Quite a coincidence. My dad was an HM3 on the USS Frontier from 1964 to 1967. He also passed in 2016. He never talked much about his service though. I only remember one story he told where US soldiers were issued bullet proof vests for the first time, and they chose to try them out by shooting each other with M16s. The result wasn't pretty.

My Father-in-law was a Vietnam Vet, an older one who had been in the military for awhile and made a career out of it. I believe he retired in 1978, he passed several years ago. My wife was born after he retired and he spoke very little about the war. He had PTSD, but he'd mostly dealt with it by the time I met him.

The only vivid story I recall. He talked about when they were stationed at an outpost. The supplies would be stacked up in a central area and he was getting the rations for his men. There was an explosion and everyone thought they were being shelled.

However, it turned out that one of the other Sergeants was wearing a grenade on his vest. The pin caught on something and pulled out without him noticing.

They had to spend the next few days taping down the pins on all the grenades to avoid another accident.

Fascinating. I wonder what the psychology is there.

I saw a Plymouth Superbird a couple years ago that had “original damage”. It looked like it had been stolen and taken on a joyride. No straight body panels, scratches everywhere.

The story went that some kid got drafted and figured he was never coming home so he spent his life savings on the fastest car he could and tried to have as much fun as possible.

I assume it is a similar state of mind to a terminal medical diagnosis.

pro-Russian rebels of the Donbass war trying out bulletproof vest

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2ysQqHKYV1o

Arghhh! Where was Darwin when this video was made?

I worked with a electrician whom was my boss.

The company supplied us with kevlar gloves.

He took a drywall knife, and with all his might, propelled the knife into his hand.

He was know as Kevlar Ken from then on.

This is really cool, what an honor to see. Thank you for digitizing the footage and sharing it to the world.

Couple q's if you're up for it:

* What camera did he have? Was it common in that era for cameras to not have a mic? (not complaining, just curious)

* Did he ever watch the footage, after the war? I know some veterans, depending on how they processed their experience, just block it all out.

* Can you share more on what he thought of his service there?

* I'm not sure of the specifics of the camera. But the reels of film say "KodaChrome Movie Film Super 8" on their boxes.

* I don't think he ever saw the footage. I would assume that at some point he had a projector, but as far as I can remember, he just always kept them in his top drawer. He always talked about getting them transferred to VHS. Never did it.

* He's in the video at 38 seconds in. I assume his buddy from the previous frames filmed him. https://youtu.be/1hiNanqC5aQ?t=38

He didn't like the military. He had a lot of explosive outbursts I remember growing up. Later in his life, when he was finally convinced to see a VA doctor, he was diagnosed with PTSD with - 100% related to the war. He received full disability but very late in life. He was fired from so many jobs during his lifetime.

Most Super 8 cameras could not record sound.

In the 70s, Kodak introduced a variant of Super 8 film that had a magnetic strip for audio, but it wasn’t widely used. Later in the 70s video on magnetic tape cassettes became popular, which was the first time most people had home movies with sound.

Both technologies arrived too late for the US war in Vietnam.

Amazing... my aeromedical examiner, Dr Richard Pellerin, served as a special forces medical corpsman in Vietnam in 1969/1970. He also filmed his own observations and recently digitized/uploaded about an hour worth, along with narration. Powerful stuff. https://youtu.be/87Dd7GSNAPM

Dont imagine and look at the article . They refer to photos taken by vietnamese photographers. It is actually pretty good.