John Steinbeck visits his sons in Vietnam
Words by Matt Warner
“Take Your Child to Work Day” was always a letdown.
My mom didn’t work, and my dad was a podiatrist. Doctors don’t exactly love having a couple of brats running wild in the OR. So, while most kids got to skip school and tag along with their parents to the office or hang out at a construction site, my brother and I were stuck in homeroom. Hell, if we weren’t allowed in the operating room, why couldn’t he at least visit us at school?
That’s exactly what happened to the sons of John Steinbeck when they were gainfully employed shooting commies in Vietnam.
Yeah, you’re right. The Grapes of Wrath guy.
Steinbeck’s friend, President Lyndon B. Johnson, asked him to visit Vietnam as a war correspondent, probably hoping for a favorable write-up. This was just the excuse he needed to visit his boys.
John IV was an Army combat journalist and through this son he learned the truth about the war. After his father’s death a year later, John IV would be involved in bringing the horrors of the My Lai massacre to the public eye, no doubt earning his late father’s pride.
His other son, Thom, was a helicopter door gunner and would expose Steinbeck to the front lines of the war against Communism. Steinbeck pulled strings to reach Thom’s forward base and, once there, even offered to man the M60 machine gun to give his son’s platoon some much-needed rest.
Although Steinbeck never had Hemingway’s action-hero reputation, he saw plenty of war. He had covered World War II, even participating in covert naval raids with actor Douglas Fairbanks Jr.’s commandos.
By the time Vietnam rolled around, war wasn’t just a topic for Steinbeck. It was personal. His late wife would say that he didn’t just go because the president asked, he went because he needed to see what his sons were up to.
His reporting from Vietnam surprised many. At a time when most writers leaned anti-war, Steinbeck praised the soldiers. He admired their skill, their grit, and their flying. One passage stands out:
“They make me sick with envy. They ride their vehicles the way a man controls a fine, well-trained quarter horse. They weave along stream beds, rise like swallows to clear trees, they turn and twist and dip like swifts in the evening. I watch their hands and feet on the controls; the delicacy of the coordination reminds me of the sure and seeming slow hands of Casals on the cello.”
Writers back then didn’t specialize like they do today. They reported, wrote fiction, and commented on public events.
Steinbeck did what any good father would do.
He checked in on his boys.
He wrote what he saw.
He tried to understand.
Some dads bring their kids to the office.
Steinbeck brought himself to the jungle.
Here’s to the badass dads.
