Plant City’s Mack McClendon graduated from the Marine Corps Recruit Depot Parris Island in 1964 and began his four years of service with the United States Armed Services. Along with McClendon, his cousin graduated from the same Marine training facility in 1964 and his brother followed suit in 1966.
For McClendon, he says that it was an unspoken expectation in his family that you would serve your country. Before enlisting himself, his father, two of his uncles and his older brother all served in the United States Army.
“We figured that we owed somebody something,” McClendon said. “You’ve got to pay your dues… I don’t know, it was just sort of like it was expected of you to do it.”
To the surprise of McClendon and his wife Nora, their son Gary later followed suit. It was never something that Gary McClendon had mentioned or seemed driven to do growing up, according to his parents, until the day he showed up at the front door with a Marine recruiter.
“It was never discussed,” Mack McClendon said with a laugh. “Nobody ever said anything about it, he just came home one day with a recruiter.”
Gary McClendon became a second generation member of his family to graduate from Parris Island before also going on to graduate from from Marine Corps Base Quantico, ultimately serving five years as his service was extended while working as a Marine Security Guard at the United States Embassy in Guatemala during Operation Desert Storm.
Gary McClendon returned home, earned three college degrees and currently works for BayCare.
Extending further, Mack McClendon has two nephews who served in the Armed Services and several members of his extended family who have served as well.
Earlier this year, Gary McClendon’s son William McClendon became the third generation of their family to enlist in the Marine Corps and graduate from Parris Island. After graduating from Steinbrenner High School in Tampa and spending two years at Hillsborough Community College, William McClendon made his decision, enlisted and the family was later able to be in attendance for his graduation, allowing a grandfather, son and grandson to reunite for the first time as three generations of Marines at the training facility that they all once attended in South Carolina.
“If you put your mind to it, you can do anything you want to,” Mack McClendon said he learned from his time in the Marine Corps. “It doesn’t matter what it is in life, you can do anything. I guess you could say that it gives you confidence on your own and in yourself, it’s all up to you.”