Tag: Fort Riley

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Patriotism, by Phillip Hoyle

Last
weekend while travelling south along I-25, we approached the Broadway exit. A
large American flag held aloft on a sturdy pole sunk in concrete and sitting at
the top of a rampart flapped in the breeze. “I’ve never noticed that before,”
my friend commented.
“Nor
I. Must be new,” I responded.
Her
next comment was about how good it is to live in America. I agreed with my
rather minimal statement that I, too, was happy to live here. I believe for her
the sentiment is rather standard fare formed from listening to too much
conservative talk radio. We don’t talk about that. For me the issue of being
“proud to be an American” is something quite different. She seems some kind of
absolutist while I am surely a relativist. So are we philosophers? Since we
spotted the flag on I-25 I’ve been thinking about patriotism—perhaps that does make
me a philosopher of sorts.
I
believe patriotism most dramatically relates to an image of heroes who put
their very lives on the line for their identity as part of a particular people.
The history of any Fatherland or Motherland obviously has its origins in the
LAND. For me the land is always the Flint Hills of Kansas. I grew up in wide
open spaces with a broad river valley and low bluffs nearby. The landscape was
further defined by creeks: so grassy highlands and wooded valleys with stretches
of plowed fields in the bottomlands of waterways are all a part of my
fatherland. Agriculture abounded there.
In
my particular patria a military
presence with a long history lent gravity and opened me to a larger society and
world. I grew up around the U.S. Army’s Seventh Cavalry; Custer was once
stationed at Fort Riley just across the river from our town. The presence of historic
stone buildings that housed both the officers and the fine horse stock of the
cavalry, of wooden barracks for the enlisted men, of parade grounds, of rifle
ranges, of helicopters coming and going in the air around the base’s heliport,
of convoys made up of personnel carriers and artillery, jeeps and guns, trucks
and heavy machinery often impeding traffic on highways, and of our lively
community that entertained GIs provided endless variety for a Kansas town me.
Then there were the children of Army families in our school population, and for
me, the family-owned IGA store providing groceries for families of GIs, Civil
Service employees, as well as the townies like me.
Thus
my patria was racially mixed, with
multiple languages, mixed-race families, and people who had lived all over the
world—especially Germany and Japan as I recall it. Soldiers marched in local
parades and cannons and other Army equipment impressed the youngsters and brought
tears to the eyes of elders.
My
fatherland was rather new by world standards yet as a youngster I felt
connected to the antiquity of the place by the presence of an old log cabin church
and by stories of my ancestors who had long lived in the area. Still the Hoyle
and Schmedemann families arrived only three generations before my advent. My
great grandparents came to Kansas to homestead. Some may have come to help
assure that Kansas would be a free state in the political heat up that
eventuated in the US Civil War. Yet in my family there were no ultimate
patriots—those who made the ‘ultimate sacrifice’ for their country—in any of
the stories I heard.
Growing
up I heard lots of talk of such sacrifices of life, but most of them were in sermons
not about the country but quoting a “no greater love” value as applied to the
ultimate vicarious death of Jesus as the Christ. Religion figured heavily in my
fatherland.
I
became aware of the country as something much larger than my state when I heard
my parents talk about the differences between Ike Eisenhower and Adlai Stevenson, then when I met men who had served in the Korean conflict, when I
further realized just what the US Army did besides entertain us with wild
stories and exotic tattoos, when I became aware of missile crises, the Cold
War, the building of the interstate road system, the anti-communist diatribe,
the deaths of national leaders, the threat of the draft, the Vietnam non-war,
the peace movement, and the growing realization that our USA motivations
idealized in myth and PR announcements didn’t well match my own vision of reality
or basic values.
Welcome
to thoughtful adulthood, Hoyle.
AND
EVEN MORE THAN THAT, THERE WAS ALWAYS THAT NAGGING REALIZATION THAT IF ANYONE
REALLY KNEW ME, THEY CERTAINLY WOULDN’T LET ME BE A PATRIOT IN ANY SENSE OF THE
WORD.
But
I am a patriot who feels a deep sense of meaning in being American. I love it
but not in an exclusivist, better-than-any-other identity or country.
© 25 Sep 2013 

About the Author  

Phillip Hoyle
lives in Denver and spends his time writing, painting, and socializing. In
general he keeps busy with groups of writers and artists. Following thirty-two
years in church work and fifteen in a therapeutic massage practice, he now
focuses on creating beauty. He volunteers at The Center leading the SAGE
program “Telling Your Story.”

He also blogs at artandmorebyphilhoyle.blogspot.com
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State of Origin, by Phillip Hoyle

I
moved into my apartment on Capitol Hill soon after reaching Denver in my fifty-second
year. There I lived in the third block south of Colfax Avenue, that old highway
that has claimed to be the longest main street in America. Not owning a car, I
walked everywhere, but was surprised when a friend asked, “Aren’t you afraid to
walk along East Colfax?”
“No,”
I immediately answered. “It’s just like the main street in the town where I
grew up.” I wasn’t freaked out to walk down an avenue with bars, tattoo
parlors, Army surplus stores, small groceries, gas stations, two-story
buildings with markets below and apartments or offices above, theatres, people
of various races, even drunks on the street. Strolling along Colfax always
reminded me of my hometown Junction City, Kansas that was located adjacent to the
US Army Base, Fort Riley.
I
had spent my childhood and early teen years living in the third block west of
Washington Street, the long main street that offered in addition to groceries,
clothing, theaters, lawyers, and real estate, a variety of beers, tattoos, Army
surplus, pawned goods, drunks, and prostitutes. My family lived on West
Eleventh Street, but the more colorful array of folks and their bad habits
rarely made it that far off the main drag.
Washington
Street ran for eighteen blocks from Grand Avenue on the north, the gateway to
Fort Riley, to I-70 on the south—well eventually when the Interstate made its
way that far west. On the south end of Washington Street our family ate at the
Circle Cafe that offered Cantonese and American food. Dad ordered Chinese food,
Mom her favorite fried chicken, and we kids our regular hamburger, French fries,
and a Coke. Later, when I began working at the store, I had lunch sometimes at
the Downtown Cafe where, much to my junior high delight, I discovered chicken
fried steaks. I already knew the middle part of Washington Street from walks
with Mom when she shopped, but also from visits to the two Hoyle’s IGA stores, both
located along Washington, one at 9th, the other at 13th.
Then there was the Kaw Theater where we watched movies and ate the homemade
cinnamon and horehound candies made by Mr. Hoyle, the owner and the father of my
Aunt Barbara. Duckwall’s and Woolworth’s stores sat on the east side of the
street in the same block as Cole’s Department Store where Mother used to model
clothes on occasion. I had seen photos of her as a young model posing on the
runway.
I
got to know Washington Street. North, between 15th and 16th
streets stood Washington School where I attend grades one through five. On
occasion I got to be the crossing guard on the main street, wearing the white
halter that symbolized enough authority to push the button for the stop light
and walk halfway across the four-lane street with a stop sign. No accidents
occurred on my watch. The school playground for older students was on
Washington Street so I saw its activity from swings, monkey bars, and see saws.
Walking down that street one afternoon when our class went on an outing to
visit the local potato chip factory seems as real today as it was then. Across
the street from the school was Kroger’s, and across the street from our store
that Dad managed, sat Dillon’s. I knew these stores to be the competition. Next
to Dillon’s was the Dairy Queen where we kids liked to go on Sunday nights
after church. I knew Washington Street.
As
older elementary kids we neighborhood boys began to walk the street without
adults. There we discovered the bars, a variety of shops including the Army
Surplus stores where we looked longingly at the gear of soldiers, the
barbershop where my best friend Keith got his flattop haircuts and where I
first saw professional wresting on TV, and tattoo parlors where we’d choose our
future body ornamentation from designs displayed in the windows. From
Washington Street, we’d gaze down East Ninth where we knew several houses of
prostitution stood. We’d continue on to Duckwalls and Woolworth’s where we
loved to look at toys and sometimes swiped them, to the Junction Theater where
we ogled the ads for adult films we never got to watch, or to Clewel’s Drug
Store where we drank sodas at the fountain where they mixed drinks and I often
ordered a grape Coke. Occasionally we’d walk on to Dewey Park where we saw
small children dancing at the city band concerts, where a statue of the 19th
century Admiral George Dewey with his drooping handlebar mustache stood atop a
classical archway, and where large WWII cannons stood sentry. By day people sat
there in the shade of huge elms and more than once on hot summer afternoons we
waded in the fountain that dominated the middle of the park.
I
never entered any of the many bars but was fascinated by their neon lights,
dark spaces with cool air wafting strange odors out the front doors. I wondered
about the men we saw inside sitting at the bar drinking beers, usually quiet
but sometimes with juke box blaring and loud talk and laughter, especially
around payday when the GIs came to town to squander their meager paychecks in
the dives on Washington Street and the whore houses on East Ninth. The
challenging presences rarely made it over to where I lived, but of course, we
boys had planned all our escape routes in case we might have run-ins with drunks.
Our survival tactics were actually just another form of play; after all we were
kids, boys with dreams of self-sufficiency, survival, and strength.
Life
changed for me over the decades between my fifteenth birthday when we left
Junction City and my fifty-first birthday when I showed up along Denver’s
Colfax Ave. My experiences along the unusual Kansas main street prepared me for
living in the city. In my fifties I continued to spend time among people of
various races and backgrounds. I ate Chinese food, chicken fried steaks, and
really nice hamburgers along Colfax. In contrast to my childhood activities, I did
go into bars and did get a tattoo. I still didn’t go into whorehouses. In this
real, really large city I walked down many streets and greeted many people. I
shared a new life with them but still kept my eyes open to possible developing
trouble and chose my routes with the wisdom I had learned in childhood walking
along Washington Street with my friends. Then I walked unafraid but never
unaware. I still do.
© 16 August, 2012 – Denver  
About
the Author 
Phillip Hoyle
lives in Denver and spends his time writing, painting, and socializing. In
general he keeps busy with groups of writers and artists. Following thirty-two
years in church work and fifteen in a therapeutic massage practice, he now
focuses on creating beauty. He volunteers at The Center leading the SAGE
program “Telling Your Story.”
He also blogs at artandmorebyphilhoyle.blogspot.com 
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Military Me by Phillip Hoyle

I didn’t serve in the Army, Navy, Marines, Air Force,
Coast Guard or Reserves. I dropped out of Boy Scouts after moving up several
classes and earning lots of badges. Although I liked singing in the choir at
Boy’s State I pretty much detested its political plotting, campaigning, and
especially marching. I wasn’t military material; not competitive, obedient, or
strong enough. Still I had a strong military background; I grew up in a
military town, Junction City, a railroad town next to Fort Riley in central
Kansas. I grew up next to where General George Armstrong Custer with his
Seventh Cavalry planned military campaigns against aboriginal folk. I grew up
next to military games of the Seventh Cavalry Armored Division that in my time
featured jeeps, tanks, big guns, infantry, and nighttime flares. I grew up
knowing my great grandfather had worked at three Kansas forts when he first emigrated
here from Germany and that two of my uncles had served in the military. I grew
up in schools peopled with the children of Army officers, GIs, and civil
service employees. I sat in classes with kids who had lived the past three
years in Germany. I attended school with girls who grew up in Europe and spoke
heavily accented English. Daily I heard the chop, chop, chop of overhead
passing helicopters from the base airport. When we drove through the Fort I saw
barracks, parade grounds, war memorials, historic officers’ houses, weapons, and
armories. I saw the PX and the Commissary. 
I went to church with folk from the Fort. I carried out groceries to
cars owned by soldiers. I watched my neighbor polish his boots to the most
unbelievable shine. I got to know his Japanese wife. I shopped in Army surplus
stores, daily walked past GI bars, and on payday night saw lines of enlisted young
men waiting to enter whore houses on East Ninth Street. I saw silk jackets with
wild-looking dragons on their backs brought home from Asian assignments. I heard
stories, saw military parades, and watched as convoys passed by on Interstate 70.
I played Army with my neighborhood buddies using either plastic soldiers or our
own play guns. I viewed endless military newsreels while awaiting my turn at
the Saturday morning gun club in the basement of the Municipal Auditorium where
local police took their target practice, in the same building that housed the
USO. Army was everywhere, even in my imagination, but I couldn’t feature
actually entering the service in any of its forms. I wasn’t a good match.
Dad told me of a worship service when America was on the
brink of war, probably at the onset of the Korean conflict. The preacher that
Sunday had waxed eloquently about the terrible enemy that was threatening our
values and safety. After Dad had turned off the organ, stowed his music scores,
and said goodbye to the choir, he stopped to shake the preacher’s hand.  He asked, “Why is it that preachers preach
peace until the nation is on the brink of war and then preach war?” He said the
preacher got really red in the face, but he didn’t tell me the man’s response
to him, or if he did I have no memory of it. I was fascinated with Dad’s
ability to support and confront, a natural counseling approach he had never
studied. He did so out of a sense of conscience, a tribute I suppose to his
father’s being reared Quaker. His people were thoughtful and honest. Coming out
of high school in the early thirties, he was unable to attend college, but he
was an avid reader, a theologically curious church lay leader, and very bright.
I don’t recall Dad leading me away from military service, but I do remember his
interest that I become a preacher. Perhaps he wanted me to preach peace.
In a Christian Ethics course in Seminary I developed a
great interest in how decisions are really made, at least that’s how I
expressed it. I opined over and over in the class the function of emotions in
moral judgment and action. I criticized our texts that said little about their
roles. I studied extensively in nineteenth and twentieth century philosophical,
theological, and psychological theory of the passions to find out all I could.
The teacher of the course liked to quantify our responses to ethical problems.
“On a scale of one to ten,” he’d say, “where do you place yourself…?” We were
supposed to choose a number. War was one issue. I refused to quantify my
response but, knowing myself, explained that if I were faced with an enemy I
would probably defend myself and my family. Having lived around the military
all my childhood, even without being interested in becoming a soldier, I
realized I’d probably want to defend my loved ones and country in some way. I might
declare myself a pacifist theoretically, but if the enemy was crossing the
border with guns aimed at me, I’d come to the defense. I was pretty sure that my
response would be visceral. Visions of helicopters and jeeps, guns and GI’s
still played out their power in me even fifteen years after I’d moved away from
the Fort. I guess that’s just old military me.
On the other hand I pretty much believe in the sanctity
of all life. Also I can pretty much be a wimp. Maybe I’d argue with myself as
the enemy approached and have no chance to use a gun I don’t know how to shoot,
be run over by an enemy who is stronger than I, or otherwise fight without any
chance of winning. And if I lasted very long, I’d surely wonder “winning what?”
Now that is really old me even though I can still hear the big guns blasting
off in the distance of my childhood. Guess I’d better stick with philosophy.
© 23 Nov 2011  

About the Author  
Phillip Hoyle
lives in Denver and spends his time writing, painting, and socializing. In
general he keeps busy with groups of writers and artists. Following thirty-two
years in church work and fifteen in a therapeutic massage practice, he now
focuses on creating beauty. He volunteers at The Center leading the SAGE
program “Telling Your Story.”
He also blogs
at artandmorebyphilhoyle.blogspot.com