Word: polks
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...publicized PFCs in Army uniform. Announced the Commander in Chief: "I have asked the Army to cancel the trial of PFC Larry D. Chidester of Fort Lewis, Wash., and I've directed the Army to remit the balance of the sentence of PFC Bernis G. Owen at Fort Polk...
...Army reservists who bellyached about being recalled to active duty last year, PFCs Owen and Chidester had two of the tenderest tummies. A pre-law student at the University of Texas, Owen, 23, organized and addressed meetings of unhappy reservists at Fort Polk that drew as many as 700 men. When the meetings were banned by his commanding general, Owen told a newsman that the order was "a hilarious climax to a chain of injustices." For such disrespect to a superior officer, Owen got a court-martial sentence of a $300 fine and six months at hard labor...
...many a veteran of World War II can recall, Fort Polk is halfway to nowhere...
...were not enough blankets, boots or underwear to go around. Worst of all to the men of the 49th, after the Berlin crisis seemed to ease, there appeared little reason for their being in uniform. Major General Harley B. West, the division commander, recognized the problem. Said he: "Fort Polk, La., is a hell of a long way from Berlin or Viet Nam or Laos. If there was a shooting war, shots being fired, there'd be no problem." Plucked from his pre-law studies at the University of Texas, Pfc. Owen soon proved himself an outspoken guardhouse lawyer...
Also, mimeographed questionnaires, to be mailed to Congressmen, were surreptitiously passed around Fort Polk. Sample questions: "Is the real reason for the National Guard and reservists being held on active duty the fact that Kennedy's plans to cut down on unemployment have failed?" and "Are you conscientiously representing the people who elected you to office, or are you merely appeasing all the 'too liberal' party majority in order to feather your own nest?" Finally, the 49th's General West had had enough. "Each meeting they had was a little bolder," he recalls. "I finally came...