Ask The Company Commander
Joe Lipsius
Regimental Headquarters 272nd Infantry
I was drafted October 23, 1941 for 12 months which turned out to be "for the duration" after Pearl Harbor.
One of my first resolutions, besides
to be a good soldier, was to grow a
mustache! Soon,
I was looking
like a young Groucho Marx!
Nothing was said of the hair on my
lip untiI I arrived
at Camp Croft, South Carolina, a Basic
Infantry Center. The trainload of raw
recruits pulled into
the Camp a short time after midnight in the middle
of November, 1941.
We had been asleep for no more than a
couple of hours when aroused to dress and
fall out for a welcome and inspection by
the Company Commander, a Captain Beck.
The Captain was already atop a stand
used for leading physical training excercises.
After a welcome and a few
remarks about his goals for us, some do's and
don'ts, out came these
damning words - at least for me. "I
notice a mustache here and there among you.
In order for us to be uniform in appearance when we fall out, there will
be no mustaches. I will be happy to grow a
mustache for anyone wanting to see one. Just
ask the 1st Sergeant for permission to speak to me."
After we were dismissed, I rushed to the latrine, shaved my full grown mustache and decided to forget about one. I didn't think a mustache was worth asking the Company Commander to grow one!