The Aerograph
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The AEROGRAPH NAVAL WEATHER SERVICE ASSOCIATION February 2003 VOL 27-1 WEB Site: http://www.navalweather.org/ INSIDE THIS ISSUE Editor's Notes .................................. 2 ..Publication Information ................... 2 Officers/Committees ....................... 2 President's Column ......................... 3 Antarctic Explorers .......................... 3 Necrology ........................................ 4 Secretary/Treasurer ........................ 6 Address/EMait/Phone Update ......... 7 NWSA Reunion #29 ....................... 8 Travel Via the Moon ....................... 13 Aphorisms ....................................... 14 LETTERS ....................................... 15 SN Anthony McCarty ...................... 16 Santa Visits VA Hospital ................. 18 Demographics ................................. 19 Conversions ................................... 19 Chapter News Southern California ......................... 20 Pensacola ....................................... 21 Hampton Roads .............................. 21 Monterey ......................................... 22 Downeast ....................................... 22 Potomac ......................................... 23 Puget Sound .................................... 26 Historians Comments ...................... 28 XAerM Carl Peterson ...................... 29 AGC Geneva Pitzrick Woods .......... 30 1948 Kodiak Crew .......................... 31 Unlucky Randolph ........................... 32 Whiteout ......................................... 33 Young Man's Dream ....................... 34 Merely This — Conclusion .............. 35 Navy Life ......................................... 37 Storm Cycles .................................. 38 Miscellaneous ................................. 39 New Member/Renewal Form .............. ........................................ Back Cover Items of Interest 1. Quie a few members send me personal update informat on such as new addresses, new telephone numbers new or changed email addresses, notice of members' deaths, and various other bits of information they want printed in The Aerograph. This is all information that Jim Stone, our Secretary/Treasurer needs to update the NWSA database. Please send all such information to Jim Stone. If you sent it via email please make me a copy to addressee. 2. Don Cruse is looking for information about the USS MISSOURI (BB-63) and a WWII wave aerologist HENRII TTA TERRY. Read the NWSA Historian's Comments to see if you can give him some help. 3. Photographs: Some members have been sending me pictures is email. Some of them, for whatever reason, are not compete pictures when I receive them. And some of them do not print clearly enough to make a good copy to print in The Aerograph. Color pictures especially do not print we 1 in black and white. If you want a picture printed, please send me a copy of the picture via snail mail. I can have it formatted for the newsletter and will return the picture if you need it back. 4. If you send in an article and don't see it in the next issue, don't despair – I will get it printed. ----------------------------------------------------------------------- VW1 Reunion A VWI Reunion will be held September 15 – 18, 2003 in Reno NV. The contact for information is: VW1 ASSOCIATION c/o ED AND SALLY METZGER 710 EDGEWATER DRIVE INVERNESS FL 34453 <[email protected]. com> ----------------------------------------------------------------------- `Shortie Puns' gleaned by John Shay of P-cola --If ever v car in the country were white you would live in a white carnation. -When the wheel was invented it caused a revolution. --The first scientists that studied fog were mystified. --When they bought a waterbed, the couple started to drift apart. --Two peanuts were walking in a tough neighborhood and one was a-salted. -What you seize is what you get. A successful diet is the triumph of mind over platter. A perfectly spherical pumpkin makes good pi. Politics only serve to make the future moron-certain. Publication Information: The Aerograph is published quarterly in February, May, August, and November. The Editor must receive contributions not later than the 15th of January, April, July, and October. Articles and letters can be submitted in any format, typed or handwritten. If you have a PC, you can send your article on a 3 '/cinch diskette and save me some typing. I now have MS Office 97 and can use most any software. However, your MAC and Apple Software still comes up UNKNOWN FORMAT. Diskettes will be returned if requested. If you are on-line you can E-mail your info to [email protected]. My 24-Hour Fax Number is 352-787-9386. Be sure to include my name on the cover page. My address is listed below. Bill Bowers Association Officers: President: AGCS Herb Goodland, USN RET 786 N Christi Lane, Las Vegas NV 89110-3714 (702) 452-1102 <[email protected]> First V.P. AGC Dan Hewins, USN RET 25 Patterson Street, Augusta ME 04430-4821 (207) 622-9429 Second V.P: CDR Earl Gustafson, USN RET 26867 Northview Avenue, Arroyo Grande CA 93420-6506 (805) 481-0320 <efgustafsona att.net Secy/Treas: AGC Jim Stone, USN RET 428 Robin Road, Waverly, OH 45690-1523 (740) 947-7111 new <[email protected]> Aerograph Editor: CWO4 Bill Bowers, USN RET 725 Prado Drive, Lady Lake, FL 32159-5740 (352) 750-2970 <[email protected]> Association Committees: Reunion Chair: AGCM Bob Coniglione, USN RET 18085 Commission road, Long Beach MS 39560-3611 (601) 863-3526 <[email protected]> Historian: CDR Don Cruse, USN RET 567 N. Livingston St., Arlington, VA 22203-1024 (703) 524-9067 <[email protected]> Scholarship: AGCS Mel Penrod, USN RET 3196 Pine Manor Blvd, Grove City OH 43123-4840 (614) 875-2970 Nominating: AGCM Moon Mullen, USN RET 1506 Kirk Avenue, Thousand Oaks, CA 91360-3516 (805) 496-1348 Finance Chair: CAPT Bob Titus, USNR RET 2321 Calle De Nuevo, Las Vegas, NV 89102-4039 (775) 345-1949 <[email protected]> FROM THE PRESIDENT NWSA I am going to reflect back in time. When I entered the Navy in 1950 people who were sent to ships. who did not go to schools, usually were put in the deck division. I was no exception I was put in the third division gunnery. My boot camp company had over 80 sailors and only three of them went to schools, two went to Treasure Island for ET school and one to Port Hueneme for Drivers school (now Equipment Operator) The rest of us were designated AR's and sent to Japan aboard a troop ship the USNS GENERAL C.G. MORTON. The MORTON docked in Yokohama and we were bussed to Yokosuka. When we arrived we ate chow in the mess hall -- we were served by female mess attendants. Then we were mustered and bussed to our ships, mine happened to be a Jeep Carrier, USS BAIROKO (CVE-115). Our first night was spent in the after elevator pit on cots. The next day we had to go and find an empty bunk -- mine happened to be in the engineers compartment, bottom rack next to the head --not the most desirable place to try and sleep. I was put over the side cleaning the fantail of oil spilled by the engineers while dumping. I complained so much they made me captain of the after officers heads. I was also third loader on a quad 40MM located on the fantail. After a few months SR's came aboard and we were then transferred to the Air Department. I was put in the hangar deck crew. When I reported to V3 division they put me in mess cooking. We lived on the forward mess deck with our seabags (the old white ones) lashed to the bulkhead. We slept on hammocks hung from the over head. If you can advance being a mess cook, I did. I was put in charge of the bread room. This meant that I would cut the butter in squares; cut the bread, after three days, (In those days they thought the fresh bread would ball up in your stomach), get the pies and cakes and rolls from the bakery. I would have to make sure that the mess line was kept supplied. I made friends while in the bread room by supplying the first division with fresh bread and butter. For the rest of the time I was aboard anything I wanted from the first division I had. It was called cumshaw. About the most exciting thing that happened while I was aboard the ship was an explosion in the shaft alley, people smoking in an unauthorized space. Four people were killed. I ran to my fire station on the hangar deck, grabbed the 2 1/2 inch hose and braised myself. I told anther kid to turn on the water -- no water. If the water was in the hose I would have probably been thrown across the hangar deck. Also one time we were sitting in port when the collision alarm was sounded. A command ship came in and rammed us in the after part of the flight deck. While were in Korea we had a Marine fighter squadron aboard VMA 312 (The Checker Board Squadron). They were flying F4U's. Our hangar deck PO had been in a squadron one time and was a plane captain. We had to get one of the planes up to the elevator and the plane captain was not around, so our PO said he could ride the brakes. He no sooner got in and released a 1,000 LB bomb. We all ran for the side of the ship to jump overboard. We thought better of that -- if it did not go off when it hit the deck then we knew it probably would not. I don't know how many people in the Naval Weather Service started in the deck division, but I venture it would be quite a few. I didn't start in the Naval Weather Service until I started striking in my second hitch at Point Mugu. We had a few well known names working there. LCDR J. A. Kerr, AGC F.F. Nunn, AGC H.G. Werner, AG1 J.A. Zuver, AG1 D.N. Brown. Later on a LT Filson came aboard as LCDR Kerr's relief. Enough about my early days. I am looking forward to Biloxi. Lorraine and I will drive We will stop at all the military bases we can. The Air Force lodges charge you $21-$29 per night.