Enlisted USMC 1957 right out of high school. Selected for NESEP and attended Auburn University 1959-62. Met and married Jean in 1960, best thing I ever did. Went from Acting Corporal E3 to Sergeant E5 at Auburn. (Made Corporal twice without ever getting busted when two new enlisted pay grades were added in 1959.) In 1963 CMC decided I would never be SNCO material and made me a 2ndLt.
Completed OCS, TBS, and flight school 1963-65. Flew CH-46s in Vietnam 1966-67 (HMM-265, 165), 70-71 (HMM-262). Flight instructor at Whiting Field 1967-69;. Really fun flying. Staff officer at Cherry Point 1971-74, flew C-117 and transitioned to KC-130. Staff Secretary at 4th MAW in New Orleans 1974-77 and flew '46s with MARTD. Retired 1977 as a very minor major. My 20 years in the Corps have been only 24 percent of my life so far but they are my bedrock.
Retired back to Auburn, found my 15 year old BA in psychology not worth much, so got BS in accounting (clean, inside work with no heavy lifting). Worked for CPA firm for a year, passed CPA exam but did not like public accounting. Worked in accounting two years as assistant bursar at Auburn and completed MBA part-time.
Decided in 1982 that teaching accountants might be more fun that being one, so started a PhD at Georgia State in Atlanta (2 hrs up and down I-85) while teaching full-time at Auburn. Defended dissertation 1989 after employing the Spanish Inquisition approach to data analysis: "If you torture the data long enough they eventually will confess." Spent 20+ years teaching accounting at Auburn, Mississippi State, and Georgia Southern Universities. Retired for the last time in 2005, still with Jean, 64 years and counting.
Attended most 265 and some 262 and Pop-a-Smoke reunions. Coordinated Charleston reunion in 2013 and Savannah mini-reunions in 2014 and 2018. Otherwise I read a lot, listen to music, play with and help run a local duplicate bridge club, enjoy family and friends, surf the net, do lots of emails, and piddle in the yard.
Dragooned into serving as Webmaster shortly after Rich Duff's passing in 2014. Keeps me off the streets and exercises what few brain cells I have left. Qualifications? Self-taught, long-time PC user, all the way back to DOS and the naked C: prompt. Wrote a lot of FORTRAN back in the 80s. Built a fairly complex website with just HTML and brute stubbornness. Nothing modern, though; no JAVA, PHP, SQL, CSS, etc., and at 86 am not likely to get better. We badly need someone with a younger person's skills, energy, and brainpower to take my place. Please email webmaster@hmm-265.org if interested. Serious request.