There was likely no bigger elephant in the room for most of the male members of the class during 1967 and 1968 than
the draft. There were classmates who knew they would be going into the service (certainly members of ROTC), those who worked assiduously to avoid it, and, the largest group, those who tried to make the best out of uncertainty.
The Selective Service and Congress didn't do much to help, as they came up with new and different ways to determine those who would be selected and inducted. College enrollment itself provided a deferment from the draft, a circumstance that increasingly became seen as unfair to young men not in college. Steps were taken to be "fairer." I recall going home to my hometownto take a test, which, depending on your score, was to determine your draft status. My score was high enough to gain deferment, but then that process was ruled unfair before going into effect.
Graduate school had been sufficient for a deferment, but then, as the Nov. 13, 1967, Heights headline said, "Grad school acceptance no protection from draft." Options became fewer and more senior males began receiving notices of 1-A status ("available for military service") and calls to take pre-induction physicals.
Along with several of my friends, in the winter of 1967-68, I applied for Navy Officer Candidate School. That also required a test. I applied to graduate school as well, and may have learned around the same time in spring 1968 that I was accepted at both. Yippee! ... At least, I felt, it looked as if my near future would be along one of those roads. And it quickly became clear, under the circumstances, that the Navy was the more realistic option.
Most of my close male friends, at graduation, did not know what they would be doing. I did know and, as I likely would not have chosen to serve in the military under different circumstances, the comfort I felt in it was somewhat odd. My first day of active duty in the Navy was the same day BC defeated Navy in football, which I latched on to as a good omen. I served as a Naval officer for the next three years, including a tour in the Gulf of Tonkin. At OCS, a classmate, Greg McClure, was in my company and a classmate, Steve Curran, was also one of my shipmates on the USS Biddle (DLG-34). I didn't know Steve at BC, but we've kept in touch since the Biddle and we both attended an all-hands ship's reunion in 2006.
Most of my friends, at least, served briefly in the reserves, Peace Corps, or VISTA, and began grad school and the rest of their lives a little ahead of me. I finally did get to grad school and, indeed, later served enough years in the Navy Reserve to retire as a Commander. But that's another story ....
Do you remember the draft as a dominant spectre during senior year, for yourself or, if you're a woman, for male classmates you knew?
According to a
list of Vietnam veterans being compiled by Boston College Magazine, 45 members of the class served in Vietnam, including six who were killed in action. We should pause to remember and honor classmates Steven Donaldson, Louis Favuzza, Frederick Harrington, Robert Hauer, Christopher Markey, and Michael Monahan, who died in service to their country. We will miss their presence, and that of other classmates who have died, at our reunion.
It might have been the summer of love in San Francisco in 1967, but in the spring of that year in Chestnut Hill, it was Gentle Monday. The Heights photo above shows George Drury, SJ, vice president (and looking cool in his shades), joining Janice Kolar, I believe, and "Naked Ned" for the festivities May 1, 1967.
There was likely no bigger elephant in the room for most of the male members of the class during 1967 and 1968 than the draft. There were classmates who knew they would be going into the service (certainly members of ROTC), those who worked assiduously to avoid it, and, the largest group, those who tried to make the best out of uncertainty.
This weekend, a local PBS station broadcast The Thomas Crown Affair, a movie set in Boston in 1968. I'd seen it before, of course, but this time, considering the amount of reminiscing lately, I watched it with particular interest.
