Veteran Salute: Watching the border during the Cold War

TOPEKA ( KSNT ) – Drafted into the army in 1970, Sergeant Stan Spice served the United States in Germany during the Cold War.

Prior to his time in Germany, Spice served as a radio operator at Fort Knox in Kentucky.

“During that time I learned how to carry this radio on my back and it had a 25-foot whip antenna on it and it was at that point in time that I figured out that I was probably going to be a target if I went, you know, into combat,” Spice said.

Spice’s final duty station was in Fulda, Germany with the 14th Armored Cavalry Unit.

“The first day I was there he [the First Sergeant] was looking through my profile, reading through there, and he says, oh, you went to Purdue?” Spice said. “Do you know how to type? I said, ‘no’. And he said, ‘well that’s fine, we’re going to teach you’.”

Spice said his primary responsibility while in Germany was to patrol the border between West Germany and Soviet-controlled East Germany.

“I’m very proud of the fact that I served overseas,” Spice said. “It’s been a big change in my life.”

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