Bruce Heilman has had a long career as an academic, first as a professor and college administrator and, since 1988, as chancellor of the University of Richmond, a liberal arts college in Virginia. To him, it all began during his four years as a Marine.
To most of my colleagues on campus, I'm a card-carrying academic. I've spent 55 years in the halls of ivy, 21 of them as a college or university president. What most of them don't know—and what might be astonishing to some of them—is how it all began. I got my start as a U.S. Marine.
In my recently published memoir, An Interruption That Lasted a Lifetime, is a photo of my high school report card that shows how difficult it might have been to predict my career path during my teenage years. The son of a tenant farmer, I didn't do well at my studies, and I badly wanted to quit school. Lacking enough credits for a high school diploma, I would have had to stay in rural Kentucky and spend the rest of my youth on the farm or as a truck driver. So, at age 17, I joined the Marine Corps. It was to change my outlook on life and lead me into a fulfilling career.
Shortly after I signed up, I wrote a letter to my mother that showed my disappointment with my previous situation and my hopes for what I might be able to gain from the service.
"We [new recruits] went up for classification and I signed up for aviation first choice and communication second," I wrote. "I think that I will get one or the other and maybe I will make something out of myself after all. I guess that will be a surprise to you and Dad if I do."
Having been considered scholastically less motivated and less apt to succeed than my siblings, I yearned to show my parents that I could rise above the shortcomings of my past. I had been a failure because I couldn't conceive of ever needing all that "book learning."
In successive letters, I alluded to my lack of interest in higher education. I mused that I might take a Marine Corps correspondence course because I didn't plan to attend college. In another I referred to my two brothers going off to college, but declared, "I can't see going to college and wasting two or three more years. I want to live my own way . . . instead of trying to learn how to do something out of books." And even later I wrote, "Don't think too hard of me for not taking advantage of a good education. I've had all of that I can stand. I guess the other two brothers will go to school some more, but I don't think that's for me."
Since I hadn't accomplished much in my early years, I was ripe for opportunities provided during my Marine Corps years. I wanted to prove that I could succeed at whatever challenge was presented. Each day I prevailed in boot camp was a success—physically, socially, and mentally. I was satisfied that I could and would succeed in living up to demands sometimes unmet by some older, larger, and stronger than I. And my drill instructor kept telling me: "Do it now!"
My most conspicuous success in boot camp came on the rifle range. Following instructions to the letter paid off with a score of 323 out of 340, and I emerged from the day of qualifying as an expert rifleman and the top scorer in my platoon. I could now taste the pleasure of success. In the Corps, every Marine is a rifleman. So, succeeding on the range reinforced my sense of self-worth—and my confidence as well. I was convinced that I could accomplish whatever I set out to do.
After boot camp I was assigned to Gunnery School, where my new sense of confidence in marksmanship led to still more successes. Four of us who completed the course—three 17- and-18-year-old farm boys and one Princeton dropout—bonded like brothers. Sixty years later, the four of us attended a reunion at the University of Richmond—now a university chancellor, a physician, a successful businessman, and an insurance executive with a Princeton degree.
After serving in combat in the South Pacific, standing occupation duty in Japan, and acquiring maturity in leadership as a Marine sergeant, I began to think about going to college. I'd learned clearly that I should do "now" what I had failed to do in earlier life—to get an education. The G.I. Bill was my path to successful adulthood, a rewarding career, and a fulfilling family life. It wasn't always easy, but it definitely has been worth the effort.
While each person's life is unique, mine is one of many in which military service helped verify a young person's childhood values and push him or her into adulthood. I can say with certainty that had I not been in the Corps, I would not have been propelled on to college, and I would not have had the career that I have enjoyed so much. Thanks to my drill instructor, "I will" became more important to my successes than "IQ."
I grew up in the Marine Corps—not just physically, but emotionally, intellectually, spiritually, and in every other way. The rigors of boot camp and the camaraderie of the Corps helped shape my future. From the moment I became a Marine, the benefits began to influence my life choices. The culture of esprit de corps and the pride engendered by being a Marine are unlike any other. By the time I was discharged, I had realized that my pursuit of a business, professional, or public life would depend on academic and intellectual achievements. The Marine Corps had brought about a transformation that would last a lifetime.
From that Marine Corps experience I have gleaned the understanding of what Thomas Carlyle reflected: "Our main business is not to see what lies dimly at a distance, but to do what lies clearly at hand. Blessed is he who has found his work; let him ask no other blessedness."
The rest is history, embodying a determination to build on the confidence and ambition that evolved during my four years as an active Marine. Since receiving my Ph.D., I have spent 54 years in higher education, and I owe my success to my military service and to all of those whose paths I have crossed over the years.
Ironically, while I never talked to a general or saw one up close during my four years in the Marines, I have seen many of them during my academic career. I've served as chairman of the board of the Marine Corps University and of the Marine Military Academy, where Marine generals served as president. One of those was the current Commandant, General James T. Conway, who was a brigadier general at the time.
At age 82, I still remember what "now" means, and as a result, while I was still able, I recently completed a 3,000-mile motorcycle adventure from Virginia to California. As Marines are wont to do, I decided that later may be too late—so I did it "now."