Our Precious Freedoms: Jack Ogren

Protecting freedom was prominent early in th elife of Tara's Jack Ogren. When he was a high school senior, conversations included the Cuban Missile Crisis and communism. He served three years in the Army and reached the corporal rank. 

"I enlisted in 1962. I knew Russia was after us at the time. Vietnam was going on. It was a tough time. We eventually lost 10 people from my high school (Blue Island, Ill.) in Vietnam. I signed up for electronics and went off to Fort Knox for basic training. Then I was sent to the missile site in Addison, Ill. It was an underground missile site that was there to protect the Great Lakes Naval Station. I got there in September of that year. It was October when the Cuban Missile Crisis hit."

"The Cuban Missile Crisis lasted 13 days. We were restricted to post at the time. I was a missile repairman and I went to a panel operator. At the time, we almost shot down an airplane, but it finally was identified right before we did. Our radar was tracking that plane and we were locked on it. There was no monkeying around at that time."

"After three months there, they called me in and told me I was headed to Germany. I was going to a base that was doing the same thing, protecting a U.S. Air Force base. It was nip and tuck at the time with Russia.  I was also in Germany when President (John F.) Kennedy was assassinated. We were at full alert for three days. Many thought the Russians were involved."

"We are still on the edge. We have North Korea, Iran, Russia, China. There never is going to be an end in the Middle East. I definitely believe their needs to be an awareness of what our soldiers do to protect our freedoms. I had friends who came back from Vietnam where people spit on them. Some of those guys won't go to veterans' functions now because they feel the government let them down."

"I don't know I ever really understood PTSD (post-traumatic stress disorder) until I got hooked up with the Elks. It wasn't that long ago the Elks took 18 veterans from Bay Pines (veterans' hospital), some who suffered from PTSD, to SMART (Sarasota Manatee Association for Riding Therapy). We taught them how to groom a horse. They had a great time. But dealing with them, those guys look right through you. This PTSD stuff is real. We also invited three of those guys to dinner with their wives. We couldn't get them to open up. Eventually, we all had some drinks and they relaxed. They were dancing with their wives, who were crying. The wives told us it was the first time they had been able to open up and relax ... I know a family whose son was run over by a Humvee ... what it did to that family. How many widows are out there?"

"There is no country like this. I have neighbors from England and they say it takes them six months from now to get an appointment because of their government medical. We have socialism in the world, and we don't want it, the government running everything. You've lost your freedoms. I don't like government-run countries."