Butler County is filled with a variety of people doing interesting things. This weekly feature offers snapshots of some of them by asking five questions. The latest installment appears below.

Carl Littejohn of Butler will be returning to familiar ground next month when he travels to Fort Benning, Ga. The former Butler High School Junior Reserve Officer Training Corps instructor was stationed there three times during his 29-year career with the Army.

But when he arrives July 12 it won’t be for instruction as it has in the past but for his induction into the U.S. Army Rangers Hall of Fame.

The 17-year-old Knoxville, Tenn., native joined the Army in 1960. “I was tired of being in high school. Just about all of the guys in our neighborhood joined the Army all at one time,” Littlejohn said.

Initially an artilleryman, Littlejohn said he joined the Rangers, the U.S. Army’s elite troops, during his first tour in Vietnam in 1966.

“They were trying everything new in the war,” said Littlejohn. “They were trying a Ranger platoon, a long-range reconnaisance patrol. They asked for volunteers. I was accepted. I was a staff sergeant. After two weeks of training, I was team leader. We’d have four- or five-man teams. We’d plan a patrol in an area the intelligence people wanted checked out.”

“We’d be dropped in by helicopter, and we usually stayed five days,” Littlejohn said.

“If we made enemy contact, we’d call for artillery and air support and we’d be extracted,” he said. “We had quite a few patrols that made enemy contact. One time when we made contact with the North Vietnamese army, my pointman and I were wounded.”

Upon returning from Vietnam in 1967, Littlejohn said he went to Ranger school in Fort Benning, Ga.

After that, it was a return to Vietnam, another assignment at Fort Benning and then stops at Army bases in Texas, Kentucky, Georgia, Hawaii and West Point, N.Y. Along the way he married Dolly and had two sons, Stephen and Christopher.

After mustering out of the Army with the rank of sergeant major, Littlejohn and his family moved to Butler where he spent 16 years as instructor in Butler High School’s JROTC program before retiring in 2004.

He recently broke his routine to answer five questions.

QUESTION: What are the qualifications needed to be a Ranger?

ANSWER: You had to attend Ranger school, which at that time (1968) was eight weeks and two days. We had to successfully complete the school to be awarded the Ranger tab.

It’s a leadership school. The only thing is, it’s broken into three sections. The Benning section, which is where a lot of people drop out, was physical training, hand-to-hand combat and bayonet combat. You were running on three hours of sleep a night, but you ate three meals a day, even when you were out in the field.

Then there was Camp Darby, named after Col. William O. Darby, the first commander of a Ranger unit in World War II. There you planned and prepared for patrols. Everything was graded. The physical training did not stop.

Then you went to north Georgia for mountain Ranger camp. There you get training in mountain operations. A lot of time is spent on knot-tying, constructing rope bridges, rappelling. But the big thing was being able to navigate in a mountain environment. You got two meals a day, so there was more stress.

Then you got to go to Florida Ranger camp at Eglin Air Force Base. There you learned about patrolling in a swamp evironment, and there you were down to one meal a day.

When you finish with the Florida part, all of the patrols that you have been in the leadership position have been graded, and you need to have earned enough points to earn your Ranger tab.

QUESTION: Why did you want to be a Ranger?

ANSWER: After I talked to some people after my first tour in Vietnam, the long-range reconnaissance patrol was recognized as a Ranger unit.

And when I got into that unit, we had some success. And when my tour was over, the division commander wanted an outbriefing. He asked me what my next assignment was. I said Texas, but he said it was Fort Benning, Ga. He told me it would be an assignment to the Ranger department, so that’s how I got into it.

QUESTION: Will you be going to the July 12 induction ceremony?

ANSWER: Oh, yes. As a matter of fact, my entire family is going: my wife, my two sons, my two daughters-in-law and three kids.

QUESTION: Why do you think you were chosen?

ANSWER: To be eligible, a person must have served in a Ranger unit in combat or to be a successful graduate of the U.S. Army Ranger School.

QUESTION: Do you stay in contact with Army Ranger comrades?

ANSWER: Oh, yes. With guys from Florida, California. As a matter of fact, quite a few will be at Benning, so it will be a reunion. They always get crazy.