Issue 1 • 2023 . ReseRvist 3 CELEBRATING CELEBRATING 70 70 YEARS OF THE RESERVIST YEARS OF THE RESERVIST Feedback As you can see, [by Adm. D. Thompson’s letter to Coast Guard Reserve Unit Air Station Miami,] Coast Guard Reserve aviation existed back to 1959 and continued until the 1990s. Please recognize this minor addition to the initial beginning of Reserve Aviation in 2020! Cmdr. Peter Heins USCGR (ret.) You’re right, sir. I looked at our aviation feature from issue 3, 2022, and story didn’t mention the legacy aviation program from 30 years earlier. While the program is “new” to those of us who joined after the mid-90s, we didn’t get a chance to pay tribute to the history of our flight forefathers in the article. Thanks for straightening out the record. I am a retired chief from four years active (1966-1970) and 18 years in the Reserve (1979- 1998). I just want to say the article by Master Chief Justin Knudsen brought back memories of my time while I was a detachment supervisor at Coast Guard Station Emerald Isle, North Carolina. Master Chief, it is the best article I have read from your level. Operations between reserve and regular is the key!! We had both trusting and non-trusting OINCs on the regular side. Sometimes it took a while, but we managed to show our abilities to support the regular Coast Guard [even] when the local command was not trusting of our skills. However, we also had some very trusting OINCs. Thank you for this article and your encouragement to all. Chief Petty Officer Rick Bulla, USCGR (ret.) It may be of interest to Coast Guard to know that there was a military judge in the Ready Reserve as far back as the 1970s. I completed the Military Judge Course at the JAG School in Charlottesville, Virginia in August 1972. Among my classmates was Cmdr. Edwin Daniels who went on the be Chief Counsel of the Coast Guard. At the time, I was a member of a VTU (Legal) and practicing as a maritime lawyer in New York City. Capt. Lennard K. Rambusch USCGR (ret.) Coast Guard In Vietnam Great timing to include the article by Capt. Larzelere on the Coast Guard's role in the Vietnam War in advance of the 50th anniversary of the end of U.S. military involvement; I highly recommend his more expansive book, The Coast Guard at War: Vietnam, 1965-1975. That 8,000 Coast Guardsmen served in the conflict is not well known, both within and outside Coast Guard circles. My father served with the Army as an advisor to the South Vietnamese Army in Da Nang, August 1966 to August 1967. Several years ago I had the pleasure to spend time with then-Commandant Adm. James Loy, himself a Coast Guard Vietnam veteran and former skipper of Coast Guard Cutter Point Lomas, which operated out of Da Nang, 1966-67. I remember commenting to him that my father was in Dan Nang at the same time. When I later told my dad that fact, he quipped he didn't even know the Coast Guard was in Vietnam, to which I replied I wasn't surprised. Capt. David Teska, USCGR (ret.) White hulls On page 37 [of Issue 3, 2022] is a picture with two obviously decommissioned 378-foot high endurance cutters in the background. Do you know which ones they are and what is to become of them? Just curious, as I was stationed on Hamilton way back in the late 1960s and have a special affinity for those cutters. Thanks. Cmdr. Jim Medeiros, USCGR (ret) After quizzing the folks out in Puget Sound, we believe it was the decommissioned Coast Guard Cutters Mellon and Midgett! We can only find the Mellon still at the pier now, as for the Midgett, she was transferred to the Vietnam Coast Guard. Correction We just saw the article [on CGMA’s reproductive services loan] in the Reservist. One note: the caption for the picture is a bit off. We never used the CGMA assistance for our process. [My wife] Morgan used our experience and her role within the CGMA board to help propose and pass the CGMA assistance to be available to future generations. Lt. Cmdr. David W. Holden, District 17 (dxr) Ah, I'm sorry. That's on me—I confused the article and the involvement; I must have filled in my own assumption of the details. I didn't realize until now that the two had no connection! Thanks for the correction. CGCVA Announcement The Coast Guard Combat Veterans Association Convention/ Reunion will be held May 8-12, 2023, at the Nugget Hotel, Sparks, Nevada. Please join us for great hospitality, camaraderie, a salute to past and present Coast Guard men and women, silent auction and awards banquet. Featured day tour is frontier town Virginia City, Nevada. For additional information, contact: Master Chief Petty Officer Michael Placencia (ret.) (661) 401-0609 [email protected] www.coastguardcombatvets.org RESERVIST MAGAZINE FROM OUR READERS
