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Posted: 12/31/1969 Name: DURKAN Message: Becky, please let Amanda or I know if there is anything you need or anything we can do. I am still in Afghanistan, but can coordiante from here. Amanda is still in Dahlonega, and I have family near Walter Reed. I know you have a lot on your mind, especially with the children and having to deal with this and making your way to Pat ... but we are all here! Just let us know! Take care, God's speed, and God Bless! Duke |
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Posted: 12/31/1969 Name: Mike Flack Message: What's the latest on Doug Perry? Is he back to normal? As bad as that may be, it's better than knowing he's sick. |
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Posted: 12/31/1969 Name: Don Hughes (johnny Quest) Message: Bob Suchke is resting in Gaineville Hospital room 3445. He requests a few days of rest before entertaining all of his friends who are concerned about him. They put in 1 stint but right now he needs rest and he's exhausted. He looks forward to seeing everyone again. |
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Posted: 12/31/1969 Name: Michael M. Keohane Message: Ranger Ed Gross is showing the hospital staff why Rangers lead the way. Up and about two days after a quadtriple by-pass. I bet he has refused "pain-killers" also. |
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Posted: 12/31/1969 Name: Mark Jordan, S1 Message: USMRA May ’12 Meeting Minutes, unabridged edition…not approved for the weak or fainthearted… …Not the normal meeting since we’re enjoying all the camaraderie of friends and brothers we haven’t seen in a while…a really good turnout of those near and many from quite a ways who usually don’t get to share this time with us… …We begin with scholarship presentation…Steve Hawk, President, recognizes Willard Langdon, Chaplain, to deliver the award since Brian Cunningham, Scholarship Committee, had to leave early… …Willard asks for Kelly Caroline Massey and her family to come forward…Willard read the letter, along with a $500 donation, and certificate for Jerry Massey’s daughter who will be attending the University of Georgia in the fall after graduating from Lumpkin County High School… …”Kelly, congratulations, you have been selected by the United States Mountain Ranger Association to receive an academic scholarship in the amount of $500. The Scholarship Committee was greatly impressed by your academic achievements, extracurricular involvement and tremendous potential for success in future endeavors. Your accomplishments and abilities reinforces our faith in American Youth and confidence in our country’s direction. The Association wishes you every success in your future education. We are certain of your place among tomorrow’s leaders. Sincerely, Brian Cunningham, Scholarship Committee Chairman”… …Let’s give Kelly a big hand!... …Kelly responded, “Thank you very much. I promise that I’ll put it to good use. I really appreciate it.”…Willard, “Thank you, you have a great future.”… …Willard, “Ok, Colonel Suchke…When the Rangers go thru the Mountain Camp we have 6 planning bays and that’s where they go in and plan their patrols, we all know that. So to honor these Veteran Instructors we are placing these signs on each of the 6 Planning Bays who are still serving each in their own way. Each sign will remain in place for one year, whereupon 6 new Ranger Instructors will be named to take their place. Well, the Colonel had his misplaced somehow so we made another sign for him.”… …”Now he has two”…”He’ll put one on each side of his truck”… …Willard, “the next sign will be…”…Steve, “just call em all out”…Ok…Ranger Steve Bishop, 1971…Tony Delp…Tony’s not here…the next one will be Ronald McElliott…the next one will be Ranger Scott Oswald…the next one Ranger Dean Papka…the next one, Jerry Roberts, 1973…not here… …The members of the USMRA would like to extend their thanks to the Commander of 5th Ranger Training Battalion…we look forward to working with him and those under his command in this and other future endeavors. Rangers Lead The Way, Respectfully submitted, Brian Cunningham… …”let’s give all these Rangers a hand”…”where’s my check?”… …Steve, “we’re in the early 70’s, so if you served as an Instructor here, we’re soon to get to you…I swear Bob now has signs for both sides of his truck”… …”We go by Class numbers, so if you need to get with Bob to update your status, make sure you do.”… …Steve, “Eventually you’ll want Ranger Students looking at your sign there in the Planning Bay and saying, ‘I don’t give a sh*t’”…but at least it’s not personal about that… …Steve, “Next up is the Fallen Ranger Memorial Road…We use this as our meeting and what’s coming up…the summer is pretty slow, we’ve got the June meeting, the first Thursday in June…if you’re here please come by, it’s really kind of a slow meeting because we don’t have a lot to plan for the next year; July of course coincides with the Fourth of July and we always put it off to spend time with our families…then August”… …Steve, “We have our next eating meeting in October so if you’re down this way or nearby we always get together and have a little food. It’s about two weeks from Gold Rush and a lot of people come by for that and it’s hard to see us and come back for Gold Rush”… …Steve, “as far as other business to go on, there’s the Fallen Ranger Memorial Road dedications to do; and keep in mind all of our brothers that are currently in harm’s way, we want to watch over the ones who elected to do it, who volunteered to do it, say a prayer for them in your own way, keep in touch with them…I found that Facebook is one of the best ways to keep in touch; we can send instant messages, we talk to people, we see what’s going on almost instantly, if a fellow brother Ranger needs help, so if you haven’t gotten into that phase of the electronic world, I know Doug is still using a TA1, cranking the sh*t out of it, wondering why doesn’t someone talk to him, and we can’t get him to take his .312 out of his boat, still fishing with it.” …Steve, “we’re going to get on with Fallen Ranger Memorial Road…as you know each year we dedicate the road that runs around the airfield as the Fallen Ranger Memorial Road…now we’ve run out of road; unfortunately we haven’t run out of dead Rangers and Rangers willing to go and fight for the country and die for the cause they love, so we’re always going to need something to name, so therefore what we’ve done is name Fallen Ranger Memorial Road that goes from the bridge all the way around the airfield and each year we rededicate it for up to six Rangers who have died and passed on, not necessarily in combat, and we’re going to dedicate the road to them. After that year, the signs will be removed and given to the families or posted in the Club or will send it to the hometown of the Ranger named to dedicate a street in his honor and send them the sign. The ones inside the club are ones who have previously been named. I hope I never am not around to see any of you named to be on this road, to be absolutely honest with you.” …”So, without further ado, we’re gonna ask those with the names of the nominations…here’s the deal, if you make a nomination, you have to come up with a bio…that’s just cut and dry…I actually nominated Eric McGlinnis, from 1st Battalion…his brother apparently fell off the face of the earth, I couldn’t get any information from him, so his name had to come down…what we’ll do is to try and get back a hold of his brother and get the information… …”But today we have 3 Rangers that are represented here on Fallen Ranger Memorial Road…Bo Baker, and I don’t know how to pronounce Johnny’s last name…Kranich…and Tom Terrell III, some of y’all may know him, Camp Commander and just passed away this past year…is that correct?...Ok…for those who made the nominations, do we have family members here?’”...Bob Williams, “just go down the signs”… …”First one up is Bo Baker”…Charles DeJarnette addresses the crowd…”first I’m gonna ask if James Roach is here”…”Jim Roach?”…”yeah, Jim”…Bob Suchke, ”no he’s not here, he couldn’t make it”… DJ, ”he’s not here?! You didn’t tell me that last night!”…Bob, ”you didn’t ask me, Sergeant Major”…DJ “Okay, Bo Baker…I met him in 1974, he was a LTC…coming down to Alpha Company, 75th LRRPs and he requested about 16 of us coming into his office and said, “Pack your bags Rangers, you’re going to Ft. Lewis Warshington…he was an officer…an outstanding officer…the bio that was given up by James…Bo Baker was born on July 22, 1930 and died in Bad Tolz, Germany while skiing of a massive heart attack on March 24, 1980…he was a Searsey native, son of Bertha Lee Baker and Alpha Saints Baker; a graduate of 1949 of Searsey High School…he attended the University of Arkansas on an athletic scholarship from 1949 to 1950, he was an Arkansas Razorback”… …He enlisted in the United States Air Force, December, 1950 and served until 1953 when he again enrolled in 1954 in the University of Arkansas and graduated in 1956 with a Bachelor of Arts degree in Physical Education…He was commissioned a 2nd LT in the US Army, attending Basic Infantry Training, Airborne and Ranger Schools at Ft. Benning, GA…in May 1957 to ‘58 a platoon leader, 9th Division, Ft Carson, CO…June 1958 to ‘59, 4th ID, Ft Lewis, Washington… …” He tells the story of being in the same barracks at Ft Lewis he was commanding out of as a platoon leader”… …(for sanity’s sake…I’m fast forwarding and plan to have some editorial privilege on future, ponderously detailed, moment by moment, day by day activities)… …some talk as to when the 2nd Batt was officially organized…the airfield at Bad Tolz is named for him…AJ “Bo” Baker AAF… …”I would follow him to anywhere…anywhere he wanted me to go”…”Hooah!”…applause… …Bob Williams, “I’m going to present Johnny Kradich on behalf of SGM (ret) Mark Baylis…because of his work he’s doing for the Valor Clinic Foundation that he’s started to help Veterans, he can’t be here today…Johnny Kranich joined the Army in 1980; his first duty assignment was as 11B, Weapons Squad, A Company, 75th Infantry, Rangers, where he’d rise to the rank of Sergeant…he survived two aircraft crashes, the first being a C-130 in late 1981 near Indian Springs, NV and the second being a UH-60 on the Calvigny Raid in Grenada; he was injured there and awarded the Purple Heart, CIB and Combat Jump Star for his Wings…after Grenada, Sgt Kranich would participate as both RIP and Pre-Ranger Instructor before he left the Battalion to become a Mountaineering Instructor at a place called Huck Creek, a Ft Lewis training site…in 1984, SSG Kranich returned to the Ranger Community as an RI, where he was considered a hard but fair lane grader, respected by a new generation of Ranger Students…His expansion of skills landed him at the Special Forces Qualification Course Class 2-88…SSG Kranich graduated as a Weapons Sergeant to be assigned to B Company, 3rd Battalion, 1st SF as a member of ODA 183…this assignment would see him on several deployments to SE Asia and most notably Thailand…in 1982 the Army seized the opportunity to share his tremendous experience and assign him as a Team Sergeant in ODA 173…In 1993 John was reassigned to Okinawa, Japan and assigned to ODA 126…He attended Free Fall School and was described as a “greased bowling ball during free fall operations”…John retired from the Army on the Early Retirement Option in 1995 after a magnificent career… …SFC (ret) Kranich used his skills to ensure the safety of numerous dignitaries for the US State Department…Ranger Kranich fell in Kandahar, Afghanistan in December of 2006 as a member of a security detail…He will be missed by all who knew him”…(applause) …”I’m Ranger Bob Suchke, and it’s my honor to talk about Tom Terrell…Ranger Thompson Allen Terrell III was born in Murphy, NC in 1940…he graduated from North Georgia College with the Class of 1962 and was commissioned as a 2nd LT of Infantry…after IOBC and Jump School, his initial assignment was as a Platoon Leader in the 82nd Airborne Division at Ft Bragg, NC…he was Honor Graduate of Ranger Class 2-71…he served 3 tours in Vietnam, earning 4 Bronze Stars, two with Valor device, 4 Meritorious Service Medals, the Air Medal, CIB and the Vietnam Cross for Gallantry with Palm device…he served with Golf Company Rangers of the 23rd ID, later with the 5th SF Group, later still with 12th SF Group, 172nd Brigade and he was Commander of the 32nd Battalion of the 7th ID…Ranger Tom Terrell, as many of us remember, was Commander here of the 2nd Ranger Company here at Camp Merrill back in the early ‘70’s…later OIC of the Mountaineering Committee…on a later tour in 1982 to ’84, he was assigned as the Mountain Ranger Camp Commander…that’s what we called it back then”… …”He was awarded Parachutist Wings from the RVN, Canada and Germany…I knew Tom Terrell very well and he was one of the sharpest officers I’ve ever known…always immaculate in appearance, he was much more than a spit and polish soldier, a highly professional leader who was highly respected by all who knew him”… …”Ranger Thompson Terrell III, age 71, of Blue Ridge, GA passed away on Tuesday, Sep 6, 2011 and it’s altogether fitting that we honor him here this day at the Fallen Ranger Memorial…Rangers Lead The Way”…(applause)… …just as Steve Hawk, President, is about to take the microphone, “Thank you, Bob”… Fast Eddie Nelson starts his traditional playing of Taps on his trumpet…a few notes…Steve, “wait wait wait wait wait wait wait”…Ed muffles it…Steve, “I appreciate it, your lips are too hot right now”… …Steve, “I just want to point out a couple of things about a couple of these guys…Tom was the Camp Commander when we started the Desert Phase and he got it going…outstanding officer…and as many of you have heard, kids cover your ears, I sat at a fancy dinner with Tom, long after he retired and I worked for the Sheriff’s Department in Dawson County, we saw each other and decided to eat together and I said, “it doesn’t really taste that well, does it?”…and he goes, “Ranger, it’ll make a tu*d”…so if you ever hear me saying that, it’s attributed to Tom Terrell, he’s sorely going to be missed, a good friend of mine”… …”Alright, we do have Taps, we’re going to play; after Taps there will be no more announcements but first let me have a vote…do we want to close the meeting immediately following Taps or do we have a motion?”…”Motion”…Okay, do we have a second?...”Second”…Good, all in favor…”Aye, Aye”…Good, Food is On, Enjoy Yourselves…be careful if you’re consuming alcoholic beverages and would you please stand and remove your hats for Taps”… …Ranger Ed Nelson plays a beautiful rendition of Taps… …Steve, “lots of dead animals that need to be consumed, let’s go for it”… …and that’s the truth… …RLTW… …Mark Jordan, S1 |
