The Draft Physical

About a year before my pre-induction physical, a friend told me about his pre-induction physical.

“It was a cold day in February when I went to my pre-induction physical in Lower Manhattan. I, and a hundred other guys, showed up early that sleeting morning and waited. I grew up in Nebraska and wasn’t used to the New Yorkers’ assertiveness.

About a half hour later, we were led into a large hall in what may have been an old court building. A master sergeant was about to address us when four men in dresses and skirts had climbed to the recessed windows several floors above and proclaimed that they would not serve in the Army or any other military branch. If their proclamation was ignored, they’d jump.

The sergeants gathered below and yelled, ‘Jump, jump you bleeping, bleeping, bleeps, jump.’ We were herded into an examining room, and I never learned what happened to those four guys. One sergeant said that the Marines drafted them, but I didn’t believe him. Others said that homosexuals were not drafted. Got to hand to those guys, they had guts to dress up like girls in New York.”

My draft experience was more tame but with some excitement to relieve the tedium. My draft board told me to report to the Oakland Army Terminal the morning of December 23, 1965, a Thursday. Transportation to Oakland would be provided, and I should be at the Napa bus station at 6:30 AM if I were to avail myself of the bus ride. Below the notification was a list of the awful consequences if I failed to report to the Army Terminal.

I arrived at the bus station at the appointed time and joined the crowd of about twenty young men who were headed to Oakland Army Terminal. I was the oldest and over dressed: khakis, a fresh shirt, polished penny loafers, and a tweed sport coat. Many of my companions that morning were wearing Levi’s and leather jackets over T-shirts. A young man approached me and asked, “Are you the doctor we’ll be seeing today?”

“No, I’m not. Like you, I’m on my way to a pre-induction physical.”

“How old are you?” He asked.

“Twenty-two.”

“How did you avoid the draft for so long?”

“I was in college for four years and had a deferment.”

“Shouldn’t you be taking a physical for officers?”

“I tried that, it didn’t work.”

Before having to explain my situation, the bus arrived; the young man rejoined his friends and boarded. I didn’t know anyone in the group and found a seat toward the back next to a snoring man. By the time we were on I-80 headed south, most of us had fallen asleep.

I always got lost in Oakland and don’t remember where the Army Terminal was. The bus pulled up next to a large building; an Army sergeant boarded and explained the day or two we would spend at the terminal. If I had known that I might be spending the night in Oakland, I would have brought a change of clothes and a dopp kit. I raised my hand to ask why we weren’t informed; the sergeant glared at me and continued talking about the physical and mental tests we would be taking.

He finished his talk by saying, “We don’t tolerate wise asses or dumb questions; so when in doubt, keep it to yourself. Got it?” Some of us nodded. “Oh, and one more point, the Marines are drafting now. Marines pride themselves in being an all volunteer force; I would not want to be a drafted Marine. Want to know why? The short answer is: Marine drill sergeants go after draftees and turn boot camp into a living hell. Now gentlemen, please follow me.”

We entered a large room; the walls were lined with lockers. We were assigned lockers and told to strip down to our underwear and socks. Each locker contained a small green bag that would hold our locker keys, wallets and watches; the bag’s drawstring went around our wrists. I knew that the physical exams would be done in my underwear; and the week before, I drove down to the Brooks Brothers store in San Francisco and bought the most unique men’s boxer shorts I had ever seen.

The unique underwear was horizon-blue cotton with mother of pearl buttons down the front. The waist bands were not elasticized; shoppers were advised to make sure their purchases were less than an inch over their exact waistline. The boxers had an adjustable cotton cinch below the waist on the back. The cinch was like the small buckled cinches on the back of the original Ivy League trousers that were popular in the mid-fifties. Several times that day, I was asked how the boxers worked and where did I buy them? I told that they had always been popular in London; as the day dragged on, I added that they had become quite popular on the Continent as well.

We were told to stand in a circle while doctors listened to our hearts, checked our blood pressure, mouths, ears, and eyes. We were told to sit down so they could check knee reflexes; afterwards we were told to pull our underwear down so we could cough while checked for hernias. We were herded into a smaller room and given small cups to urinate into. One fellow walked around saying, “Looking for diabetics, looking for diabetics…” Kind of funny, kind of desperate too.

After a couple of demeaning hours, we were led back to the locker room and told to dress for our mental examination. That was around the time that Muhammad Ali (people still called him Cassius Clay) failed his Army mental exam; whether or not he purposely failed the test was a boiling controversy. The sergeant handing out the tests explained the time limit and noted that test’s first half involved word meanings; the second dealt with shapes. Out of a hundred questions, fifty and above was passing. The sergeant ended by saying, “Should anyone fail the test, we’ll keep giving him tests until he passes, at which time he’ll be handed over to the Marines. Got it, you guys?” We nodded and started on the test. The last question on the first half was: Mary is a devious girl; what kind of girl is Mary? The four choices were: Bossy, Independent, Cute or Underhanded. I marked underhanded and passed the test.

The second part of the test boiled down to which of the four unfolded shapes would fold into the finished shape pictured. I hated those tests and never did well. Instead of getting a headache trying to figure out the forms, I marked A of the four possible choices and looked busy until time was called. The Sergeant and a Private graded the tests and passed them back to us; as expected, my results were near the bottom.

The fellow I met at the bus station that morning tapped my shoulder and said, “How did you do on the test?”

“I got a sixty-three.”

He said, “Where did you go to college?”

“Stanford.”

“How did you do there?”

“I graduated with an overall B average.”

He said, “Well, I got a ninety. So I must be a lot smarter than you.”

I gave my answer some thought, “Well, according to the United States Army, you’re streets ahead of me.”

The sergeant dismissed us for the day. Instead of the bus back to Napa, I took a cab to Berkeley.