Army money and an old soldier

Richard called the other day and said Larkin had died. Larkin was 80. He was in the Army during the Korean War. He retired from the National Guard in 1994.

Richard and Larkin were sergeants in my National Guard rifle platoon. Richard also got his own platoon and was company first sergeant for a little more than six months.

He was relieved by the battalion commander for being “too close” to his soldiers. That was the stated reason. The real reason was, Richard didn’t go along with the then-voluntary direct deposit of National Guard pay.

One Saturday morning at first formation, Richard said to the soldiers, “I’m supposed to read this letter telling you why you need to have direct deposit.” He read the letter and then said, “You can do what you want, but I’m not going to have direct deposit. It ain’t any of the Army’s business, what I do with my money.”

He would have been better off just reading the letter and not voicing his opinion. But, he wasn’t made that way.

Neither was Larkin.

In the early 1980s, Larkin and his brother sold the family farm to a coal company. Neither wanted to sell, but all their neighbors had already sold, and Larkin and his brother could not successfully run a farm surrounded by 24-hour coal-digging devices and coal-hauling trucks.

Larkin and his brother got about $1 million each. At the time, Larkin was superintendent of a rural school district, in addition to his weekend a month with the Guard.

Larkin got caught up in the direct deposit directive, too.

One Saturday the battalion command sergeant major conducted an in-ranks inspection. When the CSM was finished and gone, all of us NCOs talked about the inspection, mostly what the CSM had to say.

Larkin said, “He asked me if I used direct deposit. I told him I didn’t. He wanted to know why. I told him it isn’t any of the government’s damn business what I do with my money.”

I said, “Why didn’t you just tell him you already had a million dollars in the bank and that piddlly National Guard check wasn’t worth worrying over?”

Larkin said, “Naw, that would have been bragging.”