The Cage - Project Update - Aug 8, 2019

Hi, <<First Name>>,

It’s been a while since I’ve sent any information to the mailing list, so I thought I would catch you up with some news and information.

As you know, I’ve been working on a book about the 1st Battalion, 3rd Marines in the Vietnam War. For now, it’s called “The Cage”, which is a loose reference to Operation Beaver Cage, although the book is not just about that operation. I’ll find a better title at some point, but it helps to have a temporary working title for now, just so that we can refer to the project by a name. Going forward, I’ll be providing you with more frequent updates since I will now be putting a lot more attention to the book. Which brings me to my first bit of news...

At the end of June, I retired from twenty-three years in software so that I could focus full-time on writing. That’s right - I’m going all in! I’ve stepped way the hell out of my comfort zone and I’m a little bit terrified, but I just hope it goes to show that I am committed.

By selling my ownership back to Base22, the company I started about twelve years ago, I’ve afforded myself about four years of freedom to write. According to my “no promises” plan, I will put the first 21 months into completing and publishing The Cage. After that, I have a few fiction novels that I want to write. If at the end of my four-year window, I’m not seeing much promise with those fiction books, I guess I’ll just have to switch gears and find some other way to pay the bills. I do have a “Plan B” for that too, just in case (I may be a little crazy, but I’m not stupid). Either way, I will at least be able to go to my deathbed without the regret of never having tried.

Since I left my company, I’ve had a lot of transitional “life” stuff to sort out, but that’s almost squared away now and I expect to be putting much more sweat into the project. So, where are we with The Cage?

Here’s a brief summary of some of the work that’s been done to date:

Preliminary interviews completed with 11 veterans:
- Andrew, Lynn (Andy)
- Bozeman, Steve
- Bruce, Curt
- Cook, James Arthur (Jim)
- DePope, Jack "Doc"
- Edgemon, Lee
- Hall, Stanley "Doc"
- Hittson, Jessie
- Kelley, Ray "Machine Gun Kelley"
- Nollman, Tom
- Hicks, Ken
24 hours and 21 minutes of recorded audio interviews transcribed to text
Additional information collected from email correspondence with veterans
292 photos collected and digitized; some of which are published online.
Other resources collected such as video: Silver Star Ceremony Honoring L/Cpl Raymond Kelley, May 18, 2018
Operation Beaver Cage Command Chronology transcribed to HTML for better formatting and search ability.
Attended two 1/3 Marine reunions to meet veterans, listen and learn (San Antonio 2016 and Colorado Springs 2018); scheduled for 2019 reunion this September.

I feel like I now have enough preliminary research to start writing a first draft, or the “discovery draft” as writers call it. I’ve also heard it called the “shitty first draft” or the “puke draft”. The point is that I now need to take what I’ve learned and put it in a narrative form. If I am to follow the advice of published authors, I shouldn’t edit much while writing the first draft and the result will be necessarily sloppy, but that’s how the process goes.

I will also be continuing the research process, of course. There are more interviews to conduct, follow-up interviews, books to read, people to meet, places to visit (such as the National Museum of the Marine Corps near Quantico, Virginia again, The Vietnam Center and Archive at Texas Tech, and perhaps even Vietnam itself).

As I said, I’ll keep you posted more frequently from now on. Until next time, I leave you with these announcements...

1/3 Marines Website Redesign

The 1st Battalion / 3rd Marines Website (onethreemarines.com), maintained by Don Bumgarner (Charlie Company, Wpns -60mm Mortars), has been revamped! Behind the scenes is a new content management system called WordPress which allows for easier updates to the site, as evidenced by all the new changes. If you haven’t been to the site in a while, you might want to take a look now. There are tons of photos (many of them new to the site), company rosters, war stories, history information, links to other resources, and more. A special thanks goes out to Don for all the work he’s done in providing and maintaining the site; it continues to be a valuable reference for the project.

65th Annual Third Marine Division Reunion

This photo of Save On Branson is courtesy of TripAdvisor

The 2019 Reunion is fast approaching and is to be held Sept 17th to 22nd at the following location:

Radisson Hotel Branson
120 South Wildwood Drive
Branson, MO 65616
(417) 335-5767

Registration postmarked by Aug 15th is $25.00 and then $35.00 thereafter. Onsite registration is $45.00.

More information can be found on the 65th Annual Reunion Information page of the Third Marine Division Association website (caltrap.org).

New Photos from Curt Bruce

Curt Bruce (Delta Company) provided some new photos taken during his ‘65 - ‘66 tour for our growing collection.

See: Vietnam Tour of Duty Photographs by Curt Bruce

Great quality photos! Thanks Curt!

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