Page 54 - Amarillo Senior Link Magazine Fall 2021 - Online Magazine

Carl Hartman A Man for All Branches
arl Hartman is a retired
military veteran currently
Cserving as a chaplain for
Interim Health Care out of their
Plainview, Texas office. Carl was
born on Chanute Air Force Base
in Champaign County, Illinois.
Following his father’s service
in the Air Force, he worked
with the Smithsonian Air and
Space Museum in Washington
D.C. Carl’s earliest memories
stem from this time of living in
Maryland until his father took a
new government job in El Paso,
Texas, where Carl finished the
last three years of high school
attending Eastwood High School.
Throughout his childhood, Carl’s
mother stayed home to raise him
and his older brother and sister
and manage the daily needs of
the household.
Not wanting to attend college,
Carl entered the delayed entry
54 Amarillo Senior Link
(Nearly)
program for his parents back in El Paso. His
the Navy in the parents had started attending
summer between a different congregation, and
his junior and he attended with them and
senior years and met the preacher’s daughter,
left for basic Sarah, who was home for the
training in San summer from the college she was
Diego, California attending in Tampa, FL. For the
six days after high next two years, Carl and Sarah
school graduation. corresponded back and forth
After completing across the country until they
basic training, married August 12, 1994. She
Carl stayed joined him in San Diego, where
in San Diego their first child, John, was born in
and attended December of 1996. It was during
training at the this same period that Carl,
Anti-Submarine while still in the Navy, entered
Warfare Base in an understudy program with
order to fill his the preacher at Seminole Drive
role as a Sonar Church of Christ. After leaving
Tech, focusing the Navy on June 13, 1997, Carl
on passive towed lingered in San Diego for a year,
arrays. During working with this congregation,
his seven years before moving to Alabama
with the Navy, Carl served on to attend Heritage Christian
the USS Marvin Shields FF-1066, University (HCU) in order to
USS Lockwood FF-1064, and the pursue a BA in Biblical Studies.
USS Benfold DDG-65. On the
Lockwood and the Benfold, Carl While attending HCU, Carl
was the Work Center Supervisor worked with the East Walker,
for the towed array system, as Stutts Road, and West Huntsville
well as filling several collateral congregations of the Church of
roles. One of those roles was Christ. Carl and Sarah’s second
as the Protestant Lay Leader child, Daniel, was born right after
in the absence of any available moving to Huntsville in June of
chaplains on
his ship. This
gave him early
experience in
ministering and
caring for the
spiritual needs of
others.
During this time
of service with the
Navy, Carl met
his wife, while
on leave visiting