Ray William MacDonald was born in Green Bay, WI on June 6, 1946 to William Alexander MacDonald and Gladys Emma Schultz MacDonald, later Adams, who is now 99 years old.
Ray went to Cedarburg Public School and then attended Cedarburg High School in Cedarburg, WI for four years. He was a member of the National Honor Society, on the student council, yearbook editor, on the track team and the football team, and he graduated in 1964. He received his appointment to West Point from Congressman William K. Van Pelt and entered the United States Military Academy at West Point on July 1, 1964.
After Beast Barracks, Ray was assigned to Company G-1 for four years and attained the rank of battalion officer in his firstie year. Ray was elected class president in his plebe year in 1964 and remained in that position for 22 years.
Ray’s 1968 Howitzer entry reads, “When the group [Company G-1] that has been together for four years finally disbands in June, each member can say one thing for certain, Ray MacDonald was our friend. He was our class president and academic leader. Despite the fact that if he weren’t here, everybody would move up one slot, Ray’s jolly, starred body has been a class landmark. We shall always be grateful to him for the Saturday night music his guitar provided [Purple Cloud group], for the endless hours of tutoring and for remaining an individual.”
Companymate, Kim Henningsen wrote, “I remember Ray as a gregarious, friendly, and absolutely brilliant companymate. I recall that it was seldom that I did not see Ray without a smile on his face and a willingness to help classmates. I do remember as one who struggled with the Fourth Class System, Ray went through it largely unfazed and untouched. Perhaps that is why he was always smiling. As one who graduated near the bottom of my class, I marveled at how academics seemed so easy to him. As I look back on my time at West Point, I cannot think of a single negative thing to say about Ray.”
Ray’s roommate and close friend at West Point, Rick Adam, wrote that the only demerits he recalls that Ray ever got were because Rick accidentally left a peanut butter sandwich in their room when Ray was room orderly, but that was like Ray to quietly take one for the team.
Ray impressively graduated second in the West Point Class of 1968 on June 5, 1968 and was commissioned a second lieutenant in the Air Defense Artillery branch of the United States Army. Ray also later attended the California Institute of Technology, 1969-70, for postgraduate work while in the Army and earned a Master of Science degree in Engineering Science.
Ray was the battalion supply officer for the 5th Battalion, 2nd Artillery Regiment (“Nickel Deuce”) Air Defense Artillery in Vietnam during 1970-71, where he earned two Bronze Star Medals. The battalion used Korean War era air defense weapons (two 40mm guns mounted on a tank chassis, aka “Duster”; four .50 caliber machine guns mounted on a turret, aka “Whispering Death”; and searchlights) in a ground support role protecting fire bases and convoys. The battalion had many far-flung units in the III Corp area, and it was challenging for Ray to keep them properly supplied. He frequently flew by helicopter to those fire bases, which put him in harm’s way. Ironically, being the battalion supply officer was the same job he had as a cadet at West Point.
Ray and classmate Steve Childers became good friends in the Vietnam War during 1970-71. To understand Ray and Steve’s crazy Vietnam experience, you have to know the movie M*A*S*H, which was popular at the time. Steve played “Trapper” because of his expertise in trapping huge rats. Ray was “Hawkeye” because of his vivid blue eyes and sense of humor. The battalion had the “Chaplain,” “Doctor,” “Radar O’Reilly” and “Colonel Potter” characters with their own eccentricities, but alas no “Hot Lips Houlihan” or nurses in the “Swamp.” Ray’s friendship, sense of humor and good nature got Steve and others through that miserable experience.
One night a soldier who worked for Ray in Vietnam came into our hootch angry and drunk with a loaded M16 rifle. “Where is Captain MacDonald” he loudly slurred? From the concealment of the mosquito net above his bunk Steve cautiously answered, “He is in the next room.” Ray bravely came out to meet the soldier, calmly talked him down and led him out of the hootch. Ray probably saved the lives of five officers that night.
After Vietnam, Ray became the battery commander of a Nike Hercules battery in an Air Defense Artillery group in the Seattle, WA area. He then resigned his commission as a captain and left the Army in 1973. He again did postgraduate study at the University of Wisconsin, starting in 1975, and added two more Master of Science degrees in Physics and in Nuclear Engineering. He was married in 1977 and had a daughter, Kristine Lee Mac Donald, in 1981. After that, he took various computer and engineering jobs in Illinois, Sweden, and Wisconsin until he retired early. Always the scholar, one of Ray’s “hobbies” in retirement was to attend incredibly complex physics lectures at University of Wisconsin just for fun, according to his daughter, Kristine, and his sister, Dale Weidman. Ray passed away unexpectedly in Madison, WI on May 3, 2018. Our class and his family will miss him.
— Stephen Childers, classmate and friend