Vietnam and America in 1967

Some soldiers got drunk and climbed atop a memorial fountain before being run off politely by the Canadian police. Peter Miller, drafted out of the assembly line of a Procter & Gamble soap factory in Quincy, Massachusetts, found himself in jail in Seattle following a dustup at the bus station. | After a few weeks of this military being and nothingness, the men of C Packet were told to get their wills in order, their teeth fixed, and their dog tags ready because they were being shipped to Vietnam as permanent overseas replacements in the First Infantry Division. Most of them knew what was coming, but some were taken by surprise, and the news provoked a round of concerned calls to the base from relatives, congressmen, and clergy. —David MaranassVietnam and America in 1967 (MSNBC)

The above is an excerpt from Maranass’s book, which examines in detail an antiwar protest and an ambush on US forces in October, 1967. I wasn’t yet born then.

Seton Hill University is hosting a “War and Antiwar Memorabilia” display. In the halls of the admin building, weapons and uniforms from the war are displayed. In a room at one end of the hall are photos of Allegheny County (Pennsylvania) war dead, with rubbings of their names taken from the Vietnam War Memorial. Some facutly were holding a routine meeting in that room when I visited it a little while ago, just as if they weren’t in an impromptu shrine to our war dead. At the other end of the hall, in a large, brightly lit room that I had never seen used before, is a display of anti-war newspapers, poster, and slogans.

A cousin of my mother’s served in Vietnam, and when he came back sometime in the mid 70s, he started bringing over refugees. At one point, about 30 Vietnamese men and boys were living in our house, sleeping on the cement floor of our basement. We would eat dinner in three shifts. Cousin Jim and his friend Terry started a furniture business — first buying unfinished chairs and tables, finishing them, and then selling them on street corners.

I have no idea what my parents’ politics are on the Vietnam War, but my own youthful experience of seeing so many refugees who were grateful to America for giving them a place to go and start a new life for their families means that I didn’t grow up with the the knee-jerk “the war in Vietnam was bad” attitude that much of mainstream America has. And as a college student, I volunteered at a nursing home with a Vietnamese girl who was born in the U.S. of refugees who were grateful to the U.S. for giving them a place to go.

3 thoughts on “Vietnam and America in 1967

  1. Thanks for your comment, Susan. Maranass’s talk last night was packed, and it was great. One of the vets whose story is told in the book was there, as well as that vet’s sister, who opposed the war. The audience gave both an ovation. It is, of course, too simplistic to suggest that one book can heal all the wounds, both in the war and the antiwar, but Maranass (himself a war proster) made sure to get at the core humanity of the characters his book covers; there don’t appear to be any “bad guys” — like a good journalist he tried to tell the truth and left it up to his readers.

  2. How nice to see one of the few things good that came out of the Vietnam war. Right or wrong to go in–I don’t know. Successful in helping a country–that was the main idea, after all?–no. But somewhere we did open up a door for so many who recognized that there may be better lives for them over here. They came, they worked so very hard, and they achieved their dreams. Does it make up for all the dead, both Vietnamese and American? I don’t know. It’s always going to be a hard one to truly answer simply.

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