Four Ashland Friends, One Photo, and a Bond That Has Lasted 60 Years
ASHLAND, Ohio — Some friendships fade with time. Others are tested by distance, war, life, and the passing of decades, and somehow grow even stronger.
For four Ashland High School friends, Dave Anderson, Dave Sloan, Ron Cahill and Steve Scurlock, one old photograph tells a story that began long before they ever wore a uniform. It is a story of classmates, buddies, soldiers, veterans and lifelong friends who left Ashland together during one of the most uncertain times in American history, and, by God’s grace, all came home.
The four men graduated together from Ashland High School in 1965. They had grown up together, gone to school together and spent their younger years running around Ashland as friends. But by 1966, the Vietnam War era had reached into small towns across the country, including Ashland. The draft was underway, and all four young men were called to serve.
On June 1, 1966, Anderson, Sloan, Cahill and Scurlock left home for basic training at Fort Benning, Georgia. There, sitting together on a log in their uniforms, someone snapped a photograph that would become more meaningful with every passing year.
At the time, they were young men just beginning a journey none of them could fully understand. Sixty years later, that photo has become a symbol of friendship, service, survival and home.
The four went through basic training together, but after that, the Army sent them in different directions. Steve Scurlock went on to train at Aberdeen Proving Grounds in Maryland before serving in Korea. Ron Cahill became a heavy truck driver and heavy equipment operator before being sent to Vietnam. Dave Sloan trained in helicopter maintenance and also served in Vietnam. David Anderson was sent to Europe, serving in Germany, France and Belgium.
They were separated by oceans, assignments and war, but the connection between the four Ashland friends never disappeared.
Scurlock served in Korea during a tense period that included the seizure of the USS Pueblo and heightened conflict with North Korea. He remembered Korea as a place with bigger mountains than Ohio, hotter summers and brutally cold winters. At one point, he recalled temperatures dropping to 20 below during the day and 40 below at night.
Cahill served in Vietnam after training at Fort Lewis, Washington. He remembered leaving Tacoma on June 1, exactly one year to the day after being drafted, aboard a World War II-era troop ship headed for Vietnam. He served around Saigon and Camp Bearcat, where his unit helped build its own base camp after being dropped into a field and told to set up a perimeter before dark.
Sloan served in Vietnam after training in helicopter maintenance, graduating third in his class. While overseas, he said he crossed paths with two other men from Ashland, a small but powerful reminder of home in the middle of a war zone.
Anderson’s service took him east, to Germany, France and Belgium. He helped close out bases in France before later serving as a cook at a NATO SHAPE hospital in Belgium. Looking back on everything the four men experienced, Anderson summed it up in just a few words: “We all came back.”
That is what makes the story so powerful.
Four friends left Ashland together during the draft. Four friends went through basic training together. Four friends were sent to different parts of the world. And four friends returned home safely.
Over the years, they went on with life. They worked, married, raised families, shared stories and carried memories that only those who lived through that time can truly understand. Some memories were good. Some were difficult. Some were better left unspoken. But through it all, the friendship remained.
There is another special thread that ties them together: all four were born in April. That shared birthday month has kept them connected year after year, giving them one more reason to remember where they came from and what they went through together.
Now, 60 years after that original basic training photo, the four friends gathered again to recreate it. Older now, but still together. Still friends. Still Ashland boys at heart.
For Sloan, the recreated photo was meaningful because their friendship started before the military ever entered the picture.
“I think it’s pretty neat myself because we all ran together during high school, too,” Sloan said.
For Anderson, the moment represented the full circle of life.
“You start out somewhere and it goes full circle,” Anderson said. “Sixty years. A long time.”
In a world where time changes almost everything, the story of Dave Anderson, Dave Sloan, Ron Cahill and Steve Scurlock is a reminder of what does not change so easily: hometown roots, brotherhood, service, memories and the kind of friendship that can survive 60 years.
One photo captured them as young soldiers in 1966.
Another photo, taken 60 years later, captured something even deeper, four friends who served their country, came home to Ashland and never lost the bond that began long before the Army called their names.
