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Gerszewski Barracks in 1975

By: SP4 Chelle Clements

HHC S-4 Water Purification Specialist

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Here is a map of the military installations in the Karlsruhe area in the 1970s.
You'll see Gerszewski, Smiley, Neureut and more.
MAP
Dave Nelson provided the link.
Thanks Dave!

Here is a map of Gerszewski Barracks


After driving through the Main Gate (#2) drive up and make a left, the 79th was in the left-half of the Kaserne, and the 249th was in the right-half.

That place was home for many GIs and is among those unique things in life that are forever known by only one word. People like Elvis, Cher, Bono, Hillary;
Places like Yellowstone, Yosemite, and others.
And thus, so be it forever known ....

"GERSZEWSKI"

Bruce -
I found a few more shots when I was going thru my old photo albums...I guess it says something about this project that I am finding pieces of my memory everywhere! Now to give a few notes on the shots, mostly from '75:


Guard duty at the front gate as viewed from the wac shack...I guess some of us had to wear those silly helmets! I had forgotten! I remember everyone took turns on the front gate, but only guys did the back gate it is not safe for women.... Do you remember trying to close down the nco club on saturday nights? That was always fun...Saturday was Country and Western night, and no one wanted to go home, so whoever had guard duty had the pleasure of escorting the patrons out.


The shot looking over to the 79th from the top of the 249th wac shack

This photo was taken from the building on the left of the #2 (front gate) shown on the MAP. You are looking directly at #1 (HHC) on the map behind the Snack Bar building with the tree. Charlie is behind HHC. Operations is to the right of Charlie at the top right of the picture.

Do you remember the Friday afternoon parties out in front of HHC? The ones with a jeep trailer filled with beer and playing drinking games until the light disappeared around 11 at night? I was a lightweight drinker and could not keep up on those games, but I tried (rather unsuccessfully!).

At one of those parties someone threw me into the trailer with all that ice and water...it was hot outside and cold in the ice! I was wearing brand new jeans and new clogs...my legs turned blue and my feet were a weird yellow-ish color. I think the party moved to Wes Husband's place after that. I remember I had to go shower and change (the better to not look like a chameleon), and then a bunch of us went to Wes's.

Wes Husband lived at Smiley with his family as I recall. He was there when I got there and he was there after I left. He's probably still there. Here is another picture showing S3 down there between the buildings in the Fall of 1974.

He's another guy I have very fond memories of, he had a great sense of humor and he liked to laugh. And I didn't realize how great his comb-over was until one p.t. afternoon during a hot spell we all did at the pool (after the usual 'shirts and skins' football game at the field)...his hair was hanging over his face down to his chin and there wasn't much on top! You know, those o.d. caps hid many a follicle-challenged head! another joke/memory on the shirts and skins games...some of us women would wear our swim suit tops down to the field and be on the 'skins', partly because because we were so dang cute anyway and partly because it was such wicked fun to be such exhibitionists (There! A chick finally admitted it!) ...ah to be young and skinny and stupid again!


I think this unit behind the 249th was the 501st Ordnance Company...I think!
Anyway, it is a good shot of what the buildings we lived in looked like.
MAP


This was the view from my room on the 3rd floor of the 249th (wac shack) towards the river where the ESSO refinery was. In my shot I can make out the 'ESSO' markings on one of the middle stacks. I guess I should look for the shot I took at twilight...The lights were so pretty, and you'd like it. When I was back in Karlsruhe last June those stacks were one of my landmarks as I wandered around...they are still there.

Don't be fooled by the industry there. Just behind all that is this.

In the fullness of time the 79th Engineer Battalion occupied the same location that the Roman Army controlled from about 58 BC to roughly 500 AD.

In 1975 AD one of those soldiers from the 79th was watching another pull maintenance on a truck.

This fact was not known by you until now. His name was Reggie Snowden.

He was caught by a camera while scratching his balls on that day in 1975. It happens to the best of us sometimes.

Chelle, being the absolute doll that she is, called it something else.


Reggie Snowden holding up a wall at the S-4 motorpool while Englund works.
Reggie was pretty smart, (I'll say) I wonder what ever happened to him.


Stan working on his beloved 3/4 ton in the S-4 motorpool. Stan loved that truck, a 3-speed with a missing 2nd gear! When driving it you had to really get all you could out of 1st then jump to 3rd. (Ah, what a battle ready army we had. Obviously the same truck that Woolsey is sitting on in 1963. He probably stripped the gear; right Dan? Uh huh ...)

Stan taught me how to drive it on my first field exercise, but we were not with the 79th, we were with that other engineer outfit on the other side of Karlsruhe, the HUGE outfit. (That was the 78th Combat Engineers at Rheinland Kaserne) They had something like 4 water pure trucks (to our one) and a bunch of people. She means "Boo-coo dudes, man."

They also had a little racial problem in 1970. Click Here and scroll near the bottom. But this is what it says:

"In April, 1970, an organization of racist lifers burned a KKK-style cross at an army base in Karlsruhe, Germany. On April 11, rebellious anti-racist soldiers took the offensive. Black and white GI’s of the 78th Engineers Battalion launched a coordinated, pre-planned attack on the highly sensitive Atomic Demolition Maintenance Section. Using Molotiv cocktails and pickaxes, they decommissioned 23 trucks and burnt the headquarters of the commanding and executive officers to the ground."

Anyway, that exercise was next to some river (not the Rhein), the field was all messed up from the heavy equipment and had deep trenches from the tires. Stan was trying to teach me to shift that old 3/4 ton truck with the missing 2nd gear as the truck jumped from one ditch to the next! It was hysterical!

Hugs! Chelle

Thanks Again Chelle! These pictures are GREAT!!!
You are such a doll for sharing them with us!



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Bruce Christman, Chelle Clements
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