I was a junior in 1969 and attending NCSU. Along with two other buddies we were listening to the lottery picks on a small radio. One of our buddy’s birthday was picked at number 18 and when it was called out he slapped the radio across the room and started ranting. We finally got it put back together and tuned in as they called out number 29. We listened up to about 270 and neither of our other two numbers had been called. We decided to go the a bar and celebrate our good fortune and drown our buddy’s bad luck. This we did.
The following day the local paper had a list of the lottery number and to our surprise my number was 22 and our third buddy was 26. The irony was that none of the three of us ever got drafted. I had a missing digit on my left hand and got a IV-F status. One buddy had a knee that would swell up on him occasionally so the day before his physical we played basketball on a concrete court for about 5 hours. It was a little puffy on physical day and during his physical the doctor asked him what he had done to his knee. He told the doctor, "Oh when I have to stand in line for a while it will somtimes swell up." Needless to say he got a IV-F also.
Our third buddy’s physical had been scheduled during Christmas break in Raleigh, N.C. He notified the board that he would be in Western N.C. and was considering dropping out of school and could they re-schedule the physical near his home. They agreed and said we will notify you of the time and date. By the time they got it re-scheduled he was back in school and so he again requested that the physical be re-scheduled to Raleigh. They agreed. By the time it was scheduled he had graduated and working in Georgia. He again requested his physical be re-scheduled in Georgia and they agreed but never called him.
None of the three of us ever went into the military.