Likely so. Another famous draftee who comes to mind is baseball player Ted Williams, who, at age 23, was already a two-time All-Star outfielder for the Boston Red Sox when he was drafted in early 1942. Williams joined the Navy Reserve in 1942, and continued playing baseball (winning the Triple Crown that year), but then was in active duty from 1943 to 1945, as a Marine pilot.
But, as you note, WWII was different than Vietnam, both in the number of men who served, and in the societal pressure to serve.
There are usually several famous musicians, actors and athletes in that age range at any given time. And there are several famous people who were drafted (or chose to enlist) during WWII, so it’s not immediately out of the question that there would be a corresponding list for Vietnam.
I think the big thing is that Vietnam was extremely unpopular with people in that age range, while WWII was widely supported by the same age group. People were rushing to enlist and pressuring each other to serve during WWII, while it was almost the exact opposite during Vietnam. I suspect the pressure not to serve was as huge in the late 60s as the pressure to do so was in the early 40s. The one inarguably famous person mentioned in this thread who was drafted refused to serve.
Explain how this is arguable. Elvis is arguably one of the most famous people who ever lived. Is anyone higher on the “fame” list who was drafted after becoming so? Ted Williams was mentioned, and is definitely one of the most famous people to have been drafted, but I don’t think he’s quite as famous as Elvis.
Depends what is meant. Elvis and Ted Williams served. Muhammed Ali was drafted but did not serve, he could be more famous than Elvis. Define your terms, what does drafted mean, how is fame measured? And then don’t make an assertion with unknown intent about Elvis and a thread about the Vietnam war, I have no idea what Omar Little intended to convey with that non sequitur post.
That’s how it’s arguable. Not to mention that you started arguing about it.
It was relatively easy, during most of the time, if you had money. If you were broke, in the age range, and not in college (and a whole lot of people at the time didn’t go to college, many of them for financial reasons), not so much.
The college deferment was not guaranteed to last and was mostly removed near the tail end of the war, though they let you finish out the term. The draft itself ended soon after that; but my friends who drew low numbers didn’t know that would happen. I remember being in the room, listening to the radio as they announced numbers. Somewhat less unnerving for me, as they weren’t drafting women; but still the sort of memory that sticks in your mind.
Kris Kristofferson did not go to Vietnam, being a bit ahead of that time, but he did join the Army and become a helicopter pilot with the 8th ID in Germany.
Jerry Garcia enlisted in the Army in 1960 to avoid going to jail for stealing his mother’s car. After basic trainig, he fucked off so much that they gave him a general discharge less than a year later.
I don’t think it’s out of the question either - but chances are, that a drafted 18-year-old hasn’t had as much of a chance to become a famous basketball player or guitarist as a 26-year-old. There are exceptions; we’re talking about millions of people here, but all other things held equal, the most famous basketball players at 18 years old are known and recognized by fewer people than the most famous basketball players at 24 - even if that 18-year-old is equal in talent to the 24-year-old, they’ve had less of an opportunity to display that talent in such a way that it works its way into the daily newspaper, the concert billing, becoming a household name.
There’s undoubtedly a similar phenomenon at the other end of the age distribution, where once people get too old to have a basketball career (or once their music goes out of fashion) a 30-year-old basketball player is more famous than a 45-year-old player of similar talent. We don’t have to worry about that end of the distribution, though, because they don’t get drafted.
That’s definitely a factor - not only will the 18-year-old seek the college deferment, but the 26-year-old might seek the graduate school deferment, they both might seek the marriage deferment when they were still giving those out, or the ministry deferment, and so on. But age will have a direct, causal effect on fame; while fame most likely has an indirect effect on deferments, probably mediated through wealth. (Although somewhere there was probably some famous 19-year-old skipped over by the draft board because one of the board members wanted to see him play for the old U. or something.)
I’m still puzzled about the use of death ages to infer average age of draftees. The Army must somewhere have statistics on how old the average draftee was - are those not public for some reason?
Formula One driver Brett Lunger, who is best known for helping rescue Niki Lauda from the burning wreckage of his car, had previously served as a Marine infantry lieutenant in the Vietnam War. He was not drafted, he volunteered for service.
Jerry Lewis’s son Gary Lewis was a hit-making pop singer (Gary Lewis & the Playboys) when he was drafted in 1967. According to an article in the LA Times he spent most of his two-year hitch in South Korea.
That was not the Vietnam war era for the US, as it notes in your definition that we aided the South Vietnamese later, not between 1958 and 1960. I was simply trying to clarify that, and I agreed that in Elvis Presley was the most famous draftee of all time, though allowing for some argument on the subject based on definitions.
It is certainly arguable as well what the time period was for the Vietnam War Era was for the US. I didn’t mean to sound like I was denying your statement, merely clarifying it’s meaning in the context of the thread.
If anything you should help prove that it was Elvis Presley who was the most famous draftee. I don’t think Ted Williams competes in that regard, but Muhammed Ali might, but he had not reached the pinnacle of his fame at that point, his refusal to serve on the grounds that he was a conscientious objector did elevate his level of fame, but that I would’t consider that as applying at the time he was drafted.
In 1956, the year before he was drafted, Elvis starred in his first movie and had 3 of the top 5 records released in that year.
When Ali was drafted he was the heavy weight boxing champion and had been for 4 years, and had been a US Olympic gold medalist in boxing. Ali went on to be the only boxer to win the title on three different occasions.
I would say that Elvis was more famous at the time of his draft than Ali.