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SPIRIT OF GENEROSITY LEFT: Bill Kurtis observes the presentation of the colors at the 2012 Marine Corps Scholarship Foundation Dinner. BELOW: Kurtis was a member of Platoon 154 in Parris Island, later joining the United States Marine Corps Reserve and the United States Navy Reserve. In the Trenches M y father had been in the Marines as an aviation officer since 1936. He was going to make a career out of it: It was in the middle of the recession, he wanted to fly.... He became an instructor and was stationed at Pensacola, where I was born on September 21, 1940. We stayed for six months and then went to Quantico, and eventually Miramar, Florida— my early life was spent moving around like a typical military child. The culture is really something, because we always lived on the base. It's like living in Berlin when there was the Berlin Wall. All you know is the military lifestyle: the commissary, the dispensary, the schools, the officer's quarters, the enlisted barracks, the bachelor officer's quarters.... You have to move every two to three years usually, and—at that moment—you are sad because you have to leave your friends and make new ones, and that means going into a new classroom, establishing yourself with a teacher, with "I felt better upon graduating from boot camp than I did graduating from college."—BILL KURTIS extracurricular activities, trying out for an athletic team. In other words, you have to establish yourself all over again. That experience is enormously continued on page 66 PHOTOGRAPHY BY RICHARD SHAY (PRESENTATION) AS THE MARINE CORPS SCHOLARSHIP FOUNDATION HOLDS ITS ANNUAL FUNDRAISER, LEGENDARY CHICAGO NEWSMAN BILL KURTIS REFLECTS ON HIS LIFELONG COMMITMENT TO MILITARY SERVICE. 64 MICHIGANAVEMAG.COM 064-069_MA_SP_SpiritofGenerosity_October13.indd 64 9/17/13 1:30 PM