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Phu Cat - 1 August 1966: "Day One, Hour One" for the 37th APS at what
will
become Phu Cat Air Base. SSgt Swartz closest to camera. Who else?
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Phu Cat: Day One, and several hours later is photo of bags with all out personal gear.
Bulldozer in background (left of tent) is clearing ground for our tents and roads.
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Phu Cat 1966 - Photo of “Ol'Glory”. We built the flagpole out of 2x4s.
We did
have an Arizona State Flag up but the CPT said to take it down because we didn’t
have the US flag up and it could have been mistaken for a VC flag. Hmmm.
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Brand new Tents!
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Phu Cat 1966 - Photo of me (Swartz) with my mongoose “Zippo”.
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Phu Cat 1966 - A close up of “Zippo” a baby mongoose.
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Phu Cat 1966 - A photo of our official messhall nicknamed “Lyle’s Poison Pub.”
Guess the cook’s name was Lyle.
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Phu Cat 1966 - Photo of our hospital “Cappy’s Dispensary.”
Guess the corpsman’s name was Cappy. No doctors or nurses.
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Phu Cat 1966 - Depicts mail-call the old fashioned way. Whomever hands out mail at mail-call for the 37th APS
also gets the package. SSgt Swartz with his package from home. This is when homemade cookies are really good.
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Phu Cat 1966 - Photo of, L to R, Swartz, Unk AP, Irwin, unk AP and Gorman. Aah, those were the days.
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Phu Cat 1966 - Photo of SSgts Irwin and Swartz, A2C Gorman and others checking out possible tunnel entrance.
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Phu Cat 1966 - Photo of Irwin, Swartz, Gorman and others REALLY checking out the tunnel entrance.
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37th APS getting ready for the first bath in two or three days. No showers set up for us yet.You had to wade
thru mud
to get in and out of the water but the river bottom was gravel and the water was clear and cool. One
or two men
stayed on guard duty. You had to wait for the mud to dry and peel it off before you got dressed.
Ramsey is holding the jacket. (Note: who's the guy mooning us?)
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Phu Cat 1966 - 37th APS getting clean. One day the guys doing the guarding got tired of waiting and came
in
also. Five ROK soldiers in the area snuck up on us and all of a sudden the air was filled with automatic weapons
fire.
No chance to get to our guns. My thought was how long can I hold my breath and how far can I swim
under
water. We had some good times with the ROKs in sporting events but we never could top the “ambush”.
