AaronMcCaan.com
Professional researcher Aaron Arthur McCaan served in the U.S. Marine Corps from 1968-71. Assigned primarily as a gunner on Navy patrol boats in Vietnam’s Mekong Delta, he earned two Purple Hearts, one for injuries he suffered when his boat was blown up. That killed two of his shipmates and left him with a bad concussion and some scrapes and bruises. The other medal was for a nick he got on his shoulder in a firefight later in the war. He called it a “paper cut” and never gave it much thought. Finishing his tour at the USMC Supply Depot in Barstow, CA, he used the G.I. Bill to attend San Diego State University, where he earned a B.A in anthropology and history and an M.A. in anthropology for the combined fieldwork and documentary research that led to his thesis, “Ancient Rituals of the Mohave Indians.”