Jim Davidson dreamed of joining the United State Naval Reserves, but his eyesight kept him from fulfilling that goal.
Instead, the Pittsburg County native found a home in the Oklahoma Army National Guard for over 30 years of service.
“My dad was a coal miner,” he said. “I was one of six kids and thought I had the best growing up years of anybody. My brother was two years older than me and was my hero. He joined the Naval Reserve when he was 17, and I thought they had the coolest uniforms. So, my ambition was to join the Naval Reserve as soon as I got old enough. I went up on my 17th birthday. I went up to sign up, and they were giving me my physical.”
Davidson, a resident at Villagio of Bradford Village Independent Living /Assisted Living, located at 300 Enz Drive in Edmond said when he went in for a vision test, an optometrist gave him disappointing news.
“When I walked in for the vision test, the doctor happened to be my optometrist,” Davidson said. “He said, ‘There’s no need for me even going any further. You can’t pass the Navy’s vision test.’ And I was so disappointed. He said, ‘Go next door and join the National Guard. They’ll take anybody.’ Well, in 1955, that was true.”
Davidson, (Ret.) Sergeant First Class said a cousin who was in the National Guard invited him to go on a National Guard drill.
“Before I left that night (after the drill), they had signed me up. And that started my military career,” he said. “I am a retired military. I receive an annuity, though I am not officially a Veteran due to insufficient consecutive active-duty service days. And there are probably not a whole lot of people like that. But I stayed in the Guard off and on from 1955 until 1996.”
Davidson served in the 45th Infantry of Oklahoma National Guard nicknamed the Thunderbirds. He served a variety of roles in service.
“The main thing they drilled into me was what an honor it was to be a Thunderbird,” he said. “I did a little of everything. We were an infantry unit to start with. And when I retired, we were MPs.”
During his time in the Army National Guard, Davidson worked for Maj. Jimmy Burnett, who was the Unit Administrator of the National Guard Unit Company L in Hartshorne.
“All the years I was in the Guard, I worked for Maj. Burnett in one capacity or other, except for the last four years and he retired before I did,” he said. “He was a fine man to work for.”
Davidson said he only served overseas twice during his military career, and both times were in Panama.
“The only time I left the country, we went to Panama during the time that they were getting ready to retire, Mr. (Manuel) Noriega,” he said. “I was not sure what our duties were, but we got there and we discovered that we were what they called relieving active-duty soldiers. We were doing guard duty around the Panama Canal zone so the active-duty guys could do their business, preparing Mr. Noriega for retirement.”
In 1960, Davidson graduated from East Central University in Ada and then began his teaching career.
“At that time in Oklahoma it helped a great deal if a teacher had a secondary job and the National Guard was always my secondary job,” he said.
Davidson taught in Kansas and Oklahoma before becoming an elementary school principal in McAlester.
My calling, I think, in the education business was to be a grade school principal because I loved the kids and I recall my years in grade school, I was afraid of everybody,” he said. “And I felt my job was to make kids realize that the teachers and the school staff were there to make their life better.”
Davidson retired from education at age 51, followed by a brief foray into selling insurance.
He later started a second career as a child development specialist at the McAlester Army Ammunition Plant.
“They had a daycare center. I did not know the Army was in the daycare business. So, I went to work there,” he said. “I tell people I went to work for civil service, and I got a $10,000 a year raise because that’s what the difference in the pay I was getting as a grade school principal.”
Davidson worked at the daycare department for three years before transitioning to an employee relations position at the plant before retiring from that post.
Davidson added another job to his resume as a church pastor in Pittsburg County.
“All the churches in Pittsburg County were familiar with me because I went around speaking in different churches with the Gideons,” he said.
Davidson said he began pastoring when a small church in Pittsburg County could not afford a full-time pastor anymore.
“They were looking for a pastor for that little church,” he said. “They wanted to know if I’d come down and help them and fill in on Sundays. It developed into a full-time thing because I stayed there for 12 years.”
After retiring from that, Davidson and his wife of 63 years Mary bought a motor home and started traveling before deciding to move to Edmond to be closer to one of their two sons.
“Our son had a pastor friend who lived here (Villagio of Bradford Village), and he liked it, so we came over and visited him, and that is why it appealed to us. The people are super friendly. As retirement communities go, we are one of the smaller ones, and so that gives us more of a community feel.”
Davidson didn’t abandon his ministerial hat completely after he was selected by an advisory committee as the Villagio of Bradford Village community chaplain.
“We have an advisory committee here made up of the residents and we came home (from seeing family in Michigan) and they said, “By the way, we elected you chaplain.” I said, “Only if you get me a badge.” And so that is where the badge came from. I’ve been the volunteer chaplain here ever since.”
Davidson said what he enjoys most as community chaplain is helping send Christmas cards to Veterans.
“The residents donate Christmas cards signed a lot of times with a little message in it, and we collect them and we distribute them to all seven Veteran centers in Oklahoma,” he said. “And this year there were 1,051 cards that we delivered to the Veterans homes. It makes me feel good because I have friends who were at the Veteran’s home and many of them never have any company. They’re just all but forgotten. It’s just good to show somebody that somebody still cares.” • story by Van Mitchell, staff writer
