Excerpts from the Preface...
.....I had entered a program with a proud history. Red Cross first initiated its supplemental recreation program during WWII
at the request of the Secretary of War. In June 1950 MacArthur asked Red Cross centers in Korea to continue the
clubmobile of WWII with programs for the men and a special portable component....donut machines. Over the course
of the next twenty years of operations and almost 3 million miles clubmobile would become synonymous with donut
distribution and the 899 women who served them, “Donut Dollies.” Surely it must have been a record that they could
turn out 20,000 donuts a day when the troop ships were in.
...There were 627 of us who served mostly year-long tours in Vietnam (without donut machines). By the time the last
of the twenty-seven units shut its doors at Bien Hoa in 1972 we’d averaged 17,000 air miles monthly for a grand total
of 2,125,000. If it flew and had room for “two Donuts” and a program you can bet we took it.
... Our job was communicating a touch of home to the troops, but staying in contact with home…well, that was another
challenge altogether. Compared to today’s instant communication technology ours was embryonic. We wrote or typed letters
and mailed them in envelopes. We also recorded messages on small reel-to-reel tapes, eagerly waiting to receive them from
family and friends just to hear their voices....
Living in Vietnam was like living in a fishbowl with nowhere to be entirely alone. Dating was scrutinized, community
involvement discouraged and forbidden in uniform. The appearance of impropriety could result in the immediate transfer
to another unit and its certainty, a one-way ticket home....
I left Vietnam but, truth be told, it hasn’t left me. Triggered occasionally by the most ordinary sound, sight or smell I am
instantly transported there, however briefly, and in this… I’m not alone.
Would I do it all again? Absolutely.
Would I want my daughter to go? Never.
J. Holley McAleese Watts
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