Pictured: Willis Grimmius wanted to join the Navy right out of high school, but his parents did not want both of their sons sent to Vietnam. He joined the National Guard instead.

By Jill Fennema –

Willis (Willy) Grimmius graduated from Chandler High School in 1969. He was one of five children – two sons and three daughters – born to Hilko and Jenny Grimmius of Chandler. 

On December 1, 1969. The United States held its first draft lottery since World War II, which gave young men a random draft number corresponding to their birthdays. The first draft number drawn was 258 – the 258th day of the year is September 14. So those young men with that birthday were assigned Draft Number 1. Willy’s birthday, July 29, 1951, was drawn 4th, so his draft number was four – meaning he would be drafted soon.

But waiting to be drafted wasn’t Willy’s plan.

“I wanted to join the Navy right out of high school, but my folks wouldn’t sign,” he said. He was only 17 at the time and joining the armed forces requires a parental signature when the inductee is that young. Willy’s brother Larry was also drafted and served in Korea during the same time that Willy was drafted, and his parents didn’t want two sons going off to war at the same time.

Willy decided to enlist with the National Guard and his parents were willing to let him do that. Willy signed up in Worthington and from there he went to Ft. Louis, Washington, in November 1969. He came home for Christmas. It was a three day trip by train or bus. He took a train one way and a bus the other – he can’t recall which he did first. He doesn’t recall much of the trip – just that everywhere he looked there was snow.

“You knew within the first week if you were going to make it,” Willy recalls. One memory that sticks with him is that soldiers came in as hippies with long hair and everyone left the barber with the same high and tight haircut.

He remembers crawling through the mud while bullets – real or otherwise – whizzed by overhead. He remembers being awakened by the drill sergeant at all hours of the night and marching for miles. Sometimes the drill sergeant would come into the barracks and tip over all the cigarette butt cans and make the floor a mess. 

“You are standing at attention at the edge of your bed,” Willy says. “And then you have to clean up the mess right then and there in the middle of the night and resin the floor.”

Many trainings involved navigating the woods near Spokane, Washington, in the middle of the night. 

“They gave you a compass and a piece of paper with instructions where you were supposed to end up at.” 

Many got lost in the woods.

He also didn’t mind the food, even though they only had a few minutes to eat. When they were out in the field they ate C-rations, and that was fine with him, too. Part of the C-rations were cigarettes. He remembers the drill sergeants saying, “Light ‘em up,” and then 30 seconds later, “Put ‘em out!”

The weather at Ft. Louis is often rainy. If they were caught in a downpour, it would be after the rain fell that the drill sergeant would say, “Put your ponchos on,” so then they could run with their ponchos on, sopping wet and sweating bullets. 

After basic training, which was a lot of running and marching, he had Advanced Infantry Training. This training also took place at Ft. Louis. In AIT, he learned more hand-to-hand combat.

They also learned more about different types of weapons. He spent a lot of time on the shooting range. His first weapon was the M14 and later it was the M16.

The thing he remembers most about his training was the gas chamber training. When they went into the gas room, they had to have their gas mask at their side. They had to hold their breath while they put on the mask and then blow out to expel any of the gas that remained in the mask. Once you had your mask on, you had to recite your social security number. 

It may not sound difficult, but many soldiers were left gagging on gas, with burning eyes.