Band of Brothers
From left, classmates and now Marines, from left, Leonard Reeves, Tyler Cornelius, R.J. Allison, Miguel Garate and Nathan Hegstad. They graduated together in 2017 and went through Marine boot camp togther this fall.
They’ve been friends since grade school. Earlier this month, they all graduated from Marine basic training in a rare feat — they went through boot camp together in the same platoon.
Columbia Falls High School 2017 graduates Leonard Reeves, R.J. Allison, Tyler Cornelius, Nathan Hegstad and Miguel Garate all signed up for the Marines last spring and summer.
It wasn’t supposed to be that way. Cornelius filled out form earlier in his high school days that he might be interested in joining the Marines.
Then one day last spring there was a knock on his door.
Cornelius was in his underwear, watching TV after a hard day working for Mild Fence.
Marine recruiter and Staff Sgt. Cory Scott-Willardson, who was also a Columbia Falls alumni was at the door. Cornelius joined the Marines shortly thereafter. Allison and Garate were going to join the Navy, but changed their minds and signed up for the Marines as well. Then friends Hegstad and Reeves followed.
In September, they all entered boot camp at the Marine Corps Recruit Depot in San Diego. They graduated Dec. 1 after 13 weeks of grueling training. After a break, they were headed back for a month of combat training. Their platoon graduated 91 Marines.
Their lifelong friendship made the journey easier, they noted. The first three days were the worst, they said. Part of the initial training is sleep deprivation and they learned to grab some shut-eye standing up, they said.
In basic, recruits have no phones, no Internet. The good old-fashioned hand-written letter from friends and family was all they received. But the five did pray together during breaks.
“Basic never gets better,” Garate noted. “You just get used to it.”
The last days are physically challenging, including going through the three-day “Crucible” where they hiked with huge packs up steep terrain and slim rations on a 56-mile course.
“(Basic) was one of the hardest things I’ve ever done,” Garate said.
“But it was also the most rewarding,” Allison noted to nodding heads from his colleagues.
By the looks of them, they traded a few pounds of chub for several pounds of muscle.
After combat training, the five will separate to other regions of the country.
Reeves is going into motor transport, Hegstad communications, Garate logistics and Cornelius and Allison in infantry training as their journey continues.
There’s about 183,000 Marines in the U.S. military. They’re deployed in about 150 countries worldwide.
“They were very lucky to be in the same school, enter basic on the same day and be in the same platoon,” Scott-Willardson noted.