LIEUTENANT GENERAL
Lawson W. Magruder III
Lieutenant General (Retired) Lawson Magruder III is inducted into the Ranger Hall of Fame for his exemplary service to his country. After serving in Vietnam as a rifle platoon leader in the 23rd ID and as a company commander in the 82nd Airborne, he completed Ranger School as the Honor Graduate in 1974. He was then selected to be the first Bravo Company Commander in the newly formed 2nd Ranger Battalion. His company had the highest pass rate at Ranger School, and during the battalion's first ARTEP the evaluator cited Bravo Company as the "strongest, most disciplined company that he had ever seen."
Later in his career, Ranger Magruder incorporated his experience as a Ranger company commander into the tactics curriculum of the U.S. Army Infantry School, fielded "Best Ranger" teams from the 25th Infantry Division and 10th Mountain Division, and integrated Ranger tactics, techniques and procedures into the training of light infantry and airborne units at the Joint Readiness Training Center at Fort Polk, La and the Jungle Operations Training Center in Panama.
Throughout his 32 years as an Army Officer, Ranger Magruder transformed every unit he served in through his outstanding leadership and "gallantly showed the world that he was a specially selected and well-trained Soldier."