Veterans Day

Calvin Andrew: profile of a Freeport veteran

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Veterans Day, unlike Memorial Day, commemorates not only veterans who were killed in battle or survived war and have died since, but also those who are still living. Freeport’s American Legion Post 342 was to hold its yearly observance of Veterans Day on Nov. 11, after press time, at the monument in front of the Freeport Memorial Library. Calvin Andrew, Post 342 treasurer, gave the Herald an interview in which he recounted his own journey after returning from the Vietnam War.

“I enlisted in 1964 at age 18,” Andrew said, who is now 75. “I was in Vietnam for 11 months and 29 days, 1966 to ’67, on convoy duty.”

Andrew was stationed near Saigon close to Tan Son Nhut Air Force Base. He saw soldiers die in combat, though he saw no direct action himself because the convoys generally were not bothered on the road.

For a 20-year-old African-American, the months spent amid a distant and different culture brought some unexpected revelations.

“It opened my eyes to understand what the world was about in terms of understanding my own culture, my own experience of America,” Andrew said. “I mean, when you have a Vietnamese tell you, ‘You should go home and fight your own war. Why are you fighting us?’ He didn’t feel like we African-American soldiers should be in Vietnam when we were still fighting for our [civil] rights, and there were times when we were ready to bring our rifles home, feeling like we were fighting two wars.”

Andrew was raised in Harlem and Brooklyn. His family moved to Hempstead when he was in high school, and he graduated from Hempstead High School. He enlisted in the military because he could not afford college and he knew that the Servicemen's Readjustment Act of 1944, more commonly known as the G.I. Bill, would fund his education if he completed his obligatory service.

Upon completing his period of service, he returned home to an unwelcoming America. “Vietnam vets got a lot of rejection,” Andrew said. “I didn’t go anywhere in my uniform or identify myself as a veteran.” Even getting a date proved hard. He didn’t develop a serious relationship until he met his future wife, Eleanor, whose brother was also a Vietnam veteran.

Despite funding from the G.I. Bill, Andrew’s journey to a master’s degree in student personnel services and counseling involved not only the hard work of studying for courses, but also a nimble aptitude for recognizing when to leave an unsatisfactory situation and grasp opportunities.

“At first, I worked at Grumman putting heat shields in airplanes,” Andrew said. “I worked on F-11 jets. I talked to a guy who said every time Grumman got a new contract, they’d fire everybody and then rehire them at less pay. And I decided that wasn’t me. I decided to go to college full time in January [1969].”

Andrew took a six-month course at New York University called Veterans in Public Service. “We took nine credits at a time and worked in the public schools in Harlem,” he said, “in the classroom when teachers couldn’t handle things. The goal was to have us go on to be teachers.”

Commuting to NYU from Hempstead became wearying. Andrew went to the office of a Hempstead activist and educator, Alverta B. Gray Schultz.

“Ms. Schultz was the one who said to me, ‘Calvin, there’s a scholarship at Hofstra,’” Andrew said.

He and a good friend both entered Hofstra, from which Andrew emerged four years later with a four-year degree in anthropology and a minor in speech pathology. Meanwhile, he said, “I was a youth worker for Hempstead and Roosevelt, in a student organization for leadership called [the] Organization of Black Collegiates at Hofstra.” Having learned tae kwon do from Koreans that he met while in Vietnam, Andrew also taught martial arts to children at Hempstead’s Kennedy Park and at the Percy Jackson Center on Greenwich Street.

After earning his bachelor’s degree, Andrew was accepted into the master’s degree program for student personnel services and counseling at SUNY Albany. After graduating, he was hired into the administration of Nassau Community College, where he specialized in helping veterans on campus. He retired 42 years later, in 2015, with the title of professor emeritus.

Andrew has never stopped reaching out to veterans. He helps soldiers who have been given a dishonorable discharge by guiding them through their issues and upgrading the discharge to honorable, enabling them to find employment. He mediates with the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs.

“Back in my day,” he said, “the [then Veterans Administration] was not that nice to us. I avoided going to the VA for over 20-something years. ... But now the VA’s been reaching out. We have a VA representative on [the Nassau Community College] campus who comes in once a week.”

Andrew and the members of Post 342 never stop seeking out veterans to help them access education and claim their rightful benefits. The post has expanded its electronic footprint with Zoom meetings that attract veterans from surrounding states and overseas.

Post 342’s recently acquired building, at 525 Ocean Ave., at the foot of the Nautical Mile, has increased the meeting capacity for the post, which can rent the building out for weddings and community events.

Andrew spoke with appreciation of State Sen. John Brooks, a Democrat from Seaford, a veteran himself whose efforts on behalf of veterans are far-reaching.

“He’s helped us out a lot,” Andrew said. “He’s given us a donation to keep our building going. I have great respect for him.”