OralHistory

Life on the home front during the Vietnam war was not a good time for anyone involved with the war. If you had relatives that were fighting in Vietnam, it was a very depressing atmosphere in the home environment. You never knew if your brother, or your uncle, or your father, or even your grandfather would be coming home from the war in body bags. I know it was hard for my grandmother, because her brother was in the war. Sure it was just one brother, but this brother meant a lot to her family than anyone else. Shortly after my grandma's older sister was born, my great grandma gave birth to her first born son, Ronnie. A short thirteen months after he was born, he died. My great grandma didn't hear about his death until another month. At the time of his death, she was in the hospital and she was very sick. The doctors feared that if she heard the news, something would happen during her next childbirth, which would come a month later. Due to the fact that little Ronnie died, my great grandparents last child, a son, Kenneth, was very protected by his older sisters. When Kenny, as he liked to be called, joined the military during the Vietnam war, my great grandparents and my grandma and her sisters were scared to death.