By: Sgt Darrel B Whiting
I was in Boot Camp in August of 1953, and could not remember if there were yellow foot prints there at my arrival…others during the same area couldn’t remember if they were there either. I called MCRD and talked to a nice young lady in the Museum there. She confirmed that the first they could establish that the Yellow Foot Prints were there was in 1963, in fact JFK visited the base and stood in the foot prints. Also she told me that in 1953 the first recruit graduation books came out. Thought others would be interested …. guess we are now ready to report to the museum at 84 years old….
31 comments
I enlisted in Our Corps August 1956. Arrived at MCRD San Diego, CA during that same month. There were no yellow foot prints at that time.
May 3, 1977 — 21:30 Pacific Time - yellow footprints. 6 hours later - May 4, 1977 -03:30 Pacific Time - “GET UP !!! GET UP !!! GET OUTTA THE RACK !!! WHAT DO YOU THINK THIS IS ??? A F____ING HOTEL!!!” 60 started / 39 graduated.
Was on yellow foot prints January 1965 plt 103 MCRDSD..SEMPER FI ALL MARINES
Arrived December 15, 1968 platoon 2255 on the road girls! Never forget those words as the DIs below out deep from their voice for us to fall into those yellow footprints snapping us on the back of the head as we got off the bus from the airport dark cold early in the morning!! Graduated March 16, 1969 Honor Platoon 2255 Semper Fi Bother’s !
I was standing on the yellow foot prints at 2:30am after arriving at MCRD thinking in my mind oh lord what have I gotten myself into there no way I’m going to get out of this. But 13 weeks later I did graduate from MCRD and became a Marine…………Leonard Louder-Graham, Tx
Sorry, I was in platoon 27. I was the JDI for platoon 306. 85 year old brain .
Nope been here for a while. But I have started posting more stories recently! Semper Fi Cpl!
I arrived on a bus at P.I. in the middle of the night. There were yellow footprints because I was standing in a pair. Like a lot of you I was confused, scared, with chaos all around; But we made it. Platoon 2063 July 1966. Semper Fi.
I arrived on a bus at P.I. in the middle of the night. There were yellow footprints because I was standing in a pair. Like a lot of you I was confused, scared, with chaos all around; But we made it. Platoon 2063 July 1966. Semper Fi.
The yellow footprints at P.I. came about in 1965. President Kennedy’s “Yellow Footprints” memorialized his visit to MCRD San Diego in 1963, so MCRD obviously had them before that.
The night of 12 November 1963 the footprints were definitely there. I pulled out my very old boot camp memory photo book and on page 8 or so there is a photo of the entrance to the Receiving Barracks and the footprints are shown in the photo.
I was here August 1953 and still can’t remember any foot prints..
but I guess you and I have CRS (can’t remember sh**)
guess thats just part of the program… have several good friends all Korean War Veterans, we meet for breakfast once per week and we all are in the same boat…I like to say we are ABOVE AVERAGE…. Semper Fi
I’m with you. Not there the end of ’53 and beginning of ’54.
I was there in August 1958 and the footprint was there
June ‘53…no footprints that I remember. It was not yet dark. First order of business was to stand in formation. Then told: “ why aren’t you inside the squad bay”… Of course no one knew what that meant.. Well some guys who had reserve time did, so when they started for the door(which later was to be referred to as a hatch), everyone followed.. That’s when the real fun began!
I was at MCRD San Diego in June 1958, Platoon 150. There were no yellow footprints at that time.