Published Quarterly by the USS Tullibee SSN 597 Association Bill Keel Association Commander, 815-715-9966, [email protected] Eighteenth Edition, 13 July 2017 Commander’s Corner period and location soon. Until Hello Shipmates! then, start saving that change SPECIAL OFFER FROM Many of us recently and stow it away for the next CAPTAIN DOMMERS returned from the 2017 reunion. Every reunion seems Reunion in Portsmouth, NH. to top the ones before it; that All comments I have heard and should make 2019 pretty read were extremely positive special! and complimentary toward nthe I will be purchasing a reunion and the venues website in the very near future provided. Special thanks to so that I can make regular Warren Mackensen, Bob updates, add pictures, and just “Bingo” Bode, Mike Drooker, be able to keep it current. I Mike Haselberger, Jack Munro, am the furthest thing there is Max Gildner, and Mike from a computer guy so I need Wilkerson for all their help to get something that even I making this happen! And a can work! It will be a little huge thank you to Rear Admiral more expensive than what we Captain Dommers has Clarke Orzalli for being our have previously used and will be very generously agreed to reunion speaker this year! He monthly payments, but none of donate ALL proceeds from the did an outstanding job. I have the Association money will be sale of this book purchased by been receiving correspondence used to purchase or maintain Tullibee sailors and families to from many shipmates our new website; this will be the USS Tullibee SSN 597 expressing how much they my contribution to the USS Association. He will even write wanted to attend but were Tullibee SSN 597 Association. a message in the book to the unable to due to illness, As soon as I have it up and purchaser and autograph the inability to travel, financial running, I will post many more book! This is extremely kind resources, or other reasons. reunion pictures than I have of Captain Dommers. Please The next reunion will be in the capability to add in this read about the book on the 2019. I will convey time newsletter. ---Bill following page! Moray:A Tale of the Deep age (or approximate age), wife’s “Combining Cold War adventure HELP US TO and/or children’s names, place of with an intimate look at the people enlistment, last known address, involved, Moray tells of a U.S. REACH OUR place moved to after discharge, Navy nuclear submarine, the men etc. who man her, the families that SHIPMATES! Thank you Mike for wait at home, and her adversaries. taking on this project to grow Assigned a mission in the Every time we have a our list of shipmates! Caribbean in late 1962, the ship finds herself enveloped in the reunion, we hear from shipmates unfolding drama of the Cuban after the fact who were upset USS TULLIBEE SSN Missile crisis. As the situation they did not know about the escalates, Moray is suddenly reunion and wished they could 597 ASSOCIATION involved in a direct confrontation have attended. Almost all of us with Soviet have shipmates in our contact Are you a member of the USS submarines that carry nuclear lists. Why not forward a copy of Tullibee SSN 597 Association? torpedoes. When the Cuban crisis this newsletter to every Tullibee winds down, Moray receives a new Being a member is not essential shipmate you know? If they are commanding officer whose in order to get newsletters, leadership style already on the mailing list, they’ll attend reunions, or enjoy the contrasts markedly with that of appreciate you for making sure camaraderie of shipmates, but the previous commander, and at they have received it! If they it does help to maintain funds the same time is handed a highly are not on the mailing list, it will to ensure reunions and dangerous mission to collect give them the opportunity to be perpetuate the memory of the intelligence on Soviet missile included. SSN 597 and those associated testing in the Black Sea. The Our goal is to reach with her. If you are not a drama of her confrontation with every Tullibee sailor we possibly Soviet surface and subsurface member, please consider can and put them in touch with forces will hold the reader's joining. attention through the thrilling their shipmates. Many of you conclusion.” are reading this because Nancy Memberships Coover, Captain Carl Dunn, some Membership Dues for the USS As I read the book, I couldn’t other caring shipmates, and I Tullibee SSN 597 Association help but notice all the spent countless hours tracking are as follows: similarities with the Tullibee you down so you could be involved (intentionally written as if the with shipmates and Tullibee YEARLY DUES: action occurred on 597 ??). I activities. Please help us reach $10 per year and renewable enjoyed Moray and felt much even more shipmates! December 31 of each year. nostalgia as I read the book If you have someone you cover-to-cover. think we can locate, please send LIFETIME MEMBERSHIP the information to Mike DUES: The price for this book is just Wilkerson at The rates are as follows $15.95 per copy. Send a check [email protected]. Mike will made out to USS Tullibee SSN be taking the point on adding and are based upon the 597 Association, along with the people to our mailing list, but he member's age at time of inscription you would like Captain needs your help! If you want him payment of lifetime dues: to locate someone, send the Dommers to write in your book, Age 65 and Over: to: shipmate’s name, but add as $50.00; much information as you can. For Bill Keel instance, do not simply say, Age 60-64: $75.00; 333 Songbird Road “Please find John Estes.” There Age 50-59: $100.00; Collierville, TN 38017 are thousands of John Estes Age 49 and under: listings. Give as much $150.00. information as you can, such as -Ball caps, with gold or silver Navy News Dolphins -- $14.25 plus $5 shipping Making chief: What -Tullibee coffee mugs -- $10 the quotas don't tell plus $5 shipping you -Tullibee T-shirts – Sm, Med, By: Mark Faram, July 11, 2017 (Photo Credit: MC3 Anna Van Nuys) Lg, XL $15. XL and 3XL $17. Price includes shipping -------- Pride Runs Deep ------- Pinning on the fouled anchors of a chief petty officer is, for many, the -Zippo lighters with the boat’s Ship’s Store crowning achievement in a sailor’s crest on one side and the T2 career. The lore of advancing into the emblem on the other. $17. Navy’s chiefs mess is unlike any other Tullibee items are available Includes shipping. enlisted advancement in the military. in our ship’s store. I get a Each summer, a chiefs selection board lot of emails from people convenes and culls through the records -Tullibee patches, with boat’s claiming to be Tullibee and of thousands of first-class petty Crest or Patch with they sell “Tullibee” items. officers, looking for the Navy’s next “Association member” $10 or generation of senior deckplate Remember, they usually 2 for $15. Includes shipping. leaders. Navy-wide, the advancement are not associated with the rate is about one in four. This year’s USS Tullibee SSN 597 and board, which started deliberations on -T2 patches. $6 each. Includes their sales go to their June 26, has quotas that will advance shipping. private enterprises. That’s eligible E-6 sailors at a rate of about 23.6 percent. The results will be good, and private published in August. enterprises make America On an individual level, the average run. But when you buy sailor makes chief petty officer in just from the Tullibee under 14 years of service after Association, you are spending an average of about six years as a first class petty officer. supporting the mission of Yet the statistics for individual the Association, and we ratings fluctuate depending on the need your support! health of each rating. For a high- demand career field like Explosive Ordnance Disposal, sailors make chief in less than 12 years on average. Meanwhile, for a more competitive rating like Personnel Specialist, it takes on average more than 15 years. And within the individual ratings, the path to the chiefs mess varies a lot. Some sailors advance very quickly, potentially making chief in less than seven years. Others take more than 20 years to make the cut near the end of a career, when they are dangerously close to being shown the door because of up-or-out limits. We have the following A detailed look at the Navy items available: advancement data can help sailors calibrate their hopes and expectations. “Sailors can use this information and -Golf shirts, with gold or silver tailor it to their own motivation,” said Dolphins -- $19.75 plus $5 Command Master Chief (SW/AW) shipping (add $2 for 2XL and Bill Houlihan, a former destroyer 3XL) command master chief and now the top enlisted sailor at Naval Station awarded his chief’s anchors in August Over the past five years, no rating Mayport in Florida. 2015. When the word came down, he has had consistently higher “If I am a boatswain’s mate and had five and a half years in the Navy, opportunities to make chief petty see that the average sailor in my rating and was still under six years in when officer than explosive ordnance puts on chief at the 14-year mark with his official advancement date arrived disposal, which has advanced 66 an average time in grade of almost four months later.