 we discuss reading, and I'm your host, Dr. Rita Forsyth, coming to you on the ThinkTap Network series, broadcasting from our studio in downtown Honolulu. Today, I'm not coming from my home on Maui, but I'm actually coming to you from Seattle, Washington. The title of today's episode is From East Garrison to the Ranch House. Joining me today is his honorable Peter Gravitt, Major General Retired, former California Secretary of Veterans Affairs and Author. Welcome, Peter. Thank you for having me. I appreciate that. There's so much to talk about with your life and your history and your book. You were promoted to Major General becoming the first African-American in the 225-year history of the National Guard to earn the rank of division commander and simultaneously you worked in law enforcement and then you were also appointed to be the California Secretary of Veterans Affairs. So, so much to break down and talk about. Where would you like to start? Well, I'd like to start with my, at my beginning and where I come from and then just travel through my life. Great. I'm from the South, I was born in the South. My parents were sharecroppers in the South and pretty much lived the life of most sharecroppers, picking cotton and sharing the proceeds with the landowner and if they're worrying the profits at all after a year of picking cotton. And my parents lived in a county where the schools only went to eighth grade for color kids, color children. So they decided to leave the South and head west and they did, they picked up roots with their eight children and moved to California, settled in the Los Angeles area. And I was very, very young at that age and I think I was like two years old. And just a few weeks after my parents arrived in Southern California, my father was drafted into the Army Air Corps, leaving my wife, leaving his wife and eight children, the oldest was 10 years old at the time, leaving a wife with no money, no savings, no car, no telephone, but lots of friends and relatives. And so my father went out to war and my mother existed with her family. But on his return, he and my mother had additional children. I previously had 12 children, one of which passed away shortly after birth, but they raised 11 children together. And- Well, not to interrupt, but I'm so fascinated about your father's story. Can you share a little bit about your dad? Yeah, my dad was a very honorable man and he was my role model. As a matter of fact, he was the impetus for me joining the military post. When he returned from the military, the only time I ever saw him in a military uniform was the day he returned home. And I was very young, but I recall him coming into the house in uniform. And what struck me was that he removed the hat from his head and placed it on my small head. And I just kind of marched around the room like I was a soldier. And from that point on, I believe that's when I knew that I wanted to be a soldier like my father. And eventually I became a soldier as you can see now. And I think my brothers also saw that too, because eventually eight of my nine brothers served in the army. How many? Eight of my nine brothers served in the army. My goodness. And, but my two sisters got into the act also because one married a soldier and one married a Marine. We had a Marine in the family. And tell me about your father's role in the military. Well, my father was drafted, as I said, in the Army Air Corps. He was assigned to the 332nd fighter group, which later carried the title of Tuskegee Airmen. My father was an enlisted soldier and a ground crewman. And his role was to support the pilots in preparation for their missions. And then when they returned from missions, his role was to receive them back and make sure that they have all the logistic that they needed for their next mission. That's incredible. It's an honor to talk to someone who has so many military experiences and backgrounds. So let's talk about your book from East Garrison to the Ranch House. First, I wanna ask you, why that name? Okay, let me explain the title. And on the front cover of the book is a photograph of the California State Capitol. And in the foreground are colored people in the South picking cotton. I merged those two together to talk about where I came from as a sharecropper son and where I achieved some success as a member of the governor's cabinet in California. And the title of East Garrison to the Ranch House was coined because in California on the central coast, there's a military base there called Camp Roberts. At Camp Roberts in World War II, the colored soldiers were based upon the east side of the post called East Garrison and the white soldiers run west side of the post called West Garrison. And on West Garrison, there was an old Hacienda that became the quarters of a commanding general. And it had been a Hacienda going back a hundred years, of course remodeled many, many times. And up until the time that I eventually took up residence in the Hacienda as a commanding general of no other black or African-American officer had ever resided in the Ranch House. So my journey was from East Garrison across the highway to West Garrison to the Ranch House. Amazing, amazing. So what inspired you to write that book? My sister, one of my sisters. I had served in the police department for over 20 years. I served in the Army National Guard for over 20 years simultaneously. And then later, after I retired from the police department and returned to full-time military duty for another 20 years. So I served a total of 44 years in the military, active and reserve combined. In that time, in both careers, I had done a lot of things that my family didn't know about because I was working in law enforcement, doing things that police officers do. And then in military, I had traveled several places in the US and around the world. And my family didn't really know all that I had done. So my sister encouraged me to put pen to paper and start striking keys on a computer to write my story for them, if nothing else. And so I really started writing the book for my family. It was only toward after I'd been into the book for over a year or so on and so forth. My sister suggested that I let others read my book. She had read the manuscript and some of the drafts. She said, other people need to know what you've done. And I said, well, I'm not writing it for that, writing it for the family. She says, well, the world is your family. And so when I finished the book, that's when the decision was made to have it published. And that's the genesis of the book. Well, let's hear a little bit about from, if you don't mind reading it from your book. And I know it kind of goes back and forth between law enforcement and military since you were basically having two jobs at once there. Could you start with maybe something from the law enforcement perspective? Well, in my law enforcement career, after graduating from the Los Angeles Police Academy, I served in a number of positions along the way, uniform patrol, traffic, I eventually became a detective and served in public affairs and spent a lot of time in traffic enforcement. And traffic enforcement is one that I wanna read about because all police work is not dangerous. Some of it can be funny at times and comical at times. And the police officer has to have a sense of humor to exist in law enforcement. So I'm reading a passage from my book of my law enforcement career. This is just one piece. One summer day while patrolling alone in a beach area, the driver of a four seats, four in red convertible committed a traffic violation. So I made a traffic stop. The driver was a young blonde girl, probably about 16 years old, and there were three other young girls her age in the car and they were all wearing bikinis. I requested the driver to produce her driver's license but she replied that it was in her purse and her purse was at home. As I began taking personal information, she attempted to get out of the car and I requested her to remain inside. She exited anyway as did the other three girls. I politely but firmly ordered all of them to get back in the car, but they just giggled as if it was all a lot of fun. As I was writing the traffic citation with the limited information she provided me, one of the girls came up behind me and grabbed my uniform hat. As I turned to retrieve the hat, she tossed it to another girl and they began playing keyboard with my hat. All of this was being watched from across the street by a group of young beach party-going teenage boys. These boys were friends of the three girls, four girls. The boys were clapping and edging them on. It was not funny to me. In fact, it was downright maddening and embarrassing. I radioed the dispatcher to send a backup unit but cautioned that I did not require any assistance as that would have generated several police cars responding with red lights and siren. I didn't want that. When the dispatcher requested the nature of assistance that I required, I chuckled and there was said that there were young girls playing keyboard wave with my hat. Minutes later, there come several police cars, red lights and sirens blaring. Now I was totally embarrassed. I finally retrieved my hat and wrote the driver a citation for a violation of not having a driver's license and also for the violation she committed while driving. I ordered her to lock the car up and walk and she would not be allowed to drive any further with no license. They all protested as they were barefoot and only wearing their swimsuits. I considered this payback. As they walked away, just as quickly as I could, I left the area. No doubt the other officers would have preferred to have given them a ride but refrained from doing so. At the end of the day, there was probably four pairs of blistered and sunburst feet. I suspect those young ladies really learned several lessons that day. Always have a license when driving, take shoes from going to the beach and never play keyboard wave with a priestess hat. I too learned a lesson. Never stop a red convertible sports car with young blonde girls wearing bikinis. But if so, leave your hat in the car. So that's just a lighter side of law enforcement. And you know, in law enforcement, there are a lot of lighter sides and we need to always understand that. Oh, that's great. Oh my gosh. Okay, so you were in law enforcement and then you joined the National Guard or was it the other way around? What was the other way around? I went into the National Guard right after high school and went off to the Army for training and served my time in the Army when I returned from the Army. I was a National Guard and then I joined the push department. So from that point on, for the next several years, I was a full-time police officer and a part-time soldier. And somewhere along the way, I, well, I was promoted to an enlisted ranks, E1, E2, E3, and finally, I was a sergeant. And then I made the decision to apply for officer training. And I was accepted and I went off to officer candidate school. And officer candidate school was very rigorous as it should be. And I was on leave from the push department during the time. And my intent upon being commissioned as an officer was to serve in the tank corps, armor, armor, armor branch, which I had served in as enlisted soldier. And so if it's possible, I can read a little passage that occurred, something that occurred after my training was just about over. Yes, please. Okay. And it's called a field artillery, the elusive branch. Just prior to my graduation from officer candidate school, all candidates appeared before a branching board to determine which branch in the army there would be a commission. Generally, these candidate will list up to three choices in priority, but it's up to the needs of the service which branch they would be assigned. In priority, my choices were field artillery, armor, which is a tank corps, and infantry. I specifically did not want to be branched military police as I had served there as enlisted soldier, as enlisted soldier. Each cadet was directed to report to the office where the branching board was in panel to receive their branch assignment. The board consisted of, as I recall, a lieutenant colonel, a major and a captain. Just as I was about to enter the room and within hearing distance, though not eavesdropping, I overheard a casual remark by a board member a known bridge suggesting that I not be branched field artillery. And as I recall, his exact words were, field artillery requires a lot of mathematics and computations and blacks lack that ability. The other board members mean were colonel. My minor in college was criminalistics, requiring several courses of advanced mathematics and I was very familiar with the tactical and operational employment of artillery in support of infantry and armor units. I had a bachelor's degree, which with a major in criminalistics and a minor in mathematics. Additionally, if that person had studied military history, past and current, it would have known that black soldiers had served in field artillery for almost 200 years. So that was just one episode in my army career, a negative episode, if you will, but overall my military career was very, very favorable. And I was able to get commission, served in the armor branch as an officer. I commanded the armor platoon, armor company, armor battalion and finally a brigade. And this is over a period of years. I never did serve in the field artillery, but I found a home in armor. And later on, I was able to serve as chief of staff of a division and then upon sending confirmation as a major general, I was appointed as a division commander of a mechanized infantry division. And all along the way, I had met a lot of great soldiers, a lot of friends and enjoyed my military career. However, I enjoyed my law enforcement career also and that's why eventually when I retired from law enforcement, I returned to military duty full-time and was able to serve in several places. Well, we've had some discussions and I remember you saying that you've had a four career life. So, okay, so there's military, law enforcement, what are the other two? So military, law enforcement and then also federal and state government. So, upon my retirement from the military, I was appointed as the California State Chairman of ESGR. The ESGR is Employer Support for the Guard and Reserve. I was appointed by the Assistant Secretary of Defense. And what that agency is, they serve as a conduit between military reservists and their civilian employers to ensure that the employer understands the role of their employees do in the reserve military. And, you know, oftentimes reserve military personnel are mobilized and deployed moving away from their civilian employer. And there are certain rules and regulations and federal rules that employers must follow in terms of rehiring or replacing the military with a return from active duty. So my role was to interact with employers, major employers statewide. And every state has this, by the way, and every state has a state chairperson and I was a state chairperson for the state of California. So that was my extent of my federal government in employment. And then a state, when I was serving as the ESGR State Chairman, I was contacted by a California Governor's Office about a position in state government. I had not applied for position in state government and was kind of shocked that I would even receive a phone call. But I was asked to meet with the governor, which I did, and I was interviewed and then resulted in me being appointed as Secretary of the California Department of Veteran Affairs, an agency which works side-by-side with the federal VA. Again, now the federal VA Veteran Affairs provides all the benefits to veterans but they are administered by the state and the state provides its own benefits to veterans. So as Secretary of Veterans Affairs, I had an agency of about 5,000 employees scattered statewide, but this included eight veteran homes that we house veterans in need and then we have service centers throughout the state. They're work side-by-side with the federal government. And in that role, I was able to work with veterans, ensure that they had their benefits, connect them to the federal benefits, ensure that the eight veteran homes were operated efficiently. One home, which is the largest in the nation, is in Yeltonville, which is in the Wayne County of California, north of San Francisco. And that particular home at a time housed 1,200 veterans and with about 1,500 staff members total. And the facility was as large as a college campus and it wasn't just a building, it was a campus. And so I enjoyed my skin there as the California Department of Veteran Affairs and California Department of Veteran Affairs Secretary. Boy, I mean, these are major, major careers. So my question is, how do you balance multiple careers at the same time? How did you do that? We're a little helping God. And also my wife, you know, when I serve this as CalVet Secretary, I'm going to give a shout out to my wife, Lance. She's a retired Army colonel and she assisted me the entire time I was a secretary as the most gracious volunteer you could ever find. And she traveled with me. She spent time with women veterans. She talked to them. She was a Joan of Arc and she did a great job in assisting me. But it was a challenging position. California is a large state and from tip to tip, it's almost a thousand miles long. And so if you go to Lake California and the East Coast, it goes from Maine to South Carolina, for example. And so California then and now has the largest population of veterans in the nation. At that time, when I served as a secretary, we had two million veterans in California of the 20 million in the nation. 10% were in California. And so our work was done to serve those veterans. And I think we did a very good job. But that's only because the federal government, the federal VA and the state provided sufficient funds to serve our veterans. Well, switching gears a little bit. I know you are writing or have written a second book not published yet, but can you tell us a little bit about that book? Yes, I'd love to. The working title is, it's just a working title. It's a general patents after American battalions fighting in World War II. And the book talks about the chronicles for battalions in the U.S. Army in Europe and World War II. You know, the Army was segregated then and were quite units in what they call color units at the time. And so I selected four units that were different, totally different, that I thought someone would enjoy reading. One of them is a barrage balloon battalion. People don't realize and hope to educate them by reading the book of the role of barrage platoons, especially in D-Day June 6th, 1944. You've probably seen pictures of large blimps floating over the beach. And those beaches, those balloons were tethered through a cable stretching down. And it was designed to throw any aircraft from attacking the soldiers on the beach. And those balloons were manned by African-American soldiers. The only barrage balloon battalion in Europe in World War II. Another battalion I selected was an armored battalion, a tank battalion. And this battalion had been formed in 1942. And by 1944, there still had not been deployed. They've been training for two years. White battalions were formed and 90 days later, they were deployed. And this battalion, two years later, they were still in training because there was never any intent to deploy them into combat because there were no colored combat troops at that time in France fighting. They had some down in Italy at the time, but nothing in France. And so the Battle of Bulge was the largest defeat. It was not a defeat. It was intelligence there that we suffered in World War II. Oh my goodness. I need to interrupt because we're running out of time, but I can't wait for that book to come out. You've got to let me know when that is published. I know you've got a publisher, so congratulations. And I just want to end with a quote, a couple of quotes that you've said to me before. It's not where you start. It's where you finish. Success depends on fortitude, drive, ambition, and opportunity. Wonderful things to live by. And that's all the time we have, and I want to thank you, Peter, for being my special guest and thank our broadcast engineer, our floor manager, and Jay Fadal, our executive producer, and a special mahalo to our underwriters, and thank you all for joining us, audience. And my book can be found on peterbradwick.com. Thank you. Thank you, Peter. Books, books, books. We'll be back next month, and Peter, you were a wonderful guest. Thank you for having me. Appreciate it. Thank you. Good book. Goodbye. Goodbye. Thank you so much for watching Think Tech Hawaii. If you like what we do, please like us and click the subscribe button on YouTube and the follow button on Vimeo. You can also follow us on Facebook, Instagram, and LinkedIn, and donate to us at peterbradwick.com. Mahalo.