“It was completely overwhelming,” Eckart, a 1969 Fenwick graduate and U.S. Army veteran, said later. “I never envisioned something like this.”
In 1970, Eckart said those who had fought during the Vietnam War, a controversial conflict that divided the country, landed in Dayton and Cincinnati airports in the middle of the night to reduce the possibilities of protesters.
Earlier this year, Eckart participated in an Honor Flight where veterans are flown to Washington, D.C. for the day, then return home that night. When the 85 veterans, including 64 from the Vietnam War, landed at John Glenn Columbus International Airport, they received letters and thank-you cards from Fenwick students.
After graduating from high school, Eckart said he wasn’t mentally prepared for college. He comes from a military family: his father served in the Navy; two of his brothers served in the Air Force; and another brother served in the Army.
So he followed in his family’s footstep.
His first day of boot camp at Fort Dix, N.J., was on Aug. 15, 1969, which happened to be the first day of The Woodstock Music Festival when 500,000 people waited on a dairy farm in Bethel, N.Y., for the three-day music festival to start.
Instead of listening to live rock-n-roll music, drinking adult beverages, and who knows what else like those at Woodstock, Eckart completed what he called “the longest day” of his life. His hair was buzzed, his arms were stuck several times with needles, he passed a physical and his civilian clothes were replaced by an Army uniform.
All of the possessions were stuffed in a small box and mailed back to Middletown.
He now was Army property.
The recruits were told to “get used to a new way of living,” Eckart said.
After more than three months of training and a Christmas leave, Eckart received his orders to report to Vietnam.
He served 11 months during two Vietnam tours, and he fondly remembers seeing Vietnam from the airplane for the last time on Jan. 5, 1970.
“No desire to go back there,” the 73-year-old said when asked about time in Vietnam. “You have to grow up over there. You have to make the best of the situation.”
He got so “homesick,” he said, his mother sent him a subscription to the Middletown Journal so he could follow his hometown news and sports.
After the war, Eckart said it was “a big adjustment period” to return to civilian life.
“Each day over there was so intense,” he said.
He took advantage of the GI Bill and graduated from Miami University in 1976, and later received his business management degree from Mount St Joseph University. He was hired at Armco in 1976 and worked there for 33 years.
Eckart and his wife of 41 years, Rose Ann, also a 1969 FHS graduate, have two daughters and one son, all Fenwick graduates.
“Fenwick has been very good to my family,” he said.
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