[j. earl carter]

I suspect that is what the UA at El Toro was about. It was a Marine Air Base and I suppose that is where he did his six months or so of specialist training

I suspect the real story is better than that. He went to basic over the summer while in high school. He then went to AIT the next summer. A few months after that, he ended up on active duty for 2 years at El Toro . I think that a possible penalty for screwing up in the reserves is to be forced to do 2 years on active duty(the early '70's is before my time and they had different rules, but I knew a guy who got out of a commission as a 2nd lt. by doing a 2 year enlistment). He has several UA's listed on his dd-214 while on active duty at El Toro. This would explain his E-1 status at ETS as he probably lost some ranks for his UA's. It doesn't look like his service in the USMC was particularly remarkable.

[blueplum]

it gets even more interesting than that - deserving another mention:

https://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/3721826/posts

h/t CaptainK

[robowombat]

Very good. Thanks.