Texaco - The Early 70's

S/S Texaco Florida

On June 13, 1970 I joined the Texaco Florida as 3rd Mate in Providence, RI, at the Curran and Burton docks just south of the city.  Funnily enough, and luckily for me, the instructor who taught the basic tanker course at Kings Point had sailed on the Florida and based much of his course on that particular ship.  Built in 1956 in Newport News, the Florida measured 23,000 gross tons.  Capt. Eddy John George was my first skipper.  He was a character.  Arnold Hall, an old timer from Matthews County Virginia, was the Chief Mate.  The ship ran between Port Arthur, TX and ports in the Northeast.  The Florida was a primarily a clean oil ship although she did have several small lube oil tanks.

I spent two months on the Florida and remember the time well.  We nearly had a collision running southbound off the Florida Keys when an old freighter, the Ocean Transporter, didn't follow the Rules of the Road and failed to give way.  Because we were running parallel to and less than a mile off the reefs, there wasn't room for us to make a round turn to avoid collision.  We had to do a full ahead hard right / hard left maneuver to cut across her bow as she passed very close astern.  I don't believe there was anyone on watch because when I started blowing the danger signal, I could see people running up to the bridge.  If we hadn't blown our whistle, he would have run high and dry up on the reefs.  The next voyage, I saw the same vessel laid up in Port Neches, Tx.

I nearly got myself fired from my first ship. One trip into Bayonne, NJ, I made the mistake of bringing my wife-to-be onboard for a tour.  Capt. Eddy was smitten.  The whole trip south he talked about her.  Now Capt. Eddy could be crude at times and he was particularly crude about my fiancee.  At first his comments were humorous but when he saw he couldn't get a rise out of me, his comments got worse.  I happened to be on watch on arrival off Sabine Pass.  He had been on me about my fiancee already that morning but when he started to tell the river pilot about her in graphic detail, that put me over the top.  I lit into him then and there and called him every name in the book.  The pilot's mouth dropped open and the Chief Mate dragged me into the chartroom and told me I'd probably get fired.  Capt. Eddy did nothing and never brought the subject up again.  I guess he realized he'd crossed the line.

Port Arthur, TX was Texaco's home base.  There were 8 berths on Texas Island, 3 or 4 of them usually filled.  Texaco had 21 American Flag ships when I first joined the company.  At the end, in 1995, only 3 remained, the Georgia, Rhode Island and Massachusetts.  On my first voyage to Port Arthur, there was a package waiting for me from the local Chamber of Commerce extolling the benefits of living in the so-called Golden Triangle.  The package quickly made its way into the circular file.  Port Arthur had seen its better days.  Besides the Lions Den, a Walgreens and Monte's news stand, there wasn't much worth going ashore for.

In many ports, Texaco provided port relief mates and engineers who came aboard and stood sixteen hours of watches to give the regular crew a break.  One trip in Bayonne, NJ, after the port relief mate arrived, I went home for the day.  That evening, the headline television news story was an oil pollution incident involving the Texaco Florida.  It seemed that the local terminal had been replacing piping under their dock.  The ship was tied up on the North side of the pier and there was a warehouse that stretched the entire length of the pier that prevented one from seeing the other side.  The ship hooked up a cargo hose to its manifold and started discharging Fire Chief (Regular) gasoline.  Unbeknownst to those on the ship, the dock had hooked its end of the hose to a pipeline that had not been reconnected under the wharf.  For three hours, the ship pumped gasoline out the hose, into the shore pipeline and straight into the water on the South side of the pier.  Finally the dockman discovered the leak.  We wound up being there for three days.

I left the Texaco Florida in the same port I had joined, Providence.  A couple of days later I joined the Texaco Wyoming in Port Everglades, FL.  The trip down was eventful.  Because I was going to be on the Wyoming for less than a month, I chose to bring minimal clothing.  I decided to wear my work clothes and boots on the plane.  Airplane hijackings to Cuba were not uncommon in those days and the flights to Florida were prime targets.  While walking out on the runway toward the air stairs to board the plane (there were no jetways in those days), I was tapped on the shoulder by a government agent and brought to a room to be searched and questioned.  Apparently my work attire fit the profile of a hijacker.  After around thirty minutes, my identity was confirmed and I was allowed on the plane, which they had surprisingly held for me.  I guess I didn't look too spiffy because as I waited that afternoon on the pier in Port Everglades while the Wyoming docked,  the Chief Mate, Jim Howell, yelled down from the bow "Are you the 3rd Mate or the Ordinary Seaman?"

S/S Texaco Wyoming

 The Wyoming was a T2 tanker originally built in 1943 as the Buena Vista, renamed Wyoming in 1950 and later "jumboized" in 1961.  The captain on the Wyoming was Ed Quegan.  After finishing discharging in Port Everglades, he got orders to proceed to Puerto La Cruz, Venezuela.  We had a fill-in Radio Operator whose job description included preparing ship's paperwork.  He was inexperienced and not familiar with foreign customs and immigration forms.  Unfortunately, Capt. Quegan was also not familiar with the forms, having always left the job to his regular Radio Operator. We anchored on arrival.  Customs and Immigration came aboard and didn't like the way the forms had been completed.  The forms had to be redone several times before they were accepted and we wound up losing a full day to the paperwork.  The oil terminal was around 15 minutes from town.  There was a nice beach and the beer was cold but other than that, I found the town unremarkable.  Our discharge port was Wilmington, NC where I went on vacation. The Wyoming was sold in 1972 and scrapped in 1974.  I did not sail on her again.

Many of Texaco's American flag ships loaded at Gulf Coast ports and discharged USNH (U.S. North of Hatteras).  So how do you get there from here?  Well, a voyage from the Gulf to Northeastern ports took roughly 5 days each way, berth to berth.  Counting port time, a round trip took around 2 weeks.  Northbound, you wanted to ride the Gulf Stream current as long as possible.  Southbound, you wanted to avoid bucking the Gulf Stream.  One common Southbound route was to head from Cape Hatteras to Matanilla Shoal north of the Bahamas, then cut over to Jupiter Inlet Light, turn south along the coast past Hillsboro Light and on down to the Florida Keys.  Before the threat of pollution altered courses ships were permitted to take when transiting the Florida Straits, we used to sail as close as one mile off the reefs, again trying to avoid the Gulf Stream and maybe catch a counter-current going with us.  There are a series of navigation lights along the reefs - Fowey Rocks (off Miami), Pacific Reef, The Elbow, Carysfort Reef, Molasses Reef, Alligator Reef, Sombrero, American Shoal, Sand Key (off Key West), Rebecca Shoal, and Tortugas.  Navigation was basic - visual bearings and radar ranges being the norm.  It was always interesting on the weekends when, wind and weather permitting, thousands of pleasure boats lined the way.  You quickly learned not to alter course when approaching pleasure craft.  If you changed course for one and the others noticed, you'd have to change course for all and steer a zig-zag all watch long.  Better to continue on a straight course and let them move for you, which they always did. 

Texaco's policy toward young mates and engineers was to put them on as many ships as possible to get a broad experience on the different types of vessels in the fleet. My next ship was another jumboized T2 - the "Mighty Minnie," and definitely different from the Wyoming..  Built in 1943 as the Churubusco, she was renamed Minnesota in 1950 and Texaco Minnesota in 1960.  She was scrapped in 1989.  The most interesting thing about the Minnie was that there were no pipelines on deck; they were all located in the tanks.  She was constructed with 2 sets of 3 tanks across on the foredeck and 3 sets of 3 tanks across on the after deck.  Having only 15 total tanks and no pipelines on deck made for an easy-functioning layout. We carried clean oils from Port Arthur, TX and Pilottown, LA up to the Northeast ports from Philly to Portland.  The captain for most of my 3 months on board was Harry Cannell, a former docking pilot who had recently returned to sea.  We got along well.  Unfortunately, Harry's next assignment was as Chief Mate on the Texaco Oklahoma which broke in two and sank on March 27, 1971, resulting in his loss as well as the lives of 30 other good men.  The second mates during my time on the Minnie were Don Sinclair, who became a Sabine pilot after leaving Texaco, and Wilbur Anderson.

On one voyage into White Fuel, South Boston, my wife wanted to fly up to visit.  We were only going to be in for 16 hours but a port relief mate was provided so I said fine and we made arrangements to meet at the Logan Airport hotel.  The ship docked right on time and I caught a cab to the airport.  When I asked at the hotel reception desk for my wife, they told me she hadn't checked in.  There were flights every hour from Newark so I figured she'd be on the next flight.  I waited in the lobby for over 4 hours, went up to the desk multiple times and was repeatedly told she was not there.  I finally phoned my mother-in-law to find out where my wife was.  She told me she was at the airport hotel and had just called.  I went back to the front desk and leaned over to look at the guest check-in cards, which were clearly visible.  I immediately saw my wife's name.  I was fuming and gave the clerk a piece of my mind.  He wasn't very apologetic and I wound up having to speak with the manager about the clerk making me wait in the lobby for 4 hours when my wife was there the whole time.  They gave us a free bottle of wine for dinner - big whoop.  My wife made several more trips to Boston over the years but we never stayed at the airport hotel again.

SS Texaco Minnesota

My time on the Minnie went very well for 2 3/4 months, then the permanent captain rejoined from vacation.  He had a bad reputation and was rumored to carry papers with him attesting to his sanity.  Oh boy.  We did not get along at all.  Unfortunately, at that time there were some old-time captains who just didn't like academy graduates and, being one, I couldn't do anything right in his eyes.  My last week on board was pure hell.  I was scheduled to go on vacation in Eagle Point, NJ (across the river from Philly) on February 14th.  I remember it well because it was Valentine's Day.  Our docking time was expected to be around 0100.  The captain had already given me my seaman's discharge papers and told me my relief would be waiting on the dock and to be packed and off the ship as soon as possible.  We made very good speed up the Delaware River and it looked like we'd be docked before midnight.  Just to prove how much of a hard-ass he was, the captain made a big show out of having me give back my discharge dated Feb 14th and issuing me a new one dated Feb 13th.  He ripped up the first one in front of everyone on the bridge, saying I wasn't getting another day's pay.  Well, our docking pilot had the nickname "slow bell" and he lived up to his name that night.  He took too long to approach the dock and missed the ebb tide.  He then had to turn the ship around and dock facing down river.  We wound up being all fast at 0015.  To get even with the captain, I told him it was now Feb 14th and to please give me a discharge for that date.  There was nothing he could do but type out a new one.  I was off the ship by 0030, new discharge and another day's pay in hand.  Six years later, the same captain asked me to sail as his Chief Mate.  I refused and never sailed with him again.  Most of the Texaco captains I sailed with were true professionals and fine people.  The very few that weren't were beasts to sail with.  There seemed to be no in between.

The sinking of the Texaco Oklahoma, mentioned above, happened during my vacation time.  When my vacation was up, I was assigned to the Texaco Mississippi.  The Mississippi was originally built as a T-2 by Sun Shipbuilding, Chester, PA as the South Mountain in 1944 and jumboized at Newport News in 1964.  Leo Brennan was the Captain, Jim Leppek the Chief Mate and Brad Towne the 2nd Mate.  I joined in Port Arthur and we shifted up to the Beaumont Shipyard where Jim Leppek moved up to Captain when Leo Brennan went on vacation.  In wake of the Oklahoma tragedy, Texaco put many of its ships into various shipyards to have them checked out structurally.  I was only on board the Mississippi for a little more than a week before being temporarily assigned to the New York office, where I spent the next 7 months.  I was fortunate to live an hour's commute from New York City so the assignment was pretty good.  I took the train to Penn Station, changing in Newark, then walked 20 minutes over to the Chrysler Building.  Texaco was generous enough to pay for my commuting costs which was much appreciated.  The only drawback was that my wife and I had already scheduled a summertime trip to Switzerland and Bavaria based on when I was next due for vacation.  The assignment to the New York office threw off my vacation schedule and we had to cancel the trip.  We vowed to re-book our Switzerland trip but didn't make it there until 2004, only 33 years later.

I shared an office with Harry Pappas, the assistant port captain.  The manager of the marine office at the time was Dick Willoch.  Tom Merrill was the port captain.  Other local seafarers assigned to the office at the time were Mike Brown, Dick Halluska and Chip Wimperis.  Much of our time was spent updating the office navigation charts and port information binders.

Capt. Stan Brownley was temporarily assigned to the office on a special project - going through the Oklahoma's cargo files and recalculating the loading stresses on the ship.  I spent many days working with Capt Stan on this project.  The importance of stress calculations stayed with me over the years.  When I was Chief Mate, each voyage I would calculate the stress on many different cargo layouts and try to get the sag factor as low as possible.

SS Texaco New Jersey

After Texaco's fleet had been checked out structurally and was fully operational again, I left the office assignment and joined another T2, the Texaco New Jersey.  Built as the Lake Erie in 1944 at Sun Shipbuilding, Chester, PA, The New Jersey was jumboized in 1959 at Alabama Drydock and was about 2,000 Gross Tons smaller than the other Texaco T2's.  Therefore, she called at ports to which larger ships couldn't, Gregory, TX and Fall River, MA being two of them.  The New Jersey was also able to use South Pass to and from the Mississippi River instead of Southwest Pass where the deeper-draft ships had to transit.  We were the first American ship, and second ship overall, to call at Yabucoa, Puerto Rico.  While anchored off of Yabucoa awaiting berth, one of our Ordinary Seamen, an Alaskan named Wnuk, caught a 10 foot shark and hung it up on the poop deck boom.  He cut out some of its teeth as souvenirs.  The New Jersey was a black oil ship.  We carried #6 oil, bunker fuel C, to power plants in the northeast.

When I joined, Joe Welch was captain.  My watch mates included Horace Guidry and Marshall Nance, who claimed to be the brother of Boston Patriots player "Big Jim" Nance. When Capt. Welch went on vacation, his replacement was an old-timer who had a drinking problem.  He lived in New England and always went home from Fall River.  He would be sober on the northbound trip, looking forward to going home.  When he returned to the ship from home, he was usually three sheets to the wind and stayed that way for 2 or 3 days.  Often the Chief Engineer would join in the partying.  One voyage, after leaving Boston, he was particularly soused.  It was foggy so we were blowing the whistle one prolonged blast every two minutes. When I came on watch at 2000, we were just clearing Cape Cod.  The seas were flat calm.  Texaco had recently installed new 3 cm Decca radars which were very sensitive and picked up everything.  The captain was on the bridge sleeping in his chair.  Every ten or fifteen minutes, he would wake up and say "Third, if you see a target on the radar, stop the ship and blow the danger signal."  Then he'd doze off again.  After a couple hours of this, he finally went below.  In those days, a Russian fishing fleet would often park itself just outside the 12 mile limit.  It was common knowledge that some of these ships were spy ships.  These Russian fleets were a nightmare to navigate through.  It was better to change course to avoid them altogether.  Right before the end of my watch that night, the radar started picking up multiple targets close by.  Thinking we had run into the fishing fleet, I started changing course.  Then more targets would appear.  When the Second Mate, Joe Halloran, came up to relieve the watch, I was way off course.  I showed Joe the targets and passed on what the captain's orders were.  Joe, nicknamed "race horse" for his penchant for going to the track, was a real easy going guy and took the situation in stride.  He had been with these new sensitive radars before.  He brought the ship back around to the original course and ignoring the targets, plowed ahead.  I stuck around on the bridge with him until it cleared up.  When it did, we could see what was causing the radar targets.  It wasn't fishing boats at all, but multiple fishing buoys fitted with radar reflectors.  Normally our radars wouldn't pick them up but it was so calm, they showed up.

The New Jersey called at Fall River regularly.  The port relief mate from Boston would come down to cover the first 16 hours of watches which worked out really well for me because I always got 2 watches off.  Fall River was a port that required daytime docking and undocking.  We always docked in the evening then sailed two days later in the morning. My wife came up to visit frequently, often bringing lottery tickets for the crew, New Jersey being one of the few states to have a lottery in those days.  She'd fly to Providence and take the bus from there.  We'd stay in the Holiday Inn.  There was an Anderson Little outlet in Fall River so we managed to shop for clothes most trips.

Jersey girl in Salem, MA

Several trips later, we were headed to Boston but got last minute orders to go to Salem instead.  My wife was planning on coming to Boston.  Never having been to Salem, I didn't know where to tell my wife to stay so I called the marine operator and her her look up hotels in Salem.  She gave me a number which I called.  An elderly lady answered and I made the reservation.  She said it was a nice place to stay.  I called my wife and told her to just take a cab from Logan airport to Salem. We docked at midnight.  I grabbed a cab to the hotel only it turned out to not be a hotel.  It was a B and B and my wife was sitting outside on the curb in tears.  The owners were an elderly couple and went to bed early.  They gave my wife a key and told her she had to wait for me outside.  She'd been sitting on the curb for 2 hours before I got there.  The trip started out bad but turned out good.  We stayed in Salem for 2 days and did some sightseeing - the House of Seven Gables, the local maritime museum, etc.  We even went to Boston for a fancy dinner one night.  I brought my wife down to the ship.  The new Second Mate, Rick Schultheis told my wife she looked like Ali McGraw which made her day.

Typical Engine Order Telegraph

My next ship was the Texaco Montana, affectionately dubbed "Queen of the Fleet" by J.K. Manry, her permanent captain.  I had met Capt. Manry before when he was on temporary assignment visiting other ships in the fleet as a roving safety manager.  He was a jovial man and I enjoyed sailing with him.  Other shipmates on the Montana included Chief Mate / Relieving Captain Ed Kitchens, 2nd Mate Jeff Ling, and Engineers Virgil Forman and Leroy Smith.  Virgil Forman was quick to dub me with the nickname "Lowlead," a take-off on my last name and the gasoline cargo we frequently carried before the days of Lead Free gas.  The Montana and Rhode Island were the two newest ships in the fleet and as such had engine control consoles on the navigating bridge.  Normally, when a ship wanted to change speed, it was signaled by engine order telegraph to the engine room where the Engineer on watch would adjust the rpm's as necessary.  On the Montana, the Mate on watch could change the engine rpm's from the bridge by just turning a dial.  One had to be careful not to make the adjustment too quickly so as not to put too much strain on the ship's boilers.

SS Texaco Montana - "Queen of the Fleet"

The Montana was built in 1965 at Sparrows Point (Baltimore).  She measured 26,564 DWT and was 604 feet long. She drew 34'11" fully loaded and could average over 17 knots.  Her runs were similar to those I had been on before, Gulf Coast ports to USNH.  I had good watch mates, AB's Frank Cady and Norman Griffith and OS Horace Guidry, who I had sailed with on the New Jersey.  I was fortunate to sail on the Montana many times over the years.

Our usual ship assignments lasted 3 months.  I only spent 1 month on the Montana before I was transferred to the Texaco Georgia.  The Georgia was a lube oil ship and the Company didn't want to put an inexperienced 3rd Mate there so they switched me and put a newly hired mate on the Montana. Chris Peterson was the Captain when I joined.  Brad Towne and Ambrose Peterson were the other two mates.  We made one trip up the East Coast then got orders for Guayama, Puerto Rico.  We could not locate Guayama on the charts, Guayanilla yes but no Guayama, so the Captain didn't know which side of Puerto Rico to head for.  We were halfway there before it was clarified - we were to load at Las Mareas, which is apparently near the town of Guayama.  The voyage down was eventful as we ran smack into a nasty winter storm.  We slowed down to where we were barely making way and rode out the storm as best we could.  Hurricane force winds and 50 foot seas off of Cape Hatteras made for an unpleasant couple of days.  I thought Capt. Peterson did a very professional job handling the ship through the storm.

After loading at Las Mareas, we proceeded to Port Arthur to load lubes for the West Coast.  Capt. Peterson was replaced by Capt. McCulley, the Commodore of the fleet.  Capt. McCulley was a real stickler for detail, specially in regard to log book entries.  He insisted that All Fast, Tugs Away, Gangway Out and FWE all be the same entry.  I remember there being a problem rigging the gangway in Long Beach, CA.  We must have been tied up for half an hour but he wouldn't let me ring off the engines.  The tug boats kept calling on the VHF to be released and the engineers below called as well wanting to know what the delay was.  It was all caused by what I would politely call a captain's quirk.  We all have them I suppose.  The highlight of my time on the Georgia was an unexpected visit in Long Beach by John and Patti McConnico, who drove down from Fresno.  It was always nice to see family.  We went to Disneyland.

SS Texaco New York

My next assignment was on the Texaco New York.  Originally built in 1953 by Newport News Shipbuilding, the New York was a 20,000 DWT two-house tanker.  In 1972, she was reconfigured at Maryland Drydock to a one-house ship.  The midships house was cut off and placed on top of the after house and an entire new fore-body constructed. The capacity was increased to 42,000 DWT and the ship's overall length increased to 723 feet.  The steady captain was Harry Mousetis, affectionately known as Harry One X, a wonderful, old-time, true-blue Kings Pointer who even lived in the town of Kings Point.  Like many seafarers, myself included, he had his idiosyncrasies;  He was in great physical shape and liked to show off to harbor pilots by doing handstands on the bridge wing.  The Chief Mate was Bruce Calhoun.  Bruce wound up being the person I sailed with the most during my seagoing career.  Our paths crossed frequently.  I couldn't have asked for a better shipmate.  Anyway, I'll never forget one of my early experiences with Bruce.  The captain developed a toothache on a northbound voyage to Eagle Point (Philadelphia).  He called his dentist and made an appointment based on our estimated docking time.  We had a slower than normal trip across the Gulf of Mexico so when we got into the Gulf Stream, he decided to speed up.  I'm not an engineer so I may not have the nozzle configuration exactly right but at full speed on those ships, the engine was designed to use 25 nozzles.  Capt. Harry had the engineers go up to 28 nozzles and then up to 32 nozzles which was the absolute maximum engine capacity.  I'm certain we burned a lot of extra fuel but the weather was cooperative and we flew up the coast.  Harry wouldn't even let the Delaware River pilot reduce speed in the river and we carried sea speed past Marcus Hook and all the way up to where we met the docking tugs off Mantua Creek.  After the tugs were tied up alongside and we approached the dock, Capt. Harry called Bruce from his docking station on the bow to the bridge to relieve him while he went down below to change.  As the ship came alongside, Harry appeared on deck in a shiny green sharkskin suit.  He paced back and forth on the deck.  Bruce turned to me and said "He looks like an organ grinder's monkey."  It was a funny but inappropriate comment and, as I learned over the years, very typical of Bruce's sometimes-acerbic sense of humor.  When we were close enough, Capt. Harry stood up on the side rail, lept over to the dock and took off running down the pier.  The Eagle Point Marine Superintendent just happened to be walking down the pier heading for the ship.  They had a brief encounter.  I don't know what was said but, obviously, it was highly irregular for a captain to be running away from his ship while it was docking.  Harry made it to the dentist on time.

Sailing from Eagle Point that trip we had an unusual occurrence.   We were nearly struck by an Air Force jet whose pilot had apparently lost control.  There were several jets flying low but in formation.   One started to dive and passed immediately in front of our bow.  Just before it hit the water, the pilot pulled the jet out of its dive.  Being on watch on the bridge, I had a good view of the whole incident.  The plane was clearly lower than our fore mast, no more than 50 feet above the river, when the pilot regained control.  We passed over the airplane's wake in a matter of seconds after it pulled up.  I have to believe this was totally accidental because I can't imagine a pilot purposely pulling such a Kamikaze stunt on an American ship in an American port.

Captain Harry went on vacation and was replaced by Ed Kitchens, who I had previously sailed with on the Montana.  He took a liking to my wife's chocolate chip cookies, which she brought to the ship whenever we were in port.  One trip, while anchored in New York Harbor, I rode the Stapleton launch ashore to home for the afternoon, bringing the empty cookie tin with me so I could get a refill.  Customs agents, stationed at the launch, occasionally checked items being brought ashore.  They were particularly concerned with the cookie crumbs in my tin, thinking the ingredients might have contained drugs.  After sampling the cookie remnants, they confirmed they were indeed chocolate chip cookies and commented that my wife was a good cook.

I was on the New York during the gas shortage of 1973, only there wasn't really a gas shortage.  On several voyages, we anchored in New York Harbor for extended periods of time loaded with full cargoes of gasoline and no place to discharge, all the shore gasoline storage tanks in the area being full. One voyage, after completion of discharge, we cleaned tanks and went up the Hudson River to load fresh water for the refinery in Trinidad.

I thoroughly enjoyed my time on the New York.  I spent most of my free time preparing for my Second Mate's license and Capt Harry, Capt Kitchens and Bruce were ready, willing and able to answer any study questions I had.

Back at the Zoo

                                                                                Vickery Gate

After ten and a half months straight at sea, Sea Year ended.  I had five weeks of summer vacation before reporting back to Kings Point for 2nd Class (Junior) year.  When we got back on campus, we were advised that Kings Pointers were no longer referred to as cadets.  We were now to be called midshipmen.  We still considered ourselves cadets and didn't like the change.

I was moved to section 70-103 and assigned a room in 6th Company.  I had several different roommates that year, most notably Mike Ryan and Bob "Ying Yang" McConnell.  Ying Yang was a former 70-101'er and a good friend.  When we had time off, he would often spend it at my parents' home, an hour away.  Ying Yang's and my room was on the third floor directly over the arch.  On weekends, when Boy Scout troops often toured the Academy, we would place my Akai M-9 tape recorder in our window and blast the Dudley Do-Right cartoon intro theme that I had recorded.  It went something like "Into the northern region of Canada at the close of the 19th Century rode Dudley Do-Right of the Mounties, lonely defender of justice and fair play, handsome, brave, daring and hopelessly lost." It always startled the scouts and made them laugh.  It made us laugh too.

It was not easy having to crack the books again after being away at sea for a year but we managed.

It was good to see Denny Gross again.  He was the Regimental First Lieutenant and later in the year recommended me for that position.

The best thing that happened to me 2nd Class year was that I met my wife to be.  The weekend before first semester finals, several of us decided that we had done enough studying and needed to relax before Monday's exams.  We had seen a flyer for a mixer/cruise on the Circle Lines in midtown Manhattan and decided to attend.  During the cruise, I noticed Ying Yang talking to a particularly good looking co-ed.  As she put it, I rescued her from him.  We exchanged phone numbers and the rest is history.

Junior Prom July 1969

1st Class Year

Prior to the academic beginning of 1st Class year, we had to spend two weeks working as shipping company interns.  I chose to work for Trinidad Corporation in New York City and commuted there from home.

1st Class (Senior) year was a testament to the original 70-101 section members;  many became Regimental, Battalion, or Company officers. Steve Ford (RX), Ennis Kay (BX3), Dave Whitty (BX2), Jim Sweeney (CC1), Bob McConnell (RA) and myself (RFL) all made the list. If I've left anybody out, I apologize.

Ying Yang and I discovered a kitten trapped behind the soda machine in Land Hall.  We named him Bronson.  Bronson lived in my room because I had a lock on my door but Ying Yang spent as much time with him as I did.  Ying Yang would tuck him inside his shirt and take him to class.  He'd also ride on his shoulder when he walked around the Academy.  I was behind Ying Yang in line at the Ship's Store one day and Bronson was on his shoulder batting at his ears.  The cashier freaked out when she noticed.  I wound up taking Bronson home during Christmas break and my mother found him a permanent home.

The Reg Aide was unofficially responsible for the keeping the "Job Book" and the "Date Book."  Ying Yang, being the Reg Aide and my best friend, always saw fit to include me in the best weekend job offers, where midshipmen could make spending cash doing handyman jobs outside the Academy grounds.  Valet parking jobs for affluent Kings Point villagers' functions were great jobs that paid good tips and let us park fancy cars.  Perhaps the best job Ying Yang and I did together was a landscaping job for Ron Swoboda, a hero for the 1969 Miracle Mets World Series championship team.  He had recently had an in-ground swimming pool installed in his back yard and needed the lawn around it graded and seeded.  We spent a Saturday afternoon and all day Sunday hauling wheelbarrows of dirt from his front yard to the back, dumping and raking it out and then planting grass seed.  It was sweaty work but Ron was a good boss and let us take frequent iced tea breaks.  When we were done, he told us if we ever wanted to use his pool to just call.  We never did since the end of 1st class year was fast approaching.

I was only peripherally involved in "Date Book" happenings.  Ying Yang had sent out "Date a Midshipman" flyers to all the local colleges hoping to line up dates with prospective co-eds.  The response was mixed, some serious, some humorous.  On a couple of occasions, I was dragged along to college dances to be the designated driver.  The girls from Grace Downs flight attendant school in Glen Cove also visited the Academy frequently however I'm not aware of any hook-ups that evolved from "Date Book" encounters, but they were great distractions from Academy life.

I was fortunate enough to be named Acting Regimental Commander for a weekend while Bob Lavinia and Steve Ford were away representing the Academy.  That weekend happened to correspond with the Maritime Administrator's annual visit to the Academy.  He mentioned to me during the Regimental Review that, when he first started sailing, he had a Scottish girlfriend named Laidlaw and was curious if she was a relative.  Although I have many Scottish relatives, she was not related.

Regimental Review Nov 8, 1969 - The Honorable Andrew E. Gibson, Maritime Administrator

Kings Point started an aggressive marketing campaign during the 1969-1970 year and was chosen to march at halftime during the Sugar Bowl football game on New Year's Day.  I was one of a hundred cadets (excuse me - midshipmen - old habits die hard) who volunteered for the occasion.  To practice for the big event, we marched at a NY Giants game at Yankee Stadium.  We had no assigned seats for the game and were allowed to stand on the sidelines behind the players.  On extra points and field goals, the stadium security guards stood behind the end zones to keep the footballs away from the fans.  Several KP'ers decided it would be a good ruse to pretend to be helping the security guards but actually steal a game ball for the Academy.  The quarterback of our football team stationed himself behind the end zone.  Another cadet stayed in the baseball bullpen which led out to the street.  Near the end of the game, when one team kicked an extra point, there was a big melee for the ball.  One of our cadets grabbed it, tossed it to our quarterback who threw a perfect pass to the cadet in the bullpen who took off out of the stadium and onto one of our buses.  They later presented the game ball to Admiral McLintock.

The Sugar Bowl trip was unlike anything I had ever experienced.  I was asked to escort the Maritime Administrator's daughter, Janet Gibson, to the Gala events.  That meant I was not available to march in the parade or game.  I shared a room with the the Maritime Administrator's Aide at the Sheraton Charles while the rest of the cadets stayed out of town at the Belle Chasse Naval Air Station.  The evening of the Sugar Bowl Parade, we dined with Moon Landrieu, the Mayor of New Orleans.  During the parade, we stood in the reviewing stand.  That night was probably the coldest I have ever been in my life.  I was wearing my winter blue uniform and a heavy cravat overcoat with lining and shivered the whole time.  My guess is the temperature was near freezing but it was so damp and windy that the cold just went right through you.  I felt sorry for those marching in the parade, especially the one group from Hawaii who wore grass skirts.

The next day, I went sailing on Lake Ponchartrain with Jay Clark, a Kings Point graduate and president of Delta Steamship Lines.  That night we attended a New Year's Eve dance at the Southern Yacht Club with the Gibson's.  After a dance with Mrs. Gibson, she commented that it was too bad Kings Point didn't offer dancing lessons.  I guess the dancing lessons I had taken in Bedford Hills during 7th and 8th grades were a waste of time.  On game day, we had breakfast with Zach Carter, the president of Avondale Shipyard.  The game itself, between Ole Miss and Arkansas, was held in Tulane Stadium.  Arkansas was a slight favorite because of its All-American wide receiver Chuck Dicus.  Ole Miss had Archie Manning at quarterback.  Archie became famous during his Junior year when nobody knew who he was.  That year, Ole Miss fans wore buttons saying "Archie Who?'  His senior year, the buttons worn at the Sugar Bowl game said "Archie You Know Damn Well Who."  Ole Miss won the game 27-22 and Archie Manning was voted game MVP but the most memorable thing to me was the Arkansas Hog Call cheer - "Woo Pig Sooie Sooie Sooie."  It was loud and echoed throughout the stadium.  When I see Arkansas on television nowadays, I root for them because of their cheer.

After the game, Janet Gibson and I went to Pat O'Brien's to sample their world-famous Hurricanes.  It was a pretty powerful drink served in a tall fluted glass.  We sat in the back courtyard and were entertained by frat pledges standing on the tables and leading the crowd in the Ole Miss fight song.  There were plenty of football players present from both teams; most were feeling no pain.  I went up to the bar to order another drink.  People were 4 deep.  I recognized the guy in front of me as Bruce Maxwell, the Arkansas fullback.  He had his arm around an Ole Miss player and was saying something to the effect that he didn't mind losing to Ole Miss as long as he didn't lose to a Yankee team.  When it was my turn to order, I did so in my best Southern drawl.

After leaving Pat O'Brien's, we made our way to Pete Fountain's club and topped the Hurricanes off with some gin and tonics.  A couple of famous television sports announcers, Chris Shenkel and Bud Wilkinson, were there and were well on their way to waking up with hangovers.

Ying Yang invited me to his house for Easter vacation.  He lived an hour east of Pittsburgh.  We pulled an all-nighter the night before, attending a Lettermen's concert at the Westbury Music Fair then driving all night to his house.  I had borrowed my parents' car for the trip.  The return trip to school was a nightmare.  Several feet of snow had blanketed the east coast but had stopped before we left.  A tractor trailer had flipped over on the Pennsylvania Turnpike and blocked a tunnel.  Traffic slowed to a crawl.  We got off the Turnpike and headed north on local roads to connect with Route 22.  Route 22 was very icy and at one point we went into a 180 degree skid and slid stern first into a snowbank.  Luckily there was minimal traffic so we were able to pull out of the snowbank and back onto the road before any oncoming traffic got there.  We were exhausted by the time we got back to school.

The rest of 1st Class year was a blur, mostly spent prepping for license exams.

We were graduated on June 3rd.  I took 10 days off then went to work for Texaco.

After Graduation - with Mum, Sugar, Dada, Olwyn (behind me), Amy, David and Rob

Z-Card issued upon graduation.  It was my 3rd Z-Card - the first being issued in 1964 for Ordinary Seaman rating.

Sea Year - 1968 - The Med Run

The Med

The day after disembarking from the Pioneer Contractor, Dick Gaston and I joined the Exford in Hoboken, NJ.  Dick and I were originally going to be assigned to the Expeditor, a sister-ship of the Exford, but we switched assignments with my former roommate, Bruno, since the Expeditor was scheduled to call at Trieste, Italy, where Bruno had relatives.

Sailing on the Exford was definitely a different experience from my previous three ships because she was so much older.  Built in 1946, the Exford was a 7 hatch C3-S-A3 class freighter owned by American Export Lines.  Even though small in size, the navigating bridge of the Exford was kept in tip top shape, being entirely clad in hard wood which was sanded and varnished every voyage.  The brass fittings were polished daily.

We had been aboard for one day when Martin Luther King was shot.  The longshoreman's union shut down for two days so I was able to go home again for a night.  After the laborers returned to work, we finished loading and sailed for Philadelphia.

Exford docked in Hoboken, NJ April 1968

We anchored in the Delaware River just off the Customs building.  At 0800, I reported to the coastwise Chief Mate, John Codispoti, a fellow Kings Pointer, and he told me to check the containers we had loaded in number 4 lower hold for damage.  The Exford, being an older vessel, was not fitted with steel hatch covers. She was fitted with rows of wooden hatch boards, the type that were commonly made into coffee tables in the 1970's.  Not all the hatch covers were in place so there was daylight filtering down into the cargo hold.  I went down through the ladder in the mast house.  As I descended lower and lower, it got darker.  When I started down into the lower hold, I stopped at the top of the ladder to let my eyes adjust to the darkness.  The Mate had said there were 2 layers of containers but I could make out only one layer.  I turned on my flashlight and saw that there were indeed 2 layers of containers, but the bottom layer was submerged under a thick layer of black liquid.  I scampered back up the ladder, found the Mate and told him there was 10 feet of molasses in the hold.  He thought I was nuts but came out and looked anyway.  He had the deck gang remove more of the hatch boards so he could see down into the hatch and was just as mystified as I was when he saw the liquid.  He called the captain, Giuseppe Ciaccio.  Captain Ciaccio was very short in stature and needed to stand on a crate in order to see over the coaming down into the hatch.  Without knowing what the liquid was, he gave the order to pump it over the side, something one could never do today.  We started pumping and the black, frothy liquid poured out of the overboard discharge line into the river.  It wasn't long before the Coast Guard showed up in a boat and asked what we were doing.  They made us stop pumping and came aboard to sample the liquid.  It was determined to be of vegetable nature and we were allowed to resume pumping.  The ship had loaded bags of powdered licorice forward across in the lower hold.  During the overnight voyage from New York to Philly, the engineers had transferred water from the forepeak tank to the afterpeak tank to adjust the trim of the ship.  Unfortunately, a valve in # 4 hold had been left open so they wound up pumping the water there.  The water had saturated and broken open the bags of licorice.  The mixture was as I had originally described it, like molasses.  When we got to the dock, the 2 layers of containers were hoisted out.  The contents in the bottom layer of containers were ruined.  The hold was a gooey mess.  The bottoms of lower holds were commonly fitted with "ceilings" which were wooden plank floor boards.  These boards were saturated with the black goo and had to be steam cleaned to get the mess out.  It took almost 2 days to get the hold clean enough for cargo again.  As a follow-up, several years later when I was sailing on my license, I spotted John Codispoti, the coastwise Chief Mate on the Exford, in Newark Airport.  As I walked over to say hello, he recognized me and said "well if it isn't old ten feet of molasses."

After the coastwise trip, the ship returned to Hoboken and several new officers joined - Chief Mate Emil Mincu, and 3rd Mates Nick Steinberg, and John Russell.  Emil Mincu was the oldest Chief Mate I had sailed with.  I believe he was in his 60's.  He always wore black pants and a button-down white dress shirt and had a knack for never getting dirty.  One day, he and I went up to #1 hatch and worked for several hours re-stowing loose boxes of cargo.  When we finished, I was filthy and he looked like he was dressed for dinner.

Exford - underway and rolling gently - April 1968

Unlike the other ships on which I had sailed, the cadets' quarters were not on the officer's deck.  On the Exford, our room was on the main deck.  We shared a common bathroom with the unlicensed crew.

Exford deck cargo

Much of our cargo was for the military. In addition to a NASA space capsule, we also loaded many crates of Budweiser beer. Of course the Hoboken longshoremen broke in to the beer immediately.  There was no stopping them. The Mate told us to go ahead and let them have one crate for themselves but to tell them not to break into other crates.  This practice seemed to work.  The longshoremen were happy and only one crate was pilfered.

Our first foreign port was the US Navy base at Rota, Spain.  It was located just to the northwest of Cadiz.  Our only trip ashore was to the town of Jerez de la Frontera which was world-renown for its sherry.  Of course we had to sample some.


Our next port was Naples, Italy with more military cargo.  Naples was a large, bustling city that did not really appeal to me, other than the fact that Mount Vesuvius was visible just to the east.  It wasn't the cleanest place either.  My only trip ashore was to the Navy PX.

Naples with Mount Vesuvius in the background

After Naples, we went to Catania, a city in eastern Sicily that sits below Mount Etna.  I enjoyed Catania.  I found it cleaner than Naples and the people were more friendly.

Catania with Mount Etna in the background

Corinth Canal

After Catania, we headed for Piraeus, Greece. On the way, we passed through the narrow Corinth Canal.  Piraeus is the port of Athens.  It was a great port.  Train transportation into Athens was convenient.  Dick and I headed for the Acropolis.  There were vendor stands set up in the parking lot there.  Dick wanted to buy a scimitar-shaped letter opener but didn't have the right change and asked to borrow some.  A word of explanation here, because cadets travel to so many different countries, it's easy to get drachmas, lira and pesos mixed up.  For this reason, we used the term "gazoony" for the local currency of whatever country we were in at the time.  So Dick asks me "How many gazoonies you got?"  The vendor spoke broken English and asked what a gazoony was.  We must have spent five minutes trying to explain to him what it meant.  He was thoroughly confused.  At the end, he said "My son is being tutored in English by a man from North Carolina.  If I ask him what is a gazoony, will he know?"  This just cracked us up.  The poor guy obsessed over our use of slang.  We left him literally scratching his head.

The Parthenon 1968

 

The Parthenon was incredible.  In those days one could walk all around and through the temple.  I don't think you can now.  The other good thing about Piraeus was that you didn't have to walk far from the ship to get a beer.  John Bull's was just down the waterfront.

Temple of Hephaestus from the Acropolis 1968

 After Piraeus, we headed for Salonica, Greece.  While Salonica was Greece's second largest city, it paled in comparison to Athens.  Our stay there was not without incident.  There was a freighter anchored near the docks manned by only three people, the Captain, his wife and the Chief Engineer.  The rest of the crew had deserted due to non-payment of wages.  The port authorities demanded the ship be moved to the dock so the three on board tried to do it by themselves.  They didn't do too badly until they got too close to us and nicked our stern.  We wound up with only a small dent and some bent handrails but I'm sure other vessel's owners' problems rose exponentially.  My other memory of Salonica was the unfortunate resemblance of a local barmaid to Ethel Kennedy.  I don't think she got many tips.

Turkish Martyrs' Memorial - 1915 Battle of Gallipoli - Canakkale 

Izmit from the sea

From Salonica, we headed for Turkey.  Passing through the Dardanalles, a narrow strait that joins the Aegean Sea with the Sea of Marmara, was interesting due to its history during World War I.  Our first port in Turkey was Izmit, a small town with friendly people located East of Istanbul.  I was sorry to hear that Izmit had significant earthquake damage in 1999.

Castle on the Bosporus

After Izmit, we docked North of Istanbul on the East side of the Bosporus Strait, near the border with Russia.  We spent two days there discharging liquid latex that was carried in one of the ship's deep tanks.  We were able to take a launch across the Bosporus to the more populated side where we had dinner at an outdoor cafe.  The most memorable part of this was the cab ride back to the launch.  Gasoline was expensive there and cab drivers used any method possible to improve mileage.  Our driver would turn off the car and coast downhill whenever possible.  Coasting downhill at night with no lights on the back roads of Turkey was not an adventure I had signed up for.  But we made it.

The Golden Horn - Istanbul

Galata Bridge - Istanbul

We shifted down the Bosporus and docked in Istanbul within walking distance of the Galata Bridge and the Golden Horn.  Water porters lined the bridge as did fishermen. We passed several large castles during the short trip down the Bosphorus to the city.

Turkish Water Porters

Grand Bazaar

We were docked in the city for only one day.  Other than the Grand Bazaar, I did not get to visit the main tourist attractions.  The Grand Bazaar was something else, a huge maze of stores unlike anything I had ever seen.  One could easily get lost inside.  I bought several puzzle rings and needed directions to put them together.  When I gave one to my brother Rob that summer, he figured it out in 5 minutes.

Tripoli Waterfront

Our next port was Tripoli, Libya.  We had a lot of cargo destined for Wheelus Air Force Base nearby.  Even in 1968 Libya was not a safe country.  There was a strong military presence which caused me not to venture too far from the ship.  The hot souvenir items of the time were sheepskin rugs. 

Libyan Desert Patrol

Downtown Tripoli

Beach at La Goulette

Upon leaving Tripoli, we headed for La Goulette, the port of Tunis.  The dock was within walking distance to a beach.  I think Dick and I started a new beach sport - soda can target practice.  We would toss an empty soda can into the sea and throw rocks at it to try and make it submerge quicker.  We drew quite a crowd of local kids and they soon joined in the fun.

From the port, one had to take the train into Tunis proper.  Tunis was quite a nice city.  The spoken language in Tunis was French which I had luckily studied for three years in high school.  I was able to get by fairly well.  One could definitely see the French influence in Tunis, especially with the wide main boulevard.  The best shopping spot was the casbah where I bought a very comfortable pair of camel hair slippers and a fez hat, which I still have.

Tunis - Habib Bourguiba Boulevard

La Goulette was a short train ride from Carthage and Dick and I had panned to go there on the way back from the city but we missed the last train of the day and unfortunately never made it to the ruins.

Sagrada Familia

Our last port in the Med was Barcelona, Spain. The stay in Barcelona was bittersweet; it was an interesting city but it was also the last foreign port of my sea year.  Barcelona seemed very cosmopolitan in that I heard many languages spoken.  The Sagrada Familia, which looked like a very confused church, was the only attraction I had time to visit.

On the way back to the States, Bobby Kennedy was assassinated, becoming the second public figure to be killed during my time on the Exford.

The Exford was scrapped in 1976.

Sea Year - 1968 - The Far East Run

S/S Pioneer Contractor

The transition from the Mormactrade to the Pioneer Contractor was similar to the transition from the African Meteor to the Mormactrade in that I got no time off between ships.  I went from one ship one day to the next ship the following day and was only able to spend one night at home.  I also picked up a new roommate, engine cadet Dick Gaston.

The Pioneer Contractor was a US Lines C4-S-57a assigned to the Far East run.  Built in 1963, she was a big, fast vessel capable of averaging 24 knots.  The deck officers I remember were Capt. Ed Clayton, Chief Mate Erwin Strom, 2nd Mate Andy S. and 3rd Mate Steve Nadeau.  As usual, I was assigned to the 4 to 8 watch with the 2nd Mate.  Capt. Clayton was very strict.  Even though I was an experienced cadet and had been trusted to stand regular watches by myself on my previous vessel, which was very much against regulations, Capt. Clayton treated me like I'd never been on a ship before.  His first instructions to me were that I had to wear my uniform, including my high-pressure hat, at all times when on the navigation bridge, even at 0400 in the middle of the ocean.  I thought then and still think now that this was a stupid rule but I did what I was told.  I've been with many strict captains since but none who tried to run a merchant ship as if it were a naval vessel.  It doesn't work.  Needless to say, Capt. Clayton wasn't well-liked by the crew.

The US Lines docks were located on the Hudson River in midtown Manhattan.  Prior to heading for the Far East, we stopped in North Philadelphia.  From there, it was about a 5 day run to the Panama Canal.  We docked in Cristobal for cargo operations.  It was a weekend so Dick and I were able to go ashore.  The docks were convenient to town; one could walk ashore in 10 minutes.  I had been in Cristobal before when I was on the Meadowbrook and knew there wasn't much to see so we just hung out in a bar, had a few beers and played the jukebox.  The local brew was Cerveza Balboa. 

The Panama Canal connects the Atlantic Ocean (Caribbean Sea) and the Pacific Ocean.  Therefore, common belief is that the canal runs East and West.  It actually runs closer to North and South.  The canal is 51 miles long and consists of 6 pairs of locks, 3 up and 3 down.  Usually ships don't transit the canal immediately on arrival; it is common to anchor and wait to join a convoy.  Uninterrupted canal transit takes about 8 hours.  The 3 locks on the Atlantic ocean side are the Gatun Locks.  These 3 locks are in a row and lift ships up to the level of the Gatun Lake.  After the lake, ships must go through the Gamboa Cut to reach the Pedro Miguel Locks.  There is one pair of locks at Pedro Miguel.  The final two pairs of locks are the Miraflores Locks.  Highly trained Panama Canal pilots guide ships through the canal.  When the US ran the canal, the job of Panama Canal pilot was considered one of the premier jobs in the maritime industry.  To make lock transit, ships are hooked up to "mules" both port and starboard and fore and aft.  "Mules" are locomotives fitted with constant-tension mooring wires that hold ships in place as water is pumped in and out of the lock chambers.  Panama Canal workers board the ships during lock transit to handle the mule wires.

It's around a 10 day trip from Balboa on the Pacific side of the canal to Los Angeles. The ship's bosun, Bob Healey, bought several cases of Cerveza Balboa beer in Panama and threw a party for the crew on the way up to L.A.  I had too much to drink and quickly learned that booze and rough seas don't mix.  I spent the next morning leaning over the rail throwing up.  I never took another drink at sea.  We stopped in Los Angeles only to take bunkers (ship's fuel), then headed for Japan.

Our first port in the Far East was Yokohama, which is just south of Tokyo.  Tokyo Bay is large and there was a lot of shipping traffic there. To cadets, Japan meant only one thing - electronics.  We were only paid $115 a month and I had saved my money from my previous two ships so I was ready to shop.  I bought an Akai M-9 reel-to-reel tape recorder and a Canon F1 SLR camera.  There went two months salary right out the window.  Both the tape recorder and camera were well-worth the money.  I used the tape recorder for almost twenty years before selling it at a garage sale for almost as much as I paid for it.  I still have the camera but who uses film nowadays.

The Chief Engineer on the ship was a part-owner of a local night club in Yokohama so that was where we went after work.  At that time, many Japanese public restrooms were coed.  Such was the case at the club and it took some getting used to.  I found out that drinks were reasonably priced if you didn't wear uniform shoes.  If you did, then the Japanese assumed you were in the military on R & R with a load of cash in your pocket and they would charge more.  Japanese people love their arcade games, pachinko being the most popular.  There were pachinko machines everywhere.

After leaving Yokohama, we proceeded to Naha, Okinawa.  We were there for one day.  Our only foray ashore was to the PX on the US military base.  I noticed quite a few banged up army vehicles on the base, probably damaged in Vietnam and sent to Okinawa for repairs.

After Okinawa, we went to Keelung, Taiwan.  Keelung was the place to buy pirated copies of LP record albums.  They were very cheap in cost and were bright red in color.  I bought a bunch of albums and recorded most on my Akai.  We were also supposed to call at Kaoshung, Taiwan but that port was cancelled.

After leaving Keelung, we sailed to Manila in the Philippines.  Manila is located on the island of Luzon.  Ships pass by Corregidor Island, of WW II infamy, at the entrance to Manila Bay.   We spent 3 days in Manila and docked within walking distance of the city and there was a good bar only a short distance from the docks.  The day we were sailing, I saved the Bosun from missing the ship.  He was up in a bar drinking and not paying attention to the time.  I had seen him there earlier and knew he hadn't made it back to the ship.  I went ashore and literally dragged him back to the ship.  We made it by 10 minutes.

From Manila we went to Hong Kong.  Hong Kong ranks 3rd on my list of most scenic ports.  Prior to the China regaining sovereignty in 1997, Hong Kong consisted of Hong Kong Island and the New Territories.  Kowloon, located just across the harbor from Hong Kong Island, is usually considered an extension of the city. We docked on Hong Kong Island, not far from the Wanchai district, made famous by the 1960 movie The World of Suzie Wong.  The city streets were very crowded, especially in the market place.  I found a music store that would put any of their albums on tape for a reasonable price.  One of the albums I had them tape for me was "Pet Sounds" by the Beach Boys.  In my opinion, it's one of the best albums ever recorded and one that I still listen to today.  We only stayed 2 days in Hong Kong.  The only sightseeing I did was to ride the peak tram to the top of Victoria Peak, the highest point in Hong Kong.  There's a great view of the city from there.  Unfortunately, I remember it being very hazy the day I was there.

Wanchai District

Hong Kong Marketplace

Hong Kong Harbor at sunset 1968

From Hong Kong, we sailed to Pusan, Korea.  The dock was within walking distance of town and there was a seaman's club right at the end of the pier.  Just a few blocks up was Texas Street which was lined with sailor bars. Venturing up Texas Street at night was not a good idea but it seemed perfectly safe in the daytime.  Someone from the ship discovered that the cases of beer at the Anchor Bar were stored just outside the mens room window.  It was easy to reach out and grab a few bottles.  Word of this quickly spread amongst our crew and everyone from the ship drank for free that day.  Americans were very popular in Korea at that time, an apparent holdover from the Korean War effort.  I'm not so sure how popular the Americans would have been had the bar owner discovered our beer pilfering shenanigans.

It was impossible to stay aboard the ship in Pusan when you were off duty.  The off-shore side of the ship was being chipped and painted by hundreds of women laborers.  The din of chipping hammers hitting the ship's side was incredible.  Taking advantage of the cheap labor pool was an inexpensive way to keep the ship looking good.  US Lines ships called at Pusan every voyage.  Each time the ship would dock on a different side of the pier so every trip, one side of the ship was scraped and painted.

The ship was scheduled to go to Inchon, Korea but that was cancelled.  It was back to Japan instead.  Our next port was Kobe.  I had heard of the Japanese love of baseball and got to see it first hand.  At coffee time and lunch time, the longshoremen broke out their baseball mitts and played catch.  I didn't go ashore in Kobe.  Neither did I go ashore in Nagoya.  I did go ashore in Shimizu.  I bought a pair of tabi shoes for my brother Rob.  He had recently earned his black belt in karate and liked the oriental culture.  Tabi shoes have split-toes, kind of mitten-shaped so that the big toe was in a section by itself.  It was hard to find a pair large enough to fit an American.  I bought the largest size I could find which probably equated to an American size 10.

I don't remember in which Japanese port it happened but all of a sudden the 2nd Mate was no longer on the ship.  I was told he had a nervous breakdown and had to be hospitalized.  I was very surprised.  I'd been standing sea watches with Andy for a month and a half and he seemed OK to me.  Looking back, there were clues that something was not right.  Andy was in his mid-40's and constantly talked about his wife and kids and their plans for the future.  I think the family relationship was not what he made it out to be and I suspect she told him she was leaving which put him over the edge.  Also, Andy used to sleep on watch which was a big "no no."  After I had stood watches with him for a while, he came to trust me.  At sea, when we'd arrive on the bridge at 0345 for the morning watch, as soon as he'd taken over the watch from the 3rd Mate, he would curl up on the settee in the chart room and have me wake him at 0530.  The Captain usually came up at 0600.  Now, I feel this was probably a sign of depression.

After Shimizu, we returned to Yokohama.  I hardly got ashore there this time because the Chief Mate, who was now standing Andy's watches, went out the first night and had too much to drink.  He couldn't get up the next day.  I wound up standing his watches which was no big deal since I'd done it regularly on my previous ship. The next day, he gave me $10 for covering for him.  He also allowed me to make overtime.  More correctly, because there was no provision for cadets to be paid overtime, he worked out a deal with Bob Healey, the Bosun, where I would do the work and Bob would put extra hours on his overtime sheet and then pay me.  Of course I got stiffed.  When the voyage was over and I had to leave the ship, the bosun was nowhere to be found with the money.  In later years, that bosun became the union patrolman in Boston, a port that I regularly called at with Texaco.  He would never attend a Texaco ship because he knew I would bring up the money he owed me.

There was another American flag freighter docked nearby and darn if my section-mate Ying Yang McConnell wasn't the cadet there.  It was good to unexpectedly see a friendly face.  We spent the afternoon comparing the tape recorders we had bought, mine a reel-to-reel and his a newfangled invention called a cassette.

Close but no cigar - passing by Honolulu and Diamond Head in 1968

We were supposed to call at Honolulu on the home leg of the voyage but that was cancelled.  We went straight from Yokohama to Panama, a seventeen day voyage.  We again stopped in Cristobal before heading back to the states.  Upon arrival in New York, we docked on Staten Island to clear customs and immigration.  My parents were there to pick me up.  As with my previous ships, I only got one night at home before being assigned to my next ship, the Exford.

In 1975, while sailing for Texaco and attending firefighting school in San Francisco, I saw the Pioneer Contractor again. She was laid up and out of service at a berth near the hotel.  She was "mothballed" to the Ready Reserve Fleet in 1981 and scrapped in 2009.