Stories of a Military Policeman: A Boy from the South Side of Town

By Robert C. Jensen

The story begins on the south side of Chicago. It is a quiet neighborhood with mostly wooden framed houses built in the early 1900's. There are some brick houses, which were built in the early 1960's. I lived in one of those wooden framed two -story house. It had a hedge around the front with two evergreens behind it.

The boys from the south side of town included Tom, Dan, Ron, and me. Me, I'm Bob, I came from a family of seven. The seven of us included my two brothers; one older one younger, my two younger sisters, my parent, and me. I'll be your narrator throughout the book. I was a slender boy, with brownish-black hair that I wore in a regular haircut.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Xlibris US
• Release date: Apr 3, 2023
• ISBN: 9781669872634

Book preview

Copyright © 2023 by Robert C. Jensen.

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without permission in writing from the copyright owner.

Any people depicted in stock imagery provided by Getty Images are models, and such images are being used for illustrative purposes only.

Certain stock imagery © Getty Images.

Rev. date: 03/29/2023

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CONTENTS

SECTION I

A Boy From the South Side of Town

Chapter 1 The Neighborhood

Chapter 2 Flipping Fences

Chapter 3 Smoking Not as Good as it Looks

Chapter 4 The Fight That Wasn’t My Fault

Chapter 5 The Ford Falcon Wagon

Chapter 6 The Driving Lessons

Chapter 7 Waving and Driving

Chapter 8 They Call It Tobagganing?

Chapter 9 "Whatever Happened to the Boys

SECTION II

Duty as a Soldier

Chapter 10 My Military Career

Chapter 11 Becoming a Soldier

Chapter 12 Thunder Drill

Chapter 13 Guard Duty and the First Night on Patrol

SECTION III

Duty as a Military Policeman

Chapter 14 Duty In Okinawa

Chapter 15 Going Home

Chapter 16 Guard Duty As A Military Policeman

Chapter 17 Life As A Reservist

Chapter 18 Coming back into the Army

SECTION IV

Duty at Fort Hood, Texas

Chapter 19 A Meeting behind the Gym

Chapter 20 The Cold Soldier / The Fire Hydrant

Chapter 21 Catching a Druggie

Chapter 22 Drugs and a Weapon

Chapter 23 Responding to Fires

Chapter 24 You Can’t Play Ping Pong that Way!

Chapter 25 They Planted it on Me

SECTION V

Duty at Redstone Arsenal, Alabama

Chapter 26 The Sergeant and Authority

Chapter 27 You are Not Supposed to Do It That Way

Chapter 28 The Missing Patrol

Chapter 29 How I Found Out About My Promotion

SECTION VI

Duty at Frankfurt Germany

Chapter 30 The Explosion

Chapter 31 The Biker

Chapter 32 Responding to a Fire

Chapter 33 The Suspicious Objects

Chapter 34 The Pregnant Woman

Chapter 35 The Suspected Terrorist

SECTION VII

Duty in the Republic of Panama

Chapter 36 December 2⁰th: The First Night of Operation Just Cause

Chapter 37 December 2¹st: What Really Happened in Arrajan

Chapter 38 December 2²nd: The Mission

Chapter 39 December 2³rd: The Bus Load of PDF

Chapter 40 December 2⁴th: Prisoners and a Cache of Weapons

Chapter 41 The Bachelor Party

Chapter 42 How My Military Career Ended

This book is dedicated to my wife Frances R. Jensen who inspired me throughout this process. She reminded me of what I wanted to do and how to accomplish what I wanted to do.

I would like to thank my brother-in-law Bruce Bauer, he helped me edit my stories to where they made sense and were grammatically correct.

I would like to thank Toni Portillo for the great illustrations without them my book would be a lot of words without understanding what it looked like.

I also dedicate this book to all my friends and family who have helped me to tell my story and to go from an idea to a completed book.

And last but not least I would like to thank all those who are part of the stories. You made this book complete.

SECTION I

A Boy From the South Side of Town

CHAPTER 1

The Neighborhood

The story begins on the south side of Chicago. It is a quiet neighborhood with mostly wooden framed houses built in the early 1900’s. There are some brick houses, which were built in the early 1960’s. I lived in one of those wooden framed two -story house. It had a hedge around the front with two evergreens behind it

The boys from the south side of town included Tom, Dan, Ron, and me. Me, I’m Bob, I came from a family of seven. The seven of us included my two brothers; one older one younger, my two younger sisters, my parent, and me. I’ll be your narrator throughout the book. I was a slender boy, with brownish-black hair that I wore in a regular haircut.

Tom grew up a couple of blocks from where I lived. He had a younger brother and an older brother, as well as a married sister. Tom wore his hair a little longer than a regular haircut and combed his hair back. He always wore his belt buckle to the side of his hip. Tom was slender and muscular.

Ron, grew up down the street from me. He was a blonde- haired boy and he also wore his hair combed back. He had three younger sisters but his father had passed away when he was six years old. He always did what his mother told him to do and he was the man of the house. Ron was slender and muscular. All three of us wore glasses.

Dan was tall and slender and wore a buttoned- down, long sleeved shirt with the sleeves rolled up to the elbow. We all hung around the