From an E-mail sent by Bruce Huffman (10/3/03):

In late spring of 1968 (late April early May) Charlie Troop was living at beautiful Camp Evans and sharing a short pentiprime runway with Bravo Troop and 15th TC. I ran across a friend with the 3/17th Air Cav in the Freedom Hill PX in Danang, who had a pocket patch on his newly issued Nomex flight suit (we were still flying in occasionally laundered jungle fatigues minus the white name tags). One of the enlisted guys from the Lift platoon was on his way to Taipei for R&R. I started sketching the patch on a piece of stationary but he actually drew the design. I added the dimensions and the color scheme for what became known as the Scout patch.

We took up a collection for ten patches each and sent him on his way. The Red platoon was given equal billing and a chance to order but they were distracted by poker and never joined in the original issue. The original ones had the word SCOUTS in White or LIFT in Blue. We would have gladly ordered one for GUNS in Red but as the old saying goes; no money, no honey!

That's my best recollection of how it all got started. By the way the first 1st Cav Trooper to burn alive in a Nomex was a 1st Brigade Scout by the name of WO1 John Hewett who dumped his OH-13S into a bunker on the Street Without Joy (Highway 1) near Quang Tri. In typical Army fashion, they waited to open his flight suit until they could get the video set up to catalog his injuries. It burned off his mustache, eyebrows, nasal hair, and a bit of his ear lobe, and left a fine zipper imprint on his chest but he was otherwise fine. God bless Nomex!