50 years later, a graduate
Fresno native dropped out of high school to go to Vietnam, now has diploma
Manuel Blunt recalls being in tears as he watched his children graduate from high school. The ceremonies were emotional because he was proud of them, but that wasn’t the only reason.
“I’ve always wanted to do that … I’ve thought about that for the past 50 years,” Blunt says. “What would that moment have been like for me?”
Now — five decades after dropping out of Fresno High School to enlist in the Army and fight in the Vietnam War — he knows.
The 68-year-old received his high school diploma this month thanks to the California Education Code, which allows educators to award high school diplomas to veterans of certain wars without requiring them to finish school. Blunt, who now lives in Riverside, walked in a special graduation ceremony in Moreno Valley with four other Vietnam veterans and two from the Korean War.
“To be recognized for my efforts after all those years and be given a diploma — it’s a godsend.”
There wasn’t any positive recognition for his service when he flew into San Francisco in 1969, returning from an 18-month deployment. Protesters spit in his face and called him a baby killer. A military police officer in the airport told him he should change into civilian clothes so he wouldn’t be harassed.
“I told them some choice words,” Blunt recalls, saying ‘You’re not taking my patriotism away from me.’ “
Of his decision to fight in Vietnam, he says, “My country asked me to do it. What else can you do for a country that’s been good to you?”
Arriving home in Fresno, he took a taxi home because no one was there to greet him. He hadn’t told his mother and grandmother he was on his way.
He dropped out of Fresno High at age 17 and joined the Army, in part, to make them proud.
“I thought it was the right thing to do, and I did it for my family — for my grandmother and my mother. You have to understand, back then, being Mexican wasn’t the most popular thing. There was a lot of discrimination. I just wanted to prove to them that we were as American as everyone else. So that’s why I went. I didn’t go because I wanted to be a hero.”
In Vietnam, he was a paratrooper infantryman and received a Combat Infantryman Badge. He doesn’t talk about what happened there.
“Those things, I just don’t want to discuss. They bring back bad memories.”
Readjusting to civilian life wasn’t easy.
“When I pulled into a parking lot, I didn’t see a parking lot like normal people. I saw a combat zone — Where’s my escape route? Where’s my field of fire? Things like that.”
He eventually got help, including medication to control nightmares and anxiety, and classes that addressed anger management, sleep therapy and wellness.
“I struggled for a long time. … People around me were telling me they were afraid of me because they never knew how I would react to a situation.”
He says the most effective therapy was with horses, which he started doing in 2005. Blunt now has a horse of his own. He named the horse Honor.
“A horse knows what you’re thinking. When you approach a horse, he can sense fear. He senses it and reacts to it. If you approach a horse with love, you’ve got a friend for life. He loves you right back.
Blunt retired as a maintenance chief for state parks in Southern California.
He says he was “blown away” when he received a letter a few months ago from Riverside County Office of Education asking if he wanted a high school diploma.
His first thought was of his favorite teacher at Fresno High when he was a student there.
“When I was struggling in school, she was the only one who believed in me. She sat me down and told me I could achieve anything I set my mind to, and excel in whatever I wanted to do. When everyone else was giving up, not her.”