There was a time, in the long-ago/deep-dark past, that the mere mention of the name General Lewis Hershey would strike fear in the hearts of just about every male who had either turned 18, was about to turn 18 or who had run out of all the allotted deferments and was classified 1A by his draftboard.
Being classified 1A meant you were bound to be called up and either drafted into the Army or the Marines – and in the 1960s that meant a reluctant journey to Vietnam.
In 1950 the reluctant journey was to Korea, where a war was well underway and whose supply of fresh troops was in danger of becoming woefully thin. With the end of World War 2 only five years earlier, the need for a draft was not critical. But now that a new war was underway, it was.
Enter General Lewis Hershey, a United States Army general who served as the 2nd Director of the Selective Service System, the means by which the United States administered its military conscription.
Hershey began his military career when he left his home in Steuben County, Indiana, to join the National Guard. There he won election to First Lieutenant just as his unit was called for duty in 1916 along the Mexican border. In October of 1917, he was promoted to Captain in the Guard, but was commissioned in the regular Army in 1920. He entered the Command and General Staff School in August of 1931, despite the loss of vision in his left eye from being struck by a mallet during a polo match in 1927. He completed study at the Army War College in 1933 and reported for duty as Secretary to the Joint Army and Navy Selective Service Committee in 1936. His first assignment was planning for a possible wartime mobilization of manpower.
In October 1940, President Franklin Roosevelt promoted him to brigadier general and named him executive officer of the Selective Service System. On 31 July 1941, President Roosevelt named Hershey director of the Selective Service. In 1942, Hershey was promoted to major general. In 1943, he received an honorary degree in Doctor of Laws from Oglethorpe University. While officially retiring on 31 December 1946, he was retained on active duty starting the next day.
He was the longest-serving director in the history of the Selective Service System, and held the position until 15 February 1970, spanning World War II, the Korean War and the Vietnam War.
Hershey was promoted to lieutenant general in 1956 and to four-star general on 23 December 1969.
Here is an interview with General Lewis Hershey from the NBC Program Meet The Press as it was heard on radio and TV on September 24, 1950
