Roger Conover is 90 with the distinguished look and vigorous attitude of someone two decades younger and he again showed his youthful vitality when he participated for the 16th year as the oldest grad March Back. Conover was in front of a group of 316 graduates, representing 69 years of West Point classes from Conover’s graduating class of 1948 to 2015. Watching were his wife, Adelaide and their son, Chris, and daughter, Laurie. The “Old Grads,” like Conover had the option of marching the full 12 miles or the final two miles. As he has done for the last 15 years, Conover marched the full route. Conover said he practiced for the hike by taking regular walks in the local Park. He also plays golf and tennis twice a week and walks regularly. But he said this was his last March Back. “I felt good but more tired this year,” Conover said. “I want to pass it along to the younger guys.” “I’m a strong believer in the long gray line,” it’s fraternity of graduates who have all been through the same thing.
The March Back is a wonderful opportunity for me to express my feelings about it.” Conover was appointed to the academy by then Republican Rep. Warren Barbour. It was the years when Army dominated college football and among his classmates were All Americans Glenn Davis and Heisman Trophy Winner Doc Blanchard. Two other classmates were the future Gen. Maxwell Taylor and Gen. Alexander Haig, secretary of state under Ronald Reagan and chief of staff under Richard Nixon, and Brent Scowcroft, national security advisor to Gerald Ford and George H.W. Bush. About Haig, Conover said, “He was a cadet sergeant, not at all distinguished.” And there was baseball. Conover was a pitcher and he split three games against a Yale team whose first baseman was George H.W. Bush.
He said he received a very fine” engineering education at West Point while he gained other qualities that have served him his whole life. “It was wonderful grounds for a military profession and a tremendous sense of duty and discipline,” Conover said. “It molded me into the person I am.” After graduating from West Point, Conover served six years of active duty with the Army Corps of Engineers. It was just three years after the end of World War II and Conover was assigned as part of the occupying forces in Austria. After three years, the Korean conflict broke out. Many of Conover’s West Point classmates were already based in Japan and Okinawa and were quickly deployed to Korea. Conover finished his assignment in Poland in 1952 and by 1953, Conover was sent to Korea where the war was coming to an end. A total of 17 of Conover’s classmates died in Korea while two were killed in Vietnam. In 1954, Conover resigned his commission and joined the research and development section at Bell Labs. He worked in finance, personnel and staff support for 31 years, retiring in 1986. Read More