I enlisted in 1989 as a 31K Combat Signaler. We ran WD-1/TT wire for TA-312 phones and SB-22 Switchboards. SINCGARS was just beginning to supplant the Vietnam Era PRC-77 and AN/VRC-46 FM radios. All this radio equipment transmitted over OE-254 or RC-292 antenna systems. It was a lot of vintage equipment; I can't believe I still remember all the nomenclatures. WD-1 was used in WWII; My Grandfather had the same set of TL pliers I was issued to repair wire with. He always wondered how much WD-1 was still lying on the jungle floors of the South Pacific.

I attended the 31k course at Ft. Gordon in the late summer/early fall of 1990. Our classes were broken up into cycles, with weekly periods being dedicated to a specific type of equipment. The seat of learning was Brem’s Barracks, a 71-acre section of Ft. Gordon, lined with single-story buildings. I can still imagine the smell inside those old barracks. Mustiness, mixed with the ubiquitous smell of army canvas, greeted us walking in the door. Long metal tables filled the room in two long rows from front to rear. Around the outer perimeter of the classroom, workstations were set up with equipment that matched the current cycle we were in.

There we’d sit for lectures and instruction, often times fighting sleep. The instructors called it the Z-Monster and warned us of it on day 1. “Now Privis listen up, I'm here to tell ya, the Z-monster is gonna getcha.” "If you’re tired, walk to the back of the class and stand ya happy ass up! Don't lemme catch ya nodding off in my classroom, Hooah!?" There was an urgent fervency in his tone, his warning would be issued only once. We'd been up since 4:30 a.m. when the fire guard began flipping light switches. The short march across the street, and a grueling round of PT on the dew-covered, pre-dawn grass of Barton Field (where flutter kicks were still allowed) was more than enough to wake us up. What set us up for failure was the shower afterwards, followed by hot breakfast chow at the DFAC. Afterwards we’d form up in front of the barracks before being packed into cattle cars that transported us to Brem’s. We were stacked in so tight that it kept you upright without much effort. Rumbling down the road it was easy to begin nodding off. A short march to our classroom was the last chance before that belly full of chow took over. Once inside the instructor would begin rifling through overhead slides, with the material being as dry to the ears as the feel of the OD green painted equipment surrounding us. In a loud but monotoned voice he rattled off various specs, nomenclatures and operating ranges, all of which slowly lulled us to sleep. AC window units chugging away in the background, with their droning amperage conspired against us as well. Our only defense against the Z-Monster were sips of water from our canteen, or push-ups on the floor. Five minutes in your eyelids would become burdened, slowly opening and closing until your chin bobbed helplessly onto your chest. When a private succumbed the instructor immediately went into Drill Sergeant mode. The yelling saved those of us who’d been on the fence.

Most of our instructors were former drill sergeants, lean-cut and still full of plenty piss and vinegar. Their appearance was meticulous. Crisply starched BDU's with sew on rank and embroidered name tapes, not the nylon crap we got in basic. Perfectly shaped soft caps were proudly perched atop gun-metal-gray hat racks during class. Jump or jungle boots were shined to a glass mirror finish. It was like being a 7-year-old staring in awe at the 8th grade class. The absence of their smoky bear hats seemed to temper their menacing disposition, but that little square patch, sewn on their right front breast pocket was impossible to miss. "This We'll Defend" The patch was a soldier's proudest accoutrement, second only to a CIB. Passing them by, and being fresh out of basic, it was easy to fumble with the greeting of the day. Behind pursed lips and clenched teeth, we'd get a cross look followed with a hands-on-the-hips head-shaking nod. Most of them didn’t mind, however. That fall there was a gleeful swagger in these men. The wake of the Cold War had hardly settled before we were plunged into the Persian Gulf War, with many of these men hoping to participate in one of history's greatest ass kickings. During breaks, they would gather like classmates on the last day of school planning their summer adventures, all the while trying to figure out how to get into the Sandbox. Every one of them had the same insatiable itch that only a CIB could scratch.

I fondly remember a small hill at the far end of the complex. There, after lunch, we’d take a nap using our BDU coat as a blanket and sunblock. On the soft Georgia grass, several of us would be splayed out in the shadow of an OE-254. Its mast sections, adapters and insulating extension pointed perfectly skyward. Sputnik-like radiating element sections, tipped with plastic oval-shaped antenna balls and secured with precise 45-degree angle wraps of electric tape, exuded from the feed cone assembly topping the antenna. Tautened guy ropes ran out in four directions from hole punched, candy-colored coded upper and lower guy plates. These guy ropes centered the equipment before terminating at the anchor hook of each metal stake, themselves hammered into the earth at the exact mandated 60-degree angle. A black transmission cable snaked its way downward from the feed cone assembly. Running through the strain relief clamp, it was secured to each mast section with electric tape before eventually running its way into the wood line.

Behind one of the buildings was a wire range. Gently sloping downhill, ran several ruddy-red lanes; mostly discernable, and teeming with the harshest flora and fauna Georgia has to offer. A small embankment marked its starting point. With CE-11 reeling equipment in hand, and supplied with hammer, stakes, tags, TL pliers, and E-tool on our hip, we moved down range stopping at several points to ply our trade. All along the way catbrier tore at our BDU’s while fire ants competed for our ankles. An occasional copperhead slithered by.

It was a lot of fun; I wonder if it's all still there. I returned to Ft. Gordon several times over the years, once as a reservist on annual training, and a second time as a BNCOC student. In 2004 I spent the loneliest Christmas of my life there after being called out of the IRR, in route to Iraq. If it hadn't it been for the bowling alley bar, and jukebox, I would have completely despaired. During my career I was reclassified twice, once to 31U, and then 25U before being discharged in 2006.