Gene Spicer has enjoyed life. He’s married to his first love, he has five adopted children, and he spends his time restoring WWII era Jeeps, skydiving, and traveling with his wife. He also spent 30 years serving in the Army, an experience that built him into the man he is today.
“I was a poor, dumb, midwestern farmboy,” 91-year-old Spicer said. “I was the greenest greenhorn to come out of Jefferson County. I think what [the military] did more than anything else was I got to do some things that I would have never done if I’d been a civilian. I was 20 years old, and I met people I never would have met. I’ve been places I never would have been.”
The military also “cuts mama’s apron strings,” Spicer said. It also taught him that there’s more than one side to every story.
“I’m not extremely religious by any means, but I believe in ‘do unto others as you would have them do unto you,’” Spicer said. “I’d do it again. I couldn’t do much today, but if they need me today, I’d go.”
Spicer knew he was going to be drafted, so he enlisted on November 3, 1950, alongside one of his neighborhood friends.
“I was told by the recruiter that if we enlisted, we could get any job we wanted,” Spicer said with a laugh. “Do not believe the recruiters… When we went to take our physical, they swore us in, and we said, ‘I do.’ Then they said, ‘Change of plans. You’re going to the 101st Airborne.’ We wanted to be tankers. We wanted to drive a tank. I finally got to see the inside of one when I came back and became an officer.”
He trained with the 101st Airborne at Camp Breckinridge, Kentucky for 14 weeks, and they were immediately sent to Korea. He served with the 24th infantry division in Korea for 11 months, 14 days and three hours in 1951 and 1952.
“I was with the 19th infantry regiment as a radio operator, truck driver — whatever came around,” he said.
The brotherhood of his fellow soldiers is what first comes to mind when he looks back on those years. When times were tough, letters and packages from home kept them going as well.
“We had a little Italian boy from the east coast who always got pepperoni,” Spicer recalled. “We had a Japanese boy from California who had family in Japan who sent us dried shrimp. I had an aunt who made the most wonderful peanut butter chocolate candy you ever put in your mouth. That’s part of the comradeship, because when the packages came in, you split it up amongst everybody.”
When his time in Korea was over, he got out of regular Army and joined the National Guard in Indiana for three years. His friend, Clyde Kelly, talked Spicer into using the GI Bill, which allowed him to attend the University of Kentucky, where he earned a bachelor’s and master’s degree in education. He then joined the Guard again, spending the next 24 years as an officer for the 38th division. He’s served in a wide range of military ranks, from company commander up to a brigadier general. Indiana has a northern and southern division for the National Guard, and he was in charge of the southern division at the time of his retirement in 2004.
He also put his education degrees to use and taught school for 28 years, retiring from the classroom in 1988.
“I taught agriculture,” he said. “I was with the boys and girls in blue jackets — the FFA members. I’m quite proud of that. The people who I had in school were the people who are now running the community. I don’t see any basketball or football players doing it, but I see my people.”
While he was teaching the next generation and continuing to serve in the National Guard, he also raised five kids on a farm. He taught them how to work and become “proper members of the country,” Spicer said. Two of his boys served in the military. One retired after 25 years and the other retired with 30 under his belt.
Spicer’s lived in Lake Havasu City for 10 years. He spends the summers in Indiana, where he often participates in parades, showing off his perfectly restored military Jeeps. He’s revived 15 of them in total over the years.
Spicer’s wife has lived in Havasu for much longer, about 30 years. She runs Xanadu Condos on Lake Havasu Avenue and has been in the business for years. She and Spicer grew up together in Indiana
“I let her get away from me,” Spicer said. “It took a while to get it done.”
When they first met in 1952, he was stationed at Fort McArthur in California. He was home on medical leave and didn’t pay much attention to the girl next door.
“She was just a little skinny girl at that time,” Spicer said. “But we had a date in August of 1952. She was going to nurses’ training, and I came back to California. As the years passed, she married somebody else, and I married somebody else, and we lost our spouses.”
In 1969, they tried to rekindle the relationship, but it wasn’t working out. So they both married new people and both lost their spouses yet again. Spicer lost both of his previous wives to cancer.
“This time, I knew where she was at, and I got her sister to give me her telephone number,” Spicer said. “I called her up and said, ‘I’m coming out. Would you like to go to Vegas with me to the races, to NASCAR?’ And it’s been going ever since then.”
They got married on July Fourth with a military wedding at Camp Atterbury, Indiana.
Spicer has only been able to see one of his comrades from the military since leaving Korea. All of the others he served alongside have passed. But there is another soldier in Havasu that actually served in the same division, though their paths never crossed directly – Dan Rickert. You can read his story in our collection of Havasu veterans on HavasuNews.com.
The two of them became friends at a 24th infantry division reunion in Hawaii, and they’re still thick as thieves today.
Spicer is a firm believer that everybody should put time in the military. He encourages all young people to use it as a chance to see the world and what else is out there.
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