In November of 1983, my enlistment was up & I left Germany to return to California. I was back as a civilian in 1 month's time. I just could not see living anywhere else.

I worked for the Army & Air Force Exchange Service (AAFES) at Panzer for several years, during which time the snackbar at the BMF was enlarged & rebuilt. A barbershop was also added. Later, in 1987 or 1988, I was moved into a supervisory/ management position at the BMF snackbar.

In the meantime, 78th Maint. Company, had become 263rd Maint Co & was now billeted at the BMF in the old Flughafen Hotel. (My snackbar was in a smaller building , #2810, attached to the back. There was also another unit, & a small detachment billeted there at the time.

I worked there until the 263rd was sent to Saudi Arabia for Operation Desert Shield in August of 1990 & stayed for Operation Desert Storm.

At that time, I was informed by AAFES that we would be closing, maybe just until the my old unit returned, or maybe for good, no one knew for sure. I spent my last week there, boxing up supplies & cleaning, all the time hoping I would be opening it up again soon, but that would never happen.

I was only to enter the BMF front gate on two more occasions, when some of the 263rd returned from Saudi, only to packup & leave for their next post in the US.

I stayed in Germany until 1995, when the falling dollar, the U.S. base closings & an overstaffed AAFES-Europe made it impossible to stay, but I will always remember my time at the BMF as one of the happiest in my life.

(courtesy mil-airfields.de)

My old snackbar building (photo above - 2810 in the foreground). This is a picture I found online, taken shortly before it was torn down.

An interesting note:
In 1993 I think, the U.S military paid for a complete renovation of one of the barracks (I don’t remember which building number, but it was at the far right front corner of the post when you came into the front gate, it was the old CLG barracks). The decision had already been made to turn the BMF back to Germany & the city of Böblingen had told the U.S. military it did not need the building renovated, as it would be bulldozed anyway, but the expenditure had been approved, so the entire building was renovated as a barracks & Germany had to wait until it was finished before taking ownership. I think it was used for a year or two, as immigrant housing, before being torn down.

I was stationed at Nellingen Airfield with the 124th Ordnance Heavy Maintenance (1959). This later became the 124th Ordnance General Support. We were under the 87th Ord Bn, 47th Ord. GP, Seventh Army.

To the best of my knowledge also in the BN were the --
585th Ord Co (Park)
903rd Ord Co
504th Ord Co
(there was another Ord Company but I can't recall its designation)

When I was there (early 1959) CO was Capt. Lushbaum. He was transferred to BN as supply officer.

We then had the honor, privilege or whatever to be commanded by Captain Billie E. Searles. This guy was real GI. He had more medals than any of us had ever seen. He was a good CO.

I left for home in March of '61. All in all in was a tremendous experience. Don't regret one day of it. Lots of great memories.

If any one remembers the bar outside the lower main gate....the La Paloma. I ran into the owners at a social gathering in New Jersey. Boy did we have fun talking of old times.

Another one of my assignments took me to Bad Tolz and Lenggries. They are also long gone. These were beautiful Kasernes. Never touched during the war. My CO in Bad Tolz was Clovis J. Snyder.
Hope I may have filled in some historic holes

I was then moved to Technical Supply Platoon. I worked for Staff Sergeant Kruk. SSG Kruk was my squad leader and NCOIC of the Cannibalization Point (this has been mentioned in other posts on here) that we maintained for the Stuttgart area. SFC O’Connor was our platoon sergeant.

Then the the “red-headed Lieutenant” showed up a few months before I ETSed. We had several Women Army Corps personnel in the company but they were enlisted like we were and were mostly clerks at “The Plant.” Others were in the Headquarters platoon with a few truck drivers in the Service & Evacuation platoon. Yes, the women were still called WACs in 1976-1977. I guess she thought she had to “prove something” being a female in a predominantly male unit...but she over-played her hand and no one liked her.

Also, some one mentioned First Sergeant Davenport. He came to the unit about two-thirds of my time in the 124th. Enough said about him. I also noticed in one of the previous posts that CWO Kanashiro was mentioned. He was at Panzer in the 124th when I was. Across from “The Plant” was a German Kassene & we had a rail head at BMF.

The 124th & 78th Maint Cos. were billeted on Panzer Kaserne. We were bussed to downtown Boblingen to "The Plant". Then were were bussed back up at the end of the day. Also, there was an hourly shuttle bus going back & forth. We had our own cooks that only cooked lunch for us down at "The Plant" (good duty if you can get it). We ate breakfast & dinner at the 4/73 Armor's mess hall up the street from our barracks. We lived on Panzer Kaserne but had nothing to do w/any of the two units of the 1st I.D. that were also posted there.

The story I got whilst there was that the BMF was originally the Stuttgart Flughafen. During the war, it was a Luftwaffe fighter base. This would make sense because the area that were the runways was where we had our regional cannibalization point for the Stuttgart area because of all of the space. And Stuttgart being an industrial center, and was bombed into rubble during the war, would have a fighter base nearby. Also, there was the remains of the tower and the waiting area of the airport which was our mess hall and the like. Also, we used some of the old airplane hangars. When I was there I worked in one. Also, our Technical Supply Platoon worked in one which was used as our parts warehouse.

After the war, Mercedes-Benz took over the BMF & produced cars there until they built their present location in Sindlefingen which is right next (I mean cross a street from Boblingen to Sindlefingen next to each other). Diamler-Benz then leased the BMF to the U.S. Army for, I heard, a dollar-a-year.

Across the street from the BMF was the "German Army" kaserne. We really had no interaction with them except for a once-a-year "friendship" thing in the summer where we all went over there and everyone stood around like freshmen at a dance until we could go back across the street to "The Plant". I attended one of these in the summer of 1976.

We were barracked at Panzer Kaserne and worked at the BMF (Boeblingen Maintenance Facility). We were billeted with the 4/73rd Armor and 1/16th Infantry battalions. M60A2's and M113 personnel carriers were the heavy equipment on post.

At the BMF, the 124th was a sister to the 78th Maintenance Company. Both companies were depot repair providers.

The 124th had the following shops:
* MSE (military standard engine) - The Hercules generator engines. We rebuilt 1.5hp, 3 hp, 6 hp, 10 hp and 20 hp engines;
* 5-ton truck transmission rebuild shop;
* The M880 (Dodge Pick up) engine and transmission rebuild shop;
* The 1/4 jeep rear end shop;
* F&E rebuilt distributors, fuel pumps and carburetors);
* The packing and crating shop for shipment of all the materials that had been rebuilt;
* The warehouse managed the surplus weapons arms room, maintained inventories of all incoming and outgoing equipment, and supported the armored and infantry divisions at Panzer Kaserne;
* The Evac crew ran the 747/746 Heavy Equipment Transport (HET), an M88 recovery track, and several 5 Ton wreckers and lowboys. Within Evac there was also the crane crew which loaded and unloaded incoming surplus vehicles at the railhead. Such as the 5/4 tons that were turned in after the arrival of the Dodge pick ups. I recall most all of these loaded and sold to the Greek army.

I worked my way through each of the operations including operating and maintaining the HET's.

Commanders were Capt. Wilkins (?); Major Turner, and 1st Lt. Ogden. First Sergeant most of my 44-month tour was Davenport.

There were three warrant officers I recall: W1 was Faust and Rhodes, and there was a W4 that I cannot recall his name. The other W4 I was stationed with also at Ft Ord where he retired and we road Harleys together and that was Leslie Kanashiro.

If I think of anything else that is worthy I'll send you a note.

I was on a contact team. Actually we were a contact team of not more than 3 or 4 persons as our shop was never that big as I can recall. Pretty small for a GS/DS small arms shop, but we had a large community to support at the time there were somewhere around 25 or more Kasernes in the Stuttgart area; 15 or more just in Ludwigsburg area alone, of which were some of the main Battalions or companies that worked within the greater Stuttgart region.

We also we went to Crailsheim and Gross Sachsenheim missile sites at least once a month. I remember they had problems with bent barrels and front sights. They would drop their rifles from the towers or close the doors of their trucks on them when they hung them from the inside window latch upside down.

Some of the people I also remember are 1Sgt Mcfarlan, D. Nichols, Dan Fulkerson, Dave Tucker, and SSG Robertson who was the Mech Maint Plt SGT at the time. Another very good friend was my first roommate Paul who showed me Germany like a true young soldier should know it, and that's why I loved it so much and moved back after retiring. To this day we are still friends. He also married my wife's best friends.

Related Links: