1SG (R) Michael Cornish

1SG (R) Michael Cornish sat down with me for Heroes I Know.

Superman. That pose. Camera hits him and he does it. His wife was at the museum. The kids have taken over the I-love-me room.

Lawton, Michigan. Small town. Forty-four in his senior class. Thirteen guys on the football team. Iron man football. Quarterback. Defensive end. Kickoff return. One win his senior year. Quiet. Shy. He kept the walk-on letter from Albion. Graduated in June. Basic in July of 94. Lawton, Michigan to Lawton, Oklahoma. Fort Sill.

First duty was Fort Hood. Second Armored Division. Patch over the heart. Then 1-44. He came in 16S. MANPAD. They crossed him to Avenger. He did not make sergeant until right before Korea. Four years at Hood. Korea in 99. Germany in 2001. That is where he met Royce Adams.

Staff sergeant. Squad leader. He had never been on Avenger. He learned it with everybody else. Hearnden on his team. Mills and Adams on the other. They watched Grumpy Old Men every morning. They won. They shot missiles. Iraq later. Small arms. Direct fire. Same as a lot of us.

He was a drill sergeant. They called him Robo-Dog. Then first sergeant of Bravo Battery. Seth Barrett was his commander. First commander bigger than he was. He wanted Echo at Bragg. Paris Williams gave it to somebody else. He is still salty. Airborne school as a sergeant first class. First jump counted.

Kyle Kernan. Big Papa. Jeffrey Underhill. Clem. Gary P. Paris Williams. Harold Lincoln. Steven Burnley. Orlando Silva. Royce Adams. Chris Hewitt. Chris Lane. He took a little from each of them.

He did not have a family in the Army. He started later. Now the sons. A day away and he misses them. Enjoy your family. Be true to yourself. Fix it and move on. Sometimes you are the bug. Sometimes you are the windshield. That is why we hit record. Get the story on tape before we are too old or too sick to tell it.