Senator Max Cleland

Senator Max Cleland

NFL Quiz: Following are some pairs of old time running backs

who were teammates, or contemporaries, for a significant part of

their careers. Who had more career rushing yards in each case.

Answers below.

–Hewritt Dixon or Pete Banaszek?

–MacArthur Lane or John Brockington?

–Walt Garrison, Dan Reeves, or Don Perkins?

–Jim Kiick or Mercury Morris?

–Don Nottingham or Don McCauley?

Senator Max Cleland

I came across this story written by Neal Thompson of the

Baltimore Sun. Cleland is currently a Democratic Senator from

Georgia and his personal story of courage is inspiring. He is a

triple amputee, having suffered a terrible injury in Vietnam. It”s

the story of the explosion that ripped through his body that is

our tale today.

Cleland had once served a semester in Washington as a college

student. He toured the Oval Office three days before John F.

Kennedy was assassinated. The death of Kennedy gave Max a

“sudden inner drive to serve my country.” After a year of

graduate school, he joined the Army. He was 24 when he

volunteered for Vietnam.

In early 1968, the Viet Cong launched the Tet offensive. By

March, after suffering some initial devastating blows, the

Americans had the situation fairly under control (in war, it”s all

relative) except for a remote village, Khe Sanh. The Marines

there remained under seige, prompting an Army-Marine rescue

mission.

Cleland volunteered. He spent five days in a bomb crater,

watched friendly fire kill four men, but emerged alive. On April

8, with a month left in his tour, Cleland was ordered to set up a

radio relay station on a nearby hill. As writer Neal Thompson

writes, “A helicopter flew him and two soldiers to the treeless top

of Hill 471, east of Khe Sanh.”

“When the helicopter landed, Cleland jumped out, followed by

the two soldiers. They ducked beneath the rotors and turned to

watch the liftoff. Then Cleland looked down and saw a grenade.

Where”d that come from? He walked toward it, bent down, and

crossed the line between before and after.”

The details that emerged in the aftermath of the explosion were

sketchy. Cleland, meanwhile, assumed it was his grenade and had

blown himself up. For years he thought that the grenade had

popped off his flak jacket. For years he blamed himself. The

Silver and Bronze Stars he received only embarrassed him.

Few soldiers returned home as severely damaged as Cleland. Of

the 6,878 who lost limbs in Vietnam, 52 were missing three.

Cleland has become a hero to many with the life he has led since

the war. In 1996 he was elected to fill retiring Senator Sam

Nunn”s seat. Nearly every day, someone calls to thank him for

the inspiration he provides. Then one day a fellow by the name of

David Lloyd called.

Lloyd was a 19-year old gung-ho Marine who was in a mortar pit

on April 8, 1968 when he heard an explosion. Thompson picks

up the story.

“Shrapnel bounced off his flak jacket. He ran to the injured

officer, a man named Max Cleland. ”Hold on there, Captain,”

Lloyd told Cleland. ”The chopper will be here in a minute.””

“Lloyd took off his web belt and tied it around one of Cleland”s

shredded legs. When the medics arrived, he left to help another

injured soldier – one of the two who had gotten off a helicopter

with Cleland. The soldier was crying. ”It was mine,” he said, ”it

was my grenade.””

The private had evidently failed to take the appropriate

precautions when he grabbed the grenades from an ammo box so

that they wouldn”t accidentally dislodge. This soldier”s flak

jacket was full of grenades with pins that were no properly bent.

Lloyd said “He was a walking deathtrap.”

Lloyd never assumed that Cleland would think it was his own

grenade. It wasn”t until Lloyd saw a History Channel program

earlier this year where he saw Cleland explain how he “blew

himself up” that Lloyd was able to set the story straight. Imagine

the weight now off of the Senator”s shoulders.

AP Top Ten Male Tennis Players of the Century

1. Rod Laver

2. Pete Sampras

3. Bill Tilden

4. Bjorn Borg

5. Don Budge

6. Lew Hoad

John McEnroe (tie)

8. Roy Emerson

Ken Rosewall (tie)

10. Jack Kramer

David Letterman on the Year 3000

The Sunday Times magazine asked Letterman to come up with

Top Ten”s for the Year 3000, just to give these folks a sense of

what we were all about. Here are a few…

–President Clinton put the “oh” in the Oval Office. (This joke

wasn”t funny in 2000, either).

–We also buried a case of Bud, 43 degrees north, 102 degrees

west. Go Nuts, Dude.

–The Great Pyramids were a gift to David Letterman from his

adoring Egyptian viewers.

–Large hole in the ozone? It was there when we got here.

Top 3 songs for the week of 12/12/64: #1 “Mr. Lonely”

(Bobby Vinton) #2 “She”s Not There” (The Zombies…yeah,

Baby!) #3 “Ringo” (Lorne Greene…yes, it”s true, kids).

NFL Tidbits:

–Jack Kemp had a career completion percentage of 46.7%. He

threw 114 TDs and 183 INTs!! No wonder he couldn”t be

elected President.

–For four seasons, 1967-70, the “Mad Bomber,” Daryle

Lamonica, hooked up with Warren Wells. After the 1970

season, Wells was arrested and out of the NFL (if I recall

correctly). Lamonica was a shell of his former bomber self. But

check out Wells” four years; passes caught, yardage, avg., and

TDs

1967 – 13-302 (23.2) 6 TDs

1968 – 53-1137 (21.5) 11

1969 – 47-1260 (26.8) 14

1970 – 43-935 (21.7) 11

Quiz Answers:

–Banaszek, 3772 – Dixon, 3090

–Brockington, 5185 – Lane, 4656

–Perkins, 6217 – Garrison, 3886 – Reeves, 1990

–Morris, 4133 – Kiick, 3759

–McCauley, 2627 – Nottingham, 2496.

Next Bar Chat, Monday.