Recipes for Living Gary R. Fouche

I was born in 1946, raised in Osceola, and lived here until I was 19 years old. My parents, Robert and Helen Frances Fouche, had just two children - myself and my sister, Patty. We lived on North Main, where my mother still lives. She worked at the J.C. Penney store; Dad worked for John Deere, and ended up with Dana Corporation.

Our parents were not well to do. We got by on the necessities. I remember one Christmas my main gift was a pair of four-buckle overshoes. But I consider I had a good upbringing and a great childhood - actually a pretty normal one for the area at that time. There were kids my age in the neighborhood, and we played a lot of basketball and baseball. There were the Graceys - Curt, Herman, and Tom, Leland Crawford, Terry Morris, and Sid Fenton. On weekends, I often went to my uncle's farm north of Osceola, helped with chores, put up hay in the summer, picked corn in the fall. Nothing earth shattering.

As I got into high school, I played baseball, football, and wrestled. We raced cars and worked on them. I didn't get too interested in the female population until about my junior year. I dated to have someone to go to dances with. There were some fellows who had girl friends, but none were serious at that time because none of us knew where our lives were going. There weren't the counselors there are today to encourage us to think about and plan our futures so we just played sports, went to school, and had a good time.

I graduated from Clarke Community High School in 1965; then worked for the Highway Commission for a year before I was faced with being drafted. I didn't want that, so I enlisted in the United States Marine Corps on December 29, 1965, and served four years until December 20, 1969. I was sent to boot camp in San Diego, California, from there to Camp LeJune in North Carolina. I started out going to diesel mechanics school, and then was sent to a couple other schools. I did pretty well in those. I was sent on to Camp Pendleton and told I would work in diesel mechanic supply, but after a few weeks, with some better skills I worked up into the world of "recon," which was going out in the field, staying out of sight and out of mind so that nobody sees you - they don't know you are around, and you observe what is going on.

Although we were still in the states, we were talking Vietnam and training for what we would face there. So we would watch for the Viet Cong, trying not to make contact with them, which wasn't always possible. We'd have a little skirmish then try to break contact, scouting the areas. It was special training, learning camouflage, learning to shoot all the weapons that were on the face of the earth, and how to make them work.

From there we were flown into Guam and into Okinawa. This was many years after the time when the US took those islands so they were under US control. There our unit went to another special school for another period of time refining our skills.

When I arrived in Vietnam, in September, 1966, I was sent north of DaNang to the 3rd Marine Division in Hue and from there operated out of a support group for approximately 13 months. The Vietnam War was different from previous wars - especially WWI, WWII, or the Korean War. In those wars there were lines drawn in the sand. In Vietnam there were no lines in the sand, and the same person who cut your hair in the day on the main base might try to kill you in an ambush at night. We really had no idea who was who. During the day they were one person but at night they were different. Vietnam was the first time the United States had ever fought this type of war. I see the same thing in Iraq. We had so many rules and regulations set down by the Geneva Convention, it was hard to fight a war like WWI and WWII. We almost had to justify anything we did before we could do it. It really put a restraint on the men.

We also had the weather to contend with. There was the monsoon season where we were wet days and days at a time. We had to learn to live that way. We ate C-rations and once in awhile we'd get back to the main base and have a hot meal. It became a way of life. We'd be out in the field three or four days at a time. We'd be flown in or out, then go back to the main base and wait. For a period of time, I worked on supporting logistics. If something came down the pipe-line, which was the information source, that there was activity around the area where we'd been, we were regrouped and sent back. We might be out one day or five days. That is the way life was and we learned to live it and tried to survive. We never knew what was going to happen the next day. After awhile we accepted this is the way life is, this is my job and we paid no attention to what we heard. We didn't have access to papers or TV news, and it may have been true that sometimes ignorance of what was going on is a blessing in disguise.

I was in Vietnam for 13 months and that is the way we lived. It wasn't noted anywhere because that is the way the government operated. The less known the better for everybody, I guess. I worked in the field I was trained for only about a month. The rest of the time was spent in and out, observing, watching, and assisting in any we could.

At that time, I felt that what I was doing and the assignment I was given was to be fulfilled to the best of my ability, which I did. Some of the things I try to forget, even though they never go away. There are things we veterans don't talk about except to other military people who have been through the same type of experience, because a lot of people don't understand what was going on, or what it was like. It was one of those scenarios that if you were not there, you can't really understand. We thought we should be there. We thought we should help South Vietnamese stay free from Communist North Vietnam. It becomes something we put in our subconscious minds and hope it will go away but I've found out over my lifetime, it doesn't go away.

Yes, in my eyes I am still proud of what I did, but in other people's eyes I have a hard time knowing if they would understand what it was really about because they were not there. Now it has been so long ago that the US govt. would just as soon it hadn't happened and wish it would disappear forever. Where it will end up in the history books, I don't know; but what I do know is that I felt I did what I had to do and am proud of being someone who tried to help.

If I had it to do over again I would, because at that time it is the way I felt about our country. Now, after I've been home some years, having more access to newspapers and television, and beginning to realize what was really involved in the war, in my mind it has become a political war. Money was to be gained, growth, and industry, which today I feel was very wrong, but I can't go back in time and change any of that. I see the same thing going on now in Iraq and Afghanistan. Those people have lived that way for thousands of years, and they will continue to live that way for more thousands of years. We've stuck our nose in other people's business again and we are in another scenario that I feel we cannot win.

I returned to the States in December 1969, and served in Alaska for one year on a small island, Adak. It was a naval base and I was sent there for security reasons. The only people on the island were Naval and Marine Corps personnel. There was top secret equipment on the base for listening, and sub-chasers to keep an eye on our fellow Russians. I enjoyed the fishing we got to do and the sights of the country. It is a small island, mountainous and beautiful.

I came back from Alaska and spent the last six months in Barstow, California before getting out of military service December 20, 1969. I left with a rank of E 6 Staff Sergeant, which I am very proud to have achieved in four years. I returned home, worked for the Highway Commission for a year, and then went to work for Firestone while I attended college. After two years of college, I reevaluated what I was doing. I noted that I was making the same amount of money as friends who had four years of college and became teachers. So now I have been at Firestone for 34 years.

I am married to Merrie, who came from Sioux City. We have a daughter Jennifer who is married to Jake Hermanson, and they have a three-year old daughter, MacKenzie. My wife is a first deputy at the Treasurer's office in Warren County, city of Indianola; our daughter is an RN at Mercy Hospital, our son-in-law is in the National Guard, a jet plane mechanic with the fighter wing in Des Moines, Iowa. He is just back from three months in Qatar, an island off Kuwait where there is a big Air Force base and they fly into Iraq and Afghanistan from that island. He may have to go back in the near future, but at this time, who knows?

I have been involved in hot air ballooning since 1982, and am now passing that on to my son-in-law, daughter, and granddaughter, who I hope will enjoy it as much as I have over 25 years.

My father passed away in November 1981, still working for Dana Corporation. My mother has retired and is living in the house I was raised in on the north edge of Osceola. I try to come one day every week, do lunch, and take care of things she needs to have done. I also enjoy coming to Osceola to have coffee with friends.