192nd AHC Redux

3/15/2010 - Added SP5 Anthoney G. "Tony" Pepples and his wife Katherine. Tony came to the 192nd AHC from the 155th AHC, where he flew on Stagecoach slicks and was assigned to the Falcons gunships. After the 155th AHC broke up, he came to fly as a Crew Chief with 192nd AHC Tiger Sharks. While with the Tiger Sharks, Tony spent most of his time running missions out of Ban Me Thuot. Tony served with the 192nd AHC between January 1970 and April 1971, when he DEROSed.

3/13/2010 - Added SP4 John A. DiMeola and his wife Lucille. John served as a helicopter mechanic with the 192nd from January 1967 until July 1968. He rotated to RVN on the troop ship USNS General Nelson M. Walker. After flying for three months with the 192nd AHC, John was transferred to the 335th AHC at Tuy Hoa where he finished out his tour.

3/5/2010 - Added SP5 Jim Odom. Jim was a cook with the 192nd AHC from October 1967 to July 1968. He was stationed first at Phan Thiet and then at Tuy Hoa until July 1968. Jim deployed from Ft. Riley, KS, in October 1967. He traveled to Vietnam on Board the USNS General Nelson M. Walker troop carrier.

2/23/2010 - Added SP5 Jon Freel. Jon served with the 192nd AHC as a Crew Chief between May 1969 and August 1970.

2/19/2010 - Added WO1 Tom "Don't Know" Dunno. Tom served with the 192nd AHC in the Tiger Shark gunship platoon between February 1970 and February 1971.

2/16/2010 - Added 1LT Ronald J. Kraus and his wife Barbara. Ron served with the 192nd AHC as Assistant Flight Operations Officer from May 1971 until October 1971, at which time he transferred to the 2nd Flight Platoon until January 1972 when the unit stood down.

2/10/2010 - Added WO1-CW2 Eugene W. "Chip" Reaves IV and his wife Lori. Chip served in the 192nd AHC 1st Platoon as "Polecat 31" at Phan Thiet and Phan Rang between December 1969 and December 1970.

2/9/2010 - Added SP5 Bert Sosa. Bert, "Polecat 303," served with the 192nd AHC in 1968.

2/9/2010 - Added SP5 Earl H. "FOD" Patterson and his wife Pat. Earl served with the 192nd AHC Tiger Sharks in Armament between June 1970 and May 1971. He worked with Dan Chelmo and Charles Rategan. His home base at the time was College Pt, New York.

2/5/2010 - Added (SP5/Acting SGT) John A. DeFeo and his wife Sharon. John served in Avionics with the 65th Signal Detachment, which was later made part of the 192nd AHC, between April 1969 and March 1970.

2/2/2010 - Added E-5 Kenneth R. Printz and his wife Sharon. Ken served with the 192nd AHC in POL and as the Company Clerk between December 1968 and August 1970

1/20/2010 - Added WO1 Richard "Rich" Clayton and his wife Kristin. Rich served with the 192nd AHC in the 1st Flight Platoon between August 1971 and December 1971, before transferring the B Troop, 7/17 Cav, following the stand down of the 192nd AHC. While with the 192nd AHC, he remembers serving with "Orson" Wells, "Sleepy" Todd, "REMFKE" Lemke, and "Lunchmeat" Javens, among others.

1/18/2010 - Added CW2 Roger "Woody" Mitchell and his wife Nancy. Woody served with the 192nd AHC in the 1st Flight Platoon between December 1969 and May 1971.

1/10/2010 - Jim Godfrey, 192nd AHC Association, issued "Warning Order - 2010-2" notifying all that the 192nd AHC Reunion will be held 4-8 August 2010 in St. Louis, MO. Click here to read all about it.

12/18/2009 - Added SP5 William E. "Bill" Lorfing and his wife Carla. Bill served with the 192nd AHC in the 1st Flight Platoon. He came over to Vietnam with the Company from Ft. Riley, Kansas.

12/7/2009 - Added SGT Renaldo "Rey" Garza and his wife Odilia. He was a SP4 when he volunteered as a door gunner. Initially, he was assigned to the 17th Combat Aviation Group on 2 March 1969, where he flew for a while. Then Rey was transferred to the 192nd AHC where he served as SGT of POL until his DEROS on 5 December 1969. This was his 2nd tour in Nam, his first being from May 1967 to May 1968 with the 551st Transportation where they hauled ammo and supplies to infantry units - 25th, 9th, 196th Light Infantry Brigade, and the 5th Special Forces camps along the border with Cambodia. After his first tour in Nam he was assigned to the 2nd Armored Division at Ft. Hood as an APC driver and tanks. He didn't like that duty so he volunteered to go back to Nam again.

12/7/2009 - Added SP5 Clayton "Benny" Benson. He was the 1st flight platoon door gunner on 356 with AC Jim Schueckler and Crew Chief Lee "Bad Bascom" Pearson. Later he was promoted to Crew Chief on 408 with AC Mr. Wise. He served with the 192nd AHC from April 1969 to April 1970.

11/15/2009 - Added SP5 Charles "Charlie" Breden. He was in the 1st Flight Platoon between May 1968 and May 1969. He crewed Polecat 250 then Polecat 356. Bascom was his door gunner who took over as CE when Charlie left. Charlie is a retired Police Officer with 23 years OTJ. He lived on Long Island in N.Y. He was a tent dweller his whole tour at LZ Betty. He was one of the first replacements to be assigned to the 192nd AHC in Phan Thiet.

11/15/2009 - Added SP5 Charlie Winnekens. Charlie served with the 192nd AHC between 1969 and 1970.

11/5/2009 - Added CW2 Dan Snook and his wife Laurie. Dan, Polecat 29, served with the 192nd AHC between May 1970 and April 1971.

10/26/2009 - Added Warren Allison and his wife Renee. Warren also started out with the 192nd AHC at Fort Riley, KS, and moved with the unit to Phan Thiet. He was a Gunner and then Crew Chief with the Tiger Sharks from the end of 1967 until the beginning of 1969.

10/18/2009 - Added SGT Vernon Darling and his wife Donna. Vernon started out with the 192nd AHC at Fort Riley, KS, and stayed with the unit to Phan Thiet, returning to the States in July 1969.

10/14/2009 - Added SP5 Larry L. Craft and his wife Patricia. Larry transferred into the 192nd AHC from HQ, 10th CAB, in 1968. He was originally in the motor pool and later served as a door gunner in the 1st Platoon.

10/4/2009 - Added SP5 Floyd Alan "Tiny" Tiner and his wife Sun. Tiny was a crew chief with the Tiger Sharks.

10/2/2009 - Add Philip Copenhaver's RVN photos to the Copenhaver Sortie tab.

9/28/2009 - Added SP5 Philip Copenhaver and his wife Brenda. Philip worked in maintenance at Phan Rang as a 67N20, and then as a crew chief with the Tiger Sharks tail # 497.

9/5/2009 - Added a My Life Since tab tp the FRIENDLIES tab containing short bios since leaving the 192nd AHC (if I had something), and THEN and NOW pics (if I had them).

9/3/2009 - Added several new Vietnam-era photos (Chesnes, Williams, Klein, Whitney) to the Friendlies/192nd AHC Muster contacts tab

9/3/2009 - Added WO1 Edward J. "Eddy" Chesnes to the Orderly Room/Final Farewells tab - After Action

9/3/2009 - Added Jim Williams' Vietnam photos to the Flight Photo Ops/RVN/Williams Sortie tab

8/28/2009 - Added Post DEROS photo of Jim & Pam Williams

8/25/2009 - Updated Dennis Javens contact information, and revamped the Home Page with the aim of bringing it up to the present time and presenting something that will entice site visitors to have a look around

8/22/2009 - Received the following email from Jim Godfrey ( 192nd_AHC@charter.net) regarding the establishment of the 192nd AHC Association. If you are interested in supporting the Association or have any questions, please contact Jim directly.

Hi Bill:

I was trying to find any email that I had sent you but I am not sure if I did. I know you have been in contact with Darrel Koenig (I was in the Tigersharks with Darrel) and he may have told you about the recent activities that the 281st had in which they invited members of the 10th Btn to Join. We had 6 members of the 192nd that I was able to get together at somewhat the last minute. At that reunion we voted to formally start the 192nd AHC Association – somewhat patterned after what the 48th, 92nd and especially the 281st. We are working on a 501C19 tax free corporation. That will take a little time. We have opened a bank account and have a good bit of money coming in from donations of the founders and some of the guys that I presented this to at the VHPA convention at Philly this year. I have over 600 names with various contact information. I have pretty good info (probably over 80%) on the officers and less on the enlisted men. Attached is a copy of that list. It is truncated some to make it easier to read and see where we are.

We are kicking off a search for all of the members Pilots and EM. We do this by several methods. For the pilots I have used what info I can get from the VHPA. If they don’t have good info, we are using SSnumbers to track them via a service that I subscribe to. That will be the main way that we find the EM. I have SSN for about 2/3 of them. There are a lot of soldiers missing from these lists – mainly after 71 and before 68. If you and the guys that are participating on you web site can support this effort it will be great. We will have website specific to the association in a few weeks. We are not trying to compete with yours or Jim Scheuckler or Pat Rooney (I few with them as well) but it will deal with specifics of the objectives of the association and activities. It will be www.192nd.org

The next 10th Btn. Reunion including 192nd Association will be the first week in August of next year. I think Darrel is sending you info. Our goal is to have 100 troupers at this reunion. That is achievable – we will need help. We start the searching process (the biggest cost to this effort) in the next week.

One aspect of this project is to find photos of every man in the unit. It is daunting task as so many Huey and dead body pictures took precedence over the people of the 192nd. What you have done is great. I hope we can combine efforts. We have a major project as well to collect as many collections of photos as possible and identify what is on them. These will be left to Texas Tech University when we are all gone as a tribute to the 192nd. I see you have a lot already. We have over 4000 that I have started to catalog and try and pull out people to be identified. As the year(s) go on, I want to reach out to those that have passed away and see if their families are interested in the association. Under 501 C 19, that is possible. They will have photos as well. We are not planning on putting these on the web but will be available to the members.

Enough for now, just wanted to introduce myself and the efforts that we are taking on behalf of the 192nd members. Please let me know if you have any thoughts, ideas questions etc. We are looking for people to support the effort. Although we do not have any membership cards or dues yet, we have a budget for the first year and that is about 1,000 (searches cost $ 1.00 each and there is postage etc.) we have kicked in over $ 400 so far and are soliciting anything anyone wants to contribute. The associations that I have seen are charging about $ 20 a year – really not a lot. But with several 100 guys, we can get this effort well underway before we all die.

Sorry for the long email, but we need help from all 192nd members and I wanted to reach out.

I will look forward to hear from you and the guys that are showing up on your site. Can you please publicize what we are doing?

Thanks
Jim Godfrey
Tigershark 35
192nd AHC Association
Phan Thiet June 69-June 70

8/21/2009 - Added some new photos from Greg Keay and Don Lemke to the Flight Photo Ops/RVN/Keay Sortie and Flight Photo Ops/RVN/Lemke Sortie tabs. Added some new patches (thanks Wolfie) to the OPS/INTEL/Unit Patches tab

8/5/2009 - Added an R&R tab under the Orderly Room menu item. Added several PC wallpapers with a UH-1 "Huey" helicopter, or general Army theme, for download on a newly created Orderly Room/Downloads tab. Check them out!

8/4/2009 - Added a cool short video on UH-1 pilot training at Ft. Fucker to the Avionics/RTO Cope/UH-1 Pilot Training tab

8/3/2009 - Website received X5 Excellence Award for 2009! See Base Camp page

8/2/2009 - Updated menu button labels to coincide with AHC/Army jargon

7/31/2009 - Updated the webpage corner "New" graphic on the Base Camp page, and updated the sound and video files/players on the Avionics tab

7/31/2009 - Added Frank Newsome's "Vietnam 19" sound file to theAvionics/RTO Newsome/19 tab. Frank is a website guru and his input and assistance has contributed greatly to the "punch" and appearance of our website

7/28/2009 - Added UH1 sounds to Base Camp page

7/26/2009 - Added Mike Martinez' photos to the Flight Photo Ops/RVN/Martinez Sortie tab

7/25/2009 - Added John Hennigar's (USAF 435th Munitions Maintenance Squadron, Phan Rang) photos to the Flight Photo Ops/RVN/Hennigar Sortie tab

7/21/2009 - Added poem "Army Helicopter Pilots - One in a Million" to the Avionics/RTO Wolf/One in a Million! tab

7/20/2009 - Added CPT Ronnie "Stonewall" Jackson to the Friendlies/192nd AHC Muster page

7/19/2009 - Added Mark Lobodzinski's photos to the Flight Photo Ops/RVN/Lobodzinski Sortie tab

7/17/2009 - Added CPT Bob Goolsby to the Friendlies/192nd AHC Muster page and added a Flight Photo Ops/RVN/Goolsby Sortie for him. Used a picture from Bob of Specialists Arthur and Montoya for the Orderly Room/Final Farewells tab

7/16/2009 - Added photos of of CW2 Richard "Stache" Claeys provided by Stache's wife, Janis Claeys, to Flight Photo Ops/RVN/Claeys Sortie tab and to Orderly Room/Final Farewells tab. Added her comments on the Orderly Room/Final Farewells tab. Added Stache/Janis Claeys contact info to the Friendlies/192nd AHC Muster page

7/15/2009 - Added photo of KIA Specialists Arthur and Montoya provided by 1LT Robert E. Goolsby (pilot at time of incident), and his comments to the Orderly Room/Final Farewells tab

7/15/2009 - Added AFVN sound clip to the Avionics/RTO Petty/AFVN tab

7/15/2009 - Added RVN Blood Chit to OPS/Intel/RVN Blood Chit tab

7/14/2009 - Added CW2 Ted "Enema" Emery to the Friendlies/192nd AHC Muster page

7/14/2009 - Added Hanoi Hannah audio to the Avionics/RTO Petty/Hanoi Hannah tab

7/14/2009 - Added SP4 Louie Gooch Montoya and SP5 Johnny Arthur to Orderly Room/Final Farewells tab - On the Wall

7/14/2009 - Added 1LT Robert J. Lobodzinski and WO1 Richard P. Claeys to the Orderly Room/Final Farewells tab - After Action

7/14/2009 - Revamped the Final Farewells tab with "On the Wall" and "After Action" columns

7/12/2009 - Added Polecats and Tiger Sharks Guest Book to the Orderly Room tab

7/12/2009 - Added the Latest News tab to the Orderly Room tab, redirect from the Base Camp page via Red "New" button in the upper right corner.

7/12/2009 - Added SP5 John "Armpit" Gladden, SP4 Mike Martinez, SP5 Dave Noble, and SP4 Rob "oMo" Webb to the Friendlies/192nd AHC Muster page

7/11/2009 - Added Final Farewells to Orderly Room tab

7/10/2009 - Added list of 1st Aviation Brigade aviation units on OPS/Intel tab

7/10/2009 - Added list of 192nd AHC aircraft tail numbers on OPS/Intel tab

7/9/2009 - Added a Links tab to Orderly Room tab

7/8/2009 - Added 192nd AHC 1st Platoon patch to Unit Patches on OPS/Intel tab