Gary Jay McMaster was a career soldier, military museum chairman and curator, historian, author, world traveler and public lecturer. He spent seven decades with the United States Army in various capacities in and out of uniform.
Early Life
Gary Jay McMaster was born in the village of Penn Yan, New York on October 15, 1943. His father, Kenneth C. McMaster, was a welder by trade, a motorcycle enthusiast, and had ridden the rails throughout the nation during the Great Depression. His mother, Wilma M. Ingraham, was born to family that were some of the very first pioneers of the area. His older brother Allen is said to have asked for a baby brother for his birthday, and Gary was born on his fourth birthday. Gary was told that he was named after the doctor who brought him into this world, whose name was Gary. He grew up in Penn Yan, mostly across from Red Jacket Park and in Indian Pines. He attended two different elementary schools until his family's move to San Diego, California in 1955, when he was 11 years old.
1950s.
The family lived in Old San Diego, called "Old Town"--the birthplace of California—where Gary attended the second semester of 6th grade at Fremont Elementary School, the 7th and 8th grades at Richard Henry Dana Junior High School. His best friends were Julio Ruiz and Stanley Crane. With Dana overcrowded, he was sent to Point Loma High School for 9th grade, where his older brother was going to school. Then the family moved to Fifth Avenue and Upas Street and he attended Theodore Roosevelt Junior High School for the second semester of 9th grade. He helped to pay the rent by taking care of the yard and hedges for the realtor, and had other part-time jobs during his school days. During his months at Roosevelt, Meredith Wilson came to town and 76 trombone players were recruited from San Diego schools, of which he was one, so he got march in a band in the annual Fiesta del Pacifico in front of Wilson, who was the Grand Marshal of the parade. His graduation ceremony took place on the stage of the Spreckles Organ Pavilion in Balboa Park. After graduating from Roosevelt, he went on to San Diego High School for 10th, 11th and 12th grades. He was in Army ROTC and the marching band, and he enjoyed art service. He was sent to San Diego State University for a special art class. He graduated in 1961, receiving his graduation diploma in the school ceremony at the Starlight Bowl in Balboa Park.
1960s.
His first job was as the only employee of a printer in an upstairs fire trap building on Skid Row, printing billboard sections and other types of advertising. He also had odd jobs, including delivery advertising samples door to door and selling subscriptions for a new newspaper. After many subscriptions were prepaid, the newspaper never was published and the publisher disappeared with the money. Gary entered San Diego Junior College (late called San Diego Community College), majoring in journalism, writing for the college newspaper, and got to attend a college journalism convention in Palm Springs.
During this time, he began an interesting hobby—"gate crashing." There were two major hotels in downtown San Diego, so when celebrities came to town they would usually stay with one of the other, and he know the layout of each. He crashed a fundraising dinner for JFK's run for President at the U.S. Grant Hotel and not only met former President Harry Truman, but entered and left the dinner as part of a 4-man group that consisted of Truman, two off-duty firemen assigned to him, and Gary (no Secret Service agents were assigned for former Presidents back then, and they thought he was a member of the press). Then he sat down for a private, albeit brief, conversation with Truman at a private reception in the Presidential Suite. As people began to wonder who he was, he disappeared. He also crashed a reception for John Glenn and Scott Carpenter just after their orbits of Earth, and was able to have a 3-way conversation alone with them. He crashed a reception following the premiere of "To Kill a Mockingbird" and met Gregory Peck, and an award ceremony for Jimmy Durante and met him as well. He even came down the steps of the Santa Monica Civic Auditorium alone with Sidney Poitier in 1964 after the actor received the Best Actor Oscar for "Lilies of the Field."
He met many other famous people with his fun hobby and again during his later life. He began going to the CBS affiliate studio in San Diego in a talk show audience and got to meet Johnny Weissmuller (popular film "Tarzan") and silent film star Francis X. Bushman ("Ben Hur"). He was also a regular at the Regis Philbin Show at NBC affiliate KOGO-TV when Philbin was getting started as a TV host. There, he got to meet comedian Jerry Lewis, and live through a bomb scare with newspaper columnist Walter Winchell (Winchell later mentioned him in his column). Gary got to ride back and forth on a ferry boat in San Diego Harbor as Jerry Lewis was filming a movie on it during this time, and his father later told him that he had done a welding job on Lewis's boat and Lewis had helped him bring his welding equipment aboard. Regis and his wife gave Gary a ride home from Regis's show one night. Lew Scarr, columnist for the San Diego Union-Tribune did a whole column on Gary and his "Phantom Gate Crasher of San Diego" escapades. While going to college in 1965, Gary received his draft notice in the middle of a semester.
He wrote to Vice President Hubert Humphrey to see if he could first finish his semester, and later the school received a letter from General Hershey, head of the Selective Service, allowing him to finish out his semester of schooling before entering the Army.
Gary was given his Army skill exams and physical exam at the military entrance station in Los Angeles, and he would have done his basic training at Fort Ord, California, but they were having one of their frequent bouts of spinal meningitis, so he and others were flown all the way to Fort Polk, Louisiana in the summer of 1965. Getting the highest score in his company firing the M-14 rifle, he was given a pass go spend the day in the nearby town of Leesville, which was his first exposure to racial segregation. About to see a movie at the theater, a Filipino with him was motioned to go upstairs with "the other coloreds." They both left the theater without going in, and after his Army hitch, Gary participated in Freedom Marches in San Diego.
During his basic training, a Sergeant came into the barracks asking who could touch type. Gary had taken a semester of touch-typing in junior high school, and his parents bought him a metal typewriter and stand so he could type his term papers, etc. The Army gave him a typing test, and with his skill he received orders after training to be a clerk-typist. After graduation from basic training, however, he took the train back to San Diego for a short period of leave. Without any additional training, he had received orders for Fort Wainwright, in the Interior of Alaska, assigned to Yukon Command. After his leave, he flew up to Fairbanks and the first flurries of winter began coming down as he exited the airplane.
He spent a few days mopping floors in Yukon Command Headquarters while they decided what to do with him. Soon, he was taken down the highway to Fort Greely, which was where the Army Materiel Command tested everything the Army used for extreme cold weather. It got down to 100 degrees below zero with the wind chill factored in, but luckily he worked indoors in the Headquarters Company, training with the company clerk and personnel sergeant. Activities there included games at the service club and bowling alley, bus trips into Fairbanks, and shooting privately-owned weapons out on the frozen Big Delta River.
After that winter of 1965, he was sent back to Fort Wainwright and attached to a signal company and trained under that company clerk who was getting ready to be discharged. He, the supply sergeant, the armorer and a couple of the linemen all became friends. He and the supply sergeant would often go downhill skiing or fly fishing for grayling in the glacier-fed streams on the weekends, and he would go the saloons in Fairbanks with friends. He flew to Dawson, Yukon Territory to see Roberts Service's cabin and the other sights there, went gold panning, and watched the dog sled races in town and at Tok Junction. He visited the Malemute Saloon, the museum at the University of Alaska, and took psychology at the University. He took the train to Denali National Park.
When he was honorably discharged in 1967, he flew to Seattle and took the train back to San Diego. Soon, he utilized the G.I. Bill to enroll back at San Diego Junior College and completed the two-year Police Science curriculum, receiving an A.A. degree. He passed the exams for the San Diego Police Department but failed the physical as his myopia had increased. He applied for a job as manager of the store at the gas station on the Navy Hospital and made a close friend in James Vogltanz, a friendship that would last until James' death in 2018. They would be roommates at different times and Gary was best man at one of James' weddings.
He wrote and illustrated the legitimately-published book, "The International Trout and Salmon Cookbook." It was published simultaneously by E.S. Barnes of New Jersey and Thomas Yoseloff of London in 1970 and was featured prominently in major bookstore chains.
1970s
After a couple of years, Gary took a job as a warehouseman at the main Navy Exchange at the hospital. The new overall manager then had him set up a hobby shop and later a garden shop. He soon followed the manager to the Navy Exchange at Miramar Naval Air Station, running all of the outside areas.
In the early 1970s, serving in the Inactive Reserves, he soon decided to join an Army Reserve unit at Camp Pendleton Area 21 (Del Mar Basin in Oceanside) and learned to fully operate a 30-ton capacity amphibious vehicle called a LARC-30, and would train by driving it out through the surf, unloading cargo onto the deck from Navy ships and make beach landings. He once drove his LARC onto Black's (nude) Beach on the way back from Coronado and his commander received a complaint.
1980s.
In 1979, he transferred into a tank battalion of the California Army National Guard at the main San Diego Armory on Mesa College Drive. He was put to work on administrative duties and spent extra days helping the fulltime Administration and Supply Technician. The following year he was offered a fulltime position as fulltime Administration and Supply Technician of one of the tank companies, Company C. He was sent to the National Guard Professional Education Center at Camp Robinson, Arkansas, where he was top of his Unit Administrator class. He went back several times for additional classes on the fulltime management of National Guard companies. His military unit would often train at Fort Irwin, Fort Hunter Liggett and Camp Roberts. He also began a toy drive for more than a hundred Indian children at the Viejas Indian Reservation, which he ran for ten years until the reservation built a casino, after which he ran the toy drive for the Vietnam Veterans Family Outreach Program. He helped the Command Sergeant Major set up a museum room in the armory on the history of the battalion, arranged participation of the battalion in a large military encampment near Seaport Village each year, participated in off campus recruiting drives, and arranged unit participation in local parades and other events.
1990s.
He was transferred into the Brigade Headquarters training section after ten years with the tank company. Soon, he took over the position of fulltime Unit Administrator for the Brigade Headquarters and Headquarters Company, also serving as the Nuclear, Biological and Chemical NCO for the Brigade after completing schooling at Camp Parks, California. He test drove the first HMMWVs that came to his brigade. After three years, he was transferred to the armory in National City as Unit Administrator of HHC, 2nd Battalion, 185th Armor Regiment. He was sent to Camp San Luis Obispo for training on large Army vehicles, which included how to drive and load semi-trucks and operate HEMMTs, and he was given the job of Battalion Truck Master during drills, supervising all the tank battalion's ammunition and fuel trucks and their drivers.
During the early 1990s, he joined a fledgling group the reenacted Scottish highland soldiers of the Gordon Highlanders during the Anglo-Egyptian Campaign in Egypt and Sudan and continued in that group as a Martin-Henry MkIII rifleman for ten years. Becoming a commemorative team under the Gordon Highlanders Museum in Aberdeen, Scotland, the group, named Bydand Forever, performed three "battle tours" in Scotland, with their Gatling gun and other weapons, staying in Gordon Barracks in Aberdeen, in 1994, 1997 and 2000. During those tours, he performed at the 200th Anniversary of the Gordon Highlanders (in front of Prince Charles), the Gordon Highlander Museum in Aberdeen, Glenfiddich Distillery for the introduction of Gordon Highlander Whisky, the Tall Ships Festival in Aberdeen, and many other venues. The group was featured in many news articles while there. He remained a rifleman in the group for 20 years, and performed at countless Scottish Highland Games and other venues with them. During the 1994 tour, he met someone who would become another close friend. He was an enlisted soldier in the Gordon Highlanders, and that friendship continued for the rest of his life, with many more personal visits to Scotland. He also got to know Lt. General Sir Peter Graham quite well.
He researched the early history of the M(a)cMasters in the Western Highlands of Scotland and wrote a treatise on their history, which is in the archives of the Library of Scotland. It was also used as the central article in one of the journals of the Scottish Genealogy Society, which is headed by Great Britain's Lord Lyon, King of Arms.
He was member of the House of Scotland, one of the International cottages in Balboa Park in San Diego. When he was appointed Trustee, he spent a lot of time greatly improving the cottage, and then served as President for a term until moving to Paso Robles, California. He also did many interviews and a lot of research, writing the history of the cottage, which is in the archives of the San Diego History Center. During his time as president, he was invited to attend the Royal Highland Games at Braemar, Scotland, by the convener. He was accompanied by the convener to inspect the cabers being used on the field, right in front of Queen Elizabeth and Prince Philip.
In 1996, he was in the blockbuster film, "Titanic" with Leonardo DeCaprio and Kate Winslet. Filming was done on sets of the full-size ship and Southampton terminal at 20th Century Fox Studios built especially for the film on the coast of Baja California. During filming, he was in a scene coming down the grand staircase in white tie and tails in front of all the main cast; carpenters must have left one of the brass vertical plates on one step barely sticking up and he tripped. As he and a lady professor from the University of Mexico were the first couple down the stairs, he almost fell into the lap of James Cameron, causing the director to yell "CUT!" He was in several scenes, but went to Scotland for Christmas and New Year's; therefor he could do no more scenes during that period, although was asked many times.
In 1997, he was transferred to Camp Roberts, California to be Training NCO and Security NCO for the entire installation. Camp Roberts has begun in 1941 as the US Army's largest basic training installation in the nation, and beginning in 1971 it had been managed by the California Army National Guard as its main training and pre-deployment station. He served in that garrison position until he retired at age 60 in 2003 at the rank of Sergeant First Class, with an Army Meritorious Service Medal, two Army Commendation Medals, three Army Achievement Medals, a Good Conduct Medal, Two Army Reserve Components Achievement Medals, two National Defense Service Medals, an Outstanding Volunteer Service Medal, an Armed Forces Reserve Medal, an Army Service Ribbon, the Army Overseas Ribbon, and several others, plus several letters of commendation. He was once awarded NCO of the Year by the Association of the U.S. Army.
He put up and ran several Facebook pages and put up tributes to several deceased relatives and friends on the Findagrave website.
He had enjoyed riding motorcycles most of his life and donated his last motorcycle to TV host Jay Leno for Leno's collection in Burbank, California, revisiting the collection many times.
2000s.
The year following his retirement from the US Army, he was offered to oversee the computer software data for Camp Roberts and performed in that position for seven more years until he totally retired.
In 2002, when the founder of the Camp Roberts Historical Museum passed away, Gary took over the reins of the museum and built it up over the decades into the largest Army museum in California. He built several times more exhibits, wrote books on the history of camp for the museum, including the camp's World War I Medal of Honor namesake Army Corporal Harold W. Roberts (The Ultimate Sacrifice), built an exhibit on him and got the museum to have a flower arrangement placed on his grave in France every Memorial Day, started and ran a membership program, managed the donation program, managed the gift shop and built that up, gave public presentations to groups on the camp's history, co-wrote the script for the camp history video shown to visitors, designed the brochure and posters, and participated in many events for the museum. This continued throughout the rest of his life.
He is a recipient of the President's Lifetime Volunteer Service Award.
Following his first trip to Scotland with Bydand Forever in 1994, he got the travel bug. He went back to Scotland another 14 times besides the 3 times with Bydand Forever, staying with friends, visiting many historic sites and castles, riding a motorcycle through the western highlands and the first air boat across the Firth of Forth, attending Tattoos at Edinburgh Castle, and enjoying many other adventures. Over the years, he traveled in India (3 times), Australia, New Zealand, Egypt, Ethiopia, Argentina, Brazil, Yucatan (twice), Chile (including Easter Island), Denmark, Peru (including Machu Picchu and the headwaters of the Amazon), Fiji, England (8 times), Ireland, Northern Ireland, Wales, Spain, Morocco, Gibraltar, Portugal, Czech Republic, Slovakia, Austria, Germany, Italy (3 times), France (4 times), Norway, Greece, Turkey, UAE, Belgium, Netherlands, Hungary, Romania, and Switzerland. He sailed on the Queen Mary 2 from Southampton to New York. He also traveled to most of the United States, including Hawaii (twice), visiting many historic sites and museums, including several of the Presidential museums. He helped, as a layman, with medical missions in India, Ethiopia and Romania.
He became a member of the Knights Templar in 2009. His investiture took place in the 14th century chapel of Balgonie Castle near Glenrothes, in the Kingdom of Fife, Scotland. (The historic castle was once captured during a raid by the Scottish outlaw and folk hero Rob Roy MacGregor in 1716.)
He met countless celebrities during his life, including President Truman and the first U.S. Astronauts, and had a collection of letters, cards, portraits and photographs inscribed to him from a great many famous people, including US Presidents and Royalty. He attended major productions on Broadway, in London, and at the Moulin Rouge in Paris. Gary lived through the last years of World War II, the Moon landing, the assassination of President Kennedy, the Vietnam War protests of the 1960s, the drug-fueled disco hedonism of the 1970s, the AIDS crisis of the 1980s, the Iraq and Afghan Wars, the dawn of Artificial Intelligence, and the terms of 17 US Presidents and three British Monarchs.
Gary Jay McMaster was a career soldier, military museum chairman and curator, historian, author, world traveler and public lecturer. He spent seven decades with the United States Army in various capacities in and out of uniform.
Early Life
Gary Jay McMaster was born in the village of Penn Yan, New York on October 15, 1943. His father, Kenneth C. McMaster, was a welder by trade, a motorcycle enthusiast, and had ridden the rails throughout the nation during the Great Depression. His mother, Wilma M. Ingraham, was born to family that were some of the very first pioneers of the area. His older brother Allen is said to have asked for a baby brother for his birthday, and Gary was born on his fourth birthday. Gary was told that he was named after the doctor who brought him into this world, whose name was Gary. He grew up in Penn Yan, mostly across from Red Jacket Park and in Indian Pines. He attended two different elementary schools until his family's move to San Diego, California in 1955, when he was 11 years old.
1950s.
The family lived in Old San Diego, called "Old Town"--the birthplace of California—where Gary attended the second semester of 6th grade at Fremont Elementary School, the 7th and 8th grades at Richard Henry Dana Junior High School. His best friends were Julio Ruiz and Stanley Crane. With Dana overcrowded, he was sent to Point Loma High School for 9th grade, where his older brother was going to school. Then the family moved to Fifth Avenue and Upas Street and he attended Theodore Roosevelt Junior High School for the second semester of 9th grade. He helped to pay the rent by taking care of the yard and hedges for the realtor, and had other part-time jobs during his school days. During his months at Roosevelt, Meredith Wilson came to town and 76 trombone players were recruited from San Diego schools, of which he was one, so he got march in a band in the annual Fiesta del Pacifico in front of Wilson, who was the Grand Marshal of the parade. His graduation ceremony took place on the stage of the Spreckles Organ Pavilion in Balboa Park. After graduating from Roosevelt, he went on to San Diego High School for 10th, 11th and 12th grades. He was in Army ROTC and the marching band, and he enjoyed art service. He was sent to San Diego State University for a special art class. He graduated in 1961, receiving his graduation diploma in the school ceremony at the Starlight Bowl in Balboa Park.
1960s.
His first job was as the only employee of a printer in an upstairs fire trap building on Skid Row, printing billboard sections and other types of advertising. He also had odd jobs, including delivery advertising samples door to door and selling subscriptions for a new newspaper. After many subscriptions were prepaid, the newspaper never was published and the publisher disappeared with the money. Gary entered San Diego Junior College (late called San Diego Community College), majoring in journalism, writing for the college newspaper, and got to attend a college journalism convention in Palm Springs.
During this time, he began an interesting hobby—"gate crashing." There were two major hotels in downtown San Diego, so when celebrities came to town they would usually stay with one of the other, and he know the layout of each. He crashed a fundraising dinner for JFK's run for President at the U.S. Grant Hotel and not only met former President Harry Truman, but entered and left the dinner as part of a 4-man group that consisted of Truman, two off-duty firemen assigned to him, and Gary (no Secret Service agents were assigned for former Presidents back then, and they thought he was a member of the press). Then he sat down for a private, albeit brief, conversation with Truman at a private reception in the Presidential Suite. As people began to wonder who he was, he disappeared. He also crashed a reception for John Glenn and Scott Carpenter just after their orbits of Earth, and was able to have a 3-way conversation alone with them. He crashed a reception following the premiere of "To Kill a Mockingbird" and met Gregory Peck, and an award ceremony for Jimmy Durante and met him as well. He even came down the steps of the Santa Monica Civic Auditorium alone with Sidney Poitier in 1964 after the actor received the Best Actor Oscar for "Lilies of the Field."
He met many other famous people with his fun hobby and again during his later life. He began going to the CBS affiliate studio in San Diego in a talk show audience and got to meet Johnny Weissmuller (popular film "Tarzan") and silent film star Francis X. Bushman ("Ben Hur"). He was also a regular at the Regis Philbin Show at NBC affiliate KOGO-TV when Philbin was getting started as a TV host. There, he got to meet comedian Jerry Lewis, and live through a bomb scare with newspaper columnist Walter Winchell (Winchell later mentioned him in his column). Gary got to ride back and forth on a ferry boat in San Diego Harbor as Jerry Lewis was filming a movie on it during this time, and his father later told him that he had done a welding job on Lewis's boat and Lewis had helped him bring his welding equipment aboard. Regis and his wife gave Gary a ride home from Regis's show one night. Lew Scarr, columnist for the San Diego Union-Tribune did a whole column on Gary and his "Phantom Gate Crasher of San Diego" escapades. While going to college in 1965, Gary received his draft notice in the middle of a semester.
He wrote to Vice President Hubert Humphrey to see if he could first finish his semester, and later the school received a letter from General Hershey, head of the Selective Service, allowing him to finish out his semester of schooling before entering the Army.
Gary was given his Army skill exams and physical exam at the military entrance station in Los Angeles, and he would have done his basic training at Fort Ord, California, but they were having one of their frequent bouts of spinal meningitis, so he and others were flown all the way to Fort Polk, Louisiana in the summer of 1965. Getting the highest score in his company firing the M-14 rifle, he was given a pass go spend the day in the nearby town of Leesville, which was his first exposure to racial segregation. About to see a movie at the theater, a Filipino with him was motioned to go upstairs with "the other coloreds." They both left the theater without going in, and after his Army hitch, Gary participated in Freedom Marches in San Diego.
During his basic training, a Sergeant came into the barracks asking who could touch type. Gary had taken a semester of touch-typing in junior high school, and his parents bought him a metal typewriter and stand so he could type his term papers, etc. The Army gave him a typing test, and with his skill he received orders after training to be a clerk-typist. After graduation from basic training, however, he took the train back to San Diego for a short period of leave. Without any additional training, he had received orders for Fort Wainwright, in the Interior of Alaska, assigned to Yukon Command. After his leave, he flew up to Fairbanks and the first flurries of winter began coming down as he exited the airplane.
He spent a few days mopping floors in Yukon Command Headquarters while they decided what to do with him. Soon, he was taken down the highway to Fort Greely, which was where the Army Materiel Command tested everything the Army used for extreme cold weather. It got down to 100 degrees below zero with the wind chill factored in, but luckily he worked indoors in the Headquarters Company, training with the company clerk and personnel sergeant. Activities there included games at the service club and bowling alley, bus trips into Fairbanks, and shooting privately-owned weapons out on the frozen Big Delta River.
After that winter of 1965, he was sent back to Fort Wainwright and attached to a signal company and trained under that company clerk who was getting ready to be discharged. He, the supply sergeant, the armorer and a couple of the linemen all became friends. He and the supply sergeant would often go downhill skiing or fly fishing for grayling in the glacier-fed streams on the weekends, and he would go the saloons in Fairbanks with friends. He flew to Dawson, Yukon Territory to see Roberts Service's cabin and the other sights there, went gold panning, and watched the dog sled races in town and at Tok Junction. He visited the Malemute Saloon, the museum at the University of Alaska, and took psychology at the University. He took the train to Denali National Park.
When he was honorably discharged in 1967, he flew to Seattle and took the train back to San Diego. Soon, he utilized the G.I. Bill to enroll back at San Diego Junior College and completed the two-year Police Science curriculum, receiving an A.A. degree. He passed the exams for the San Diego Police Department but failed the physical as his myopia had increased. He applied for a job as manager of the store at the gas station on the Navy Hospital and made a close friend in James Vogltanz, a friendship that would last until James' death in 2018. They would be roommates at different times and Gary was best man at one of James' weddings.
He wrote and illustrated the legitimately-published book, "The International Trout and Salmon Cookbook." It was published simultaneously by E.S. Barnes of New Jersey and Thomas Yoseloff of London in 1970 and was featured prominently in major bookstore chains.
1970s
After a couple of years, Gary took a job as a warehouseman at the main Navy Exchange at the hospital. The new overall manager then had him set up a hobby shop and later a garden shop. He soon followed the manager to the Navy Exchange at Miramar Naval Air Station, running all of the outside areas.
In the early 1970s, serving in the Inactive Reserves, he soon decided to join an Army Reserve unit at Camp Pendleton Area 21 (Del Mar Basin in Oceanside) and learned to fully operate a 30-ton capacity amphibious vehicle called a LARC-30, and would train by driving it out through the surf, unloading cargo onto the deck from Navy ships and make beach landings. He once drove his LARC onto Black's (nude) Beach on the way back from Coronado and his commander received a complaint.
1980s.
In 1979, he transferred into a tank battalion of the California Army National Guard at the main San Diego Armory on Mesa College Drive. He was put to work on administrative duties and spent extra days helping the fulltime Administration and Supply Technician. The following year he was offered a fulltime position as fulltime Administration and Supply Technician of one of the tank companies, Company C. He was sent to the National Guard Professional Education Center at Camp Robinson, Arkansas, where he was top of his Unit Administrator class. He went back several times for additional classes on the fulltime management of National Guard companies. His military unit would often train at Fort Irwin, Fort Hunter Liggett and Camp Roberts. He also began a toy drive for more than a hundred Indian children at the Viejas Indian Reservation, which he ran for ten years until the reservation built a casino, after which he ran the toy drive for the Vietnam Veterans Family Outreach Program. He helped the Command Sergeant Major set up a museum room in the armory on the history of the battalion, arranged participation of the battalion in a large military encampment near Seaport Village each year, participated in off campus recruiting drives, and arranged unit participation in local parades and other events.
1990s.
He was transferred into the Brigade Headquarters training section after ten years with the tank company. Soon, he took over the position of fulltime Unit Administrator for the Brigade Headquarters and Headquarters Company, also serving as the Nuclear, Biological and Chemical NCO for the Brigade after completing schooling at Camp Parks, California. He test drove the first HMMWVs that came to his brigade. After three years, he was transferred to the armory in National City as Unit Administrator of HHC, 2nd Battalion, 185th Armor Regiment. He was sent to Camp San Luis Obispo for training on large Army vehicles, which included how to drive and load semi-trucks and operate HEMMTs, and he was given the job of Battalion Truck Master during drills, supervising all the tank battalion's ammunition and fuel trucks and their drivers.
During the early 1990s, he joined a fledgling group the reenacted Scottish highland soldiers of the Gordon Highlanders during the Anglo-Egyptian Campaign in Egypt and Sudan and continued in that group as a Martin-Henry MkIII rifleman for ten years. Becoming a commemorative team under the Gordon Highlanders Museum in Aberdeen, Scotland, the group, named Bydand Forever, performed three "battle tours" in Scotland, with their Gatling gun and other weapons, staying in Gordon Barracks in Aberdeen, in 1994, 1997 and 2000. During those tours, he performed at the 200th Anniversary of the Gordon Highlanders (in front of Prince Charles), the Gordon Highlander Museum in Aberdeen, Glenfiddich Distillery for the introduction of Gordon Highlander Whisky, the Tall Ships Festival in Aberdeen, and many other venues. The group was featured in many news articles while there. He remained a rifleman in the group for 20 years, and performed at countless Scottish Highland Games and other venues with them. During the 1994 tour, he met someone who would become another close friend. He was an enlisted soldier in the Gordon Highlanders, and that friendship continued for the rest of his life, with many more personal visits to Scotland. He also got to know Lt. General Sir Peter Graham quite well.
He researched the early history of the M(a)cMasters in the Western Highlands of Scotland and wrote a treatise on their history, which is in the archives of the Library of Scotland. It was also used as the central article in one of the journals of the Scottish Genealogy Society, which is headed by Great Britain's Lord Lyon, King of Arms.
He was member of the House of Scotland, one of the International cottages in Balboa Park in San Diego. When he was appointed Trustee, he spent a lot of time greatly improving the cottage, and then served as President for a term until moving to Paso Robles, California. He also did many interviews and a lot of research, writing the history of the cottage, which is in the archives of the San Diego History Center. During his time as president, he was invited to attend the Royal Highland Games at Braemar, Scotland, by the convener. He was accompanied by the convener to inspect the cabers being used on the field, right in front of Queen Elizabeth and Prince Philip.
In 1996, he was in the blockbuster film, "Titanic" with Leonardo DeCaprio and Kate Winslet. Filming was done on sets of the full-size ship and Southampton terminal at 20th Century Fox Studios built especially for the film on the coast of Baja California. During filming, he was in a scene coming down the grand staircase in white tie and tails in front of all the main cast; carpenters must have left one of the brass vertical plates on one step barely sticking up and he tripped. As he and a lady professor from the University of Mexico were the first couple down the stairs, he almost fell into the lap of James Cameron, causing the director to yell "CUT!" He was in several scenes, but went to Scotland for Christmas and New Year's; therefor he could do no more scenes during that period, although was asked many times.
In 1997, he was transferred to Camp Roberts, California to be Training NCO and Security NCO for the entire installation. Camp Roberts has begun in 1941 as the US Army's largest basic training installation in the nation, and beginning in 1971 it had been managed by the California Army National Guard as its main training and pre-deployment station. He served in that garrison position until he retired at age 60 in 2003 at the rank of Sergeant First Class, with an Army Meritorious Service Medal, two Army Commendation Medals, three Army Achievement Medals, a Good Conduct Medal, Two Army Reserve Components Achievement Medals, two National Defense Service Medals, an Outstanding Volunteer Service Medal, an Armed Forces Reserve Medal, an Army Service Ribbon, the Army Overseas Ribbon, and several others, plus several letters of commendation. He was once awarded NCO of the Year by the Association of the U.S. Army.
He put up and ran several Facebook pages and put up tributes to several deceased relatives and friends on the Findagrave website.
He had enjoyed riding motorcycles most of his life and donated his last motorcycle to TV host Jay Leno for Leno's collection in Burbank, California, revisiting the collection many times.
2000s.
The year following his retirement from the US Army, he was offered to oversee the computer software data for Camp Roberts and performed in that position for seven more years until he totally retired.
In 2002, when the founder of the Camp Roberts Historical Museum passed away, Gary took over the reins of the museum and built it up over the decades into the largest Army museum in California. He built several times more exhibits, wrote books on the history of camp for the museum, including the camp's World War I Medal of Honor namesake Army Corporal Harold W. Roberts (The Ultimate Sacrifice), built an exhibit on him and got the museum to have a flower arrangement placed on his grave in France every Memorial Day, started and ran a membership program, managed the donation program, managed the gift shop and built that up, gave public presentations to groups on the camp's history, co-wrote the script for the camp history video shown to visitors, designed the brochure and posters, and participated in many events for the museum. This continued throughout the rest of his life.
He is a recipient of the President's Lifetime Volunteer Service Award.
Following his first trip to Scotland with Bydand Forever in 1994, he got the travel bug. He went back to Scotland another 14 times besides the 3 times with Bydand Forever, staying with friends, visiting many historic sites and castles, riding a motorcycle through the western highlands and the first air boat across the Firth of Forth, attending Tattoos at Edinburgh Castle, and enjoying many other adventures. Over the years, he traveled in India (3 times), Australia, New Zealand, Egypt, Ethiopia, Argentina, Brazil, Yucatan (twice), Chile (including Easter Island), Denmark, Peru (including Machu Picchu and the headwaters of the Amazon), Fiji, England (8 times), Ireland, Northern Ireland, Wales, Spain, Morocco, Gibraltar, Portugal, Czech Republic, Slovakia, Austria, Germany, Italy (3 times), France (4 times), Norway, Greece, Turkey, UAE, Belgium, Netherlands, Hungary, Romania, and Switzerland. He sailed on the Queen Mary 2 from Southampton to New York. He also traveled to most of the United States, including Hawaii (twice), visiting many historic sites and museums, including several of the Presidential museums. He helped, as a layman, with medical missions in India, Ethiopia and Romania.
He became a member of the Knights Templar in 2009. His investiture took place in the 14th century chapel of Balgonie Castle near Glenrothes, in the Kingdom of Fife, Scotland. (The historic castle was once captured during a raid by the Scottish outlaw and folk hero Rob Roy MacGregor in 1716.)
He met countless celebrities during his life, including President Truman and the first U.S. Astronauts, and had a collection of letters, cards, portraits and photographs inscribed to him from a great many famous people, including US Presidents and Royalty. He attended major productions on Broadway, in London, and at the Moulin Rouge in Paris. Gary lived through the last years of World War II, the Moon landing, the assassination of President Kennedy, the Vietnam War protests of the 1960s, the drug-fueled disco hedonism of the 1970s, the AIDS crisis of the 1980s, the Iraq and Afghan Wars, the dawn of Artificial Intelligence, and the terms of 17 US Presidents and three British Monarchs.
