Interview with Bob Cortinez

From Little Rock Central High Memory Project

Transcription

Bob Cortinez: I was a member of Dog Company, Delta Company now, of the 327th airborne battle group, one of the first airborne divisions. At that point and time, we were on the readiness alert, alternating readiness alert throughout the division with different battle groups being on alert and at certain times of the year with individual companies being on full alert, which means that if there was anything that was hot occurred, any type of aggression anywhere in the world we were prepared to go. We were transported on C-123 airplanes, and we jumped out of the C-123 airplanes. I had just come back on that day from Shreveport, Louisiana, which is my hometown. I was on a three-day pass and came by and the personnel in my company were packing up. We were already packed up to a certain extent, but they were packing up their personal gear to go somewhere. Of course, I started packing up my gear and we loaded up on C-123 planes and probably about a platoon to a plane. They called them sticks; one side a stick, on the other another stick.

George West: How many is a platoon?

Bob Cortinez: Probably around 50 troopers to a plane. That’s crowded. So we were going somewhere where we didn’t know. We landed at Little Rock Air Force Base. The platoon leader, once we landed, told us where we were and what we were going to do. Our first assignment they took us on 2½-ton trucks transported us from Little Rock Air Force Base to Little Rock Central.

George West: What time of day was it?

Bob Cortinez: It was near daylight hours. We, I can recall going across the bridge. I can recall the billboards that where up. I can recall the people cheering us whenever we were in convoy going along Central High School. At that point and time what my company did was to stay in the dressing room underneath the stadium, and we rotated; the platoons would rotate guard duty—perimeter guard duty outside the school, which means that we formed a perimeter of troops standing at parade rest in, we had our helmets on, shin straps. We had tear gas protective masks. We had M1 rifles with bayonets attached to the end of the rifle and as best as I can recall I think the bayonets had scabbards, they were covered, which means we didn’t have any weapons, so to speak, except the fact that we did have bayonets fixed to our rifles. We did not have any type of tear gas or any other type of gas. We had no live ammunition. We stood at parade rest for probably around 6 hours until we had a change of guard and then we’d be relived and go back to the stadium

George West: And were people around you or in front of you? What were the crowds like when you were there?

Bob Cortinez: There were no crowds. Whenever we first came in the troops in front of us formed perimeters. Whenever they formed perimeters, they’d move the crowds out—the civilians out. And the civilians were moved out to probably a block away and they were controlled by roving patrols. They were Jeeps attached with 30-Calibur machine guns mounted on the hood of the Jeeps and these Jeeps belonged to what we called the Recon Platoon and they constantly patrolled the outer perimeter kept the civilians away from the inner perimeter, which is where we were. The only ones allowed in were news media people and there were a lot of them.