Old Soldiers Never Die

They get preserved digitally. Once again, I was digitizing old radio broadcasts. I thought since this was my second time, it would be easier, but I was wrong. I struggled so much to lock the reels of tape onto the player, I ended up with not one, but two blisters. I threaded the tape through the machine incorrectly twice. One of the tapes was so twisted; I had to rewind part of the tape by hand, which was incredibly time-consuming and tedious. I was so frustrated with the whole process.

Then something amazing happened. I actually started listening to the tape. It was a speech MacArthur gave to a joint session of Congress in 1951. It was neat to hear what Sam Rayburn, the speaker of the house, sounded like, having come across his name in multiple biographies of Lyndon Johnson. I realized that Lyndon Johnson, John F. Kennedy, and Richard Nixon would most likely have been in the room when MacArthur delivered the speech, and that’s just cool. MacArthur’s famous quote “Old soldiers never die, they just fade away” was part of the speech. However the speech was not about his career, the main topic was foreign policy in Asia, with a focus on the Korean War.

It was strange to hear MacArthur talk about the importance of stopping Communism abroad. The speech was a defense of the Korean War, and why it was necessary to take action. It was creepy hearing him discuss the domino theory, since at night for fun I am reading Patriots: An Oral History of the Vietnam War. That also made MacArthur’s mention of Indochina almost spooky.

Reel to reel tape is still frustrating. There are still issues I have with the tapes, but it is worth it. I am getting to listen to actual historical events, and that is pretty amazing.