Cornerstone offers a variety of options for keeping children engaged during the summer. Please email dcossette@cornerstonesalina.com with questions and to reserve your spot for camp.

1. Kindersmusik Summer camp
For ages 3-7 yrs. Snack and craft included. Enroll for Kindermusik camp at www.joyfulnoisesalina.com. See attachment for full details.

2. New Student Camp
Each new student entering Grades Two and up will be required to take a mathematics placement test and a grammar placement test and may choose either June 2nd or 9th. Based on these test results we will ask students to attend at minimum four sessions throughout the summer for tutoring before school starts. All new students entering Grades Two and up will be asked to attend at minimum of four sessions of Latin camp.
Dates: June 16, 23, 30 July 7, 14, 21, and 28
Times: 8:00 – 9:00 Math
9:00 – 10:00 Grammar
10:00 – 11:00 Latin

3. The Mysterious Benedict Society Book Club
Join other Cornerstone students this summer as meet to discuss The Mysterious Benedict Society by Trenton Lee
Stewart! This book club will meet twice in June and twice in July to discuss the adventures of Reynie, Kate, Constance,
and Sticky as they work with Mr. Benedict to defeat Mr. Curtain and his nefarious Ten Men. This book club is for students entering Grade Two or above this fall. Children may come either having read it individually or having listened to it as a family read-aloud. A minimum of 10 children must register to make this camp viable. Let us know by May 17th if you would like to attend so we can order your copy. We will discuss the first seven chapters at our first meeting. Register soon to get your copy of TMBS in time to prepare for the first meeting!
Cost: $30.00 (includes the book)
Dates: June 9, June 23, July 14, and July 28
Times 1:00-2:00 pm. The nature studies garden and playground will be open for family playtime following the Book
Club.

4. Academic Refresher Camp
Grammar, writing, and math review for the upcoming year. Open to students entering Grades Two through Grade Six.
This is camp is for anyone who wants to jumpstart their child’s learning for next year.
Grammar 8:00 – 9:55.
Math 10:00– 11:55.
You may choose to attend one or both. A minimum of 8 students for each section must register to make this
camp viable.
Cost: $30 per child
Dates: August 2-6th
Times: Grammar 8:00 – 9:55.
Math 10:00 – 11:55.

5. ***FULL–Registration Closed*** Multi-Sports Camp
Ages 4-7. Enjoy a day of baseball, basketball, golf, and soccer. Each day will focus on one sport with time to learn skills,
read a story about that sport, and work on a character trait that will help you be a good sport.
Cost: $30
Dates: June 14th – 17th
Time: 9:00 am – 12:00 pm
Summers at Cornerstone

6. Baseball and Softball Camp
A minimum of 8 students must register. Students entering Grades Three through Six. This is a camp for any skill level. We will have three coaches to work with different skill levels. This camp will meet at the baseball field behind the VFW.
Cost: $30.00
Dates: July 19th – 22nd
Time: 9:00 am – 12:00 pm

7. Health and Fitness Camp
Students entering Grades Six and up. This camp will focus on nutrition, basic cardio, and lightweight lifting.
Dates: August 2nd – 5th
Time: 9:00 am – 12:00 pm

8. Tech Camp
Students entering Grades Five through Nine. A hands-on technology camp with a customized take-home project
Cost: $15 for supplies.
Dates: July 26th – 29th
Times: 10:00 am to 12:00 pm

PDF Cornerstone Camp flyer.

If you put a pull-up bar in the gym, students—more boys than girls—will line up to try it. Many of them will fail and many will not be able to do very many or as many as the boy who did the most. Some may not even be able to reach the bar but will have to jump for it to even have a chance. Nevertheless, they will try—and try repeatedly.

In many academic settings, boys are denied this experience. The “pull-up bar” in the reading classroom is put very low so boys can do it easily and so that the differences in ability and effort go unnoticed. Despite the way boys respond to challenge, teachers dare not put the bar high so as to challenge the boys, allow them to struggle or fail on the first try, or demonstrate how they are different from each other.

Education has to be a balance, and in our day, we need more of the pull-up bar experience in the classroom. I don’t know if I can put it better than T.H. White in The Once and Future King, “ ‘That [a person licking a dog’s nose] will come to be regarded as an insanitary habit,’ said Merlyn, ‘though I cannot see it myself. After all, God made the creature’s nose just as well as he made your tongue. If not better,’ added the philosopher pensively. The Wart did not know what Merlyn was talking about, but he liked him to talk. He did not like the grown-ups who talked down to him, but the ones who went on talking in their usual way, leaving him to leap along in their wake, jumping at meanings, guessing, clutching at known words, and chuckling at complicated jokes as they suddenly dawned. He had the glee of a porpoise then, pouring and leaping through strange seas.”

I have seen grammar school students read King Arthur by Roger Lancelyn Green in literature class. It was very hard—above them. They disliked it at first, but the teacher went slowly, and they did more in-class reading than usual. By the end of the book, they were in love with it. At the end, one reader who struggled greatly at the beginning confessed to the teacher, “I finished the book, and the ending was very sad.” These students learned about more than King Arthur in that exercise. They learned they can work at something difficult and unenjoyable and come to love it.

At Cornerstone, we encourage every family to participate in reading aloud together (even after children are able to read on their own), because it cultivates rich opportunities for academic, relational, and even spiritual growth. This study from the Australian National University explores the benefits of a well-stocked home library on children, even as they enter adulthood. Read the article here: https://www.smithsonianmag.com/smart-news/growing-surrounded-books-may-bolster-skills-later-life-180970523/

I don’t want you to think the wrong way about standardized testing, such as ERB tests or the CLT, etc.
 
Your goal is growth for your students. You cannot make them grow, but you can create an environment where faithful effort is a necessary condition for growth. You can also create an environment where there is a loose connection between faithful effort and growth. The former will engender growth for most of your students. The latter will engender growth for a select few.
 
The tests we take are not minimum skills tests. They are designed to work for the brightest students in the country. It is unreasonable to expect a high “percent correct” on these tests. You should expect students to grow from one test to another. Your daily faithfulness to preparation, your own learning, grading, consistency, expectations, student shepherding, and reasonableness creates the environment wherein students have to grow if they are going to be successful.
 
You may hear students talk about a “really hard question” on the test. This is not necessarily a reflection on your teaching or an indication that you failed to cover certain material. The test is designed so that a large majority of your students will encounter very hard questions.
 
That there are hard problems on the test and also in life is why it is essential that we provide students opportunities to struggle, fail, and succeed in a consistent classroom environment. It is this experience that teaches them how to continue on after failure or struggle, calling on God for help
 
This is also why it is important that we give our students the opportunity to struggle, to fail, and to succeed as this experience in a guided and safe environment of home and school prepares them to succeed through failure in life.

Salina, KS, February 22, 2021 – Cornerstone Classical School is a 2021 Casey’s Cash for Classrooms grant recipient. The school will receive $10,000 for its playground renovation. This project will help students and nearby families by making safe, outdoor play possible.

“With great thanks we have received a Cash for Classrooms Grant. This grant allows us to revitalize our playground so our students and neighbors can play safely. The grant comes just in time as we approach spring and the outdoor play season. It is a joy to see neighborhood families using the playground in the evenings, through the summer, and on the weekends.” Christopher Stevens, Headmaster

“The past year has been unlike any other for schools, and our Cash for Classrooms grants will help schools through this difficult time as well as to improve the learning environment for the future. Casey’s is here for good and that means supporting students, teachers and families in our local communities,” said Katie Petru, Director of Community at Casey’s.

School families helped with the project which began in the fall and will be completed by March 2021.

For more information on Casey’s Cash for Classrooms grant program, visit: www.caseys.com/community/cash-for-classrooms-grants. The 2022 grant program will open in the fall.

In addition to the grant program, Casey’s guests can support schools year round by directing their Casey’s Rewards points toward a donation to their school of choice. Sign up for Casey’s Rewards here.

Why do we continue to work hard, even harder, in a crisis?


I have been wondering about this. We started back only three days from the end of Spring Break. We have asked your children (and their teachers) to work hard by transitioning to Cornerstone at Home. I have found that this Cornerstone at Home is difficult. It is harder than normal days at school. A teacher cannot go to her desk and look over her notes for the next hour of class when she is working online. The students cannot depend on the teacher looking over their shoulders to see mistakes or signs of misunderstanding—they have to take the initiative and ask questions instead. This different work is hard work. The students have more responsibility working from home. For teachers, papers come in all at once—a pile of grading.


Why don’t we just take a break or take it easy? Why can’t it be “Cornerstone Light.” Why do we have to continue to work through our curriculum? Why can’t we just review?

God has given us work to do and time to do it in. We must be stewards of both this work and this time, for time passes never to return. While Covid-19 makes things more difficult, it does not change our responsibilities. We learn in James 1 that trials produce character. Cornerstone at Home is a trial, rather than running from it, we should lean into it to see what God has to teach us. 

We need people who can work in a crisis. Life is different. Things have changed; anxiety is surging, and school is harder at home. While we have many excuses to take it easy, it is important that we model the behavior we would like to see. We work hard doing our job, as a way to be faithful to our communities and to honor those who are working hard on the front lines—our doctors and healthcare workers. There would be something wrong if we sat back and ceased work we were able to do—albeit with a little more difficulty—while others around us risked their health to fight our common enemy—Covid-19. I am reminded of Uriah the Hittite who would not sleep in the comfort of his house while his men were on the front lines of battle. When America goes to war, we all do our part.

A corollary to the second point is that we are teaching our children that when adversity comes along, they should keep working and keep fighting. This is experience is an invaluable lesson for them! I hope and pray that Covid-19 is our last pandemic and our last crisis, but the history of the world tells us it won’t be. We are raising the next generation of front-line leaders and fighters. We need leaders in that generation who have the experience of working through adversity and pressing on without slack. Years from now, we want them to be ready to serve and fight on the front lines when they are called to face whatever challenge comes our way.

Parents, your feedback and support have been fantastic through this time. I am amazed by the reports I hear from teachers about your diligent children! I want to thank you for being leaders in your community by supporting the continued education of your children in this crisis. Please keep in touch with your teachers. They are available during school hours to help with questions and encourage your children in their work. 

We know that good parenting is an essential part of a child’s academic and moral development. Come hear Keith McCurdy, counselor and education specialist, talk about how to raise sturdy children.


Thursday, April 16, 2020, at 6:30 PM – 8 PM at First Southern Baptist Church – Salina, KS.


Keith provides counseling and consulting services as well as a variety of workshops on improving parenting skills, building strong marriages, and maintaining healthy relationships. He has developed and regularly offers parenting retreats entitled “Raising Sturdy Kids” to help parents operate from the correct paradigm with their children and has extended and customized this powerful program for schools and students.

From our Nation’s birth there have been people, men and women, who have given their lives in service to their country. Some of them in their serving, like John Adams or Thomas Jefferson, have lived to a ripe old age.  Others have died at a very young age; some would say too soon, but these people have all been patriots, full of courage and faith, who heard a call to serve. From our Nation’s earliest days there have been differences of opinion and politics that forced us to compromise and sometimes forced us to agree to disagree.
During the Viet-Nam era, the 1960’s through the 1970’s, the United States of America was deeply divided, more divided than any other time in our nation’s history, except for the time from the run-up to the civil war through reconstruction following the civil war. In the years after World War II, Viet-Nam had experienced civil war between communists and nationalists opposed to them. By the time the U.S. was involved, the country was divided into North Viet-Nam and South Viet-Nam, with the Communists ruling the north and their opponents the south.

People in the U.S. who were opposed to the Viet-Nam war voiced their disapproval in very radical means, ranging from outright violence at anti-war demonstrations to humiliating and degrading treatment of the soldiers who fought in the war.


People in favor of the war were somewhat more subdued in their support. President Richard Nixon called them “the silent majority” in a speech he gave in November of 1969. (For the full text of the speech, and to see our Nation from President Nixon’s view, see http://watergate.info/nixon/silent-majority-speech-1969.shtml.)  Some supporters did so at the ballot-box, others through letters to the editors of newspapers. Some were in favor of the war because they hated communism, and many of those volunteered to serve in our Nation’s armed forces.


You’re going to meet three patriots and see them through a friend’s eyes. They volunteered to serve in Viet-Nam and lost their lives. You may have heard the phrase “Freedom isn’t free.” These men’s lives and deaths attest to the truth in that saying. Their names are HARRELL SAMUEL MEFFORD, STEPHEN ANDREW YOUNG, and GENE JOHN OLSON. The friend who wrote this is Steve Collinsworth, and he served with them in Viet-Nam. All four men were U.S. Army Warrant Officer Aviators who served in Troop A, 1st Squadron, 9th Cavalry, , part of the air cavalry reconnaissance unit of the First Air Cavalry Division.


HARRELL SAMUEL MEFFORD
WO – W1 – Army – Reserve
Length of service 1 years
His tour began on Apr 6, 1969
Casualty was on Jun 29, 1969
In TAY NINH, SOUTH VIETNAM
Non-Hostile, died of illness/injury, HELICOPTER – PILOT
AIR LOSS, CRASH ON LAND
Body was recovered
Panel 21W – Line 34
 
There’s a phrase from Hegel that comes to mind when I think of Harrell Mefford, “the futility of war.”  His service in A Troop, 1st of the 9th Cav, was that of courage and commitment to our mission. It’s funny the things you remember about fellow soldiers.  Harrell’s nickname was “Worm,” if I remember correctly.  I have no idea where it came from, and my recollection may be wrong.  It may have had something to do with the thin, dark brown mustache he was growing when I last saw him.


Though I’m unsure of the source of his nickname, I know it took guts to be a scout pilot in 1st of the 9th Cav. You had to fly an OH-6A “Loach” scout helicopter at treetop level over the jungle as part of a hunter-killer team, hunting for enemy soldiers moving through the jungle below. And every day Worm flew these missions, taking his hunter Loach and two crewmen, flying over the jungle, covered by a Cobra gunship, the killer, flying above them at about 3,500 feet.


On the morning of June 29, 1969, Worm took off in a Loach with his crew, headed for the area of operations where we searched for the enemy. As he turned downwind after climbing to traffic pattern altitude he heard a loud bang from the tail section of the Loach, and he brought the helicopter back around to land at A Troop’s strip. As he slowed the Loach to near a hover it started spinning counter-clockwise – something had happened to the tail rotor, and it wasn’t working, wasn’t counteracting the torque.


The Loach’s left rear skid hit the airstrip, and then it tilted more to the left, the rotor blades striking the ground. The Loach seemed to be beating itself to death, and then I saw Worm jump from his door, trying to get clear.  One of the rotor blades struck him from behind, just where his neck and head joined, just below his flight helmet, and he fell to the ground motionless. He was pronounced dead a short time later at our local MASH hospital. Back to Hegel’s phrase, “the futility of war.”  Worm’s death seemed so futile. Had he and his crew been “taking fire,” (getting shot at by enemy ground forces) then it seems his dying would have meant something. But you see, his door gunner and observer, both enlisted men, sat in the Loach until the blades stopped turning, unhooked their seat belts, got out, and walked away without a scratch.

Shortly thereafter, our executive officer, Captain Paul Funk, talked to me and another new pilot about volunteering for scouts. I volunteered and learned scouting from the next guy.


STEPHEN ANDREW  YOUNG
WO – W1 – Army – Reserve
1st Cav Division (AMBL)
Length of service 0 years
His tour began on May 10, 1969
Casualty was on Aug 9, 1969
In TAY NINH, SOUTH VIETNAM
HOSTILE, HELICOPTER – PILOT
AIR LOSS, CRASH ON LAND
Body was recovered
Panel 20W – Line 120
 

He was my best friend in our scout platoon, and taught me all he knew about how to fly this very dangerous mission. Steve was a very good scout pilot, one of our best. He and his crewmen died on a mission over very hostile territory, too close to Cambodia. Our Division, The 1st Air Cav, had a job. We were assigned to an area where North Vietnamese Army (NVA) troops came out of Cambodia, off the Ho Chi Minh trail, into South Viet-Nam, and they tried to get through our area of operations and go to the city of Saigon to attack it or support Viet-Cong guerillas operating in and around Saigon.


There were large enemy base camps close to Cambodia, staging areas, the heart of where you didn’t want to take fire or pass from the view of the Cobra pilots watching your Loach. Both happened to Steve and his crew. There was some low cloud cover, early morning cumulus, and just as clouds hid Steve’s Loach from the Cobra crew’s sight, the Loach took fire and went down in the middle of an NVA staging area.


The Loach was burning when it hit the ground. Whether the fire was caused by NVA tracer rounds or a white phosphorus grenade in the Loach exploding, the fire destroyed the Loach and took the lives of those three young men. It took our infantry platoon and other 1st Cav infantry companies a couple of days to fight their way into the crash sight and recover their remains.  Here’s how “The Virtual Wall” website describes it.
“On 09 August 1969 three men from “A” Troop, 1/9th Cavalry, were conducting a recon mission in the area between Nui Ba Den Mountain and the Cambodian border. As they approached the border at a point about 18 kilometers northwest of Tonle Cham Airfield their helicopter, OH-6A tail number 67-16269, received heavy fire, began to burn, and crashed, killing all three men:

WO Stephen A. Young, Las Cruces, NM

SP5 James C. Dine, Granite City, IL

SP4 Michael R. Seibert, Parkersburg, IL

According to comments recorded in the Vietnam Helicopter Pilots’ Association database, there was a 48-hour dispute over access to the wreckage, with both the NVA/VC and US forces attempting to gain control of the area. One comment states the US Air Force lost an F-4 during the fight, but there’s no record of an F-4 loss in South Vietnam between 09 and 14 August 1969. Alpha 1/9 did lose another soldier on 09 August – Corporal Virgil L. Castle of Athens, Ohio was killed by gunshot. It is possible that he was in A/1/9’s aero-rifle platoon and was killed during the recovery effort.”
The time from when that Loach was shot down to when we recovered their bodies was a time of anguish and grief. We were so frustrated at not being able to recover our friend’s bodies without losing more of our own troops. We felt rage and bitterness toward the NVA soldiers who caused their deaths, and wanted vengeance. But we had to learn to wait for the right time and the right plan until we could recover their bodies.


GENE JOHN OLSON
WO – W1 – Army – Reserve
1st Cav Division (AMBL)
Length of service 0 years
His tour began on Jun 4, 1969
Casualty was on Jan 3, 1970
In TAY NINH, SOUTH VIETNAM
HOSTILE, HELICOPTER – CREW
AIR LOSS, CRASH ON LAND
Body was recovered
Panel 15W – Line 123

Gene was a Cobra pilot, an aircraft commander on a hunter/killer team to cover a scout ship. The “hunter” Loach had taken fire from a .51 caliber machine gun, and Gene was diving on the .51 cal. position, engaging it with his rockets and guns. And the unthinkable happened.  You see, Cobra pilots usually did not get hurt! They normally flew above the range of small arms fire, just diving towards enemy machine guns, firing their guns and rockets when needed.  A .51 cal. round came through the side of the Cobra, took off the top of Gene’s cyclic control (the stick that lets the pilot control the aircraft’s directional movement), and tore open Gene’s femoral artery.


His copilot in the Cobra’s front seat was somehow able to recover the aircraft from the dive just at treetop level and fly back the MASH hospital’s helipad. But in those few minutes Gene bled to death. He was so young, had just been married before coming to Vietnam, and his wife had recently given birth to their first child.


This was the kind of guy you wanted covering you when you were the low bird in a hunter-killer team. He was conscientious, serious, young, full of life, and such a good, good pilot!  One of the top students in his flight school class, he went from flight school graduation to Cobra transition school, then to ‘Nam. He had it made, driving a gunship up there out of danger, keeping his eyes peeled for us in our Loaches, but an NVA gunner got, well, lucky.


So what’s the point? We were all in South Viet-Nam because of something we believed. Our nation was trying to help the people of South Viet-Nam live free of a communist dictatorship.  We believed freedom was not free, that someone had to step up and bear arms against this enemy, so we volunteered.


Today our nation is facing an enemy that claims to represent a religion which they say teaches them to do vile, hateful acts of murder and destruction. You may have parents, uncles or aunts, older brothers or sisters, or friends serving in our armed forces. You may be thinking of enlisting in the military after high school or college.  From our nation’s beginnings, we have needed people with courage and faith to face our enemies, and to grow strong and robust as a country. These three young men, HARRELL SAMUEL MEFFORD, STEPHEN ANDREW YOUNG, and GENE JOHN OLSON, were such men of courage and faith. Learn from their example, their service, and their love of country.

Friends on the Wall

From our Nation’s birth there have been people, men and women, who have given their lives in service to their country. Some of them in their serving, like John Adams or Thomas Jefferson, have lived to a ripe old age.  Others have died at a very young age; some would say too soon, but these people have all been patriots, full of courage and faith, who heard a call to serve. From our Nation’s earliest days there have been differences of opinion and politics that forced us to compromise and sometimes forced us to agree to disagree.
During the Viet-Nam era, the 1960’s through the 1970’s, the United States of America was deeply divided, more divided than any other time in our nation’s history, except for the time from the run-up to the civil war through reconstruction following the civil war. In the years after World War II, Viet-Nam had experienced civil war between communists and nationalists opposed to them. By the time the U.S. was involved, the country was divided into North Viet-Nam and South Viet-Nam, with the Communists ruling the north and their opponents the south.

People in the U.S. who were opposed to the Viet-Nam war voiced their disapproval in very radical means, ranging from outright violence at anti-war demonstrations to humiliating and degrading treatment of the soldiers who fought in the war.


People in favor of the war were somewhat more subdued in their support. President Richard Nixon called them “the silent majority” in a speech he gave in November of 1969. (For the full text of the speech, and to see our Nation from President Nixon’s view, see http://watergate.info/nixon/silent-majority-speech-1969.shtml.)  Some supporters did so at the ballot-box, others through letters to the editors of newspapers. Some were in favor of the war because they hated communism, and many of those volunteered to serve in our Nation’s armed forces.


You’re going to meet three patriots and see them through a friend’s eyes. They volunteered to serve in Viet-Nam and lost their lives. You may have heard the phrase “Freedom isn’t free.” These men’s lives and deaths attest to the truth in that saying. Their names are HARRELL SAMUEL MEFFORD, STEPHEN ANDREW YOUNG, and GENE JOHN OLSON. The friend who wrote this is Steve Collinsworth, and he served with them in Viet-Nam. All four men were U.S. Army Warrant Officer Aviators who served in Troop A, 1st Squadron, 9th Cavalry, , part of the air cavalry reconnaissance unit of the First Air Cavalry Division.


HARRELL SAMUEL MEFFORD
WO – W1 – Army – Reserve
Length of service 1 years
His tour began on Apr 6, 1969
Casualty was on Jun 29, 1969
In TAY NINH, SOUTH VIETNAM
Non-Hostile, died of illness/injury, HELICOPTER – PILOT
AIR LOSS, CRASH ON LAND
Body was recovered
Panel 21W – Line 34
 
There’s a phrase from Hegel that comes to mind when I think of Harrell Mefford, “the futility of war.”  His service in A Troop, 1st of the 9th Cav, was that of courage and commitment to our mission. It’s funny the things you remember about fellow soldiers.  Harrell’s nickname was “Worm,” if I remember correctly.  I have no idea where it came from, and my recollection may be wrong.  It may have had something to do with the thin, dark brown mustache he was growing when I last saw him.


Though I’m unsure of the source of his nickname, I know it took guts to be a scout pilot in 1st of the 9th Cav. You had to fly an OH-6A “Loach” scout helicopter at treetop level over the jungle as part of a hunter-killer team, hunting for enemy soldiers moving through the jungle below. And every day Worm flew these missions, taking his hunter Loach and two crewmen, flying over the jungle, covered by a Cobra gunship, the killer, flying above them at about 3,500 feet.


On the morning of June 29, 1969, Worm took off in a Loach with his crew, headed for the area of operations where we searched for the enemy. As he turned downwind after climbing to traffic pattern altitude he heard a loud bang from the tail section of the Loach, and he brought the helicopter back around to land at A Troop’s strip. As he slowed the Loach to near a hover it started spinning counter-clockwise – something had happened to the tail rotor, and it wasn’t working, wasn’t counteracting the torque.


The Loach’s left rear skid hit the airstrip, and then it tilted more to the left, the rotor blades striking the ground. The Loach seemed to be beating itself to death, and then I saw Worm jump from his door, trying to get clear.  One of the rotor blades struck him from behind, just where his neck and head joined, just below his flight helmet, and he fell to the ground motionless. He was pronounced dead a short time later at our local MASH hospital. Back to Hegel’s phrase, “the futility of war.”  Worm’s death seemed so futile. Had he and his crew been “taking fire,” (getting shot at by enemy ground forces) then it seems his dying would have meant something. But you see, his door gunner and observer, both enlisted men, sat in the Loach until the blades stopped turning, unhooked their seat belts, got out, and walked away without a scratch.

Shortly thereafter, our executive officer, Captain Paul Funk, talked to me and another new pilot about volunteering for scouts. I volunteered and learned scouting from the next guy.


STEPHEN ANDREW  YOUNG
WO – W1 – Army – Reserve
1st Cav Division (AMBL)
Length of service 0 years
His tour began on May 10, 1969
Casualty was on Aug 9, 1969
In TAY NINH, SOUTH VIETNAM
HOSTILE, HELICOPTER – PILOT
AIR LOSS, CRASH ON LAND
Body was recovered
Panel 20W – Line 120
 

He was my best friend in our scout platoon, and taught me all he knew about how to fly this very dangerous mission. Steve was a very good scout pilot, one of our best. He and his crewmen died on a mission over very hostile territory, too close to Cambodia. Our Division, The 1st Air Cav, had a job. We were assigned to an area where North Vietnamese Army (NVA) troops came out of Cambodia, off the Ho Chi Minh trail, into South Viet-Nam, and they tried to get through our area of operations and go to the city of Saigon to attack it or support Viet-Cong guerillas operating in and around Saigon.


There were large enemy base camps close to Cambodia, staging areas, the heart of where you didn’t want to take fire or pass from the view of the Cobra pilots watching your Loach. Both happened to Steve and his crew. There was some low cloud cover, early morning cumulus, and just as clouds hid Steve’s Loach from the Cobra crew’s sight, the Loach took fire and went down in the middle of an NVA staging area.


The Loach was burning when it hit the ground. Whether the fire was caused by NVA tracer rounds or a white phosphorus grenade in the Loach exploding, the fire destroyed the Loach and took the lives of those three young men. It took our infantry platoon and other 1st Cav infantry companies a couple of days to fight their way into the crash sight and recover their remains.  Here’s how “The Virtual Wall” website describes it.
“On 09 August 1969 three men from “A” Troop, 1/9th Cavalry, were conducting a recon mission in the area between Nui Ba Den Mountain and the Cambodian border. As they approached the border at a point about 18 kilometers northwest of Tonle Cham Airfield their helicopter, OH-6A tail number 67-16269, received heavy fire, began to burn, and crashed, killing all three men:

WO Stephen A. Young, Las Cruces, NM

SP5 James C. Dine, Granite City, IL

SP4 Michael R. Seibert, Parkersburg, IL

According to comments recorded in the Vietnam Helicopter Pilots’ Association database, there was a 48-hour dispute over access to the wreckage, with both the NVA/VC and US forces attempting to gain control of the area. One comment states the US Air Force lost an F-4 during the fight, but there’s no record of an F-4 loss in South Vietnam between 09 and 14 August 1969. Alpha 1/9 did lose another soldier on 09 August – Corporal Virgil L. Castle of Athens, Ohio was killed by gunshot. It is possible that he was in A/1/9’s aero-rifle platoon and was killed during the recovery effort.”
The time from when that Loach was shot down to when we recovered their bodies was a time of anguish and grief. We were so frustrated at not being able to recover our friend’s bodies without losing more of our own troops. We felt rage and bitterness toward the NVA soldiers who caused their deaths, and wanted vengeance. But we had to learn to wait for the right time and the right plan until we could recover their bodies.


GENE JOHN OLSON
WO – W1 – Army – Reserve
1st Cav Division (AMBL)
Length of service 0 years
His tour began on Jun 4, 1969
Casualty was on Jan 3, 1970
In TAY NINH, SOUTH VIETNAM
HOSTILE, HELICOPTER – CREW
AIR LOSS, CRASH ON LAND
Body was recovered
Panel 15W – Line 123

Gene was a Cobra pilot, an aircraft commander on a hunter/killer team to cover a scout ship. The “hunter” Loach had taken fire from a .51 caliber machine gun, and Gene was diving on the .51 cal. position, engaging it with his rockets and guns. And the unthinkable happened.  You see, Cobra pilots usually did not get hurt! They normally flew above the range of small arms fire, just diving towards enemy machine guns, firing their guns and rockets when needed.  A .51 cal. round came through the side of the Cobra, took off the top of Gene’s cyclic control (the stick that lets the pilot control the aircraft’s directional movement), and tore open Gene’s femoral artery.


His copilot in the Cobra’s front seat was somehow able to recover the aircraft from the dive just at treetop level and fly back the MASH hospital’s helipad. But in those few minutes Gene bled to death. He was so young, had just been married before coming to Vietnam, and his wife had recently given birth to their first child.


This was the kind of guy you wanted covering you when you were the low bird in a hunter-killer team. He was conscientious, serious, young, full of life, and such a good, good pilot!  One of the top students in his flight school class, he went from flight school graduation to Cobra transition school, then to ‘Nam. He had it made, driving a gunship up there out of danger, keeping his eyes peeled for us in our Loaches, but an NVA gunner got, well, lucky.


So what’s the point? We were all in South Viet-Nam because of something we believed. Our nation was trying to help the people of South Viet-Nam live free of a communist dictatorship.  We believed freedom was not free, that someone had to step up and bear arms against this enemy, so we volunteered.


Today our nation is facing an enemy that claims to represent a religion which they say teaches them to do vile, hateful acts of murder and destruction. You may have parents, uncles or aunts, older brothers or sisters, or friends serving in our armed forces. You may be thinking of enlisting in the military after high school or college.  From our nation’s beginnings, we have needed people with courage and faith to face our enemies, and to grow strong and robust as a country. These three young men, HARRELL SAMUEL MEFFORD, STEPHEN ANDREW YOUNG, and GENE JOHN OLSON, were such men of courage and faith. Learn from their example, their service, and their love of country.

The pace and demands of our world keep teachers and parents very busy. They do not often have time to think about what it means to be a human being raising children to be good, free adults. We need to think deeply about what is happening when our children disappoint us.
We tend to think that every time a student or child does not do what we want, they are actively disobeying or trying to be difficult. In truth, there are at least four reasons a child may not comply with our expectations, rules, or wishes.


Sometimes a student is just being bad. They might want to cause trouble. Encourage these students to do the right thing and provide consequences and counseling to help them.


Unwritten expectations. We learn many things through experience, including accepted ways of interacting and communal responsibilities that we have to one another as adults. Children are unfamiliar with these things. A teacher of mine told me about a time when she was waiting for her parents to pick her up from an event. They were running extremely late. To help them out, she decided to hitch a ride home with friends. She had no ill will. When her parents eventually arrived, they panicked. She soon learned to think about others’ expectations for her in these situations.
Foolishness. Children have an age-appropriate foolishness. While they still need consequences for foolish behavior, try to approach things differently than if a child is simply “being bad.” In my experience, boys especially seem to learn about the world by doing silly things. I have had boys turn a water cooler into a bar—serving up water to friends during break. Some of these same boys decided to crush the used water cups by holding them to their chest and running into the wall. From the adult perspective, this was purposeless and senseless behavior. They put a hole in the wall. Initially, this looks pretty bad, but they did not intend to break the wall. They were having a silly, good time. I appreciated their honesty! They paid to fix the hole, but that was it. When I discipline students, I always look for simple foolishness; it still needs a consequence, but sometimes it merits a different approach than if someone was “being bad.”


Giftedness. Each of our children are uniquely gifted. We work, play, and solve problems out of our giftedness. This means that different people may solve the same problem in different ways. I can remember bringing firewood inside with my older brother. We disagreed over the best, fastest way to do it. I am sure he had the better way, but I wanted to experiment to know for myself. We got in a fight over it. In families and schools, we have to have a certain efficiency without which we would get very little done. This means that people must bend to make things work. Growing up with seven siblings and one bathroom, there was not a lot of time for creativity, primping, and prepping in the bathroom before school or church! We did not have the time for eight people to do things in eight different ways. Teachers face a similar challenge in the classroom. There has to be one way to turn paper in—not 25. It is helpful to remember that frustration is sometimes a function of someone trying to work within their giftedness. Study your children to learn their loves and gifts. Parents of larger families need to take the time to mediate both time and power so that each child has opportunities to do things their own way. No one can do it their way all the time, but some time for this is good and healthy. It is not good if everyone has to do it their older brother’s way, their coaches way, or their parents’ way all the time.


Take time out to remember that you are working with children. Children who are learning, growing, and making mistakes. Not every child who frustrates us is out to make things difficult. Sometimes, children are just trying to make their way in a big, adult world.