..... I made three Med cruises. I was in the lighting shop under Chief Harry Miller. We had a lot of good times together. There was nothing bad ever happened.

..... When we went to Cuba they pulled out of Norfolk and went down there. I was home on twenty-four day leave. I was only into my leave about two weeks and they sent me a telegram telling me that I must get back to the ship. I still have the Western Union telegram. They flew me down in one of these little planes, that if you wanted a little air you pulled a little plug out of the window. It was a prop run by a Navy reservist. We had to fly straight from New York to Guantanamo Bay, Cuba (GITMO). When you go in to land at GITMO, all you see is a cliff coming in that’s the runway. Then I had to spend a week on board a tin can. They high-lined us across to the Indy. Always making sure the heavy guy went first. We kid about that, but it’s a fact. If the line didn’t break, then everybody else would be fine.

..... Sleeping on that tin can wasn’t very comfortable. I had the top bunk and all I could see was the pipes, not like my bunk on the Indy, where I had a lot of room.

..... The time I was at GITMO there were all kinds of flash bombs going off and most of the dependents were sent home and only base personal allowed on there. We did loose a plane during the Cuba Crises because of some malfunction. We were able to rescue the pilot by throwing meat out so the sharks would go for the meat and leave the pilot alone. We were down there until the Russians backed off. Then we pulled out and went back home.

..... I gave my son all my uniforms, my necktie, that I had since boot camp, my stencil that you stencil your name on all your clothing and my Blue Jackets Manual. He’s a collector of military memorabilia.

..... Some of the guys would throw chains with hooks and meat on them off the elevator and they were catching sharks. ..... We had heard between Canes, France and Naples, Italy as the liberty launches were going, the officer on deck noticed a girl, and she wasn’t supposed to be there. From what we heard she was a French General’s daughter that came on in France and they kept her up near the chain locker. Some of the other guys I was talking to said they heard the same thing. There were two or three guys that had to explain to their girlfriends or wives, when we got back to Norfolk, why the MP’s were with them.

..... Another thing they used to do is bring home cars. What I got into was big stereos. You could buy them over there for a couple hundred bucks and bring them back to the U.S. You could sell them for twelve hundred dollars.

..... I was talking with one of the guys in the Power Shop, where I worked sometime during my tour. We used to bring steaks down to there about 1:00 in the morning and put them on a sheet of metal and we all were eating steak in the middle of the night.

..... The Diamond Head, an ammunition ship, rammed us. I don’t remember when that was but it was while I was on board between 1961 and 1964. They said we were lucky because it just missed the oxygen tanks. They had a fire on board their ship but we didn’t. E Division was sleeping on the second or third deck below the hanger deck and it woke us up.

..... My son found out we had metals coming so we just applied for my Cuba Crises medals. They sent me all my military records, which I already had, I didn’t throw anything away. So my metals are in progress and should be coming soon.

..... I remember us riding out a storm in the Atlantic where it ripped off the new engines that were still in cases on the fantail. It was like a hurricane, we road right through it.

..... I remember the movies and the Geedunks. Going to the barbershop. I enjoyed myself on the Indy..