Video Interview: Dan Glidden

Roaring Fork Veterans History Project

3-17-07

Dan Glidden

US Navy – Vietnam War

(1968-1972)

Interviewed by: Willard Clapper

At GrassRoots Community TV, Aspen, Colorado

Welcome everyone, my name is Willard Clapper today I have this distinct privilege of interviewing one of Aspen’s Veterans as part of the Aspen Veterans History Project, Mr. Dan Glidden.  Dan is, by the way, it is Saturday, March 17^th, St. Patty’s Day and I was asking Dan if he was Irish and he doesn’t know, but I bet he is.  Everybody is.  And it’s, we’re in Grassroots Television and that’s kind of a fun time, fun place to be.  Dan is 64 years old, although he’s not bragging about it and I’d like to ask you a couple questions first.

Dan, just for the recording, what war did you serve in and what branch of the service?

I was in the US Navy from 1968 to 1972.  I spent a year in Vietnam.

A year in Vietnam, and what was your rank when you finished up there?

I went into the United States Navy as a Seaman, I came out of the United States Navy as a Seaman.

Perfect.  Well, done.  I’m sure that, well, I understand that cause that’s what I did in the boy scouts.  I went in as a low man and quit as a low man, too.  Anyway, Dan is fun for me to interview, because he and I share some history.  We both were fortunate enough to grow up in the beautiful Aspen area, during the good old days.  And Dan, tell me a little bit about your history in Aspen at the very beginning.  Who your family is, cause you have a very special Dad, and you know, what was it like growing up here?

Ah, family came up here 1946, I was 4 years old.  My dad came from New Mexico.  He was a western writer, Luke Short wrote, 55, 56 westerns.  Came up here to Aspen we settled here, grew up here, fabulous place to grow up.

Yeah.

Yeah.  Small town, knew everybody.  It was great.

You were one of my heroes growing up.

Oh, boy.

Yeah, here we go.  That’s a great deal.  I remember, I was telling Dan, that growing up I was in one classroom and I would look over the, we had a doorway with a glass window, and I’d look over it, peering over like this, and guys like you would walk by and I’d be going oh, my God, look at those guys.  Cause we were all in the same building.  We’re all in the Red Brick Building, where we are today, and it was a wonderful time.  What kind of things, give me an example what kind of things you used to do when you got up at 10 o’clock in the morning, cause I know you slept late?

Well, on any given day, summer times were fun.  Get on my bikes, 8 o’clock, 9 o’clock in the morning, come home for lunch.  Mom would say, be home for dinnertime, and rode my bike, played, goofed, climbed, had fun.

Favorite places?

Shadow Mountain.

And why was that?

Ah, we had King of the Mountain battles over there where we had a defending team and a conquring team and we’d throw rocks and roll rocks down on each other, then trade places and do it all over again.  Great place.

Yeah, did you ever used to ride your bike on my mine dumps?

Oh, yeah.

Oh, was that fun.

Uh, huh.  Rolled a few of the cars out of the old, rolled cars out of the tunnels.  Probably was not the best thing to do, but it was fun.

Yeah.  Did you experience as I did, that it was really at that time a village taking care of a kid?  Cause I know when I was growing up where ever I was; somebody was looking, watching over me.  I thought I was totally independent, but there was always somebody out there. 

Oh, yeah.  It was fun.  Um, you know it kind of stayed in the family too.  Everybody took care of everybody, everybodies kids, but kept your thumb on them.

Okay, now, as you left the younger years, you went into high school, and you went into high school here.  You did all that stuff.  You played sports.  Which were those?

Yep, yep.  Football and track.

Did you used to practice on the old rotten field over here, where the Yellow Brick is?

Yes.

Yeah.  I tell people about that and they go, what? 

They used to be cinders, you know the old hard-core hard rock cinder, get beat up, cut up, dinged up.  Oh yeah, it’s fun.

Yeah. 

Yeah.

Yeah, it was fun.

Yeah.

Yeah, and then you did track.

Did track.

That was probably your best sport.

Yeah.  Well, we knocked some heads on football, though.

Yeah. 

Yeah.  Ah, track was fun, as I told you earlier, only in the winter time, the spring we still had snow outside, so I’d set up three hurdles in the hallway here and over the first three hurdles I was good.

Yeah.

Went down to Grand Junction in the springtime looked over all twelve and said, oh my word, am I gonna run over all of those?  But yeah, it was fun.

Yeah, so, you, high school was a great time here because not only, not only did you know everybody, but you knew everybody in town and it was all, as you said, it was a big family, but what was, what was the real, what did, what did growing up, what did going to high school here give you?  Cause ultimately, you, you either drafted or got enlisted, which I’ll get to in a second, but before you did that, what was, what was the strength of being here for you?

Ah, close knit.  It’s family.  Everybody, everybody knew what everybody was doing and everybody had fun doing it.  Everybody took care of everybody else, it was fun.

Yeah.

It’s just close knit.

Do you see a difference today?

Yeah.  Um, just not necessarily the social or the economical difference, but yeah, it’s just, and it’s too big.  I mean I’m one of the school resource officer’s this year at the high school and great kids, but there’re little clics in different groups that don’t necessarily mix.

And you didn’t really see much of that when you were in high school.

No we all got along.

And the ranch kids would mix with the whatever else they had.

Oh yeah.

Were you a hippy during the 60’s there?

No. Nah. Didn’t get into it.

Didn’t have to. Alright. So that brought you to the end of your high school career, and that was the highlight I am sure! But then, here came Vietnam, and that is where we are going right now. Did you get drafted or did you enlist?

I got drafted. Long story. Went, graduated from Aspen High School, went to CSU, it was huge. I got lost. College was so big that I got lost. Two years there didn’t do well, came back and did two years in the Peace Corps. Down to Peru for two years. Came back in ’65. Went to Northern Arizona, finally found my major. I wanted to be in anthropology and archeology. Colorado quit drafting at age 26, I got drafted 6 days before my 26^th birthday. It was be a Phoenix Monday morning at 8 o’clock. Be there.

But you said that you were in the Navy.

Yeah.

They drafted you into the Navy? Or when they drafted you say, you get a choice?

This was the armed service physical. If you walked in you passed. Which I did. I wanted to take a look at the Air Force, 12-month waiting list. Coast Guard had an 18-month waiting list. If you went into the Army or Marine Corps you automatically going to Vietnam. So I talked with a Navy recruiter. He said great. Signed up for four years. Told him that I wanted to be a photographer, and your good to go. So, done deal.

Done deal. And we have some photographs here, and we will be looking at those a little bit later. Obviously you did become a photographer!

Well, I was on my own. Showed up at boot camp with my camera, and my company commander looked at me with not-so gentlemanly terms said, “what are you holding in your hands?” I said it’s my camera sir. And he said well. Throw it away because you are now a radioman. I said no way. So we butted heads for four years.

Right away.

Yes.

He didn’t know that he was dealing with Dan Glidden did he?

Well. I don’t know who had the harder head out of that.

So there you are in boot camp. You show up your first day and he tosses your camera. What was boot camp like?  I mean I have heard stories. I did not, I was fortunate, and because I believe that I was. I did not get drafted. I didn’t have to go to Vietnam.  But I was always, what would that have been like? What was it like for you?

Hard. I flew under the radar for four years, basically. I was the oldest one in boot camp, in my company. You can see the idea behind lets break down the individual then rebuild them remold them in your style. So the first half of boot camp was that. You know marching and drilling, those types of things.

Did you see those as mindless tasks?

Yeah. Don’t rock the boat. Go with the flow, because that if you fight the system it will destroy you, so go with it. So I did. I did what I needed to do. Survived boot camp. Roughly 6 months, 9 months. When I went to Phoenix, you took a battery of tests. They determined that I was to be a radioman. So for that next year they sent me to radio school, for the entire year in San Diego. Radio at that time was Teletype. SO you would be on ship and all of the messages that you send would be from ship to ship ship to shore was all Teletype. So that was my training for an entire year.

That is a long time to learn how to type.

Well, you learn electronics, basic electronics, electricity, code, Morse code, 7-4 lights all that stuff.

Sounds complicated!

Well it wasn’t that difficult but it was long. And they held that thread over your head if you flunked out of radio school that you would go out in to the fleet as a Boson’s mate. I ended up after Vietnam out in the fleet as a Boson’s mate.

And what is that?

Take care of the ships, drive em paint em, launch the boats, launch the helicopters. All that kind of stuff.

So did you find that during that time that you sort of formed an attitude about what you were doing that was not necessarily conducive to where you were going?

Oh yeah. Survival.

So that part was OK, you knew how to survive.

Yeah. Well, it was disappointing to me because I had, in good faith, gotten into the Navy and said I will gladly go to photography school, send me to it and I will do the best that I can. And that never materialized. That was not necessarily sour grapes, but it was disappointing, so go with the flow.

Now I have known you for a long time, and I have known you to be a committed, kind of patriotic guy. You love this country, at least as I know, and your profession that you have done after you came back in the years that I have known you. Did you find that your natural commitment your natural tendency to do the right thing was compromised in those beginning, in that boot camp and that experience?

Not initially, because you think, maybe this will work out. Or I will ultimately get into photography. I went to Vietnam, and finally ended up doing some photography work, my company, the bas commander said if you want to get into photography, take the courses, he said I will write the BUPERS, Bureau of Personnel in Washington, DC. I will try to get you into photography. And he did, and it didn’t work. They said because radio is a critical rate, you stay in it. So that was another disappointment, I realized that I was going nowhere, so I said OK, I will do what I have to do. But as you get into the war and you see what is happening, you have to question what we were doing, why we were there.

I am going to get to that here in a second, you were in Vietnam. When you finally had to ship out, when was that, and tell me how did that whole thing went down?

Well you get. I arrived in Vietnam in June 6^th. June 6^th 1969. I had known for a month prior to that, my orders were to Saigon, COMNAFORB (SP?) was the communications center for all of Vietnam.

So you were right in the middle of everything?

No I was right smack in the center of Saigon. But they flew us, I mean one day you could be at Travis Air Force Base; take a 19-hour plane trip to Anchorage, to (indecipherable) Japan, to (indecipherable). I originally started out there in the Comm. Center; they had what was called port and starboard shifts. You could work two weeks of days, two weeks of nights. I would go up at night and I would look at the flares and look at the tracers and say Oh that is cool. What finally clicked was one night. This was the comm. Center for the entire country. All of the messages coming in and out would come out of there. 3:30 in the morning, I was underneath the desk with a putty spatula, scrapping the wax buildup off of the underneath the desk. SO the light bulb kind of went on, what am I doing here? This is not what I want to do. And I very clearly remember I went to the chaplain and said, I want out of the comm. Center. Get me out of here. Next night I saw the watch commander, Captain Fink, I said sir I want out. I don’t want to be here. He said are you sure? I sad yes. He said absolutely sure? I sad. Yes. Next day, here I was – river boats in the Mekong Delta.

What is it, I know something triggered that. Did you feel that you needed to be out and part of what was going on out there?

Yes.

If you were there, you might as well be there?

Well it is not. I mean reflecting back, how much Peace Corps influenced my future life. Two years in Peru, you know, you’re down there with the idea of helping people, trying to accomplish something. Trying to help the people, and I decided that sitting underneath a desk with a putty knife in a cement bunker building was not what I wanted to do. I wasn’t quite sure what I was getting into. But. No. I said there has got to be a better way. So I was transferred there.

That is a pretty gutsy move.

Not necessarily very smart, but uh…

When you look back on it now, was it still the right move?

Oh yeah. No regrets. None at all.

So you wanted to get into some combat.

Not necessarily combat, I wanted to do something with the Vietnamese people. I didn’t go over there to kill them all. And I mean my experiences are different that the majority of veterans that you have interviewed or seen or talked to, because when they went over there the only Vietnamese that they ever saw was the one that was trying to kill them. That was not my case.

Really?

No.

Talk a little more about that. Who did you see then?

Well, the Navy base was about 60-70 miles below Saigon. You have to understand the geography of the country. The parrot’s beak is Cambodia. It came down into Vietnam. Well there were two main rivers that came down out of Cambodia. The Vam To Tay and the Vam Co Dong. Well, there is a series of canals and everything, came down through there to the Ben Luc River. The Ben Luc went directly to Saigon. So for the 1968 Tet offensive, all that the Vietcong did was bring everything down from the Parrots Beak, down the Vam Co Dong, up to Saigon. So the idea of the Bam Lucbase it was dredged out of the river, built right on the side of the river. They said we want to stop this interdiction, we want to stop this supply, we want to stop the troops, we want to stop the Viet Cong. So that was the idea behind the riverboats, the river bases. So I connected up with, when I got there it was probably 60% American crews, 40% Vietnamese. On the riverboats. When I left they were all Vietnamese. So I was there for the Vietnamezation, the turnover of American assets to the Vietnamese. So what I am doing is going out with the Vietnamese, trying to show them, teach them.

So you were teaching and helping them to take over. Wow. We don’t hear enough about that kind of stuff.

Well it was interesting because my ability to fly under the radar. I was in Saigon, and I think that the Navy sent us over with literally wool uniforms, some old timers over there said go back to the grab bag room and find some lightweight uniforms. So I went back and found 5 short-sleeved camouflaged shirts that had cloth stripes for Lt. on the collar.

Oh no. So you were a lieutenant!

Well I cut them off, but I left the laundry marks on the collar, so when I showed up to the Vietnamese, they thought that I was a Lieutenant. So I never, I didn’t say yes, I didn’t say no. I just stayed low. We had a SEAL team there that had three officers, during the day that is is when you would do what you needed to do. They needed a fourth for volleyball, so I would play with them, so the Americans thought that I the fourth SEAL officer. So the Vietnamese think that I am a lieutenant, the Americans think that I am a SEAL officer, so I just stayed as low as I could.

Worked nicely for you!

Oh yeah. Well I got into, through a helicopter accident that took the psychological operations officer, rotor came off and killed him, so the base manager said we need a replacement, and I said as long as I don’t get in a helicopter I’m cool! But I got into PsyOps. Which is trying to work with the Vietnamese. You go out with PsyOps teams, Vietnamese, you broadcast, and sometimes you go at night. The Vietnamese are very superstitious, only if a body is dismembered or broken apart, the soul runs around forever, so we would play on that weakness. Make a recording… “This is your soul…”. But go out in the daytime, you go out for Medcaps you go out and do medical, you go to a village with a couple boats, you park the boat right up on the dock and say “bring everyone that you can”.  Hurt wounded, bleeding cut, whatever. Treat it. Help these people. So that was kind of the idea behind it, and that is why I wanted to get into it, because I felt that if we don’t connect with the people if we don’t work with the people there you are not going to win the war.

So your most memorable experiences probably have to do with the dealings with the Vietnamese people.

Oh yeah. Because here I am finally working on the June 6^th, May, turnover is completed. I was going out on the Vietnamese boats; I was the only American going out.

Wow.

So you go with two boats, four or five guys, a dozen guys on two boats, and I am not there as an advisor, there would be American advisors that would go out there with them you known occasion. These are the military advisors that tell them what to do. I am going out as a kind of a gopher. Medical stuff; see what we could do to help.

So you in a way were sort of self-deployed.

I had my own missions. Yeah.

You were under the radar, you went out and did the things that you thought mattered the most and made the most difference.

And although Commander Sigmund never did see any of the pictures, he said go take pictures. He said go out and do that. He said I want you to do that. You do a good job at it, go out with the people, work with the people, and go do it. So that was very rewarding to me. SO now this again, just look at the situation, I am working, first of all with the Vietnamese, because I trust them with my life everyday, and night I go out with them, so I am dependent on them entirely. The people that I deal with are Vietnamese all the time, so I am not trying to kill them, they are not trying to kill me, I am trying to help them, so that is a different approach.

How did you deal with the language barrier?

Surprisingly, some of my college French came back, and surprising number of Vietnamese do speak French. So it was kind of pidgin French, pigeon English, pigeon Vietnamese. We got by, and most of the boat skippers were a little more educated, had a little more knowledge, they might have been trained, some of them were trained on American bases, or were trained obviously by Americans, so between those three languages you could get by. You always had an interpreter, so you knew…

And even you had an interpreter when you were under the radar.

Sometimes.

Well lets take a second here and look at some of these pictures, I am not user how you guys are going to do this (talking to director) but, I want you first to show us the pictures that you took you know when you were out there, and then lest save the Vietnamese people one, cause I want to talk about those later. So just sort of go through these individually and tell us what is going on.

1. The Bassac and the Ben Luc was dredged up out of the river, as you can see in the background here, it is a fence, the idea behind that fence, it is steel mesh was to keep the Viet Cong from shooting rockets on the level, they would have to lob them over, which was good. But I was sitting down on the beach, riverfront, if you will, one evening and looked out, and here comes a Sampan full of folks going home. And then half an hour later, a helicopter coming in, we had a heli pad on the base, and I just happened to be at the right place right time.

And what kind of camera did you use for this?

I had a Pentax. A nice Pentax.

You had a pretty good camera then!

And then this one is one of my favorites. As we were going up the river. I call this freedom of religion. But this is a Catholic Church, set up off the riverbank. And it is just shot up, blown up, burned up. And this was the kind of the start of the rainy season, this was the clouds were coming in, the sun the moon kind of thing was starting, so I just took that.

Well it is a beautiful picture because you cant really tell if it is color, black and white. And the huge contrast between the…I like looking at the water which is nice and calm and placid, and then the church, right on the shore…

Well then this is the same church, daytime. But again freedom of religion. Freedom of expression.

And who destroyed that church?

That is a good question! Probably, my venture would be the government. ARVN troops, probably, thinking the VD would use it for something, OR, it could have been the VC thinking, hey, were not going to have any Catholic religion here, so.

You must have seen a lot of destruction while you were over there.

Yeah.

Was there any destruction that you, would…. You know I think in terms of agent orange and defoliation and all of the other things that happened over there, of course I wasn’t there, just reading about it. Was there any just wanton destruction of property just to mow it down?

Well, I lucked out. I was up the river, but, got away from the Agent Orange, which you see, you know you read about Agent Orange it is just mind-boggling.

It’s just devastating!

You know, the spray. Basically they sprayed the entire Mekong Delta.

So you were close?

Yeah. Yeah. It is kind of interesting, you read the stories. When I was in Vietnam, the Chief of Naval Operations was a general, Admiral named Admiral Elmo Zumwalt (Sp?).  He gave the orders to spray Agent Orange in the Delta, his son was in the Delta, and was sprayed with Agent Orange and died from Agent Orange. So here is the commanding officer who gives that order, probably realizing that he has put his son in harms way, and his son died from complications of Agent Orange.

That is a tough one. Because then you look at it and say, what a heroic man to place his country above son? I don’t know.

I don’t know either. I have a hard time with that one.

War is war. You see the randomness of it, the insanity of it, and you just wonder why?  Why this was destroyed, I don’t know. Was it a political threat? Was it a religious threat, I don’t know?

Well it had to be difficult, for you, coming from beautiful pastoral Aspen, Colorado where everything is absolutely perfect, as we saw it, and go to that.

Well. It hasn’t been any easier. Because when I read why we were there, and what we were doing there. It is disappointing, it is discouraging, and I see the repetition of it happening today, and I wish that it weren’t. But I think that we as a government ever really understood the Vietnamese people, I don’t think that we understood their traditions, and culture and history, and as a result, we lost it.

Lets talk a little about the Vietnamese people; I know that you have some beautiful pictures here. My experience with the Vietnamese people is that they are hard working people. Really hard working. Can you show us some pictures of your experience with the Vietnamese people and what that were like?

Well let me, Willard if I may, just show you. I was on a PBR most of the time. Small, fiberglass boats.

It is a PBR?

River Patrol Boat. Patrol Boat River. But this gives you an idea. This picture is one day we would go up a river of this size, so you can see that there is not much room, not much maneuverability, etc. etc. The next day we would be on a river this size, so it depended on where you go. You go with, militarily you go where the intelligence tell you. Where there are crossings, where there are VC, etc, etc. We would take these boats to go on our MedCans (sp?), go to villages where there was questionable security wise, so you would take a couple of the bigger boats.

And it had to be kind of terrifying for you to be driving up those shorelines, especially the small ones, knowing that somebody could be over there saying I am gonna take you out!

Oh yeah. Well most of the things that you see. Most of the day patrols were stopping boats, checking boats, checking ID’s, talking to people. Where are you coming from, searching their boats, where are you going? Have you seen anything? Those types of things.

If you saw somebody that was carrying something what did they do?

Well. Depends on what. At this stage of the game the Viet Cong would mainly operate at night, because they knew that if they worked out in the day that their chances were not good. But you can go back, for a second to this picture, and you can see this wake that you put up. I saw this happen, unfortunately, on a couple of occasions. But this sis a Sampan. And if you aren’t careful the wave you’ll swamp it, you’ll sink it.

And that is their whole life?

And that is their whole life. So now instead of making a friend you have just alienated.

(New photo) This is an idea, of again, just going to a village. Drive right up to a village; drive right up onto the shore. Unload. Get your corpsman; get your doctors out there. And treat anything that comes in. And it is rewarding in a way to see that you can do it, but then you know you get a disease that is treatable, but then those people don’t have money, they don’t have the means to get the medication.

And you know as they walk away, that this might be it.

But you hope. Have you made some impression on some person here that says, you know, that you are not here to kill them and blow them up, that you are here to help them? Try and make their life better, so…

Did you find that as you spent more time with the Vietnamese people that they were more willing to accept you as friend, and to understand why you were there?

Well, yes to a degree. But you have to realize, go back to the history, and understand the culture of the Vietnamese. Their first question other than, why are you here militarily?  What do you want? Why are you here?

What do you want?

So it takes a while to gain their confidence, gain their trust. And you hope, I mean you can only guess that you did that, accomplished that.

And you were always dealing with, I guess, it would be a pretty frightening situation, where you don’t know if the next person that walks up to you is going to have a grenade attached to it.

Yeah. Well we did a couple Medcap (sp?) things were you get a loudspeaker and then start to walk away from Bodyhungo (sp?) the village and set up the loudspeaker. But then you realize, suddenly that I am getting further away from the river, from my boats, from my help, so you know. Vietnamese people, I think of all of the pictures that I took, I think that this has to be my favorite (new pic). I have named all of these pictures, I call these The Victors. But you wonder, you know you look at the eyes; you look at the faces, what happened to these kids? What was their future? Did they live?

And this is 1969-1970?

And I mean the hurt, the pain that I have is that I look at the Vietnamese military guys that I worked with, the boat captains, the skippers, the boat captains, and I wonder what happened to them?

Yeah.

Cause they, if they were captures then they were implicated as having worked with the US, or the Saigon government. So were they reeducated, were they killed? Did they die? Did they move, did they escape? I don’t know. It has bothered me for years, I have wondered for years.

You know now that I think about that, that is one of those forgotten parts of that war. Many of us, myself included, I was very anti-Vietnam, and I probably didn’t know enough. But now that I look back, and you mention that, you wonder that what happened to those people that were on our side, whatever that might be? You sort of forget about that.

Well you read about the Hmong’s in the highlands, or in Cambodia and Laos, those people worked with us, fought with us, and then we basically had leave them abandoned. Where are they? What happened to the,

And they were a tough people I remember.

Yeah. These guys, it was funny. They were very proud to be peasants, very proud to be farmers. Before  they would let me take their picture this guy had to get the hoe that he has, and this guy had to get his pith helmet on, and once they had that they were very proud. They are a neat people. They are very hard working. Once they get to know you they are very friendly, very open.

Well they certainly are industrious. Those that have come to the US have done very well.

Oh yeah. and the kids I mean you know you stop the boat, the Medcaps (sp?) that we do and the ids always s show up, the one hand out, which you cant blame them, but you know kids are kids, they are goofing here, playing around. Again, I can’t help but look at these guys and wonder. What happened to them?

Beautiful faces, just gorgeous.

This one here, I tried to explain to these kids to line up, and I did pretty well except for this one, I am not quite sure what he had thinking, I mean he is at the line, but uh…

He was a little shy I guess.

You look at the faces, each of them, you know, these four gals in particular, look at these eyes, these expressions; you look at them and wonder what happened to them? This little kid, what is he thinking? Look at one of these, this little guy, whatever happened to him? You know, and if you could have helped them…did I make their lives better, did I do something for them, I don’t know. You hope that you did.

Well, we will talk a little bit more about what it was like when you came back. But at least when you left, you had some feeling that you had done something productive, and primarily because you were under the radar. You had done something productive.

Well, I was trying, and there was programs that we did, you hoped that they worked, the pacification programs that we did, you hope that they worked. When I left they were working, how much longer they did I don’t know. Again, there are the forgotten people.

Have you gotten back since?

No.

Do you have any interest?

Not really. I mean it is pretty country, but it is very tropical, hot, steamy, sweaty everything.

Well right now it is one of the gangbuster places for tourists to go I guess.

The Mekong Delta, the highest thing in the Mekong Delta if you could flatten out all of Aspen, would be Red Butte. And the rest of it is just level or green or lush. Swamp, river, bogs, so it was a pretty country but I don’t have any great desire to go back.

So when you left, you left.

I left.

Well tell me, what was a day; you mentioned that you had time off and time on. There were times that you were doing things and there was off time. What did you do in your off time, v=give me an example of an off day. What did you do?

Well. There weren’t many, only in the sense that, I wanted to stay involved. I am not good at sitting around and doing nothing.

You are an antsy guy, I know that.

So, again because I could plot my own course, if you will, do what I wanted to do, my CO never basically knew what I was doing. So I could take my choice, I could go out on the riverboats if I wanted, I could run daytime, and I could go out at nighttime if I wanted. Nighttime was different. Different story. But I knew some of the helicopter guys; I would go take helicopter rides. We had escort boat duties, where some of the river bases upriver would need all of their supplies, and they would come by barge, so we would hop on a boot and escort them. Go out, again, on the day boats to check boats, check rivers, check canals, check boats, stop people, where are you going? What are you doing? So I stayed busy. I am not a sit around and do nothing…

Did you find that keeping busy like that was what kept you kind of sane?

Oh yeah. I enjoyed it. It is a different philosophy, a different situation that I was in. I am not trying to go out and kill people, and I have no problem, I cant say that I had a problem that were doing that, when the only Vietnamese that you ever saw was the one who was trying to kill you. So I am trying to work with these people, trying to learn something about them, help them out.

So you were on an advanced Peace Corps mission!

Kind of, yeah. If you figure that you can go something to help somebody, and have the opportunity to do it!

Another thing that I want to ask you about and have heard so much from other people is about the weather. And how the weather played on your psyche. Obviously it is a very tropical area, you have the rainy season come in and then the dry season, walk me through the year, in terms of the weather and how it affected you.

Well, you hear the stories about the Highlands get cold at night, you need the ponchos or parkas or something. I have never been up there in the mountains, so I don’t know that. But obviously the higher that you get the cold, cold chill the cold nights. Basically here it was wet season and dry season. And that was it. So the wet season it would rain, just literally day and night, just pour. Just rain, rain, and rain. So it is kind of a struggle. I don’t know if you have ever lived in a tropical climate, but it is brutal, because everything, cuts get infected, food rots, cant preserve stuff. It is muddy it is dirty, it’s wet, equipment rots, rusts. SO it is just constant upkeep of equipment, and food, just trying to survive. And these people just deal with it on a daily basis. What was fun, what amazed me about this river, was that we were probably a hundred miles up off the coast, and tides would drop 6, 8, 10, 12 feet, daily.

And you would still experience it that far up?

Oh yeah. It just totally blows my mind. And then the stories of the rookie boat captains that tie their boats up at night, and if you aren’t careful you get caught. I mean we had a thing you wonder, it is kind of like family, you wonder how far up along the river people knew people, because any given day if said that we were going on a medical mission somewhere, and we would go up the river and come upon a tributary, chuck a concussion grenade in the water, and there’s fish! So we would get as many fish as we wanted, and we would drive up to the village and they had a pot of rice. And we would sit down and have a feast.

And if you brought food that helps!

Oh yeah. And not only are you sharing, you show them that you are willing to share with them, and honor what they give you, you give back in return, and then you go ahead and do your medical stuff.

And that is where you learned to fish eh?

Dupont spinner! It is the best!

It is like the old joke, you gonna fish or…That is fascinating. Are there any other experiences that come to mind that were memorable, either humorous or non-humorous or whatever that you would like to share from your time there?

Nothing that stands out.

Just that ongoing daily grind to survive…

Well it is something that if you enjoy what you are doing then it isn’t a grind.

So the secret is to make it enjoyable?

Well, you make it the best that you can. I mean we had, again, there were river bases going up all the way to Cambodia. And one day I said, hey where are you guys going? And they said we are going up to base, and so we drove up to the Cambodian border. And we happened to drive by a convoy, must have been 4 miles long, nothing but tanks, armored cars, Pac’s and stuff. We said what is going on here? Well it was the invasion going into Cambodia. When Nixon OK’ed going in to Cambodia, which we should have done years ago. But it is just, to see that and wander where that went, where that ended up…

Glad you aren’t a part of it!

Glad that you aren’t a part of it. But it was interesting to see, you could go to the different bases, and you could se the different areas, the different challenges that they faced that we didn’t. It was fun.

Incredible time and you got out of it. Let me ask you, you got out of a big family guy, I know your family, your mom and dad, everything. How did you stay in touch with them at that time, how did they endure? How did they live with you being over there?

Well, other than letter writing, that was it. We had no, we didn’t have the overseas phone. If you wanted to go into Saigon they had that, I didn’t. Saigon was overwhelming to me. I am not a city person at all and it is…

Well you couldn’t even make it through Fort Collins!

No. No! It was huge! But you just do your best. I had a little recorder so I would just record my feelings, my impressions, and send them home yeah.

Do you still have those recordings?

A couple of them, yeah!

Wow, that is something to go back and listen to on occasion.

Yeah. They were my lifeline for the film that I sent. I would package it up, and say get it developed and save it. So rolls and rolls of film.

Have you developed them all yet?

Oh yeah.

You have them all?

Oh yeah.

You have them all codified and organized…

Their there! You’ll see them, some of these.

That is a treasury. Someday that will come out.

I wish that we had more time. The memorabilia that I have…I have ration coupons for alcohol, tobacco.

Oh really?

ID, the MPC was military payment currency, they wouldn’t pay you in money, because it was black market. You could make a killing on the black market with US dollars. SO they give you, sort of looks like Monopoly money. What’s this? You know…

I had another friend who was in the military over there and he told me that he ran a whorehouse, as an American GI, and I was going, that’s pretty interesting! You could make some money over there! And he said, Oh yeah I made a lot of money.

If you had those inclinations the black market…

It was there.

Oh yeah.

Well I guess that is the way with any war.

And it is unfortunate.

And back to your family, were they uncomfortable with you being over there?

Well. Just young and stupid. They…It was not necessarily by choice. I mean ultimately it was my choice when I got my draft notice, it was, you know where are your beliefs, where are your feelings? I couldn’t go to Canada! (indecipherable). I could not have lived with myself. You know, I felt that it was my duty. And I think that, you know, I cant fault any of the soldiers that went over there, guys or gals, who went over there for going 2 rounds. Because it is a feeling of duty, a feeling of obligation that you have to do. And I mean I am not just saying that as this blind, whatever they say for me to do I am going to do it…but you know, you see your family. WWII, Korea, you did it because it was something that you were expected to do. And I went there with that train of thought, that mindset, and I am disillusioned now. Disappointed, in the direction that we are headed.

That is a great segway here. I don’t want to get in heavy and political with this, but I know that when Vietnam vets returned, they were not treated as they should have been treated. A lot of them came back with heavy post-traumatic stress syndrome. Of course it wasn’t even defined at the at time, it wasn’t even acknowledged. But when you came back, what sort of experience did you have? Was it one of those ugly ones where guys were spitting on you, or did you come back….

No. I am glad that you asked that, and looking back, my Peace Corps experience, I was in Peru for 2 years. So Vietnam, only one year, so obviously not the same type of situation, but I came back one day I got to Lima, the next day I was in New York City to see my sister. And that was culture shock magnified. I mean she had to take me literally to a water spigot and say here is a glass of water, it is OK to drink. So, I came back to New York for a week, and then I came back to Aspen. And other than my parents, I would see people on the street and they would say Where you been I haven’t seen you for a while! I said, OK. I have been in Peru. They would say oh neat! Did you know that the Yankees won last week? You know…SO that kind of cold shoulder of the people that really don’t care, or the ones that did care, like your family, you would try to sit down with them and explain to them what you have done in as much as they wanted to know and learn and listen. They couldn’t comprehend it. They just didn’t understand it. Now I don’t want to sound selfish or closed off and say, “You weren’t there so you can’t understand!” But they didn’t.

But it is true!

It is true. Yeah. So I got on, I was in Saigon, made my way to Saigon, June 6^th, I was home June 6^th, 19 hours later. Got to Travis AFB and went to San Francisco, flew out of there, got reamed by the shore patrol because I didn’t have a dress uniform. I said guys; this is the only thing that I’ve got. They were going to court marshal me! They were going to throw me in jail. But to have the demonstrations…there was nobody there. Period. Walked in. Got hassled. Got on a plane, came home. Walked in the back door of my parents house, they bout had a heart attack. They were having a dinner party when I walked in.

Wow.

And the same thing. You would see people, and they would say ‘Where you been, I haven’t seen you for a while?” Oh, I was in Vietnam. Oh, cool dude, see you later. So there was just this wall. Of people that either didn’t care, or didn’t want to know, or couldn’t relate.

Or all of the above.

Yeah. But I had had that in the Peace Corp. So when I came home I said, hey. I’m good. So it was easy for me. But my heart goes out for the guys that you know, and you brought up PTSD, I mean I think that you know part of the history of the memorial that is here. But before that I started a talk session in Basalt. Veterans welcome, you know. And that was a calming relief for me, and I felt again that I was doing something. For the vets, just to sit down and talk.

And as you said earlier, you are talking to people that get it. Talking to me, I don’t get it, and I try my best. But it is hard.

It is a trap. You’ve seen it. In your brotherhood of fire fighters. You can talk to someone about that until you are blue in the face, and they will nod their heads and try to understand it, but if they haven’t been there they don’t understand it. It is not that you are being aloof; it is not that you are being special; it is just that they do not understand. So you talk with Vets, you try to talk with people that haven’t been there, they don’t get it.

And if you think about it, WWII there was so many young men over there, and it was following so close on WWI, that everybody kind of did get it. So where they came back it was a different deal. Of course it was a totally different war, as well, but with the Vietnam War there were so many that didn’t go, like me, and relatively few that did, so that when y9oudid come back you are talking to a bunch of guys like me who don’t get it.

Yeah. I still can remember the picture of the sailor in New York, I think Times Square, and kissing the gal you know. But you look at WWII, they all came back together You went over as a division, a company, a battalion whatever, then you all came back. All together. Took you a week to sail back, over, OK, come back. That is the time to decompress, talk to share. I was on overseas national. Flew over to Vietnam, didn’t know anybody. While planeload of guys, didn’t know a single person. Sitting by myself, you know, wondering what have I gotten into here? June 6, 1970 I am on National Airlines coming back, didn’t know anybody, and didn’t know a soul. All just hodge-podge people. So I never went over as a group, never came back as a group, and I think that the military at least they tried in Iraq, to you know, send ‘em all over a s a group, bring them all back as a group. That is very important. I missed out on that. So, if you are not aware of that…

So perhaps there are some lessons from Vietnam that is being transferred to the war in Iraq. At least that one.

But it is huge.

It is huge. It is like being a part of a team, a football team, whatever, it essentially is a team.

Absolutely, and if you don’t have that, you know…

Amazing, well in your experience coming back, as you said now, and I have heard this from others, they just kind of took you back, dropped you in, and said see you later. Was there anything made available to you if you had wanted it? Any extra help?

Well, not really. But now I have to qualify. I came back, I had a month leave. I had two more years in the Navy, so I met some Vets in that two-year time frame. People that I could relate to. So I could talk about that. So when I finally walked out of the US Navy after 4 years, I was OK.

You had cleared it.

Yeah. But, no, there was a stigma, for PTSD, as you say, that hadn’t probably even been invented, but if you go seek help, if you go get counseling you are weak, you know it is a sign of weakness, or you’re crazy. So there was a huge stigma back then.

And right now we are looking at the repercussions of the Walter Reed Hospital stuff, and I know, we will be out of time with this interview. But I thought that we would have learned more and to allow that to happen after the experiences of Vietnam is sad.

No excuses. I mean and it is not as if Iraq snuck up on us. How many things have we done between Vietnam and Iraq that we could have been picking up on? We need to treat these people when they come back.

And I know with Post Traumatic Stress, I actually do those debriefings with the Emergency Responders and firefighters around here, so I know how important they are. And you were very lucky that you were still in the Navy and you got to go back and be with people that got it. You did have some lucky breaks. You had some good luck! It sounds like you took good advantage of it too.

Well it is not like you, what is the old saying? You get a handful of lemons or something…Make some lemonade. I was fortunate. Make no regrets. I have to say, and again my heart goes out to these veterans now that have been in heavy heavy combat, I mean I didn’t have friends killed, and body parts and dying. I mean I can’t imagine what they are going through. And these are the people now; we need to take care of these folks.

Well if there is anything that we can all agree on, it is that. Whether we agree politically on whether we should be there or not, it is beside the point.

And even this is huge. To, it is still, another chapter, it is also closure. It is also, you know addressing of the final realization.

Are you still doing you talk sessions with the vets?

No that all went by the wayside. It got replaced, I think by our efforts through the memorial.

Tell me a little bit about that. How did all of that start, and where is it now. We need to have that recorded somewhere. How did that all come about?

A friend of mine, Chuck Cole.  I think that we just sat down; I don’t know who came up and said. We need to do something. And, boy it was a long process. Started by going to the city council. And a mayor who I will not name, and his offer of support was two plane tickets back to see the wall back in Washington DC, so. You could imagine those kinds of walls that we had to deal with. Presented struggled argued, begged, talked, pleaded, the city got nowhere. And one commissioner, and I will name him: Bob Childs, bless his heart.

Wonderful man.

Yep. Liked the idea, and walked out on the sidewalk in the middle of winter, and he said pick a snowball, and throw where you want the memorial, and that is where it is going to be. And a lot of then, Rick Beusch, may he rest in peace.

Yes indeed.

He was the, Chuck and I were burnt out. And Rick took it over with motivation, and as a result, there it is.

Rick was a powerful guy. Quiet, powerful moving guy.

Great guy. And I mean the community. Rick’s fondest dreams were lets get the community involved in this lets make it a community effort and it is that now, and I am just delighted.

That and marching in the parade on July 4^th. It is amazing to me how many vets are still around.

And they are here, you know, and most of them are viable functioning, valuable part of the community. There are a few that are still in the woodwork; those are the guys that you gotta get.

So you made it back. Did you go back to school when you finally got out of the navy? Or did you finally do anything beyond that, no GI Bill stuff, and you just sort of left it behind you and said adios, I am onward and upward.

Well I came back here, and was then married very shortly thereafter with a family, so. I came back and…

Decided to move on with things…

Yeah, and it is interesting that you mention that. In a way I admire the Vietnamese people, they have gotten over this. They have gotten over Vietnam. I mean you see the country, and to them it is history. It is past. It is done. And they have carried on, they are going on with their lives, and to some degree, and I mean I am not dishonoring, not disrespecting any of our veterans, but we need to follow the Vietnamese example. They have gone on. It is over. Life goes on. They have carried on.

And they still honor there past, but in different ways. They don’t have to dredge it around and parade it; they know how to do it.

I wish that I could have, met…. First of all had a better command of the Vietnamese language, I mean I wish that I could have gotten more into that. Because they are a beautiful people. They are hard working, loyal, dedicated, they are good people.

I am glad that you had that experience. It is a wonderful thing to share. When you finally got back to Aspen, you started a new career. What was that? And where are you with that now?

Well, it was come back to get a job to feed the family. It was Rio Grand Motorway, which is now gone. 10 years with the Aspen Ski Company.

What did you do for the Aspen Ski Company?

Worked on lifts in Snowmass.

I did not know that. I remember Rio Grand Motorway though. All of those characters.

And summer jobs with Morris and Knudson up in Ashcroft. And in 1990, January 1, with the Aspen Police Department.

And you are still with the police department. And as you mentioned you are the SRO out at the high school. You and I were talking a little bit earlier, and the importance of having someone like you meet and greet those high school students on a daily basis, cannot be overstated. It is a powerful thing.

Well it is fall out from Columbine, and you know you want to get away from the stereotypical cop. (I am glad they are going it.) He is unapproachable, hard assed, you cant talk to him. He is not involved. It is just the opposite of what a cop should be. And I mean we are afforded that luxury here, so to be with the kid’s everyday, it is great. It is a lot of fun.

Well, I know that it is much appreciated. You are the right guy to be there. Not only do you have the wealth of experience, but also you have the calm demeanor that needs to be in that position.

Most of the time. Thank you.

And you have got a sense of humor, too.

That you need.

For those of you out there, I think that you need to hear this one story. Dan I don’t think that you have this anymore. But you would call his house and an answering machine would answer. And you would hear an airplane. And you would go, This is Dan and I am flying about 13,00 feet over…And I’ll get back to you as soon as I can…Do you remember that? I laughed so hard at that because it was so creative, and you honestly didn’t know whether you out there flying or not. I mean the sounds, the whole thing.

Oh yeah. Well the key to life is have a sense of humor and to laugh at it.

Yep. I agree with you on that one.  Of course I have never been accused of that, so I don’t have that problem.

You have. You’re the man.

Anyway. You are now at a point in your life where, what is next? You have got a few things ahead of you. What can we expect from Dan Glidden?

Well, as you know I wrote a couple of westerns that I think I made a $1.95 for 10 years of work.

Now did your dad make much on his first one?

Yeah. It was a good living.

I think that I need to reiterate, his dad was Luke Short. And anybody who is a western novel expert knows that that name is top of the line.

55, 56 books.  That he wrote over a lifetime. But I wrote a couple, and as I mentioned earlier to you, the first one I actually was working for M&K, up in Ashcroft. And I had sticky notes. And I would get an idea and I would stick it on the dashboard. And at the end of the day I would have this whole pocket full of sticky notes. Finished the book, sent it to my dad’s agent, and he said great. Write me another one. Sez oh man. 6 months later, 9 months later, book number 2 came out, and they were published. It is an honor to know that they were published. It is fun. I didn’t make any money, but I would like to take that again. And I have been dabbling in photography.

I could see that world for you. And you are fit and strong, and I understand that you are a grandpa now.

I am a grandpa. Two beautiful little ones.

And your daughters are here and there and everywhere like they should be.

Doing well. Life has been good I am very fortunate.

Boy after talking to you, of course I knew very little of this, you were a lucky guy!

Well let me go back. Growing up in Aspen, with Shadow Mountain episodes. This is insanity as only high school kids can do it. But we would divide up into teams and we would get four or five guys to go up on Shadow Mountain, and you had a pocket full of marbles, and a slingshot, and a sling. And we had pipes and crowbars and everything else up on the mountain. So the kid’s would all start by the Boomerang. And they would all start across an empty field, and we would start lobbing rocks about that big (a few inches) at them. So that was cool. So then they would get into the trees, and we would roll rocks down into the trees, biggest rocks, bigger rock that you could get the better. Down and through the trees. And then if they got up through the trees we would shoot marbles at them. Time out. Change sides. Then we would all go back and do it again. And we would do this all summer long. And nobody ever…God had to be out looking out after you. I mean seriously. All summer long. Grand time.

Well I am 10 years younger than you, and we used to do similar kinds of things, only with me it was mostly throwing dirt clods at each other. And climbing around Smuggler Mine. That was my insanity. How I lived through that one I will never know. Gosh. Great memories, and great times shared. And it is great talking to you.

My pleasure.

Is there anything else that you would like to bring into the mix as we bring this thing to a close?

I am just, my compliment to everybody involved in this. I am so honored and delighted to be able to be a part of this. My hats off.

Well when I saw that your name was on the list I made sure that I was going to be the one that interviewed you.

Well, to Daryl to you, to Col. Merritt, I am honored to be a part of it.

It is a good thing. It is a really good thing. Anyways, on that note I will thank you for sharing with us those treasured stories, and they are now going to be in the Library of Congress I think I where they are eventually going to end up. This is part of the Aspen Veterans History Project. I would like to thank, the Aspen Thrift Shop. The ladies of the Thrift Shop, who I think that Dan knows quite well. That is where he and I got all of our cloths for I think about 20 years. And also the Aspen Elks club. I understand that they have donated quite a bit of funding for this. And they have a special sensitivity to this as well. And thank you to GrassRoots, and all of those involved. I don’t know all who is, it doesn’t make any difference, we are going to close out here on Saint Patty’s Day, 2007, Dan thank you and thank you all.

Thank you.