Park Ranger Susan Fishman-Tudor said retired Maj. Rick Spooner has served on land, sea and in the air as a Marine, enlisted in the Marine Corps as a private during World War II, and served briefly with the 1st, 4th and 5th Marine Divisions.
Fishman-Tudor said Spooner will be signing copies of his book “The Spirit of Semper Fidelis, Reflections from the Bottom of an Old Canteen Cup” and interact with the community.
“We are inviting everybody to come and spend some time with this truly wonderful individual,” Fishman-Tudor said.
Spooner was also staff NCO during the Korean War and taught infantry tactics at Camp Pendleton prior to going to Korea with the air wing. He also served in Vietnam in 1966 at the ProvostMarshal Division of MACV and as an advisor to the Vietnamese National Police.
About the book
“The Spirit of Semper Fidelis:Reflections from the Bottom of an Old Canteen Cup” is a 400-page hardcover containing war stories of a remarkable band of Marines who fought their way across the Pacific during World War II. Some were old line professionals but mostly wartime warriors still in their teens.
The names of the principals have been changed and some of the details of the stories are fictionalized.
Spooner tells in his book “how the seed of warfare, nurtured in a band of Marines, fighting across the white sands of hell in the Pacific, grew into a great oak.”
The book was published by Phillips Publications, Williamstown, New Jersey. It is available in used and new copies from $22.98 and up at Amazon.com. (www.amazon.com/gp/product/0932572448/ref=cm_cr_pr_pb_opt.)
Spooner is also the author of “A Marine Anthology in the Spirit of Semper Fidelis.”
For more information, call American Memorial Park at 234- 7207 extension 2022.
