Valor Friday

I don’t have the time this week to devote to a proper Valor Friday column, so I thought we could have a little fun with some celebrities and their military records (some that might surprise you).

We all know that Mr. Rogers was a body stacking Navy SEAL in Vietnam, but he wasn’t. He was never in the service. His PBS comrade Bob Ross, the famous happy little trees painter, was. He’d been military training instructor (MTI, what we zoomies call our drill sergeants) at one point and retired as a first sergeant (master sergeant). It was his career of yelling at people that led to his swearing off the practice in his later years, and thus his soft-spoken, peaceful persona was born.

Pictured (in a mirror image for some reason) above is Gunny R Lee Ermey (left) and Dale Dye. Both men are instantly recognizable for their big and small screen portrayals. Both were Marines during Vietnam. Both then went into the entertainment industry as technical advisors, and were so good at being the quintessential “military guy” that they ended up in front of the camera too. Ermey’s turn as Gunnery Sergeant Hartman in Full Metal Jacket is the character every drill sergeant will emulate for all time. Meanwhile Dye is perhaps best known on screen as Colonel Sink in Band of Brothers, but he also appeared in The Pacific and the more recent Masters of the Air. He was a technical advisor for all three productions, and ran the boot camp the actors for Band of Brothers were put through to make them look and act like soldiers.

Ermey left the Corps as a staff sergeant, but was later made an honorary gunny by the Commandant of the Marine Corps. Dye was a combat correspondent in Vietnam, working his way right to the front with the grunts. It was there that he Distinguished himself as a young enlisted Devil Dog that he was awarded the Bronze Star Medal for valor and three Purple Hearts. Dye made it to master sergeant before becoming a warrant officer and then an LDO, retiring as a captain.

Bob Gunton, who played the warden in Shawshank Redemption, was also in Vietnam. He was an RTO in the 501st Infantry Regiment, a part of the 101st Airborne Division. He was at the siege of Firebase Ripcord, and earned the Bronze Star w/ “V” for valor as one of the last men to leave the base before the NVA overran them.

For men of the Greatest Generation, most celebrities of the 50s and 60s had served. Those with some cachet behind their name, when drafted, were put into the special services as entertainment troops. Reagan is one of many such examples. Some though forced the service to press them to the front line.

Clark Gable, one of the top leading men of his generation, became Major Gable of the USAAF. He earned the Distinguished Flying Cross and Air Medal as an observer-gunner aboard 8th Air Force B-17s flying five missions over Germany. Jimmy Stewart, a major movie star by the time of the war, also desired combat. He took became a flier in the USAAF, and flew B-24’s in the European Theater. He remained in the reserves post-war, rising to brigadier general, and flew jet bombers for the Strategic Air Command. As a general, he flew as an observer on a combat flight of a B-52 over North Vietnam.

Ed McMahon joined the Marines during World War II to become a naval aviator. He earned his wings and was good enough to be assigned as a flight instructor on the F4U Corsair for most of the war. He wanted a combat assignment, and was slated for the Pacific Theater in 1945 but didn’t deploy before the war ended. He remained in the reserves post-war, was recalled to active duty during Korea flying O-1 Bird Dogs as an artillery spotter. He flew 85 missions and got six Air Medals. He made it to colonel before retiring in 1966.

Gene Roddenberry, creator of Star Trek, was a B-17 pilot in the USAAF in the Pacific Theater during World War II. He earned a DFC and Air Medal flying 89 combat missions, and was involved in two crashes (one as the pilot and the other as a passenger).

Johnny Cash and Chuck Norris were both USAF airmen during the 1950s. Humphrey Bogart served in the Navy during WWI. Mel Brooks was a radio operator in the 78th Infantry Division during World War II, arriving in France in November 1944. He was made a combat engineer and participated in the Battle of the Bulge. As the war ended, he became an entertainer in the Special Services, and was discharged in 1946 as a corporal.

Steve McQueen, learned how to be the “King of Cool” in the Marine Corps from 1947-1950. He was busted to private an astonishing seven times for disciplinary reasons and spent more than 40 days in the brig at one point. He definitely would have been a favorite of Chesty Puller who once remarked, “Take me to the Brig. I want to see the real Marines.”

Jimi Hendrix picked the Army when the judge gave him the choice between the service and jail in 1961 after getting caught twice in stolen cars. He became an infantryman, and a paratrooper, in the 101st Airborne Division. His obsession with music, his lack of military bearing, and an inability to follow the rules saw him drummed out of the service with a general under honorable discharge.

I can’t leave the women out. Bea Arthur was a staff sergeant in the Marine Corps Women’s Reserve during World War II, making her one of the relatively small group of Lady Marines. Her co-star on Golden Girls, Betty White, served during the war in the American Women’s Volunteer Service, a paramilitary organization that worked military support missions such as ambulance driver. Nancy Kulp, most famous as Miss Jane Hathaway on The Beverly Hillbillies, also wore a uniform during World War II. She was a lieutenant, junior grade in the US Navy Reserve, no doubt valuable experience she later relied on for her no-nonsense, by the book Hillbillies character.

In more modern times, Rob Riggle, Drew Carey, and Adam Driver were all Marines. The two former were in the reserves (Riggle retired as a colonel and Carey did 6 yrs and left as a sergeant), Driver was on active duty until an off-duty injury led to a medical discharge.

List some of your favorite little known celebrity veterans in the comments.

Category: Hidden Valor, Historical, Valor, We Remember