Donald F. van Eynde
One of my US Army battalion commanders was Lieutenant Colonel Donald F. van Eynde.
As I mentioned in my military memories, I served in the battalion headquarters element for a time under his command. He was one of the very few field grade officers I had any opportunity to observe at somewhat close range during my career, and I rather liked him. He seemed quite competent, and I wouldn't have minded going to war under his command.
Since I was the battalion TOC driver, I saw LTC Van Eynde frequently enough, but didn't have much opportunity to interact with him one on one, except once. It was during a CALFEX (Combined Live Fire Exercise) held at the Yakima Firing Center, when his normal jeep driver was off duty, and since the exercise didn't require the use of the battalion TOC vehicle, I was free, and served as his driver that day. We drove here and there, with him conducting one item of business after another, including communicating using the radio on the jeep. During one lull in the process of getting the battalion organized we were up on a ridge overlooking the battalion's deployment, and knowing that he was a Vietnam War veteran I asked him what war was really like. He said that it was 98% boredom, and 2% terror. Or words to that effect. I'm sure we had other snippets of conversation that day, but that's all I can remember. But since he was quite busy getting things organized, it's unlikely we had much conversation. He had a job to do, after all.
When I started writing this, what I loosely call my "memoirs", I wondered whatever happened to him, and a quick Bing search yielded some results!
After he left 2/39 INF, he was assigned as the executive officer of the US Army Organizational Effectiveness Center and School, at Fort Ord, California. The informational brochure about the school that I found online listed his rank as LTC(P). The indicator "(P)" in a rank designation indicates that the soldier is "Promotable". Which in turn means that the soldier has been slated to be promoted, but hasn't yet pinned the new rank on. So, I take it that he was eventually promoted to full colonel. One of his assignments was as a Military Advisor to the U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations, which I assume was near the end of his military career.
In an entry in Bing.com for ZoomInfo (the actual referenced page no longer exists) it noted that he was "the Chair, Crisis Management Team at Trinity University based in San Antonio, Texas." Further information I found online indicated that he was the chair of the Business Administration department at Trinity University.
There is at least one book authored by him, published in 1997, "Organization Development Classics: The Practice and Theory of Change--The Best of the OD Practitioner," with his wife, Dixie Cody van Eynde, listed as editor. The book appears to be a compilation of organizational development articles.
He was born on 7 September 1937, so as of this writing (January 2024), he would be 86 years old, and I am pleased to report that we are now Facebook friends.
