These pages are non-fiction stories about my short career in the service. In ’63, while a junior in high school in Walla Walla, Washington, I decided that I was going to go into the service. By this time in my life, I knew about the GI bill and the assistance you’d get when or if you went to college. My family was always on the ragged edge of bankruptcy so I knew there wouldn’t be any help there. I had a great love of electronics and wanted to get free training the military provided that would help me get an advanced degree when I got out. So I had a plan, even though my public school grades were pretty poor, I figured that I was plenty smart enough for a mere Navy school.
I checked out all the services, including asking my brother about the Army when he came home on leave since he was on active duty in Germany, and researched a bunch of stuff the old fashioned way in the library before deciding on the Navy. Along with the fact that my uncle had been a sailor in WWII, there were several good reasons. First, they had excellent schools. Also, they had pretty good food. Than, they weren’t too uptight like the Air Force unless you were assigned to a brand new ship. And they weren’t screwed up like the Army. The Marines were out of the running because I didn’t want to be in such a tough spit & polish organization. I was way too laid back for that sort of thing. After I went on active duty, I verified my findings and yes, the Navy was the best branch of the service for a kid like me.
I extensively researched my choice over several months, talked to ex-military types and concluded that the Navy would give me the best leg up on a future while giving me an opportunity to travel extensively. Not just to someplace and then park it, but all over the watery world. So, with my parents co-signed permission, I signed up shortly after my 17th birthday, while still in my junior year at high school, February 1963. In the US Naval Reserve. I choose the reserves because I’d only have two years active duty, then several years where I’d have to spend two weeks on active duty. I had a weekly reserve meeting up at the Walla Walla Airport. There were many WWII buildings up there and the Naval reserve unit occupied an old army barracks. I took the placement test and scored very high so I applied to the Navy’s electronics school and was readily accepted. Of course I’d have to finish high school first. Since I now had a career path, I really started to study and the last quarter of my junior year and my entire senior year were standouts. I got mostly straight ‘A’s with a smattering of ‘B’s. And since I’d been dragging my feet for nearly 2 & 1/2 years, when I had electives I took all those tough classes I hadn’t bothered with earlier, like psych, chemistry, etc. Paid attention, studied, did my homework. Funny how good your grades get when you do that. At the same time, I was doing the navy’s correspondence courses in electronics and in seamanship. Did really well there too. So well, that the nuclear sub program contacted me and really tried to get me to join their nuclear training program. Even sent a nuclear naval officer from the Navy base near Seattle all the way over to Walla Walla to meet with me. But that would have meant signing up for six years (!) active duty. And there was no turning back. If you flunked out of the nuclear school, you still have to serve 6 years active duty. I wanted no part of that! I didn’t really want to be a nuclear engineer either…which is what schooling the Navy wanted me to take. I wanted to be an electronics engineer.
So, after all that hard work from February ’63 when I signed up with the reserves to July ’64 when I graduated High School I discovered how smart I really was, at least for traditional schooling of the time. I found that if I just took the time to study I could easily ace my courses and even some tests. In fact I did ace the final chemistry test the last week of school, only student to do so, and a couple of my psych tests and some Senior English tests. It was funny that with all that hard work from February ’63 onward that in May of ’64, when I went for the only counseling session I had in four years in high school, the counselors first question, as he lifted his head from my transcript was, “So, you’re going to be an auto mechanic I see”, to which I replied, “No, I’m going to be an electronics engineer”. Then he proceeded to insist there was no way I could do that. Jackass. But he was nearly right.
What happened that first summer of ’63 (I was 17) was the Navy sent me to boot camp on Coronado Island in San Diego. The boot camp was only 2 weeks long and even before I got there I was having adventures. Like I got to take my very first airplane ride. I had my orders and advice from the old salts at the Navy Reserve headquarters in Walla Walla where I’d been attending muster once a week for 3-4 months, and I got my ‘standby’ tickets a few days before departure. I had my duffel bag full of the clothes the Navy gives you (we paid for it out of our monthly pay), a few items I thought I’d need over an above that recommended by the guys at the meetings. I was never a wall flower and never had that big of an ego so if I had a question, I’d just blurt it out and would often get a usable answer. Because I was 17, of course I didn’t want to carry anything that reminded me of home (even though I was proud of my family) so I had the duffel bag with mostly just Navy stuff. Had a paperback book too.
My parents dropped me off at the Walla Walla Greyhound bus station and the bus took me to the Portland, where I boarded a shuttle to the airport. Quite the adventure! Me all in my spiffy dress blues and all, carrying my duffel bag all around the airport. Had a few bucks, $20 I think, from my Navy pay I’d saved up so I didn’t want for goodies. Waited for my flight on standby, and had no trouble being able to board. For those that don’t know, most airlines offer standby tickets to active military at half price, but there’s only seats available when there are people with reserved tickets who don’t show for the flight. So if it’s overbooked, you get bumped first and have to wait for the next flight.
When I got down to San Diego, I found the bus (often my orders would be specific about transportation, including bus numbers & timing and alternate methods when there was a mishap) I was suppose to take, and got to the base on time as ordered. The gate sent me to the admin office, they assigned me a barracks and I arrived after 5 or 6 others. Chose my bunk, and settled in.
Next morning bright and early we began boot camp. Such as it was. I learned later what a soft boot camp it was from those that had to go to ‘regular’ Navy boot camps. I’m pleased I didn’t have to go through that. On the other hand, it might have made me a better person. I haven’t a clue.
Some of the highlights of boot camp;
- At the pool for water survival training, the DM (Drill Master) discovered I am totally barefooted based on the tracks I left on the dry cement. The next day while marching he asked me how my feet were and I told him they hurt like hell. He sends me to the doctor and I get reduced duty and excused from marching from then on. I still did some until my fee hurt. Felt like a King for most of boot camp.
- The DM yelled at everyone all the time and at the very first meeting told everyone that at the end of boot camp he didn’t want any gifts! And sure enough, a bunch of idiots took up a collection (I didn’t donate) and bought him some trinket at the end of boot camp. Dumbasses already disobeying orders. Jeese, I couldn’t believe it.
- Three guys wanted OUT after the first week, even though it was so easy, so one of them wet his bed, the other two climbed into a rack together. They all got kicked out. The bed wetter might have just had a medical problem but the other two, they told us they were going to do that just to get kicked out because they hated the Navy so much. And after just a week. Wow. I thought it was really easy duty.
- The Marines have their boot camp nearby and one day our DM told us that in the past week they’d have 3 attempted suicides there and 8 AWOL so we should be grateful we had it easy. I was.
- The last day of boot camp, the DM handed us pieces (rifles) that wouldn’t fire, marched us around a bit, and told us that was our required weapons training.
After all that, I was still at Coronado Island Naval base and had a couple of weeks off waiting for my orders to a destroyer that was on a training cruise for new recruits to Hawaii and back! [This may have happened in ’64, my memory is fading]. So during the wait time, I was assigned a barracks to stay in, and stuff to do that a junior boot should be able to handle. After those two weeks, I reported to the ship and saluted just like the sailor book they’d given me said. The book was pretty handy if you wanted to bother to read it. Covered practically every question a new recruit could want an answer for when boarding a ship for the first time.
Anyway, I remember getting seasick almost immediately and I was working on the mess deck. Being around food didn’t help but I had a straight shot out and than a climb up a ladder so I could puke over the side rails. Was ill three days, I was miserable, and on the 4th day, ate some crackers. After a few hours I was fine, and the rocking didn’t bother me after that. I can’t remember any more details about that ship other than we did an exercise where we shot barrels of explosives (depth charges) off the sides of the ship and they went ‘wump’ and splashed out bunches of water biggly. That was fun though I wasn’t much involved except for a minor job lasting a few seconds. Did enjoy the sea since we had pretty good weather all the way over. Got to Pearl City (right next to Honolulu) and though most went over whoring, I went over for a nice meal and a movie near Waikiki beach. After the movie, a dad came over with his 12 yo son and a free ice cream for me because I was a sailor. Very thoughtful of him but I think his motive was to introduce his son to a possible career path. I had just one nights leave so there wasn’t much I could do but I found a group of my friends and we hung out at a bar in Pearl City. I do not recall the shipboard trip back at all except the return of the seasickness for 3 days after we left the port.
After all that, it’s hazy. I don’t recall much of anything after I returned to San Diego. Had a few days waiting for transportation back to Walla Walla so I explored SD a bit. Went to the zoo, explored downtown near the base. That sort of thing.
That’s the background to this section of pages. I had such a good time in the Navy that I wanted to share that here on the blog. Just click the links below and when you finish reading, click your browsers back button to return here, or click on the next page listed in the sidebar.
We’ll start with my arrival in May or June of ’65 at the Naval base on Treasure Island in San Francisco harbor. I was already a Seaman since I’d taken those correspondence courses offered back in Walla Walla. I’d come here to attend the Electronics School on the base. There was also a Radar School on the island.
I had attended boot camp in Aug. ’63, then was assigned a ship and took a two week cruise to Hawaii in July of ’64. I can’t remember why they took so long to get me into the Electronics school. I had regular Naval reserve meetings to attend back in Walla Walla so it’s not like they lost me. There is one large possibility, I’d volunteered and requested several times in writing to go to Viet Nam, and at the time, there wasn’t much of a naval presence there. Finding a ship to assign me to could have caused the delay.
These stories are in chronological order beginning with ‘Spring 1965’. Click your ‘Back’ button to return here to select the next story, or use the links in the header above.
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Psychology of a riot…Summer 1965
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Punishment Deserved Escaped…Mid Summer 1965
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Late Summer – 1965, San Diego shipboard…
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Late Fall – 1965, San Diego Shipboard…
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Late Fall – 1965, we de-port…
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Early Winter – 1965, at sea…
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Still Early Winter – 1965, at sea…
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Winter – 1965, More about Japan…
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Winter – 1965, We leave Japan for Vietnam…Part 1…
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Winter – 1965, We leave Japan for Vietnam…Part 2…
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Early 1966, Shipboard in Vietnam…Part 1
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Early 1966, Shipboard in Vietnam…Part 2
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Early 1966, Shipboard in Vietnam…Part 3
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Early 1966, Shipboard in Vietnam…Part 4
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Early 1966, Shipboard in Vietnam…Part 5
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Heading back to the states – Spring ’66
Is that the same LSD 7 that was in Okinawa on D day.
And if so did it deliver boat pool baker to the Bishi Gawa river?
and was along side the Nevada when it took a Kami Kasi?
It might have been, Don. But I was on her in the ’60′s so have only hearsay to go on. What was said was that during WWII, she had a Kami Kasi hit her right in the bridge. Took out the Captain and several other senior officers, all except the Navigator. Since she has an aft con, below the fantail, she was navigated back to safe harbor from the fantail by non-commissioned officers mostly. Not sure how true the story is after all these years…there might have been a brass plack, at least I seem to remember one.
I was one of the last people to depart the USS OAK HILL LSD-7 on Oct. 31, 1969. That was a Friday at 8:30 AM.
I didn’t hear that she’d been decommissioned until years later. I enjoyed being part of her crew quite a bit. Really loved standing up on the bridge, or down on the bow, during storms.
Ronnie,
I was on the Oak Hill from sometime in 67 – May 1969 when I left for shore duty. Perhaps you remember me? Jim Duffy PN
Jim,
Ronnie was commenting on one of my Oak Hill stories on my blog. You can’t reach him by posting a reply to his comment on my blog story, plus he posted it back in ’12. I mustered out of the service and left the ship the fall of ’67 so it is possible you and I met on the Oak Hill, but it’s not likely. Thanks for stopping by to read some of my blog though.
Would like to hear from anyone who knew my dad David Davison,Jr during WWll////
from what I was told, he joined the military when he turned 17 and was put on the USS Oak Hill.
Wow, WWII. Far to long ago for me to know anything about that, Margaret. Sorry. I was on the Oak Hill in the mid 1960’s so there’s not much I can tell you other then that the Oak Hill was originally built to make one trip overseas…never intended to return. It was just luck that she survived WWII at all so that I could walk her decks 20 odd years later. She even suffered a kamikaze attack that wiped out the bridge crew, according to the old salts aboard back when I sailed her. But I’ll leave your comment here in case someone may pass by that remembers anything from WWII. Good luck in your search.