PHILIP "LEE" LOIACANO • VIETNAM WAR
Philip “Lee” Loiacano, 81
Gloucester, MA
Born: 7/10/44
Born/Raised: Gloucester
Service: US Air Force
Rank: Sergeant
Dates of Service: 1965-1968
In January 1965, Philip “Lee” Loiacano and his high school friend Sammy Cuomo received their letters from the government declaring them 1A, fit for service. “We had a decision to make. Are we gonna let the government draft us or are we gonna join?” At 5’5” and 115lbs and prone to seasickness, Lee said, “We didn’t want to join the Army because that probably meant Vietnam right away, I’m not Marine material. I get seasick, so that meant no Navy, so we decided to join the Air Force,” which is what they did under the “buddy program.”
The son of Gloucester fisherman Joseph “Saginaw” and Lucy Loiacano, Lee was born at home and grew up on Beach Court along with his brother William and sister Nina Marie (Peterson). He was a shortstop and captain of his St. Ann’s HS baseball team and played on the basketball team. He graduated in 1963. He studied computer programming in Boston and attended the Salem School for Accounting.
After enlisting in the Air Force, he was sent to Lackland Air Force Base in Texas. Because of his size, the Air Force had to special order a hat to fit his head. He became a squad leader, graduated from basic and was soon sent to Amarillo Air Base tasked with administration work. He turned 21 at the Airman’s Club with a beer and a cigar. He stayed at Amarillo til December of 1966. Sammy in the meantime had been ordered to France.
On leave for a month before his deployment to Thailand, he endured a 2 ½ day train ride and lost luggage but made it home by Christmas eve. In February 1967 he was sent to the Takhli Airbase of the Royal Thai Air Force Base as a personnel office clerk with the 355th Combat Support which was running bombing missions over Vietnam. In December 1967 he got to lay eyes on Raquel Welch who was performing with the Bob Hope Christmas Special at the airbase.
For his final months of service, fortune smiled on Lee as he managed to secure a posting at Hanscom Air Base in the HQ building as an admin of an all-civilian bunch of engineers. This allowed him to live at home in Gloucester and commute. He would end his enlistment in October 1968. In 1969, he and pal Tony D’Amico were frequenting the night club Sandy’s in Beverly and he was introduced to Christine Grover. The two dated and were married on June 7th, 1970 and have been together since. They have two children, Joseph and Alicia “Lee” Lambert, seven grandkids and two great grandchildren. Christine is a Line Dance instructor.
Lee had a busy career working retail at Mal’s Company and the Building Center in Rockport. He managed C.H. Rich liquors, Fish Pier Liquors and Route One Liquors in Rowley for 19 years. He temporarily retired in 2010. He started helping in the office at his son-in-law’s business, Preferred Auto, and worked for nine years before fully retiring when Covid hit. He remains very active at the Cape Ann Veterans Center.