I no longer have my Selective Service Card, but unlike many in my generation I didn't burn it. It was a small, wallet-sized card, something that would fit in next to a Sohio Credit Card, or one for Pogues, containing vital information—my birthday and social security number. For men between the ages of 18 and 26 it was a card that would admit them to a very exclusive club—the US Army.
Deferments abounded for those between the ages of 18 and 26, but they changed as quickly as the spring weather in Oklahoma. For those who did not wish to serve in the military, there were conscientious objectors, survivors of military who had died, hardship cases, ministers, veterans, immigrants, dual nationals, and more commonly, college students, people serving in Vista or the Peace Corps, and for a while, young married men. But like the weather, all that was subject to frequent change.
When I turned 18 I was a freshman at Whitman College in Walla Walla, Washington. My deferment lasted through my sophomore year, or my 19th birthday. At that time I decided not to return to Whitman, worked during the summer in Cincinnati, then found myself reclassified as 1-A, which meant "draft bait." I walked up the street, enrolled at UC, and for three years found myself exempted from the draft. The rules changed again. Now college students were draft exempt only if they had a certain grade point high enough. (I don't remember what it was.) At that time I had an English professor named Claude Allen, who so objected to the war effort that he refused to participate, choosing instead to award each and every one of his students an "A" to bolster their grade point, perhaps to make them out of reach of the long arms of the draft. (He announced those students that would have received an "A" regardless, and I was so honored).
But the rules changed again. Now it wasn't GPA anymore, but a three hour test, like the SAT, that male college students were required to take. I took it. I remember such questions as, "a machine gun is to a tank as...something else is to something else." I was supposed to pick the right choice. I passed.
I graduated in 1969, the year I turned 23. I had applied to teach English in the American Farm School in Thessaloniki, Greece, which might have been a deferment, and the Peace Corps, which clearly was a deferment. I was accepted to the Peace Corps in 1969 as an English teacher, bound for the islands of Tonga in the South Pacific, and although evading the Viet Nam war wasn't the first thing on my mind, it played a part.
So in October, 1969, we flew to the island of Molokai for three months of Peace Corps training and two years of service. Another weather change. Bob Nygard, on of the trainees, was summoned by his draft board the day he arrived in Hawaii. He flew back to Pittsburg the next day for a physical exam. Others discovered that even though the Peace Corps was a legal deferment, some draft boards ignored the legality of it all and summoned young men for physicals and service.
Marriage was a deferment, at least until August 26, 1965 when LBJ ended the deferment. Hundreds of couples, planning to marry, lined the streets of Las Vegas for a 30 second ceremony. For some, the honeymoon was short-lived. As the need for more soldiers increased, the marriage deferments ended. All those who rushed to Las Vegas to be married discovered afterwards that it didn't matter. They were eligible. Ever changing weather.
Meanwhile, I was given another 1A draft notice and a date to appear before the Selective Service Committee. I had run out of options. I wasn't willing to be drafted, and I believed that the war was both wrong and immoral. I was planning to plead as a conscientious objector, but without credentials, such as being a Quaker or having volunteered or worked with a number of well-known anti-war organizations, I knew that my plea would go unheeded. I prepared myself for jail.
And then came the lottery.
Here's the chart showing all the capsules and the results.
Someone in a college fraternity threw a brick through the TV set when September 14th was picked, the number one selection. My birthday, July 9th, was #277. What that meant was this: each month a number of soldiers was needed. Once all the September 14th eligible males were chosen, the second date was selected. And so on until enough soldiers were drafted. The next month the process repeated itself, beginning again with September 14th. It was unlikely that more than fifty birthdays would have been selected each month, each time beginning with September 14th. In any case, #277 was safe.
The lottery was held two more times, for those who were too young to be included in the original lottery but who had just turned 18. The second year Jadyne and I were walking down the street in San Francisco when I spied the San Francisco Chronicle's headlines: "July 9 is #1" read the banner. I thought, of course it is. That's my birthday. And it was. 18 year olds born on my birthday were the first to be drafted.