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thedrifter
12-30-05, 10:29 AM
Friday, December 30, 2005
Ex-officer honors past by sharing Marines' history
Man's collection, passion gets him chronicling job
By Howard Wilkinson
Enquirer staff writer

MOUNT ADAMS - It is little wonder that the U.S. Marine Corps wants Dick Camp, a Marine officer for 26 years, to help chronicle the Corps' 230-year history.

Camp's home on a quiet side street of Mount Adams is a Marine museum in and of itself.

His collection of memorabilia speaks to Camp's dedication to the Corps and its history, a dedication that went a long way in getting him a new job that he will start in January - deputy director of the U.S. Marine Corps' history division at Quantico, Va., the place where he was first commissioned as a young Marine Corps officer nearly 44 years ago.

"It's a long and proud history, the history of the Corps, and I've tried to do my part to preserve it," said Camp, 65, standing in the cluttered second-story study where the drawers, closets and walls are full of not only the memorabilia of his own Marine Corps career, but the careers of Marines before and after him.

There are dozens of dress uniforms and field uniforms dating from the Spanish-American War in 1898 to a desert camouflage shirt worn by Camp's friend, Lt. Gen. James Mattis, in Iraq. Rifles, swords and combat decorations from World War I, World War II, Korea and Vietnam fill his closets, bulge the drawers and cover the walls.

Standing in the study that he calls his "writing room," Camp showed a visitor a battered canteen marked with the name "Ho," a souvenir he brought back from his tour of duty as a company commander in Vietnam.

"I took it because Mr. Ho didn't need it anymore," Camp said, holding the canteen up to the light.

"I saw Mr. Ho walking into a rice paddy. He didn't walk out," Camp said.

Camp, a native of Newark, N.Y., retired from the Marine Corps in 1988 after a long career that included his Vietnam tour, a stint early on as a member of a ceremonial detail that served as honor guard for burials at Arlington National Cemetery and postings in Hawaii and Okinawa.

A friend talked him into moving to Cincinnati, where he took a job managing the Carew Tower for then-owner Addison Lanier.

When the office building was sold to a new owner, Camp took a job as business manager for the Lakota School District. After 10 years at Lakota, he moved to the same job in the Sycamore School District, retiring last year.

Officials of the Corps' history division could not be reached for comment on Camp's hiring Thursday.

His new job in Quantico starts at $76,000 a year, but it is not money that has drawn him back to the Marine Corps.

It is a passion for the Marine Corps and military history that has already led him to write numerous articles for military magazines, publish a book called "Lima-6" that details his experience as a company commander in Vietnam and write a soon-to-be-published book on the Marine detachment on board the USS Arizona when it sank in Pearl Harbor on Dec. 7, 1941.

"For me, this is the dream job," Camp said. "Meaningful work for an institution I care about. What more could you ask?"

When he arrives in Quantico in January, he will oversee the Marine Corps history division's publications and oral history projects.

Part of the job will involve writing a history of the Marine Corps involvement in Iraq, based on the reports coming in from active-duty Marines who serve in history detachments in Iraq and collecting information on the Marine Corps involvement in the Iraq war.

Camp said the Corps' history division will assist the National Museum of the Marine Corps, which is being built by the Marine Corps Heritage Foundation in Quantico. The museum is due to open by the end of 2006.

"From one generation to the next, every young Marine learns the history of the Corps and takes it to heart," Camp said. "It's pounded into you in boot camp, right along with all the tools you need to be a Marine."

On Nov. 10 of each year, Camp said, Marines pause to celebrate the birthday of the Corps, no matter whether they are posted stateside or serving in a front-line combat unit halfway around the world.

"I remember being out in the field with my company in Vietnam when Nov. 10 rolled around," Camp said. "After we had our c-rations, we had Australian steaks to celebrate the birthday of the Corps. How they got that beef in to the jungle, I'll never know.

"But we were determined to celebrate our birthday," Camp said. "As Marines, we honor our past."

E-mail hwilkinson@enquirer.com