Memorial Day, 2009

Rest in Peace, brothers.

Itinerary for Loon

Tuesday, May 19
5:30 pm-5:45 pm ET
LIVE National Radio Phoner
American Family Radio / Michael Reagan Hour
Contact: Devin Patrick, 662/844-8888 ext 329 or reaganprep@devinpatrick.net
*Note: The show will call Jack at 201/947-0924, backup cell 202/320-6686.

Thursday, May 21—WASHINGTON, DC
3:00 pm-3:30 pm 
TAPED National TV Interview
Reuters TV / Author’s Corner
1333 H St. NW, 5^th Floor
Washington, D.C. 20005
Contact: Deborah Lutterbeck, 202/310-5690 or deborah.lutterbeck@reuters.com

5:00 pm-7:00 pm
Book Party
1101 Pennsylvania Ave. NW (Lobby)
Washington, D.C. 20004
Contact: Amy Kitzmiller, Fabiani & Associates, 202/756-4399
Attendees: 50-100+ (friends and family by private invitation)
Bookseller: Offsite Books, Inc.
On-Site Contact: Pat Kreuzburg, 240/481-3754 or plk94@aol.com
Office Contact: Alicia Greene, 202/321-8451 or agreene20007@hotmail.com
*Note: Author Jack McLean can be reached at 202/320-6686.

Friday, May 22
7:30 am-9:30 am ET
LIVE National Radio Tour
Launch Radio Networks
Contact: Berndette Duncan, 212/536-3657 or bernadetted@launchradionetworks.com
*Note: Bernadette will call Jack at (landline TK); as backup, his cell is 202/320-6686.
**Note: There will also be interviews on Memorial Day proper.

Thursday, June 4—WASHINGTON, D.C.
6:30 pm
Reception, Talk, Q&A, Signing & Dinner
The Army Navy Club

901 17^th Street NW

Washington, D.C. 20006

202/628-8400

Contacts: Peter McCarthy, 703/671-4300 or McCarthy@Careertran.com; Megan McCarthy, Mmccarthy@armynavyclub.org; and Shannon McNess, smcness@armynavyclub.org

*Note: The format consists of a program beginning with wine and cheese at 6:30 pm.  You will be introduced at about 7:00 pm and will speak for 30-45 minutes followed by a Q&A.  Following the Forum, you’ll have a book signing (also prior to the start of the Forum if you wish) and finally a very nice dinner. 

Sunday, June 14—CONCORD, MA
2:45 pm arrival
3:00 pm-4:00 pm
Talk & Signing
The Concord Bookshop
65 Main Street
Concord, MA 01742
Contact: Jill Wassong, 978/369-2405 or Jill@concordbookshop.com
*Note: The talk should last for about 20-30 minutes, followed by a Q&A.

Thursday, June 18—DENVER, CO
7:30 pm
Talk & Signing 
Tattered Cover
2526 East Colfax Avenue
Denver, CO 80206
Contact: Charles Stillwagon, 303/436-9219 x2736 or charles.stillwagon@tatteredcover.com

Saturday, June 20—BOULDER, CO
Time TK
Talk & Signing
Barnes & Noble
Crossroads Commons
2915 Pearl Street
Boulder, CO 80301
303/442-1665

Tuesday, July 21—CAMBRIDGE, MA
7:00 pm
Talk & Signing
Porter Square Books
Porter Square Shopping Center
25 White Street
Cambridge, MA 02140
Contact: Ellen Jarrett, 617/491-2220 or  ellen@portersquarebooks.com

"Find the cost of freedom, buried in the ground...

Mother Earth will swallow you, lay your body down..."
- The Cost of Freedom - Crosby, Stills, & Nash.

Thee final casualties from the Battle for LZ Loon were laid to rest at Arlington National Cemetery last week.

Rest in Peace, brothers.

PFC Jose Sanchez    3/15/49 - 6/6/68  Buried 5/14/09

LCpl Kurt LaPlant   12/11/84 -6/6/68 Buried 5/14/09

LCpl Luis Palacios  2/28/48 - 6/6/68 Buried 5/14/09

LCpl Ralph Harper  1/14/47 - 6/6/68  Buried 5/14/09

Following is an article by Larry McShane of the NY Daily News.  

Remains of Brooklyn Marine Killed in Action During Vietnam Return Home
BY Larry Mcshane
DAILY NEWS STAFF WRITER

Sunday, March 22nd 2009, 4:00 AM

As the days became years that faded into history, as Jose Sanchez became a sad, distant memory, a 5-by-7-inch index card bore witness to his short life.  The Brooklyn teen's name was typed neatly across the Marine Corps Casualty Card, with the date and place of his last day alive: June 6, 1968. Quang Tri Province. Vietnam.

The details were sparse; the words terse: "The helicopter he was aboard received small arms fire. After crashing, the helicopter rolled down the side of a mountain and burned. "The body was not recovered." The card, stored for 41 years in a Virginia office, ended with an acronym: KIA - killed in action. Sanchez, gone before his 20th birthday, was also MIA. His remains were lost in the jungle 7 miles southwest of Khe Sanh, site to some of the war's most intense fighting.

The bodies of three fellow Marines were with him, left behind after their chopper crashed:

Lance Cpl. Kurt LaPlant.

Lance Cpl. Luis Palacios.

Lance Cpl. Ralph Harper.

For decades, what remained of the four - a boot fragment, a single tooth, scattered bone shards - stayed buried in the red Vietnamese soil. Sanchez and his missing mates were united by fate and enemy fire. Once found, in the next millennium, they would not be separated again. Sanchez was born in Kings County Hospital on March 15, 1949, when the Dodgers played in Ebbets Field and the subway cost a dime. The son of Puerto Rican immigrants grew up with his kid brother in the Gowanus Houses. Their dad died when Peter Sanchez was just 2, and Jose became the man of the house. "My father figure," his brother recalls.

Jose lifted his voice in prayer as an altar boy, and kicked his heels in fun at the YMCA pool. He was a Boy Scout and athlete: baseball, football, basketball. The teen left John Jay High School and his 8-year-old brother to enlist in the Marines in December 1967. He reached Vietnam in May 1968. Within days, he was lugging 81-mm. mortar ammo along the Laotian border. On June 6, as the nation awoke to the assassination of Robert F. Kennedy, Pfc. Sanchez was caught in the waning hours of a three-day jungle firefight with the North Vietnamese Army. He was in a small group of Marines left on Hill 672 after most of his company shifted to safer, higher ground 100 yards away.

A dozen Marines were already dead. Their commander, Lt. Col. Bill Negron, remembers everything about that sunsplashed day - the booming artillery, the gurgling jungle waterfall.  And the fear that every Marine in his command would die. "We shouldn't have been there in the first place," Negron says of their precarious location. The Marines were outmanned, and Negron wanted them off Hill 672. He convinced a general to order an emergency extraction, with a CH46A Sea Knight helicopter sent for Sanchez and the rest.

The Brooklyn kid barely knew the others. LaPlant, from Kansas, was an Elvis fan. Palacios followed his brother out of Los Angeles to the Marines. Harper, 20, of Indianapolis, was the oldest. Negron watched through binoculars as his men scrambled aboard the chopper. As the aircraft lifted, a burst of fire erupted from the jungle floor. The chopper lurched. "We were saying, 'Get up! Get up!'" Negron recalls. It did not. The chopper tumbled from the sky; 12 of the 23 Marines aboard were killed. To encourage the survivors, Negron ordered his men to stand and sing "The Marine Hymn" at the top of their lungs.

Sanchez and the rest, already gone, never heard a note.

A Marine recovery team pulled the living and dead from the crash, unaware they had missed the bodies of four colleagues. Halfway around the world, a knock on the Sanchez's door delivered the bad news: Jose was dead. And the worse news: He still wasn't coming home. A half-dozen posthumous honors, including a Vietnamese Cross of Gallantry, hardly filled the family's void. His devastated mother, Virginia, began a decades-long vigil for her lost boy.

Seventeen days after the crash, the U.S. brass abandoned the Marine base at Khe Sanh. The search for the missing Marines was soon abandoned, too. It was 1993 when a joint U.S.-Vietnamese search team revisited the site. It took another 13 years to find the first bits of remains.

Last November, DNA positively identified Palacios and LaPlant. Sanchez and Harper were included in what the military calls "group remains." The news - once dreaded, now unexpected - reached the families just hours after President Obama's election. Sanchez's mother wept. After 40 painful years, her son's recovered remains would be returned. Her mind at ease, Virginia Sanchez died five weeks later. "Finally," says son Peter, "she could rest."

The small band of brothers - together for so long on a Vietnam mountain - will spend eternity united at Arlington National Cemetery. The burial, with full military honors, is set for early May. They will share a single casket, side by side again, much as they were on Hill 672. It will hold a pressed Marines Corps dress uniform, along with a box engraved with their names and filled with their commingled remains. "They were always together," Negron says. "And now, they won't be alone." 

Thank you for visiting.

"Without your love I'd be nowhere at all..."

Loon: A Marine Story was created over the past seven years. 

Success has a thousand fathers. The seeds for this story, however, were planted by my mother.

Here is the acknowledgment page as it will appear one short week from today. 

This book emerged from more than one hundred letters home that I wrote during my two years in the United States Marine Corps from 1966 to 1968. My mother saved the letters and often encouraged me to "do something with them". Thirty-five years later, my second wife, Karen, discovered the letters, as deeply buried among my possessions as my Vietnam War experience was buried inside of me. Karen echoed my mother's earlier encouragement.

I began writing.

Thank you, Karen, from all of us.

Through fellow author, marine, and Vietnam Veteran Bob Timberg, I met my agent, Flip Brophy of Sterling Lord Literistic. Flip introduced me to my editor, Katie Hall. Katie's remarkable talent washes unseen over every word on every page. Flip also encouraged Ryan Doherty of Random house to bring the work to life. There would be no Loon without each of them. Thank you.

While writing, I received encouragement from family, friends, professional colleagues, and fellow Charlie Company survivors in an abundance that I continue to regard with awe. Terry and Nancy Tillery kept me focused by providing food, love, and unlimited access to their beach house in Kill Devil Hills, North Carolina. In Georgetown, Vera and Dandy Dickie were my daily visitors, keeping me sane with an encouraging word and a welcoming wag. Thank you.

Former Charlie Company Commander Bill Negron was a font of information. Many technical details are from his memory, and several of the better stories were borrowed with his blessing from his own writings. Bill, a uniquely American character, was a remarkable marine, and a dear friend to us all. Thanks, Skipper.

Among Charlie Company veterans, I thank Dan Burton, Mac Mecham, Jack McQuade, Robert Rodriguez, Benny Lerma, Buck Willingham, Doug McPhail, Clabie Edmonds, Neil Downey, Wayne Wood, and Gaylord Flippen. Semper Fi, brothers.

For support in Washington, I thank former marines Peter McCathy and John Miller, as well as John Shlaes, Tad Howard, Tom Coleman, Peter Van Allen, David Mitchell, and author David Maraniss. Andover classmate Ray Healey was a steady cheerleader. Ray never served in the military, but has dedicated is life to veteran advocacy. Thanks from all of us, Ray.

My three daughters and three siblings were unconditionally supportive rocks throughout the entire process. Thank you Sarah, Martha, Sylvia, Don, Ruth, and Barbara.

Present in spirit and never to be forgotten are the forty-three grand young sons of Charlie and Delta companies, 1st Battalion, 4th Marines, 3rd Marine Division who breathed their last on LZ Loon during those three horrific days in June 1968.

Rest in peace, brothers.

Thank you for visiting.

If Not For You - Bob Dylan

"You never need to doubt it, I'll make you so sure about it..."

Loon: A Marine Story will be published May 19. 

Following are excerpts from the Random House Press kit.

A perceptive memoir of the Vietnam war that is unique for the author’s background: McLean joined the Marine Corps after graduating from Phillips Academy, where George W. Bush was a schoolmate. Making excellent use of more than a hundred letters he wrote home from the war zone from November 1967 to July 1968, McLean reconstructs his time in the Marines with a sharp eye for detail and a very readable—at times almost poetic—prose. 

—Publishers Weekly

__________________________________

Dear Editor/Producer:

In the opening chapters of his compulsively readable coming-of age memoir LOON (Presidio Press Hardcover; May 19, 2009), Jack McLean writes, “In the early spring of 1966, Vietnam was still a country and not yet a war.  I was eighteen and without a plan.  But now I had an option.”  Today, we’re all so media-saturated and internet savvy that it’s difficult to imagine stumbling into a war almost by accident, with little idea of the political and moral dilemmas involved.  Yet that’s exactly what happened to Jack.

Kids like Jack didn’t go into the military.  The unprecedented wealth and privilege experienced by the baby boomer generation had already started to alienate them from the idea of service that their parents had subscribed to, even before the horrors of the Vietnam War became fully known.  A school mate of George W. Bush at the prestigious Phillips Academy, Jack grew up in an upper middle class New Jersey suburb.  But when he failed to gain acceptance to college, he made a decision that shocked his family.  Jack’s subsequent experiences at Parris Island, in Vietnam, and particularly at the battle of Landing Zone Loon changed the shape of his life in ways he never could have foreseen. 

 In an interview, Jack can discuss:

• Why the battle at Landing Zone Loon—which took place on June 6, 1968—has been in the news recently, and why it has made such a lasting impression
• What recruit training at Parris Island is like—and how it transformed him into a Marine
• What he knew about Vietnam before he entered the military—and what he found when he got there
• His experiences as the first Vietnam veteran to attend Harvard
• His advice for young people considering a career in the miltary today, with the prospect of serving in Iraq and/or Afghanistan. 

Compelling, intensely personal and beautifully written, LOON offers a Marine story of courage and sacrifice as well as a unique window into a pivotal moment in American culture.  Let’s talk soon about Jack McLean and LOON.

Sincerely

Publicity Contact: Lisa Barnes

“The battle at Loon erupts suddenly and sucks you in.  Like Jack McLean, you ask: what am I doing here?  The answer is: you joined the Marines and now it’s time to fight for your life.  A gripping story of violence and dedication to survival.”

—Bing West, author of The Strongest Tribe

_______________________________

LOON: A Marine Story (A Presidio Press Hardcover; May 19, 2009) is a lyrical memoir of a prep school boy who creates his own path to higher learning: enlisting in the U.S. Marine Corps, fighting in Vietnam, and then studying at Harvard.

Raised in suburban New Jersey, Mack McLean attended the prestigious Phillips Academy in Andover, Massachusetts, with George W. Bush.  After graduation, eager for change, he enlisted in the United States Marine Corps.  At the time, Vietnam was a country and not a war.

In LOON, McLean takes readers from Andover’s privileged campus, to the infamous Marine Corps boot camp at Parris Island, to the battle at Landing Zone Loon in the rugged hills along Vietnam’s Laotian border.  During that period, Jack transformed from a sheltered boy into a Marine, and ultimately into one of a handful of survivors of a horrific three-day assault during some of the heaviest fighting in the Vietnam War.

Richly textured and full of action-packed battle scenes, LOON is a piercingly honest and beautifully written story of an infantry Marine and his comrades as they face the challenges of boot camp, stateside service and, ultimately, war.  It neither glorifies nor mystifies.  It simply tells a compelling story about courage, honor, sacrifice—one that will resonate not only with those who have military experience, but also with anyone intrigued by this pivotal moment in American history.

About the Author

JACK MCLEAN was raised in Summit, New Jersey, where he lived until admittance to Phillips Academy.  Upon graduation, McLean enlisted in the Marine Corps.  In the fall of 1968, McLean returned to Massachusetts to enter Harvard University.  He has had a thirty-five-year career as a marketing executive in New York, Boston, and Washington, D.C.  The father of three grown daughters, McLean currently lives in Fort Lee, New Jersey.

A Talk With Jack McLean

Author of Loon

Your memoir takes its title from the battle at Landing Zone Loon, which took place on June 6, 1968.  That battle has been in the news recently.  Why?

During the battle, a helicopter crashed while evacuating part of our battalion.  Several on board survived, but most were killed in the ensuing fireball.  Last year, due in part to recent breakthroughs in technology and DNA identification techniques, the remains of the final four missing victims were recovered from the crash site.  One was buried in Los Angeles last fall.  The remains of the other three will be buried together at Arlington National Cemetery this May.

It has been many years since that day.  What made you decide to tell your story now? 

The decision evolved over several years.  I began by transcribing my letters home and filling in some blanks as a legacy for my three daughters.  Over time, as I began to reunite with my Vietnam brothers, their interest and encouragement led me to create a piece that would honor the lives of those who served.

You graduated from Phillips Academy in Andover, MA.  Most of your school mates, including George W. Bush, avoided military service that could result in their going to Vietnam.  What made you decide to join the Marines?  How did your family and teachers react?

I decided to enlist in the spring term of my senior year.  It was 1966.  There was a mandatory draft.  I was not immediately interested in attending college; and the Marine Corps, unlike the other services, had a two-year program.  Absent other plans, it seemed like an obvious choice.  I felt that I would simply get the obligation out of the way and continue with my life.

My parents were stunned.  All but two or three very supportive teachers (all veterans) were stupefied.

For those of us who haven’t (and probably never will) experience recruit training at Parris Island, tell us what you encountered there.  How were you transformed from a high school kid into a Marine?  What does it take to survive, and to succeed? 

The Marine Corps is very efficient at training recruits at Parris Island.  They’ve been doing it successfully, with few modifications, for a long time.  They focus exclusively on group discipline, Marine Corps education, marksmanship, and physical training.  There is no margin for error in any of these disciplines.

Even though I knew what to expect, and in particular that there was a focused purpose to the harassment, I found it rigorous beyond all imagination.  That being said, graduation was the proudest moment of my life.  The meticulousness of the training contributed immeasurably to our unit’s effectiveness in Vietnam and certainly saved my life time and time again.

How much did you know about Vietnam before you joined the Marines?  When you finally got there, was it what you had anticipated?

I knew that Vietnam was just beginning to escalate when I enlisted, but felt that my chances of going would be slim.  Were I to go, I naively thought that it would be in supply or some rear support capacity.

By the time I arrived a year later (after a year in supply), it was as a grunt in an infantry company at the very peak of the conflict.  Although it was what I was trained for, the experience proved to be well beyond any expectation I had formed ahead of time.

Did you expect to get into Harvard after you left for Vietnam?  What were you doing when you found out? 

I had always planned to attend college after the Marines.  Before I left for Vietnam, I had several interviews and decided to apply to Boston University.  In response to the urging of several Andover teachers, I applied to Harvard as well.  I had no expectation of being accepted.

The acceptance letter arrived one morning in April 1968.  I was in my fighting hole at Con Thien cleaning my weapon, having just returned from an all day patrol in the jungle.

What happened at the battle of Landing Zone Loon, and how did your commander, Captain Bill Negron, prove instrumental to your survival?

Captain Bill Negron was a seasoned Marine veteran who had come up through the enlisted ranks. He took over our slack company three weeks before Loon and supported us well with training, equipment, and an incalculable moral boost.  Loon was a mistake.  We were sent into an area on which there was poor intelligence.  We were isolated and overwhelmed by a vastly superior force.  Bill Negron got many of us out alive.

What was your homecoming like?  Did you adjust well to Harvard life after your hiatus?

Homecoming was surreal.  A matter of weeks separated my return from Vietnam and freshman registration in the tempestuous fall of 1968.  I switched my entire focus to academics and pushed all that was Vietnam as far as I could from my mind.

What advice would you give to high school graduates who may be considering military service today? 

Freedom is a choice that doesn’t come without strings attached.  My brother Don served in the Peace Corps after college.  My cousin Mike was a freedom rider in Mississippi.  It is important that we all serve in some capacity during our lifetimes.  The military is but one of them.

 Thank you for visiting.

 God Only Knows - The Beach Boys

Easter Morning in Fort Lee

"Everybody's a dreamer, everybody's a star..."

Top Shop, the white-hot, infinitely-hip British retailer opened their first US store in Manhattan's Soho district this morning.

Since Martha has been part of the team from the start, I stopped by to see what all the buzz was about.  Wow!

When I arrived, an hour after the opening, the line went up Broadway, around the corner, east on Broome, around the corner, south on Crosby, and around the corner and west on Grand - almost an entire NY city Block!

There were dozens of private security guards (complete with little Secret Service ear pieces), NY Police on horseback, cheerful employees handing out free coffee/donuts/water, pissed-off cabbies caught in the crush, and barricades.  

The crowd was mostly female, orderly, and filled with anticipation.

Easily, even with my bias, one of the most incredible sights that I have ever seen in New York.

Recession??!!

Martha later texted that she was sorry to miss me. 

I told her it would have been easier to see the Queen!

...which, of course, she is!

Thank you for visiting.

Celluloid Heros by the Kinks