William G. Putnam

Last updated: Saturday, June 11, 2005

I guess that I ought to take a few minutes and write a short autobiography. I was born in Houston, Texas on November 14, fifty some odd years ago the first son of Harry Herbert Putnam, Jr. and Melanie Lamb. My father was a Air Force officer. I have a brother, Robert, who was born in Vallejo, California. Our parents divorced when I was about 3 years old. My father got custody of us and since he was a career military officer and stationed around the world, my brother and I were raised by my fathers parents, Harry Putnam Sr. and Hazel Dickenson Putnam. Our grandfather was a banker and worked for the Bank of California in San Francisco. Our grandmother was an expert equestrian, and had a horse ranch in Alamo, California. This gave me the opportunity to learn horsemanship and as a result I was lucky enough to ride the show circuit, including the California State Fair and the Grand National Horse Show at the Cow Palace in San Francisco.

Our grandfather retired from the Bank of California in 1963 and we moved to Ukiah, California where our family had a ranch in the redwoods. I graduated from Ukiah High School in 1964. I went to work for a Country Western Radio Station KMSL and became the station News Director. In 1966 the Vietnam war was in full swing and I knew that since I was not married, nor going to college that the Selective Service System would soon be drafting me. I decided that the smartest thing that I could do was enlist in the military and at least have the option of choosing what job I would be doing. I chose to train as a flight operations specialist.

I enlisted in the United States Army and my life began to change, I was now a private in the Army. I was not lucky enough to be sent to Fort Ord, California, which was only three hours from my home, I was sent to Fort Polk, Louisiana. I managed to make it through basic training and was sent to Fort Rucker, Alabama for flight operations training. Fort Rucker wasn't to bad. We would go to Panama City, Florida on the weekends and have fun at the beach.

  After completing advanced training I was sent to Kitzigen Germany and assigned to 3rd Aviation Battalion, 3rd Infantry Division. Even though I was trained as a flight operations specialist, I was assigned as a clerk assigned to the headquarters company, as basically the company clerk, this actually turned out to be a very good assignment as I was given extra privileges, since I worked for the Battalion Commander I did not have to pull guard duty or KP, which was really nice. While in Germany I was able to see a great deal of Europe, one summer I took part of my vacation in Holland, which is a very beautiful country. This was an opportunity that I might not of had otherwise. I became close friends Fred C. Fick IV, the company clerk from B Company, 3rd Aviation Battalion and we traveled all over Germany. Fred spoke pretty good German, so we were able to do things that many GI could not. The German people were very friendly to us and gave us the opportunity to come to their homes and learn what they were really like. Not just the GI hang outs. After 18 months in Germany, the army decided that they needed me in Vietnam. This was not a choice that I would have made.

I arrived in Vietnam just in time for the 1968 TET Offensive. Upon arriving in Vietnam we went through an orientation in Saigon. Part of the orientation was being taken to the range and familiarizing with the M16 rifle. The M16 was totally new to many of us because in Europe the Army was still issuing the M14 rifle. While at the range in Saigon, we had been issued the M16 rifle but had not been given any ammunition. Much to our surprise someone started shooting at us.  We were under attack by a Vietcong sniper. We were pinned down for awhile, unable to return fire. The Sergeants conducting the orientation returned fire until a pair of Huey gunships flew over and opened fire on the sniper position, raining brass on us. This was our introduction to Vietnam. I immediately learned to appreciate the Huey Gunships. I guess that welcome to Vietnam made us all realize that this was for real.

I was assigned to Headquarters Company, 9th Aviation Battalion, 9th Infantry Division at Bearcat, which was just outside Saigon. I was assigned to as a flight operations specialist, after 2 years I finally got to do what I was trained for. Typical military. Shortly after arriving in at my unit the entire division moved its headquarters to Dong Tam in the Mekong Delta. The entire division convoyed to a new base.  At Dong Tam "Charlie" regularly fired rockets and mortars at the air field trying to destroy the helicopters. He got lucky once in awhile and would hit one of the hueys, but not very often.
While in Vietnam I volunteered for flight duty and was assigned to fly aerial observation missions in both fixed wing and helicopters. As with any flight missions, we got shot at often.

One of the teams I was assigned to was what they called "firefly" missions, which consisted of a large search light mounted on a helicopter gunship, which flew at about 1000 feet. a second helicopter gunship flew around the halo from the light at about 500 feet. We would fly around trying to find "charlie" mostly along the Mekong River. Once we found him all hell would break loose.  I received the following rank and medals while station in the Republic of Vietnam.

During December 1968 I was lucky enough to see Bob Hope perform at his annual USO show.
I was sent home for a family emergency at the end of December 1968 arriving back at the family home just in time to attend my grandfathers funeral, he died on January 1, 1969 after suffering a stroke.

I left the Army and went to work for the State of California as a security officer at the State Hospital in Talmage. I married Patricia Elmer on January 1, 1970 at Carson City, Nevada I worked at the State Hospital for awhile and then went to work as a Police Officer for the City of Fort Bragg, California I guess that I just couldn't stay out of a uniform. My first daughter, Melissa Rachel Putnam was born May 3, 1972. I ended up getting a divorce from Patty. I soon met and married Connie Burlesci and on April 22, 1975 my second daughter, Carla Renee Putnam was born.
While married to Connie during the summer of 1976 we took a vacation and travelled across the United States in a motor home, barrowed from one of my law enforcement buddies, Jim Andrews. doing the tourist bit stopping at the Grand Canyon, Carlsbad Caverns, the painted desert and every other tourist attraction from California to Texas. The main purpose of trip was an attempt to locate my mother, whom I had not had contact with since I was approximately three years old. I had information that I had been baptized at an Episcopal church in Houston, Texas. When I found the church the first person I talked to was familiar with my family and immediately put me in touch with my aunt Mary. I did not even know that I had an aunt. It took me about five minutes in Houston to find my mother. Something that I had wanted to do for many years. The surprising part of the trip was to find that my mother lived in Redwood City, California, about two hours from my home. I found that I had so many aunts, uncles, cousins, nieces and nephews than I could not count them all. The best thing I learned was that I also had two other brothers and a sister Kevin, James and Melanie.

My second marriage failed, adding to the statistics of law enforcement. Being the type of person that does not function without a mate I got involved in my third "serious" relationship and married Sandra Cervelli, this relationship resulted in twin daughters, Stephanie Marie and Melanie Ann born July 17, 1978. This relationship also ended up in divorce court, adding to law enforcement statistics.

For the next twenty years I was involved in several relationships, but managed to stay single.

In 1969 I left the Fort Bragg Police Department and obtained my Private Investigators License and opened Putnam Investigations based in Ukiah, California.  I could write a book about this adventure, but won't bore you with details.  

In 1988, while working as a private investigator, I was involved in an investigation at a hotel, I was asked to join the staff.  A year later I was the General Manager at the property.  This was a turning point, I changed careers.

I have been in the hotel business ever since.  I managed several different hotels throughout California.  In 1998 I was managing a hotel in Banning, California and met Sharon, my wife.  We were married on November 1st and shortly thereafter

I went to work for  Best Western International as a Quality Assurance Consultant.  The job changed and I became a Regional Service Manager responsible for 61 properties in California, Nevada and Oregon. A major part of my responsibilities is training hotel and management staff in all aspects of hotel operations, and conducting Quality Assurance Assessments at the properties.  This kept me on the road a great deal of the time.  Travel got the best of me and I left Best Western International.  I landed a job in paradise, I am now the General Manager of the Best Western Yosemite Gateway Inn, which is located 14 miles from the South entrance to Yosemite National Park.  This country is about as close to heaven that we can get on earth. 

                             BW Yosemite Gateway Inn