Scared and not sure what to do next, the first person I saw on my first day at the 13th Support Brigade Information Office at Fort Hood, Texas, was Army Specialist Fourth Class Kenneth H. Fortenberry. He was an immediate comfort and would become a good friend.
Bad eyesight had washed him out of helicopter flight school, so Fortenberry picked journalism school next. The Army somehow went along with it. He's been raising hell ever since.
Born in Florida, Ken thought of himself as an unrepentant good ol' boy and was honored when I called him a redneck or cracker. He couldn't understand why I would want to live in cold Minnesota with all those Yankee stiffs. He earnestly invited me to join him in his wonderful Spartanburg, South Carolina, just as soon as I finished my service.
"We'll start a newspaper and shake up all those hypocrites," he proposed, cracking a grin as wide as the Mississippi Delta.
A road not taken.
I lost track of Fortenberry until sometime in the 80s when I saw him on "60 Minutes." Harry Reasoner was asking Ken exactly how he'd been run out of town after printing unflattering stories about the local sheriff in his newspaper. He had children now, Ken explained, and feared local thugs might bring harm.Then he wrote a book called "Kill the Messenger."
Yesterday, while touring the Pima County Air Museum, I spotted a shoulder patch (left photo) for the 13th Support Brigade and it got me to wondering about my old Army pal. So I googled "Kenneth Fortenberry."
Here's what the search engine returned:
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Ken Fortenberry: No Accountability, No Honesty, No Ethics.
Ken Fortenberry Deals in Innuendo, Slander, & his own half-baked non-truths
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Yup, and there was a black and white picture of my old buddy, about 40 years older now, but still with a full head of hair and pugnacious look.
The anonymous entry continued:
Ken Fortenberry is rumored to be a scumbag. He prefers to use lurid accusations and defamation rather than discuss facts in a balanced or open way. He will not give people a fair shake in telling their side of a story, if he has an opinion formed about what sensationalism will sell the most papers.
Ken will quote people out of context, and use selective facts to change the whole meaning of an event, an issue, or a person's actions.
Even when caught red-handed, he refuses to admit his mistakes and likes to pretend they never happened.
Hmm. Same old Ken, I thought, with a chuckle. I'll bet he wrote that stuff himself, just to stir things up.
Ken likes to complain about high gas prices, but he is always seen driving all by himself in one of the very most gas-guzzling vehicles a person could drive. As was said by another East Lincoln birdie, "Maybe this is the only vehicle Ken's ego-inflated head and butt can fit into."
The anonymous entry continued:
Ken Fortenberry is rumored to be a scumbag. He prefers to use lurid accusations and defamation rather than discuss facts in a balanced or open way. He will not give people a fair shake in telling their side of a story, if he has an opinion formed about what sensationalism will sell the most papers.
Ken will quote people out of context, and use selective facts to change the whole meaning of an event, an issue, or a person's actions.
Even when caught red-handed, he refuses to admit his mistakes and likes to pretend they never happened.
Hmm. Same old Ken, I thought, with a chuckle. I'll bet he wrote that stuff himself, just to stir things up.
Ken likes to complain about high gas prices, but he is always seen driving all by himself in one of the very most gas-guzzling vehicles a person could drive. As was said by another East Lincoln birdie, "Maybe this is the only vehicle Ken's ego-inflated head and butt can fit into."
Yeah. Now I am certain. That's gotta be Ken.
