GI: "Government Issue"?

[sagehen]

 >> GI?
>> What else might it mean?
>
>Galvanized iron, perhaps? I have no idea. That's why I'm asking. In the
>years of my service, the very early Vietnam era, there was nothing that
>I ever came into contact with that was was referred to in either speech
>or writing as "government issue" and the term "G.I." was never expanded
>into "government issue." Furthermore, even in the immediate post-war
>years, there were claims made that "G.I." was not derived from
>"government  issue."
>
>What sorts of things were referred to as "government issue" in your
>husband's day?
>
>-Wilson Gray
 ~~~~~~~~
It wasn't that anything in particular was referred to as "government
issue," or any other sort of issue.  Equipment items that were issued might
well acquire sarcastic, derisive or scatalogical  nicknames, of course.
These were Tenth Mtn, ski troops, and they had a lot of specialized
equipment (which they tended to discard as useless a good deal of the
time!). "Government issue" was simply *understood* to be the meaning of GI.
As soldiers they themselves were GIs and anything pertaining to them was
"GI this that or the other."

A&M Murie
N. Bangor NY
sagehen at westelcom.com