Glen L. Staup, CTO2 USN, 1970-1974
  

I guess my story isn’t much different from the others.  Three months before I graduated 
from high school in 1970, I went to the recruiting station in Battle Creek, MI with the 
intent to join the army to be a military policeman.  A friend of mine and I got there about 
lunch time and the army recruiter was out.  On the way out of the building a navy chief 
stopped us and invited us in to his office for a chat. I don’t remember the gist of the 
conversation but we walked out with enlistment papers. I took them home but my mother refused 
to sign them given the fact that the Viet Nam War was still going on.  My dad, on the other hand, 
had no problem signing them.  If that was what I wanted to do it was fine with him.

About a month after I graduated I was on my way to Great Lakes.  The friend that I had signed up 
with and I were supposed to be going in on the buddy plan, but our recruiter messed up the paperwork.  
The last time I saw my friend was getting off the bus at boot camp. I haven’t seen him since.

The day we classified we were to write down 5 ratings that we were interested in.  I had thought 
I had joined up to be a journalist but that never appeared on my enlistment papers either 
(I guess I should have checked the fine print or lack of).   I wrote down 4 but for the life of 
me I can’t remember what they were except journalist. I didn’t have a 5th choice.  The classifier 
checked my GCT/ARI scores which he said were pretty good.  He also asked me if I could type.  
Since I had taken typing in high school I told him yes.  He said that the rules required a 5th 
choice and if it was okay he would write down “communications technician”.  I asked him what that 
was but he said he couldn’t tell me.  He told me not to worry about it since no one ever had to 
settle for their 5th choice.  So I told him that was fine with me.  The minute he finished writing 
it down he circled it in red ink and told me to report to an office down the hall.  I didn’t realize 
it at the time but that classifier had done me a huge favor.  I don’t know if he realized it or not.

I reported to that office and a kindly looking civilian gentleman starting asking me a lot of 
personal questions.  He was pretty interested in my past.  Since I was only just 18 and was from 
a small farming town in Michigan I had very little in my past to worry about. I asked him what 
the interview was all about.  He said it was for a security clearance I would need to be a CT.  
That was when I knew pretty much that my next four years had been planned.  He told me that when 
they (whoever they were) were done with me they would know more about me than I knew about me.  
I asked him what a CT was.  He told me that there wasn’t much he could tell me because I had no 
security clearance and really didn’t have the need to know right then.  That need to know thing….  

A couple of weeks later the company commander informed us of our orders.  Mine were for CT O “A” School 
in Pensacola.  After A school I did a tour at the Naval Security Station in DC, a 6 month TAD trip to 
FICPACFAC in the P.I. and finished my enlistment at NSGD Rota.  I must say that for the most part I 
enjoyed all of it and don’t regret any of it.  I guess my only regret is not staying in longer.

I have had a pretty good career in the criminal justice field for the last 32 years, but I think 
that I am proudest of the 4 years that I spent in the Naval Security Group.  A great bunch of people 
doing an incredibly important job.


Glen Staup