1SG (R) Terry A. Raynor

The veteran community lost a good man with the passing of First Sergeant (Retired) Terry A. Raynor. He sat down with me for Heroes I Know. Jumpmaster. One hundred eighty jumps. That tape is why this page is here.

He was my very first leader who taught me how to be a soldier and how to be a friend. Staff Sergeant Arroyo was my first squad leader. Terry was my first senior gunner. Until then everybody was a buddy from training or they were yelling at me. He put his arm around me. Me and you. We are okay. My first friend.

Fayetteville. Fort Bragg. He grew up hearing the Vietnam numbers on the news at night. He did not think he wanted the Army. His biological father died when he was thirteen. His mother and his stepfather moved him to Lumberton, twenty-five miles down the road. Stepfather for thirty-five years. He said Marshall, he was my father.

Lumberton Senior High. Track scholarship. He learned how to run. Roommate Chris Oswald said come take the ASVAB. Free meal. Terry tried not to pass it. He scored a ninety-eight. Recruiter had three offers. Rigger. Cook. Infantry. Infantry cycle was done. Then a video disc that looked like a record player. The Vulcan cannon. He signed. GT one twenty.

Two years and six months in he did not want to re-enlist. They put ten thousand dollars on the table. Two-alpha bonus. August 1990. Sergeant First Class Lamb. Earl Jenkins. Sergeant Major Ridgeway. Persian Gulf. He rode the Hercules. I rode the Win Brown. Captain Skinner. Lieutenant Tommy D. King, later Colonel King. Bravo Battery on that boat.

He asked me and my wife to keep Brittany. That mobile home. She is thirty-six now. Two beautiful kids in St. Petersburg. Another on the way. Grandpa. He still called me Tater. The name my dad told me came off Snuffy Smith.

I was his black hat in jumpmaster school. He was an E7. I was an E5. He thought it would be easy. JMPI. Fifty in a line. Rotate one jumper to the right. I would not let him slide the first paratrooper. He was mad as hell. Behind the pack shed an AMO black hat took the first word out of his mouth. Congratulations, Airborne. He said I did not keep him from being a jumpmaster. I made him a great one.

Alpha Battery was home. E5 to E8. First sergeant of Bravo. Sergeant Major Patterson put him in that slot. Sergeant Major Adams. Twenty years at Bragg before they levied him to Korea. Then Bliss. Last three years he taught at the University of Rhode Island. ALDAC at Fort Lewis three terms. Nineteen commissions and one nurse. Thirteen years as an E8.

The Gulf almost killed him. A Dear John. They pulled him out of the platoon. Captain Skinner took him to the division chaplain. He called home. A boyfriend answered. His mother drove from Raleigh and walked upstairs. He told it on tape so it would be on the record.

2005 he was working a shop off Dyer and Sun-Ray. He got robbed. Hit in the head. 2015 three craniectomies. Bleeding of the brain. Six months. He learned to walk and talk again. Raintree Villas off Dyer Street. His own apartment. Two cars. He still sang All Americans with us. He was different. That is how he wanted to be known.

His sister asked that anyone wishing to make a donation in his name consider supporting Marshall in the Middle — Heroes I Know. Battery attention. Thank you, Terry. Your story matters. Your service mattered. You will not be forgotten. That is why we hit record. Get the story on tape before we are too old or too sick to tell it.