Novelty’s Worn Off, So Gulf Veteran, 74, Says It’s Time to Quit

MILTON, Mass. —  At 74, Desert Storm veteran Norman Pearson says the Gulf War, the fourth for this ancient mariner, will definitely be his last.

“The novelty’s worn off,” says Pearson, a merchant marine ship’s captain who may be the Gulf War’s oldest veteran. “I’m not interested in it.”

Pearson, who saw his first action running supply convoys across the North Atlantic during World War II, was called up after eight years in retirement last December to ferry weapons to Saudi Arabia.

“I was ready when they called,” Pearson told the Quincy, Mass., Patriot Ledger newspaper. “I’d been through this all before.”

Pearson and his 27-member crew aboard the Cape Flattery entered the Persian Gulf through the Straits of Hormuz Jan. 16, the day the war started. They were in the Gulf for 35 days.

But he was never nervous.

“I think I probably was too old for that,” he said.

Like other warriors called to duty and an uncertain fate, Pearson stopped just long enough to kiss his 78-year-old wife of 42 years goodby, telling her not to worry.