This is the first in what I'm hoping will be many future podcast episodes of interviews with Skagit Valley Vietnam veterans. The majority of these vets are in their seventies and eighties, so within the next couple of decades their voices will become silent, and their first-hand accounts of a conflict that defined a generation will be lost unless recorded.
My first interview subject happens to also be a near neighbor to my Mount Vernon home. Bill Price's memories of the Vietnam War and his reflections on his experience of it don't nicely align with the narratives that some might prefer when we take up the topic of America at War -- but they are a reflection of how many folks felt who were in uniform at the time, along with many who weren't.
Bill's story illustrates that war holds a lot more menace than that of the people who are shooting at you.
