Verdi and Louise

If I could back up a few years to 31 May 1968, that was the day I graduated from undergraduate school at Brigham Young University (BYU), Provo, Utah.  During the three years that I attended BYU I was enrolled in the Air Force Reserve Officer Training Corps or AFROTC. The commissioning program via AFROTC is typically a four-year program, however, I had taken three years of Junior Army ROTC, during my sophomore, junior and senior years of high school which enabled me to waive off one year in the senior program in college.  I had always wanted to fulfill my military commitment to the country through the Air Force and this afforded me that opportunity.

Also, prior to transferring to BYU I is was attending Riverside City College to complete certain credits in order to make the transfer.  While there I met a young lady, Carolyn Epperson, through the school band we both played in. We dated and she became interested in the LDS Church.  We attended Church together and then when I transferred to BYU she still had another semester to complete before BYU would accept her. Her father, an Air Force Lt Colonel, respected the LDS Church though he had not accepted it as a religion.  He permitted his daughter to attend BYU as long as we did not travel to and from Provo (to home in Riverside, CA) together and as long as she did not become baptized until after she was graduated. We honored both of those conditions.

We both graduated on the same day and I was also commissioned a Second Lieutenant, actually given the Oath of Office by her father, that was May 31, 1968.  Sometime during that final semester we became engaged and married in June back home in Riverside, CA, following graduation.

My first duty assignment was with the 1090th Special Reporting Group, Sandia Base, Albuquerque, New Mexico, reporting for duty in Mid-July 1968.  It was a joint service base where all of the military services were represented Command of the base rotated among the services.  The presiding General when I arrived was a West Pointer, Major General John T. Hunneycutt. He was later succeeded by an Air Force Major General Bill Gernert.

We attended Church at a Chapel about three miles from our house on base and jointly taught a Sunday School Class.  It didn’t take long, however, for cracks to begin showing up in her testimony and conversion. Things went from bad to worse quickly ending rather quickly, 12-18 months, in divorce.  As one might assume, Albuquerque did not leave a great taste in my mouth and I began looking to transfer. The easiest, quickest and best move for my military career was to volunteer for Vietnam which I did.  I can’t honestly say that the change from Albuquerque to the war zone in Southeast Asia was an improvement, if you know what I mean, but the environment was different and that was what mattered.

I was 26 years old and it seemed like it would be an adventure…, until I stepped off the airplane in Bangkok, Thailand, October 3, 1970, for the first time with a 103-degree temperature and 90-95% humidity!!  Okay Southeast Asia, here I am!!

During this time Louise was completing her last year of undergraduate school at Utah State University in Logan, Utah.  As she and a couple of girl friend/roommates finished their schooling, I tried to keep body and soul together.

About 90 days prior to an Air Force member returning from overseas there is a process called “forecasting”.  It’s a process of the Air Force learning who you are, what your skill-level is (what you do), your grade (rank) and when you are returning.  Then they try to match you to an opening somewhere either stateside or possibly another overseas assignment if you concur.

Midway through my SEA tour I had returned to the US on emergency leave for 30 days when my mother suffered congestive heart failure.  I returned overseas with a copy of the old Improvement ERA in my suitcase. In it was a demographic study showing where the youth, ages 18-36, were located within the United States.  My objective was to go home and remarry so considering the huge time difference between where I was, Ubon, Thailand, and where I needed to call, San Antonio, Texas, very late at night (when it came my time for forecast) I called the USAF Military Personnel Center where assignments are made worldwide.  I gave them all of my pertinent information and then listened. The Improvement ERA was open wide to the demographic study on my desk with a map of the US displayed with a dark dot over Salt Lake City. Concentric rings went out from there each a little less dark.

The fellow on the other end of the phone finally listed, (1) Minot AFB, ND, (2) another base clear up in Canada and then (3) Tucson, AZ.  Of course, with Arizona having a fairly robust LDS population Tucson hit one of the concentric rings that was shaded so that’s what I picked.  Not the best career move, huh, but it worked for what I was trying to accomplish.

Almost simultaneously as I headed east from Thailand to Tucson, Arizona, Louise and two of her girl friends were leaving Logan to the same place right around early October 1971.  I established off-base housing in a nice apartment with a pool and outdoor BBQ, while Louise and her friend found an apartment a few miles west towards town, but we all attended the same student Ward.  We were all perhaps two or three years older than the rest of the student but we fit right in.

All of the students had family groups of maybe 8-12 kids for Family Home Evening.  One evening our two families shared a BBQ at one of the city parks. I tell Louise that she cooked the hamburgers and I ate them, and we haven’t stopped.  She was also seeing another A ward member by the name of Arnie Snow but I beat him out 😊.  We dated frequently going to movies, found it quite easy to drive across town, Tucson is a big city, without having to keep up a constant chatter to entertain one another. 

One evening as we returned to her apartment from a date we sat in the car for a moment and I said, “You know, we ought to make this permanent.”  I felt the comment was quite obvious, she did not so I restated it and said something like, “What say we get married.” She was all excited to go in and call her folks back in Midvale who said they were not surprised.

We eventually drove to Phoenix where she received her Endowments and then on September 15, 1972, we were married in the Salt Lake Temple and left for the Pacific Northwest, Seattle, Vancouver, etc., and eventually back to Tucson.   It was not long after that that I received orders again reassigning me (and Louise) to Aviano Air Base, Italy.

Aviano was a wonderful place especially for a couple of newlyweds.  We married on September 15, 1972 and arrived in Aviano in early May 1973.  Driving to Venice was like driving to Provo from here in Layton. And going up into Austria, Germany or Switzerland was almost as easy.  And now we are living in the home we built here in Layton, Utah, 39 years ago. Happily, ever after 😊