGUE: Did you do any special ops where you were doing sea-air rescue or recovery of people or anything like that by chance?

REED: No, we never were called to do that in our ship. I'm sure others were, but we never had that opportunity or that mission, as I recall, in my two years or so that I was aboard as an ensign and then as a first lieutenant. I mean, as a junior, lieutenant junior grade? Uh, no, I don't think we did anything else. We did go all the way to Japan at one point. And that was an interesting trip across the inland of the Pacific Ocean. And that was just, I think, just to visit Japan, goodwill probably. But also we did do our radar work and our air control work. We were ready to do that as it was called upon. But I don't remember exactly what the mission was to go to Japan other than to show the flag and to train navigating those waters and see what, if we were called upon to do 00:19:00anything else at that point, and this would have been in the 1961, '62 period.

SPRAGUE: So while you're on the ship, what what kept you going.

REED: Do you mean at sea or in the port?

SPRAGUE: At sea? Yeah. What was that like?

REED: Well, it was a tough job in many ways. Looking back on it now, I don't think I could do it physically demanding. Especially the four watch times, twenty-four hours a day. Sometimes you'd be up, as officer of the deck underway midnight to four in the morning and then maybe four to eight in the morning and eight to noon. And so it was a real tough schedule. Besides, you had to not only control the ship as officer of the deck at the time or the rest of your job, making sure the guns worked and the ship was painted and everything was working and so on. You had to be young and energetic and and all the officers were, and 00:20:00we couldn't wait to get back to the port and have a little fun, of course, and some R&R and especially in Hawaii, in Waikiki, at Fort Derusi, that wonderful military beach down Waikiki. So we had a good time as well, but it was a lot of work. It took a lot of energy. And if you were seasick and we had one officer that wouldn't did not want to get out of the Navy or be reassigned because of the seasickness. But he was miserable, flat, floating around, bobbing around and swinging and swaying and could get to you eventually, especially if you had a foot of water in your sleeping quarters. That was unpleasant. But, you know, when you're twenty, early twenties, it's a challenge, but it's not the end of the world. And it also is kind of fun to, you know, have fun with the engineers whose job it was to keep the ship, the water from flooding, the ship from flooding with the broken pipes of whatever was going on. So it was always a good time, except when the captain got unhappy, and that it was not a good time.

SPRAGUE: Do you happen to remember the those captains or any of those people?

REED: Yes, and I certainly do remember all of them. I think on my two ships, I had two captains, two different captains on each ship in my first year of the destroyer escort the USS Wilhoite. Well, we had a gentle giant of a captain, and then he was replaced by a small, tough bulldog of the captain. And that was difficult. He was a real gung ho young captain, but he was very strict, very demanding, and I think overly so, frankly. And that was not the most pleasant captain I had, unfortunately. And I think we all agreed on that, including the executive officer who sometimes confided in us, the rest of us junior officers, about what we had to do to keep the captain from going over the top with his demands.

SPRAGUE: Yeah, I in my research, uncovered a couple names that might be the captain's names. Maybe in '62 he'd be a lieutenant commander in the captainship. Frank Mead. And then from '61 to '62, a Robert Thorensen. So I ring any bells or?

REED: Both of them? Yes. Okay.

SPRAGUE: Both interest?

REED: Yes. One was the good guy and one was the not so good guy. And I could, and yes, Captain Mead was the tough one. I think he was compensating for short stature and and hoping for advancement by being very strict about the rules and the, and not being very humane about some situations, but very tough by the book and demanding, whether it was the officer's mess, as it's called, in terms of what we're eating and how we're eating, how we're paying for it ourselves. The officers had to pay for their meals and so on. And what we ate and when we ate 00:23:00and how we behaved at the table in the officers quarters in the wardroom. So we were very tough and strict by that point by the book, but that made our job a little more difficult because we were just cruising up and down the Pacific and without any action, without any interference, really, without any emergencies. So it could have been a more relaxed and yet a learning experience perhaps, as opposed to, gosh, we have to put up with this kind of a routine and we were going to get some relief. We couldn't wait to get back in. Pearl Harbor.

SPRAGUE: Yeah. So what do you know? What did you do when you got back to Pearl and Waikiki? What was that? Was that like?

REED: Well, it wasn't long, as I said, maybe a couple of weeks, depending on the routine of the other DERs. So we basically ready the ship for the next patrol. 00:24:00That meant painting and cleaning and, you know, making maintaining ship. And that was basically my job as weapons officer. I was also in charge of the vehicle. I mean, first lieutenant, who was in charge of the sailors for maintaining the ship upkeep and so on, including the ammunition and so on that we had. So it was that kind of routine really, that I was involved in. But we did have R&R and we did have a bit more time off because we were in a tough schedule, mostly at sea, frankly. So that helped in a way. It was a good time for bachelors in terms of the beaches and the officers clubs and the scenery and the people of Hawaii. It was just a wonderful place and I met a lot of wonderful Hawaiians, or especially a lot of American women who were teaching at Kamehameha High School. So it was a wonderful time. We got along very well, even though we had a little difficulty sometimes with our captain.

SPRAGUE: Mm-hmm. Any other memorable people with them while you were serving on that destroyer? Any memories? Fond memories?

REED: Well, the fond memories were many, because the officers and the crew were really great. I was really impressed. Of course, I was very impressionable, a brand new ensign. Uh, it was all very exciting and unusual for a little guy from Green Bay. And, the sailors were wonderful guys for the most part, really. I was so impressed how friendly the officers and the enlisted folks could be on a small ship, tight quarters on top of each other. And and not the most exciting job to sail up and down the Pacific, especially up near Alaska, where it was very rough and cold and the gooney birds landed on our decks and the gooney birds would land at midnight. And we'd be stumbling up there in the dark and the officers of the deck and in control. And really damn good birds were out there. 00:26:00But it was all because we were young, was all fun and games, as it were. But serious stuff, of course. But I was very impressed by the officers and the crew. They didn't expected the military to be so relaxed and so congenial. But on the other hand, by the book as well, which is very important when you're on the ship crowded and everybody has to behave as it were.

SPRAGUE: So let's go on to your next ship, your next tour. It sounded like in the pre-interview from about '63 to '64, you served on the USS Summit County, also known as LST-1146, is that correct? Can you tell me about that?

REED: Yes, that really from '63 to '65. Okay. '65. I left the ship at '63 and I 00:27:00was surprised and pleased that my next duty would be as the executive officer of the USS Summit County, LST-1146, because that was a big responsibility suddenly to go from weapons officer in the air, which was a tough job, but not that demanding really, but to be in charge. Or whereas the sailors would call me when I arrived, the commander under the captain for the crew. So I learned very quickly how to do that job. But it was on the job learning, there was no school to go to, to learn how to be executive officer under the captain, to control all aspects of the ship at sea and in port. So, somebody thought I could do the job I hope, and I enjoyed doing the job and I think I did a good job. But I had a lot of good people with ten officers, about 100 sailors, on the LST. And, I had 00:28:00a great two captains, the first captains getting it was a short termer. He was a great guy and the second captain who was with me all the time, was absolutely amazing, the kind of super captain he was in terms of the crew, terms of the officers, in terms of his life at home in San Diego and in Hawaii, when we were there. He was just a genial, smart guy and a great navigator, but also laid back, which is very nice for a change. Larry, will you take care of that, Larry? I don't want to know about that, Larry. He gave us a lot of responsibility, including myself, of course, to handle issues. And we won a lot of awards because we had a great crew and a great bunch of officers, and we kept winning those Es for excellence in all of our training off of San Diego. Were stationed in San Diego. But we did go to Pearl Harbor a couple of times. And then 00:29:00eventually, by the way, I was also the navigator. So I was also a quick learner, thanks to a great quartermaster enlisted man who helped me learn the ropes because I didn't go to school about it. But it was on the job training how to shoot the stars, the sun and the and the use LORAN, the long range radio navigating assistance and also getting up before dawn and after dusk to shoot the sun and the moon. You know? I enjoyed it immensely. I think it was the best part of my time as executive officer was being the navigator. I was exciting to learn how to use an old fashioned instruments that we had, to shoot sun the stars. And I learned a lot about the stars in the heavens. And when we couldn't see the the stars, we'd depend a lot on just guessing where we were watching where the winds were blowing and the sea was moving to estimate our location. But usually, fortunately, Pacific, we could always find out exactly where we 00:30:00were, in fact. And I'd have to brag a little bit, because the first time we sailed from San Diego to Pearl Harbor on the LST, and I was the navigator, there was a lot of joking, and "we going to get there on time? Are you going to be able to find those islands? Larry?" The captain, would kid me little bit, but I had a great navigator and we were on the bridge as we approached the Molokai, where the first light was that we would be able to spot and within a few seconds we saw the light, thanks to the navigator and of course I got myself on the back a little bit, but we were right on time. The captain was very impressed. So it was I frankly, from then on I felt more confident, especially when we had to sail via Midway and Guam to Tokyo Bay as a navigator. That was a challenge, but the captain was so cool, calm and collected, there was never any tension. It was all just doing our job and being encouraged to do it and then rewarded with praise. And I think that's why we all succeeded on that ship, including the 00:31:00entire crew and the officers were a great bunch of young officers and we all had a good time too, I think, when we're on shore.

SPRAGUE: Did you happen to mention the captain's name again or remember what it was? Not to put you on the spot.

REED: You just put me on the spot.

SPRAGUE: It might be.

REED: It's in my folder, but I can't recall the second captain. He was a super guy.

SPRAGUE: Yeah.

REED: Patrick. Is his first name. I can't remember his last name.

SPRAGUE: And this would have been in '63?

REED: '63. I went there really in the aft, '61 to middle '63 in the Wilhoite and then in the '63, '64 beginning '65 on the LST Summit County.

SPRAGUE: So we have listed, um, looks like a Brisbois.

REED: Yes. Patrick Brisbois, Patrick Brisbois, that was, that's it. Thank you 00:32:00for tickling my memory because he was super and he had a super wife too in San Diego. Just a wonderful guy. I think it was because compared to Captain Mead, Captain Brisbois was so laid back he would let, he would want people to do their job as opposed to him telling them what to do, so to speak, and encourage people, which was a key element in how he approached getting all of us, in our new jobs, especially very young sailors and young crew on that LST. Maybe not the best ship some people wanted to be on, but it was a very the workhorse of the Navy, of course. And we eventually, of course, transorted a lot of Marines from the West Coast to Pearl Harbor. And then eventually we even took some of course to Guam and and eventually to Japan and Okinawa. Made our stops with the Marines on board and equipment. So we were a transport ship.

SPRAGUE: How did you become?

REED: He was a great guy.

SPRAGUE: Sorry? How. As a as a non navy person myself. As an army guy, how, how does the LST handle at open sea, in big waves?

REED: Well, that's the problem. It's flat bottom thing. And occasionally we would we never had to run the ship aground, so to speak, up on a beach as they did in World War Two to offload. But we practiced in Hawaii, different islands, and the Navy had an island that we could do that and practice running the ship up under the sand beach. That was always a little scary because you never knew what we what we were going to hit, but we never had a problem doing it. We didn't do it very often, though, just as a training exercise. We offloaded on docks and piers, other things in terms of the equipment that we were delivering with the Marines that we were delivering. But it was flat bottom. So yeah, there was a lot of bumpy rides slapping the ocean. So we wanted calm waters because it didn't have that the bottom steerage. It was a little bit difficult, but we 00:34:00never ran into any problems. But I think maybe as the captain of the ship and I wasn't the captain, he may have had some more experience on maneuvering LSTs as opposed to regular ships, but, but we managed and we also again began winning awards, which was very rewarding to all of us because we had a captain that I think we wanted to please and we wanted to do the right thing. And it was a really good crew, a good time. But there were some difficult times that I had things I had to do on that ship which disappointed me looking back on it, especially because as the commander or the Chief Administrator Executive Officer, we occasionally had problems in terms of fights or disruptions on the ship, disagreements, especially in port, of course, when people, sailors have been drinking and so on. And I was in charge of making sure there wasm, you 00:35:00know, order on the ship. And occasionally I would get reports from other sailors on a ship or other officers about problem problems. And I'd have to investigate what was going on called people in my cabin and do a little investigating and what would, what happened, who was in charge and what was the that the problem was and who else I would talk to and so on. So I'm sort of adjudicating between the fighters or the drunks or the or the sexual activity that went on on the ship. And that was the sensitive part of my job, because occasionally, you know, the captain, Captain Patrick Brosbois, "Larry, you take care of that. I don't want to know anything about it." So, I would have to take care of some of these minor problems. We never had a serious issue. It was just after, you know, fights and good guys doing things they disapproved of, including homosexual activities that went on on the ship occasionally, not often. But when that 00:36:00happened, that's especially when you visibility there. You handle that kind of what's going on. And the and the procedure at that time, at least in San Diego, was for me to find out what went on, who did what to whom and when and to find out who was the instigator. And a lot of the vivid colored testimony they were swearing on the Bible when they talked to me, but I would eventually be able to find out what happened. And then I'd have to take the action with the captain's blessing. And we would have to remove the sailor. I would take him to the administrative buildings in San Diego, and he would be administratively discharged because of his violation of the code and his behavior on the ship. And that was the usual homosexual activity that went on sometimes with the approval, I understood, but mostly it became too much for the sailors, they would report him and they would have to find out what's going on. And that bothered me because at that point in my life I wasn't sure whether I was gay or 00:37:00not. I thought I was, but I wasn't acting on it. I was a gay man, but I wasn't acting on it. And I didn't really understand the circumstance of being in the Navy as a gay officer, let alone in the world as a gay person. So, I was dealing with my own issues at the time in San Diego on the LST, but I had a great captain who was very supportive and and we had a lot of fun all of our sailors, we just had a good time with everybody in terms of Waikiki and officers clubs and entertaining ourselves, touring around the sugar canes, I think that's where I got my first ticket, traffic ticket with speeding at thirty-five miles an hour through a sugar cane field in Oahu and darn it if they didn't pull me over and give me a ticket, I was going of course to the beach party the other side of Oahu, and I had a little M.G., a little black MG at the time. So I really had the sportin' life there in Hawaii, in San Diego. But that so there's serious 00:38:00things that happened that I had to take care of. Wasn't all fun and games. Of course it wasn't all enjoyment. And sometimes we had to be a little tough on some of the guys. And there was a teaching experience, I think for most of us, frankly, a learning experience and teaching. And I was happy to do that because I learned a heck of a lot myself, about myself, of course, and how to deal with people and how to serve my country. I was very pleased to be able to do that. Country had been very good to me and my family, especially goin' go to Northwestern, having good scholarship. But also seeing the world as a little guy from Green Bay, Wisconsin, touring the world, both the Atlantic and the Pacific. And I grew up fast, you know, by my early twenties, I think I was, well, I don't reven emember how old I was. I probably was twenty when I was ensign, and then gradually up the ladder to junior grade. And then I did make full Lieutenant, on 00:39:00my last year on the USS Summit County in San Diego. Had a big party because it really, we had to go to Hawaii. So the big party was at the officer's club in Hawaii where Don Ho was a famous singer in Hawaii and even in America he was a very popular singer at the time. And he did sing at our officers club Hawaii, Pearl Harbor, and called me up to sing with it because it was my party I just made Lieutenant. So I went on stage and sang with Don Ho, some silly Hawaiian songs as my party for making lieutenant. By that time, I had already applied, because my four years was almost up to required for the scholarship, and I decided that I was probably going to leave the Navy unless I could be sent to a language school because my major at Northwestern University as a midshipman was 00:40:00Russian civilization of the language and history and the economics and so on, the politics of Russia at the time. And I thought if I could go to language school and brush up on my Russian, maybe learn Polish or Norwegian or Italian and serve in an embassy, and that category, that status as opposed to shipboard life. And I said I'd stay in another year, in other words, a fifth year, and they agreed, and Washington bureau personnel said, okay, sure, that's a deal. We'll send you to Monterey, California, for, for school, language school. And, but the language we'dike you to learn, Lt. Reed, is Vietnamese. And I said, "Well, that's interesting. Yes. Because something is going on over there, isn't it?" This would be in 1960, late '64, '65. And I said, okay, sure, I'll go with 00:41:00language school and then we'll see what happens. After that. We'll be assigned in terms of Vietnam, this is in '64, '65 and in early '65 my year was up, I was getting ready to get my papers, go to Monterey, California, stay with school. And I got another change of orders from the Bureau of Personnel. Lieutenant Reed, we're going to send you directly to Vietnam. We're not sending you to language school. We need you in Vietnam after you go to survival school in with the Marines at get Camp Pendleton to learn how to shoot machine guns and pistols and throw grenades. And then we're going to send you the way to the jungles for survival school in the jungles, living off the land, being chased by the V.C., which were really Hawaiians and learn how to survive with no food, no water, no weapons in the jungle for a few days. So I went to survival school on my way to 00:42:00Vietnam, and not to language school, and I was assigned to relieve an officer on the river patrol. We call it a PT boat. It was really a river patrol boat on the rivers of the delta, other rivers and the coast of Hawaii, also Vietnam. And got a message saying, unfortunately, the man was killed on the boat. He's already been replaced. So we're still sending you to Saigon, but we're going to use you to set up the SOC, the surveillance operations center or the NAG, the Naval Advisory Group. And you're going to be an advisor to the Vietnamese Navy under MACV, the Military Assistance Command, Vietnam. General Westmoreland, in charge of the whole shebang, said, Wow, I guess I was looking forward to being a P.T. 00:43:00boat. Very romantic, very exciting. But as it turns out, of course, the most dangerous part of the Navy's operations there, including the what we also called the junk basins, the junk boats who were patrolling the ocean, the coast of Vietnam. The river patrol were obviously patrolling the rivers, all to intercept their jet, either when they were trying to say to stop the delivery of weapons from north to South Vietnam, either by the ocean or by the rivers of the rivers to bases, turned out in the long run, most of the arms for V.C. so to get them were overland from over Cambodia through the mountains and so on, through tunnelsdf. Very elaborate system to get to keep the war going in South Vietnam from North Vietnam. But the Navy, when I got there in 1965, the Navy had 00:44:00purchased this old French schoolhouse that was going to be in the Naval Operations Center for the Adventure Group.

REED: Located shortly not a long distance from downtown Saigon, just beyond the Catholic Church overlooking General Westmoreland's private home. Frankly, that area of southeast of Saigon, a peaceful area, a beautiful area of the Catholic Church, is beautiful, the Hilton Hotels, downtown Saigon, all the wonderful French restaurants and these restaurants and Chinese restaurants near the old opera house, which is right in the middle of that beautiful downtown Saigon, the Paris of the Orient, just a lovely place. But of course, the war was going on. And indeed there were explosions and shootings in Saigon. But, I was always stationed in Saigon for the entire year I was there. I started off as I mentioned, helping to set up the surveillance operations center for what was 00:45:00called Market Time. That was the name of the undertaking to intercede and intercept any delivery of weapons into Vietnam via the ocean or the rivers. We didn't obviously deal with the land operations, the Marines. The Army took care of that. I did get out of Saigon occasionally to fly with some new pilots that were coming into Ton Son Nhut airport, Navy pilots and crouch behind the pilots, and we would fly along the coast and the rivers. And I would try, try to point out where the friendly bases were or jump bases or river patrol bases along the rivers and the coast. We didn't know where the VC were. They were all over the place. But I did that for a while.

SPRAGUE: So tell the listener the, using the junks, how did that what was the Navy's involvement with that if you could expand on that?

REED: Well, we were advisors and the Navy had advisors, young men. I was 00:46:00supposed to be one of them, but I had got a different position and that was our Navy guys would go, usually officers, but enlisted men, the chiefs who were really well experienced. They would go to these Navy Vietnam the VN Navy base in Vietnam South Vietnam Navy bases on the ocean or on the rivers that were being set up with the Vietnamese navy. So we were advising the Vietnamese Navy on how to intercept these boats, sometimes more like junks, float or bigger boats, ships really for either going up the rivers or just along the coast to offload arms to the VC at various places along the so Vietnamese coastline. And we would have naval U.S. naval officers or, as I said, chiefs who were advising the Vietnamese how to do this intercepting of ships from the North Vietnamese. And some of my friends that I went through survival school got those jobs, when we 00:47:00all went to Vietnam, at that time, early. I think we were probably the first advisers to be there, not the exact first, but maybe the second group that went there and got jobs either on the rivers or the jump bases or in my case, in Saigon, to set up the operation center for the whole Navy, including naval ships, the US Navy that were also patrolling, of course on the Pacific Ocean, including up to off North Vietnam as well as South Vietnam.

SPRAGUE: They called that the Pacific Barrier, maybe.

REED: Or yes, there were lots of different terms. It kept changing, frankly, the whole operation was called Market Time, and that was the official name for about a year while I was there. It turned into other names because basically, as I understood it from my vantage point, there is such a thing as a vantage point. And I did have a vantage point because eventually the Navy group got an admiral. 00:48:00We had a captain in charge of the Navy, the Naval Advisory Group, for a while, Captain Hardcastle. And we were setting up the operation center with him. We had shortwave radios in that schoolhouse trying to communicate with our bases around South Vietnam. Half the time we couldn't communicate well, if the weather was monsoons, so we'd use the telephone, the South Vietnamese telephones. And the strange part was I would get on the phone if I was the officer in charge of that operation that day at the schoolhouse. And I would get a Vietnamese operator on the phone. And I said, I'd got to speak to DaNang or Quy Nhon or Vung Tau. And she would say, she's a Vietnamese operator, of course. Wonderful, wonderful people knew the English, somewhat. "If you buy me hairspray and Dove soap at PX, I'll get you through the DaNang, [laughs]. And I would say, "oh, yes, I'll buy it for you next week. Okay. Just get me through." So you talk your way through, so that I would get the information and my watch, and eventually, others had to 00:49:00do that too, and I would have to do it continuously because I became the admiral's, when he came on board, briefing officer. Every morning at 8 a.m., seven days a week, I would get in front of our admiral, whose name is escaping me, Nordby, and in the rest of the staff and any visitors from Congress or from General Westmoreland's office. And I would tell them that that briefing, what was going on with our naval efforts, both the weather, where the US naval ships were in the ocean, where the jump bases were, where there was any action on the rivers or the jump bases, who was killed? Is that at that point, the numbers game? How many Vietnamese did you kill? What was that body count or did we suffer any casualties? And we did occasionally, of course. So that kind of 00:50:00information that I would have to get via the telephone "tomatoes" because they were sweet ladies, but these tomaotes would get us through, otherwise they wouldn't have much information to report it at my 8:00 briefing, of course, all night long the operation center was working and of course, my naval fellow naval officers were gathering information.

SPRAGUE: Now, these tomatoes, the telephone operators, Vietnamese, it sounds like to me like you were going out over local telephone lines as opposed to military telephone lines. So in terms of security or operational security, maybe not so much.

REED: Not so much, no. Because at the time I didn't know, I was inexperienced, of course, that was pretty primitive, pretty, pretty improvised, whatever worked worked to communicate, whatever worked in terms of flying, going on bases and getting shot at occasionally the pilots would dive to the ocean to avoid getting hit. You know, they didn't want to be targets up here, so they would dive to the 00:51:00ocean. I didn't know that at first. I thought we were crashing. I thought we were hit, we were diving, crashing into the ocean. No, that was just the captain, you know, making evasive action. So I was relieved because I was just crouched there in my flight suit, my .38 caliber pistol strapped to my waist, in case I would have to go to the jungles and survive, which I had learned to do in Hawaii, in theory, at least. But I was young and it was exciting. It was somewhat dangerous, of course it was more dangerous to live in downtown Saigon, after a while, they kept blowing up our hotels, the VC did. They kept blowing up our favorite French restaurants, floating, my favorite floating French restaurant on the Saigon River was blown up. But I was never in any of the hotels or the restaurants when that happened. But some of my fellow officers were, especially one fellow, really seriously damaged when he made the mistake of in his room the hotel hearing noise, you know, two in the morning, three in 00:52:00the morning and going to the window to look out to see what was going on. You never supposed to do that because the bomb went off and the glass just shattered him. You're supposed to go and hide in the bathroom at the back of the room, the hotel under the toilet, the pipes, too, in case there was an explosion.

SPRAGUE: Do you happen to remember the name of the floating restaurant? Or maybe this fellow officer?

REED: I don't remember my friend. And he was a friend. Sorry to say I can't remember his name, but I visited him in the hospital at Tan Son Nhut airport, and the sweet nurses there brought me the glass of water because I was almost faint and was visibly shaken by that. The bloody mess that that officer had to go through in terms of surgery and recovery, he was sliced so many places on his body. But on the other hand, the good news is we had a Vietnamese-American society in Saigon, officers and men and women, mostly women from Saigon, Vietnamese. We gathered together occasion to socialize, to get to know each 00:53:00other, and also to raise money for their orphanages and for their goodwill efforts. The American Vietnamese Society, the work we tried to do with families in Saigon and elsewhere, probably in the area. But of course, as an officer I didn't have a lot of time to do that, nor did any of us. But I remember one occasion that we we it was Christmas time and we raised some money and we bought a lot of things from the PX to bring to the orphanage near Tan Son Nhut airport, a Catholic orphanage. And the Vietnamese ladies and some of the officers gathered the material and went there and the big bags of gifts for the orphans. Unfortunately, it seemed like the entire city of Saigon, all the orphans and young kids in Saigon realized what was going on. So they also came to the orphanage near on Ton Son Nhut. We were swamped with young children wanting gifts, wanting something from the Americans, wanting the candy, wanting the 00:54:00little gifts we were giving out at the legitimate orphanage at Christmas time. And we were swamped. But we made a big mistake with the Air Force, with the Army, I guess, Air Force. And that was to have Santa Claus arrive to cheer up the kids. And the Santa was going to arrive by helicopter and land near the orphanage near Ton Son Nhut, a big open space, Well, the hundreds and hundreds of children that were handing out gifts from the chapel windows because we couldn't be outside. There were too many kids. We had opened the chapel windows and give the gifts out through the windows. We were swamped. Well, the kids saw this helicopter, the Army helicopter, landing near them. They panicked in fear. They thought that we were being assaulted by some helicopter and the children ran screaming away from the helicopter. So, of poor Santa Claus, we got off the helicopter and his red suit and big bag of gifts, the kids had scattered out of fear. They thought there was an assault going on, and they might be killed or 00:55:00injured. It was like a battle action scene, But, nobody got hurt. And the kids did come back when they realized just that jolly old St. Nick was there to hand out more gifts. But it was terrifying. You realize how much suffering went on, the children, the orphans and the people in that war. And that's the only time I confronted that idea that we were not succeeding, as it were, with the people. It was a guerilla war of the people, and we didn't have a handle on how to deal with the people in general. I can't be more specific than that.

SPRAGUE: Now, this Christmas event was December '65 or.

REED: Yes, definitely December '65 because I served in '65 and '66. Okay. So that was my first experience, not with the wonderful people of Saigon who who were serving us food and preparing our food in the restaurant. They were wonderful people. But of course there were also brothers who were Viet Cong or 00:56:00working with the Viet Cong at the same time or relatives. And, and the Vietnamese Navy was basically a failure in the Vietnamese military was a failure that eventually just General Westmoreland and I think the other officials who really knew what was going on for them as lieutenants did, realized that we were no longer advisors, we were the warriors, we were the fighters, and we had to take over the war, not just advise the Vietnamese on their war, but it was our war now. And we were, as a military, I don't think, quite prepared to do that in Vietnam at the time. And I think that became clear to everybody from LBJ on down. It just wasn't working.

SPRAGUE: So you think while you were there and in '65 you were beginning, where were you in that transition process? From advisor, advising to fighting?

REED: That's where the change really happened. From being advisors and called 00:57:00that, of course, in the organizational chart advising the Vietnamese military, to diminishing that. Westmoreland and other military people that realized it wasn't working because we couldn't advise them. They were not taking our advice, basically. Nor were we giving them enough money perhaps, and so on, in terms of arms and training and so on, that was much more serious and happening much more quickly where the Vietcong were taking over both the land and the people, and we weren't prepared for that. So, then, I don't know exactly when that transition happened, but while I was there it became a military operation of the US government, the Army, the Navy, the Marines, and the Air Force to some extent.

SPRAGUE: Was there any particular briefing that you that sticks out in your head that you gave during that time?

REED: No, they were pretty routine, frankly, because of the lack of communications, because of the lack of at that point, very early on, of 00:58:00activity, really, although occasionally arms were intercepted, but not very often. So there wasn't a lot of business to be done. They were outwitting us in some respects, but also it was just a matter of it's a long course coastline, very intricate. It was very difficult to really survey that carefully and watch the comings and goings, By the way can I take a break shortly, if you don't mind.

SPRAGUE: Restarting with segment two with Larry Reed? And we had left off just talking about being the briefing officer for the Naval Command, a naval advisory group at the SAG, and. He had started to talk a little bit about receiving briefings at Westmoreland's headquarters.

REED: Yes, I occasionally went over there, not often with our admiral would take 00:59:00me with his aide and a few other people from his staff, and I would go with them just to hear another briefing from the Army, which was of course the headquarters for the entire U.S. operations in Vietnam. Whereas my briefing every morning was just the Navy operation along the coast, in the rivers, and to some extent the ships out at sea. All of those were under a different command. The U.S. ships at sea. So the Naval Advisory Group that mapped the even the names began to change because we were no longer an advisory group, and NAG went by the boards. It became another name and I was in the middle of the transition or near the end of, shall we say, in my tour in Vietnam at that transition period. In other words, we in the 1966 probably ,now. The admiral came in late '65, and in 1966, I think things were happening in the entire operation of America's operation there and not going well and things were changing in 01:00:00America, over, was taking over the war really and and I was there at the beginning of that and as briefing officer that my job was fairly simple because again it was just the U.S. Naval operations in headquartered in Saigon at the old French school. We were still trying to intercept the delivery of arms, via the ocean, the sea, as well as the rivers. We had nothing to do with the inland transfer of funds, of guns and so on from Vietnam via Cambodia and down through the tunnels and trails of the jungles, especially in the Mekong Delta. And when you think about it and I thought about it later, really, because I never went on a boat or a junk boat, especially if you went up the river in the Mekong Delta. The rivers are not, they're little streams, you're not far from the shores. 01:01:00You're a sitting duck. In other words, appeared in a PT Boat, a patrol boat on the rivers because the shores are overgrown and they're just ten feet away, twenty feet away, thirty feet away. You're you're really opportunity target for anybody who spots you and wants to shoot at you. And that happened frequently. That's where the deaths occurred in the Navy. In the Naval Advisory groups organization was on the river patrols, especially. And that was one of my friends, he didn't get killed, he was serving on that capacity of river patrol. Very treacherous, very treacherous operations. Well, the city of Saigon, I would get these reports and share them. And unfortunately, I never got some of the serious reports. It took a while to communicate. Again, as I said, the telephones with shortwave weren't working so often it was written reports from our American advisers and that took a while to be transmitted. And these, those 01:02:00were probably classified. I had top secret classification when I was in the Navy in general as an officer, especially executive officer. But I didn't get all the information that the admiral was getting, of course. But the operation of the Army and the Navy and the Marines, that was beyond my need to know, so to speak. I was just trying to tell them basically what the weather was like, who was killed, how many bad guys were killed, and anything else that was important to know about the villages. But really, we didn't have people in the field that were doing anything like the Marines and the Army were doing, really fighting the war. We were more observational and trying to understand how the weapons could keep pouring into Vietnam when we were finding relatively few, although 01:03:00sometimes quite a few. But there weren't that many opportunities to interdict, to intercede with them with the weapons delivery. So I was the briefing officer and continue to be even when I came down with dengue fever at one point. Mosquito bite knocked me off for a loop for a few days, quite a few days in my hotel room downtown Saigon. I would get food and so on. I didn't go in a hospital. There were important things to deal with than dengue fever. But I recovered fairly quickly. But then I also had a problem with overdosing on. And they didn't they didn't do it at the time. Neither did I. Malaria pills one. Every Sunday we would take a malaria pill to prevent anti-malarial, which is for seriously. Dengue fever, and I became allergic to something at some point. We didn't know what, the doctors didn't know what. So I had trouble speaking. My lips in a tongue were swelling up. I was allergic to something. My fingertips 01:04:00are swept up. And it turned out later on, after I left Vietnam, we discovered what it was. I was allergic to the malaria pills, which quinine constitutes the malaria pills. And to this day, that's the only thing I'm allergic to in my medical reports is quinine, but that's another story. But near the end of my tour of a year, '65, '66 and nothing much, had changed with the Naval Advisory Group. We still had the same number of people in the old schoolhouse just near downtown Saigon, but things were beginning to change, I could tell that. Because we weren't, I don't want to say, very effective, but the arms were pouring into South Vietnam from the other land routes. So things were changing then. So I decided to resign my commission from the Navy and go back to Wisconsin. 01:05:00Unfortunately, our President, LBJ, was not accepting the resignation of naval officers at the time, so I couldn't resign. I had I stayed there another, just a number of weeks, frankly, not months, really, until my resignation was accepted. And I could leave Vietnam at the end of my tour in Vietnam of a year.

SPRAGUE: So what was, what, when, when was your resignation, roughly?

REED: 1966, I think probably May of 1966.

SPRAGUE: And then you had to stay a couple of months you said?

REED: I think it was well, I think I left in May.

SPRAGUE: Okay.

REED: I think it was like maybe March.

SPRAGUE: Okay.

REED: When I resigned. Could resign officially after one year. The days might be a little off, a little bit blurry there for me right now. Because what it really opened my eyes to the fact that I was a naval officer lieutenant in Vietnam and 01:06:00in the wonderful U.S. Navy, which treated me quite well. And I learned a lot and had a great time serving. I realize that I was a gay man in the Navy, I decided there's no getting over that. So there isn't much future for me in the military as a gay man, although I wasn't "out" and no one knew I was gay, but I knew I was. And in fact, I had my first sexual experience with a man in Saigon, an Army officer, in a massage parlor and so on. Just one of those things that I look back on and say, "Wow, yeah, you came out in Saigon. Well, that's a place to come out as a gay man." And I realized, okay, I have to leave the Navy. I was doing my job. My job was done. It's time for me to resign and go on, get on with my life and not go back to Monterrey or another language school or other opportunities in the Navy. Because I just couldn't live myself, live as a gay 01:07:00man in the Navy. I had to deal with it, when I was in San Diego, on the LST for Captain Brisbois. "Larry, you take care of it." I would interview the men who were caught, for homosexual activities and drive them to the administrative office in downtown San Diego to be administratively discharged, not court martialed. Nothing serious like that, actually. So I realized that my term in the Navy after five years, very interesting time for me, but it was time to get out of the Navy, go back to Madison, Wisconsin, and the University of Wisconsin. But I had done a lot in Vietnam. I had an interesting time socially and, and, and educationally and certainly militarily while I was in Saigon. We had time off to travel in Saigon to go to Cho Lon, those wonderful French quarters, sorry, Chinese quarters with Chinese food all over, just marvelous times out 01:08:00having dinner carefully, of course, because we were still military guys. Wearing civilian clothes, by the way, when we went out on the town in Saigon or on the top of the hotels for cocktails, I even invited a Vietnamese waitress in our restaurant in Saigon to accompany me as my night date for the night, and I took her up an elevator up to the top of one of the French hotels. There was the Majestique of the Continental, and she had never been an elevator before and her stomach in her. She could barely speak English, but her stomach was in her mouth. She was very sweet and wonderful, and she felt out of place because there were some Vietnamese ladies, all in their Western garb, but she was wearing her oolong or her Vietnamese outfit. So these, I knew her Vietnamese. So I had a wonderful time with my fellow officers in Japanese. But on the other hand, it was a serious job. We had been very careful in Saigon and I wasn't there when it fell. The film, of course, is the number of years later after fighting a long 01:09:00war. Uh, basically not succeeding. Uh, but I was back in Madison, Wisconsin, at the time.

SPRAGUE: And so let me interrupt you here. It's a sequence a little, little fixed up here. So going back to Saigon and coming out and how, how was that and how are you dealing with do you were you dealing with your what you had had to do before in terms of discharging other homosexuals who had came out or did these things, conduct, had these acts and were caught? How did you deal with them? What was that in your head? What?

REED: Well, it was a head case. Yes. I had to deal with it. And I was looking back at San Diego and that experience on the LST with homosexuals on the ship. 01:10:00And now I was in Saigon dealing with the same issue, except with myself as a lead character, this little drama, because I knew the consequences of being caught, as it were, or being accused of, and so on and so forth of homosexuality in the military. So I was very careful when I did actually have a sexual encounter in Saigon for the first time in my life of any consequence, I guess. But I knew I was learning about my sexuality long before that, but I didn't know how serious it would be. It had to be a choice that I made fully, freely and openly. But I wasn't open in the military. I did not, of course, inform anybody in Saigon or the Navy that that was the reason I was resigning. But I knew I had to start my new life outside of the military, certainly outside of the Navy, which I had a great and fulfilling experience. But it was, it was difficult. I 01:11:00knew I wasn't going to be a lifetime officer. I knew that because it didn't appeal to my other side of me, which was, as I learned at Northwestern, really way back when, that I was more interested in culture and the arts and humanities perhaps, but not in engineering. I started off at Northwestern as a chemical engineer and realized that was not what I was really meant to be, a chemical engineer. After organic chemistry, if you learn for two years at Northwestern and said, "No, I need to go to some other area like cultural or like Russian civilization," or it could have been something else as well. It could have been theater at Northwestern University, which was a very popular undertaking where a lot of my friends there who were at Northwestern. So I found myself thanks to the Navy, thanks to my experiences, and I think I fulfilled my need to grow up 01:12:00as a young man in war and to have, you know, the medals, thank God that I actually served. These are not unusual medals that I'm sitting next to. I think everybody deserved them, as I did when I served. But from Vietnam.

SPRAGUE: Maybe we could just do this show and tell on this case because to make sure the camera couldn't. Yeah, we can see it all. There you go. Maybe will explain what each of them answer.

REED: Well, without reading the base of the references, but the U.S. Navy medals, they're at the top, the three of them, for just serving a year in Vietnam. And they have explanations. They're beautiful pieces of art, and I'm very proud of them. In the bottom two, come from Vietnam itself, the Republic of Vietnam, by my service to Vietnam. And everybody deserves these. Who who was there when I was there? And I hope everybody has gotten a little difficult for me to get these, thanks to our state senator. She helped me because they weren't 01:13:00made yet. When I left home, they didn't exist. And it took me about. Finally, I decided to pursue it and finally was awarded them and had them framed, because I'm very proud of my service in Vietnam. And I had a hell of a good time, if you can say that, about serving in a wartorn country that is continually undergoing more destruction and difficulties.

SPRAGUE: So you get back to Madison, you get back. It sounds like Madison was where you came up. You came home to or not. Or what was the sequence after leaving the Navy?

REED: Yes. When I left Saigon, they decided I was a good courior, so, they handcuffed a briefcase to one arm and gave me a .45 pistol strapped around my waist when I flew from Saigon via Tokyo, I think. Uh, and then I think I had, there was a direct flight to San Francisco and Treasure Island where I would be 01:14:00released or discharged, as it were, and my resignation papers would be taken care of. But yes, on the airplane, I had this thing. I was a courier in secret materials or something.

SPRAGUE: And they just gave you a standard discharge at that point because it's just a standard?

REED: Yes, yes. Yes. And I just accepted my resignation and thanked me for my service and so on and that sort of formal stuff. From at that point, it was still was LBJ and I forget who the Secretary of the Navy was and all those kind of certificates which are in my brief and folder, now, souvenirs of my time. But yes, I realized. Then I went back. I was a civilian, then went back down to San Diego to recover my MG car from my storage in San Diego and drove nonstop to Wisconsin. Literally, I, I think I must have stopped for gasoline or something to eat, but I never stopped along the way, I just wantedl to get back home. Via, 01:15:00via Northwestern. Via Chicago. A few friends were there and then they drove up to my hometown of Green Bay and saw my folks and friends in Green Bay and then came back, came down to Madison for the first time after Green Bay.

SPRAGUE: Was there any. To interrupt you? Was there any. It's still pretty early? Was there any sense of because you'd served in Vietnam, any negative feelings or different feelings you got from the public? Or was it at this point an unknown? What was that like? Tell me about that.

REED: About that. Well, very interesting, as you can imagine, coming to Madison, Wisconsin, in 1966, '67, '68, '69, a tumultuous time in America and certainly in Madison, Wisconsin, and certainly in the University of Wisconsin on campus. And I was enrolled beginning in 1966 in the University of Wisconsin. And I was older 01:16:00than my co students, my fellow students, because I had spent that a few years in the military. And so they got a kick out of me. I was the old timer at age, whatever I was, twenty-four, something like that, twenty-five. And so they got a kick out of me because I seemed to be involved in Vietnam protest on the edge of it. I was not a leader by any means. I was a witness and that was the role I played, I think all my life as an observer, as a writer. And so on. I witnessed what was going on in Madison and participated. I was tear-gassed on State Street. So it was my friends watching and and yes, being there in person protesting, I knew the war was the wrong war, as I think all Americans soon learned. They didn't already know. It was a difficult time. And and we lost that 01:17:00war in a sense. It was a valiant effort, but we didn't put the right stuff into it, whatever that is. I'm not sure. We tried. And I'm sorry to say that I've been back to Vietnam to visit not too long ago, as well as visiting other countries in the area, and I think including China and Cuba, some communist countries, in other words, I visited. I didn't visit Russia of all places, but I should have. That was my major, Russian civilization. So I visited all the other communist countries in the world, including Laos, which is also a communist country because I was very curious how they were doing in a sense, if only as a tourist. if you can figure that out. But they're all wonderful countries, of course, wonderful people. The trouble is the communist system is not a good one. And I hope we those people that are suffering today still under regimes and whether it's Russia or China, for that matter, and certainly Vietnam and Cuba. I 01:18:00don't know about Laos, I did visit there, but they have to get rid of that government of communism, no matter what you call it. Socialism to the extreme just doesn't work in terms of freedoms and liberties, especially if you're a gay person or just don't fit into the mold they want you to fit into. And we're seeing that today again, of course, all those countries and it's very sad, disheartening, and they're victims. It's not just communism. There are other countries in the world that are oppressive, of course, for various reasons, sometimes religious reasons, other times just for financial greed, political ideas which are old fashioned, don't work and so on. Tough world out there. But I was pleased that I served in Vietnam and was pleased to be in Madison, Wisconsin, to witness anti-war sentiment. I think I wrote a play a film script about my experiences in Vietnam, sort of romanticized really in some ways, 01:19:00because I was writing scripts for radio and television and film at the time when I was in grad school, and I had a good professor at the UW Madison helping me with that, and he had contacts in Hollywood. So I'm for films and television scripts, and I wrote the screenplay about my experience in Saigon and it was called Xian Hoa, which was the name of one of the waitresses who I took a shining to because she was a wonderful and beautiful young lady, and her name meant Spring Hope. And it was all about sort of a Madame Butterfly story where the American soldier falls in love with a Japanese girl, Madame Butterfly. And I'm afraid Hollywood said, Now this just sounds like a Vietnamese Madame Butterfly story. The usual thing, it doesn't interest us. Besides, at the time, they said Hollywood does not want to produce a film about Vietnam. It hasn't 01:20:00happened yet. Green Berets came shortly thereafter, and that was the first real, I think, Vietnam, based with John Wayne, a movie about the war in Vietnam, and not ao great movie. But no, I was rejected. So my screenplay about my experience in Vietnam didn't work.

SPRAGUE: And that was Xian Hoa spelled out.

REED: X-I-A-N H-O-A

SPRAGUE: Xian Hoa

REED: Xian Hoa spring flower. She told me it meant. She didn't speak English very well, but she was a delightful young lady.

SPRAGUE: Did you have anything to do with any relationships with people you served with or other veterans? Once she left, he returned to the civilian world. What what's been your contact with her?

REED: To think of it, I hadn't thought about it exactly, but no, I think the answer's simply no. Although at one point after my service, I was asked to stay 01:21:00in the Naval Reserve. And that was another issue, which almost I think most guys, officers, gals, do stay in reserve for a while. There's some benefits to doing that, to serving your country, of course, but also in terms of service and payment. And so on. I decided not to stay in, but then I declined that appointment. But no, I really got into academia working on my master's in communications and then my communications and and teaching both as a teaching assistant in medicine and going on strike the teaching assistant association back then and winning some awards with my playwriting and additional fellowships, Shubert Playwriting Fellowships from New York and being flown to New York to get an award about my playwriting. So I was encouraged and had a good experience at UW Madison with my good advisors and my good professors who 01:22:00helped me, encouraged me and got me, pushed me in the right direction with my work. So I had a good time, you know, in accidents and still do in that sense in terms of attending and on the mailing list and have some friends who were still involved, although that's a long time ago. I'm talking about the 1960s, really. Mm-hmm. I think I finished my Ph.D. in in the 1970s because that's when I was teaching at Beloit College for a while. So I left all that behind me, my military behind me. But I didn't get these medals, thanks to Senator Baldwin, who helped me get copies or get these made because they just weren't available for a long time. I don't know why. Maybe that maybe the U.S. Navy or the U.S. 01:23:00government didn't want to manufacture them becaus we were embarrassed about the Vietnam War, I don't know. But they eventually got to me. So, I'm proud of my service and that I had great experiences and great people in the military. But I knew it wasn't the place at that time. It's different now, thank goodness. Times have changed.

SPRAGUE: So what are you what is your perspective as a gay man on what's going on with the military now and the removal of the don't ask, don't tell policy and and homosexuals serving openly? How do you feel about that?

REED: Well, it was a gradual change, wasn't it? You mentioned don't ask, don't tell. I was before don't ask before. Don't Ask, Don't Tell, don't do anything because it's illegal and you'll be put in jail, period. But Don't Ask, Don't Tell was interesting. Not quite far enough, along the the voyage to equality and security and safety and so and acceptance. But yes, some of my friends who are 01:24:00gay, some aren't, but those who are about my age. Wow. What we've lived through in terms of our homosexual acceptance in society, legally and otherwise, and you can be gay and and openly so whereas you couldn't when I was coming out, you'd be thrown in jail. And of course recently some publications, especially in Wisconsin, by Richard Wagner, about Wisconsin's evolution in terms of the laws and the social acceptance and the progress. Now, in Wisconsin, that 100 years ago, fifty years ago, even less was a difficult time to be a gay person in Wisconsin. But there's been a lot of progress, and I'm alive to see it and experience it and be gratified by others who got us this far.

SPRAGUE: So I think you answered this question how has your life changed as a result of military service?

REED: Well, that's an interesting question, because sometimes I ask myself, how did you become so fastidious about your house and your belongings and, and your other things in life? Was that something that your German mother taught you Larry, or because she was a marvelous and a whole household was very, very well kept, shall we say. Or was it because of my experiences in the Navy, which is very rigid in terms of what you wear when you wear it and how much you wear and and so on? Obviously, the military is very strict in certain respects, your sexual activities included. I guess all of that together, I can't divvy it all up. I can't, you know, put it in different boxes, but all together. Yeah, I think all that all the above made me who I am in terms. And I'm pleased that it 01:26:00turned out as well as it did. I'm not perfect by any means, who is? But I think it helped me as a single man navigate through my education, through the Navy, and through graduate work, and through teaching and through civil service in Wisconsin, in the Wisconsin Historical Society, and then in retirement and continuing in my community to be a leader of some sort. The chairman of a couple of things in the village I resigned recently from one of them for after thirty years of service in the Town of Porter for the Cooksville Preservation Committee for thirty years and I'm still the chairman of the historic Cook Civil Trust, a private charity that tries to help preserve and cook schools, history and its buildings. And I'm still the chairman of that. Raising money to do all these objects of all these projects. So it's keeping me busy. And one of these days, I going have to retire from everything I hope and relax. No, I relax pretty well. 01:27:00Have a very comfortable with a lot of friends. And unfortunately some have died already and especially people I knew. Northwestern, Madison, or even in the neighborhood here. Time goes by. It's been a good time. A good ride from Green Bay to little Cooksville, seventy people in Rock County.

SPRAGUE: So what what motivated you? Why did you want to do this interview?

REED: Oh, that's a good question. I think it's because I've. I like to communicate and I like to read others' communications. I mean, I think those of us who experience things like the Navy and Vietnam or just life in general. And this weekend, I'm going to go visit a writer friend of mine from Northwestern days, sixty years ago. We're still friends. And I'll be seeing him and his wife because he was writing about his experiences, including he and I traveled around 01:28:00the world at one point after the Navy for me. And I like to communicate and I like to see things get done. And I certainly like to preserve history because history is extremely important. If we don't know our history, we're going to keep repeating the bad mistakes we made, and we're still doing that, unfortunately. But I think I like to communicate. I learned that along the way. And in the military there's a lot of communication, very strict, and it's written down, very precise and very. It's why it bonds everybody together. So early in my shipboard life, if we didn't have those regulations and restrictions and and if you go by the book, as it were, things would fall apart and get pretty messy. Human nature being what it is, let's face it. We have to have some controls. But more than that, we have to have some good experiences and good leaders and good compatriots to make it all work, whether it's a military, or even civilian life, even a little Cooksville. Still, we're all cooperating, 01:29:00almost all of us cooperating to keep it preserved and to make it a good community. So I feel I've contributed as much as I can and will continue to. And I felt that same way about the military after I resigned here. I did a pretty good job, all things considered. I was very pleased with what I was able to accomplish and what my fellow officers and my, the enlisted sailors and everybody else I came in contact with, including Vietnamese women and men in Saigon. Wow, what they had to put up with and hopefully they've survived. So, we have to do our share, whatever the heck it is, to make this world a better place. As Thomas Jefferson famously said, and there's a legal term for it. But he said, basically, we're all here on the earth to use the Earth for our goodness, but also to leave it as good or better when we leave. In that sense, I think that's a good guide for life in general. Yes. To enjoy this earth, this 01:30:00place, this community, but leave it in the land and the place as good as you found it or better. So it's the better part that's the challenge, I suppose, really, as there's so many forces to destroy and disrupt and disorganize us and, and cause us to more bloodshed, so in the world. So I think that's a good little rule of thumb I try to use when they feel that I'm not succeeding or something's wrong with that person has been nasty or that house has been torn down and needlessly so. But on the other hand, not all of us have the same guidance in our hearts and our souls to do the best we can, and then to leave it as good or as good as we found it or better in the better is the real challenge.

SPRAGUE: Okay. I think on that note, we're going to wrap up the interview. Thank 01:31:00you for your service. Do you have anything else for us, Larry?

REED: No, I think that's it. Thank you for guiding me through this time.

[Interview Ends]