By Suzanne Barker Griffith
for Carter County Times
November is National Veterans and Military Families Month; a time when America recognizes the tremendous sacrifices of our honored veterans and their families.
In 2016, General Joseph Dunford, former Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, stated, “The resilience of our families and our children is absolutely what has allowed us to do the things that we’ve asked our force to do. The strength of our U.S. Armed Forces, the strength of our nation is in our military families.”
As the proud daughter of an Air Force Veteran, Master Sergeant Clowell Barker, who fought in Vietnam, I felt that deeply. I had witnessed and lived every word.
Our family’s origin story is like so many other military families from Eastern Kentucky. After graduating from Olive Hill High School in 1952 with limited choices, Dad proudly joined the Air Force. From there he went to basic training and then to Tyndall Air Force Base in Panama City, Florida. For a boy who had never left Carter or Elliott Counties much, this was a long way from home and only the first leg of his twenty-four-year military career.
In January 1953, he and my mother, sweethearts since the eighth grade, Florene Mullins, eloped and exchanged vows in Indiana as she joined him in the great unknown.
I still have the note my mother left my grandmother. It says,
“Dear Mother,
Clowell and I have gone. We left last night. We will reach Indiana this morning about seven. Please don’t worry about us. We will call you Monday night. Hope we didn’t wake you up trying to leave. ha! ha!
Flo and Clowell”
To this day, that note, along with Dad’s dog tags, are two of my most valued possessions. When I read it, I not only think of Mom writing it and Grandma Mullins reading it, but I also think about other mothers impacted by military service finding similar notes.
Like so many other military families, the Barker family experienced many moves, twenty-six to be exact, during the years Dad was in the Air Force. Our mother became a professional at packing up, cleaning, saying goodbyes, and enrolling her children in new schools, all while longing for a permanent family home.
Each child was born on a different base, Joe was born in Alaska, Kim in Tennessee, Kathy in Italy, and I was born in Kansas. Through every military assignment, all we had was each other, no extended family members around to call for a favor, no longtime friend to help out in a pinch, just “us” and that was enough.
Dad was stationed in Mountain Home, Idaho in the mid-1960s, and this is where war came knocking on our door.
My earliest memories were of Dad going off to Vietnam, my mother crying all alone in their room, and watching Walter Cronkite’s nightly news reports on our small black-and-white television while also watching the worry in my mother’s face. Kids pick up on those things, even little ones.
I recall the day in 1968 when Dad returned. In the days leading up to his homecoming, Mom was excited and happy and this resonated with me as well. My happiness turned to shock when I saw my Dad come through our mobile home door. The first thing that came from my mouth was, “You are not my Daddy” as tears flooded my eyes.
What had happened to the big, gregarious Daddy who had left and whose picture I had been gazing at for months and who was this gaunt man claiming to be my Daddy?
Family lore has it that he and Mom both reassured me it was really him. In my utter confusion, I was not sure. It took me several days to decide if my Daddy, my real Daddy, was home. Finally, I came around.
As an adult now, looking back, I understand I was a witness to the toll the Vietnam War took on both him and Mom. I feel fortunate he came back at all and am happy to say he just celebrated his ninety-fourth birthday.
The post-war years had challenges, but Mom and Dad stuck together as one team. The frequent relocations, separations, and operational demands did not break them. They understood the assignment. To serve this country meant sacrifice.
Their love, persistence, and resilience, made it through his retirement in 1976 and continued until her untimely death in 1997.
As you go about this month shaking the hands of our beloved veterans. let their family members and their spouses, extra heavy on their spouses, know how much they too are appreciated. After all, freedom isn’t free; it was and is still paid for with the empty seats at dinner tables, strained marriages, the worry of parents, the tears of children, and the realities of veterans who came home forever changed mixed with knowing many heroes gave the ultimate sacrifice.
May God forever bless our veterans and their families for their courage, service, and sacrifice to protect our freedom.
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