A few photos from the M. R. F. A. Reunion 2001 PAGE 1 / 3
Row Sitting: #1 Ron Wallace: B 3/47, 1967 # 2 Rod Mays: C 3/47, # 3 Ron Menner: C 3/47, # 4 Gary Studley: C 4/47, # 5 Dale (Doc) Jones: B&C 4/47, 68-69, # 6 John Miller:C 3/47, # 7 Mike Richey: C 3/47, 1967 & # 8 John Blondell: C 4/47
Row Standing: # 1, # 2 Rod Compton B 3/47, # 3, # 4 Dave Schoenian, # 5 Lynn Moseman, # 6 Roy Moseman: C 4/47, 67-68 # 7 Judy Sisco, # 8 Don Maynard: C 4/47, 67-68, # 9 Mark Sisco: ? 4/47, # 10 Frank Gubala: A 3/47, 1968 & # 11 Joyce Gubala
Thanks to Roy Moseman and Rod Compton who knew most ot the names.
If you have photos from the reunion and wish to put them on this site please pass them along. If you want a copy of any of my photos let me know, which ones and I mail them to you. Also if you can add any names or info to the photos here please send it to me e-mail.
The Parade
By Frank J Gubala
This is not a story about me, rather one that was told to me at the 2001 Mobile Riverine Force Association reunion. This was the first Military Reunion I have ever gone to since I left the service. I did not know what to expect, at first I was very nervous and did not know if I could cope with it all. My wife Joyce and I went for the full 4 days, as the days went by I realized that this was a good thing for me.
The reunion was for about 1500 Army and Navy men and wives. Joyce and I decided we would not just hang with the Army people but would socialize with whomever we could.
On the 3rd day we were running late for breakfast and got into the dinning room just before they took the food away. We got our plates and looked around the room, most of the people were leaving. There was a man and his wife just behind us and we asked them if they would share a table. They said yes so we sat down together. At first things were a little uncomfortable, he was in the Navy and they, Frank & Linda Jones lived in St. Louis all of their lives. About that time a very tall man came in and asked to sit with us. He joined us and we learned that he was in the Navy also and from Wyoming.
We finished our meals and started to talk over coffee. We learned a lot about each other as the talk flowed. The man from Wyoming told us about his business and how he was called a hero for saving a woman’s life, from a burning building, in his hometown and how even the Governor honored him.
Frank Jones from St. Louis then told us his story:
Frank told us how he did his tour in Nam, 12 months, did nothing special and came home to his wife and 7 month old baby boy. He got back to St. Louis very late and went directly to his parents’ home. Where the family talked and visited till 2 or 3 o’clock. Being so late they excused themselves to go to their home. Before they left his Mother told him to be back at the house at 9:00am. He told his Mother he wanted to sleep in but she insisted and he agreed.
The next morning Frank, Linda and baby walked to his parents’ home. When they got to the corner of the street where his parents lived the street was blocked. His 10 year old sister and her friends, made signs and confetti, all of the children and adults from the neighborhood stayed home that day and gave him a welcome home parade on his street.
We all sat there with tears in our eyes. The man from Wyoming told how he was mugged in San Francisco. I told how I came home on a stretcher and had to have a Military Police escort to get past the protesters outside of Andrew Air Force Base going to Walter Reed Army Hospital in Washington, DC.
I never saw the others again during the rest of the reunion. To this day even though I have told this story many times I cry before finishing it.