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<em>Guy Wood Chipman</em> was born in Falmouth, Kentucky on 26 July 1886. His father was a country doctor, and a tobacco farmer, state senator, and county judge on the side. One of Guy’s chores, as a young lad, was to take his father’s three horses to water, several times a day, at a river some distance from their home. He did this riding one bareback and leading the other two. Dr. Chipman had a good deal of political clout and helped a local candidate get elected to the Congress. For this favor, young Guy was offered an appointment to the US Military Academy, which he readily accepted. He passed the necessary validating examination and entered West Point on 15 June 1905 with little foreknowledge of our Rockbound Highland Home. He brought to the Academy a love of fast horses and beautiful women, for which Kentucky, even then, was famed. Guy, or Chip, as he rapidly became known as at West Point, excelled in equestrian activities and was a member of the polo squad. His cadet biographer observed, however, that “his chief amusement lay in tantalizing the weaker sex” and took him to task in the <em>Howitzer</em> with these words: “Oh, you gay deceiver! Aren’t you ashamed to treat these girls in such a heartless, un-Cadet-like manner?” Chip’s blithe spirit led him to continuing bouts with the Tactical Department, and he was a regular among the “area birds” and a charter member of the “con squad.” Although naturally bright, he found that his small country high school had not prepared him adequately for the academic rigors at West Point, so, like other famous grads, he took the five year course.</p>
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On graduation, Chip, quite naturally, “went Cavalry.” He was assigned to the 6th Cavalry with station at Fort Des Moines, Iowa, and, over a four year period, moved with the regiment to Douglas and Fort Huachuca, Arizona, and Texas City, Texas, during periods of border tension, before returning to Fort Des Moines. While there, he met and charmed a southern belle from Talladega, Alabama, Mary Winfrey Oliver, who was visiting on post. Despite Chip’s clear interest in Mary, his thirst for travel and adventure led him to seek service overseas in a bachelor status. He was transferred, initially, to the 4th Cavalry, with station at Schofield Barracks, Hawaii, and subsequently to the 15th Cavalry at Fort McKinley in the Philippine Islands. After two years of Philippine service, Chip returned to this country with the regiment, and was stationed briefly at Camp Fremont, California, before being ordered to the School of Arms at Fort Sill, Oklahoma. He was retained by the school as an instructor in musketry, after first taking a quick leave to marry Mary Oliver, who had waited patiently for him during his overseas sojourn. The newlyweds had less than a year at Fort Sill. Chip’s demonstrated competence in the field of musketry, deriving perhaps from his squirrel hunting days in Kentucky, led the Infantry School to seek his services. He was ordered to Fort Benning, Georgia, where he served as an instructor and director in various arms departments, including senior instructor in musketry at the school. While at Fort Benning, Mary gave birth to their only child, Guy, Jr.</p>
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After two years at the Infantry School, Chip was reclaimed by his branch and ordered as an instructor to the Cavalry School at Fort Riley, Kansas. With some prodding from the Chief of Cavalry, the commandant had Major Chipman reorganize weapons instruction there and set up a musketry department. Chip and Mary remained at Fort Riley for four years before he was ordered to the Command and General Staff School at Fort Leavenworth. He was named a Distinguished Graduate in his class and kept on as an instructor for four additional years. Chip was then ordered as a student officer, successively, to the Army War College in Washington, DC and the Naval War College in Newport, Rhode Island. On completion of these assignments, Chip had served 14 continuous years as a student or instructor in six different service schools or colleges, and had clearly established himself as a soldier-scholar. General George Marshall brought him into the War Plans Division of the War Department General Staff, with concurrent duty on the Joint Army-Navy Planning Committee, for a four year tour. At the end of that assignment, Chip returned to his native Kentucky as executive officer of the 7th Cavalry Brigade (Mechanized), which included responsibilities as deputy post commander at Fort Knox. He returned to the Naval War College after two years at Fort Knox, this time to attend a Special Advanced Course, known colloquially as the Admiral’s Course. After graduation, he served in key staff assignments in several large scale CPX’s, and then was assigned as the senior instructor with the Illinois National Guard.</p>
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With war clouds on the horizon, Chip was returned to Fort Knox to serve in the embryo Armored Force, first as a group commander in the training center there, and subsequently as an armored regiment and brigade commander in the newly activated 5th Armored Division. However, he was caught by the 55-year age limit established by General Marshall for commanders of combat units in World War II, so instead of continued training and deployment with the division, he was given the challenging assignment of opening up Camp Campbell, Kentucky, as its first commander. A year later, Chip was ordered to the Pacific Theater of Operations as chief of staff of the Second Island Command in Fiji. While serving there, he encountered circulatory problems in his legs and was evacuated by air to a Florida hospital. He recovered sufficiently to serve six months as the Commandant of Cadets and professor of Military Science and Tactics at the University of Kentucky before again being hospitalized and retired with full physical disability at the close of World War II.</p>
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Chip and Mary moved to San Antonio for their retirement home, primarily because of Chip’s happy recollections of Texas from his early Cavalry days. To supplement his retirement pay, Mary got a real estate broker’s license and opened up Guy Chipman Co. in 1946. Guy, Jr., who had gone into real estate on his own after his release from military service, joined the firm. Chip assisted in the family business within his physical capabilities. His principal hobbies during his 43 retirement years were raising roses, playing bridge and poker, and reading Western novels. His roses were well-known, and he gave generously of them to his neighbors. He hosted a bridge game every Tuesday afternoon and a poker game every Thursday afternoon, taking time out only for Christmas and Kentucky Derby weeks. The games were held in his den, which had its own entrance to the street, half-bath, telephone and coffee percolator. Chip presided over the games gently but firmly, establishing precise house rules and stakes at a modest level. His Kentucky forebears might have disagreed with his prohibition of smoking and drinking of alcoholic beverages. He was a splendid bridge player who had, in the 1930’s, played in exhibition matches as the partner of Ely Culbertson, the famed bridge player of those days. Although few of his friends could approach Chip’s mastery of bridge, they never heard a word of criticism about their play from him. He stopped the bridge games around the time of his beloved wife’s death in 1981, because he could no longer play with the intensity he felt the game deserved. He continued, however, to host the poker games until two days before his death, being then on the third generation of poker playing friends.</p>
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The walls of Chip’s den were covered with framed diplomas of the many service schools from which he had graduated, and the bookcases were filled with hundreds of Western novels in paperback which he had read many times. He noted on the flyleaf of each the date of his last reading and included comments and a grading of its contents. He was a particular admirer of Louis L’Amour, more than 20 years before his books appeared in hard cover and on best sellers’ lists. For almost half a century, Chip had a box at Churchill Downs for the running of the Derby, reserved for him by the legendary Colonel Matt Winn, primarily because as deputy commander at Fort Knox, he had allowed the post band to play there. He had a large collection of julep glasses, inscribed with the names of Derby winners, which he brought back from the annual safaris he had made to Louisville as long as he was able.</p>
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Chip was the oldest living graduate of West Point for over three years. He was honored as such with gifts from the Association of Graduates and with congratulatory letters from the Superintendent and the First Captain of the Corps on his 100th, 101st, and 102nd birthdays. On his 101st birthday, the 101st Airborne Division sent him a handsome certificate, making him an honorary Screaming Eagle in recognition of his pioneering effort as the first commander of Camp (now Fort) Campbell, the home of the division. Chip is the third longest-lived graduate in the total history of the Military Academy.</p>
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Chip was buried with full military honors after a packed and moving service of tribute at the Post Chapel, Fort Sam Houston, with the eulogy and scripture readings given by officers of the West Point Society of South Texas. His poker playing partners served as pallbearers. A horse, led by a trooper from the ceremonial 2nd Dragoons, with empty boots inserted backwards in the stirrups, followed the hearse in the funeral cortege of this old cavalryman at the cemetery.</p>
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Guy Wood Chipman’s life spanned a little over half of the total existence of the United States of America. Somewhat surprisingly, this staunch Kentuckian, with his great pride in the Bluegrass State, had Pilgrim roots and was a member of the Mayflower Society. Chip was a man of courtly manners with a keen sense of humor and a penchant for storytelling. He was gifted and trained as a teacher and had much wisdom and common sense to impart. Although he was a caring and considerate person, he believed strongly in discipline and expected much of himself and others. He has now passed through the curtain of life on this earth to the other side of the Long Gray Line, in the process passing the torch to a new oldest living graduate. We who follow close-order behind Chip salute him as a most worthy son of West Point. He is survived by his son, Guy W. Chipman, Jr.; his daughter-in-law, Juanita Herff Chipman; his grandson, Guy W. Chipman III; his granddaughter, Carolyn Chipman Evans; his step-grandchildren, John, James, Gerald, and Harry Drought; and his sister, Nette W. Chipman of Williamstown, Kentucky. They will all miss him sorely; so will we.</p>
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<em>One who graduated a quarter century after Chip in collaboration with his longest poker playing partner</em></p>
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