Navy Memories #16: Rounding the Edges & Filling In the Blanks

Previous installments:

1. Boot Camp Memories
2. About Those Navy Memories
3. First Orders
4. Anchor's Aweigh
5. Man Overboard!
6. Reflections of a Black Shoe
7. Destroyer Life and Ports of Call
8. Warships vs. Big Waves
9. The Accident, and More Ports of Call
10. The Black Sea - Operation Silver Fox
11. 1975, A Year of Change 
12. North to the Future
13. Adak Outdoors
14. Adak Life
15. Adak Work, Winter, and More

We're nearing the end of my recollections of Navy days. Here are a few things I've left out along the way:

Memory #1:

While I was in Greece, there were two military coups. A third had occurred six months before I arrived, but the signs of it were still visible at the Athens national airport. The political climate was somewhat unstable during my 18 months there. Actually, that's putting it mildly, given the riots and the attempted fire-bombing of the U.S. Embassy. But here goes:

• The Velos mutiny (el) on 23 May 1973 against the Regime of the Colonels. The crew of the destroyer HNS Velos (D-16), under the command of Nikolaos Pappas, demanded political asylum in Italy, while the rest of the mutiny in Greek territory is suppressed;

This would be the event which left bullet holes in the airport walls, which I saw when first arriving in Athens at the Greek National Airport.

• 1973 Greek coup d'état (el) on 25 November 1973, in the aftermath of the Athens Polytechnic uprising. The coup resulted in overthrow of Colonel Papadopoulos by hardliners around General Dimitrios Ioannidis;

This was three days after my arrival. Nothing says "Welcome to our country!" like an armed uprising. :)

• Pyjamas coup on 24 February 1975, attempt by certain officers to overthrow the government of Konstantinos Karamanlis.

This was three months after the last one. By then, it was starting to feel familiar. ("What? The Greek army is shooting again? Must be Tuesday.")

* * * * *

I had been invited to an apartment taken by one of the petty officers I worked for, and one of the ship's two Hospital Corpsmen. (Note: Navy Corpsmen, like Army medics, are always called "Doc".) It was a part of Athens called Faliron, a rather-upscale neighborhood. That morning, I was supposed to walk the block or so to the neighborhood grocery store for something-or-other. But we awoke to reports on Armed Forces Radio of turmoil, scattered skirmishes, and general warnings to stay put, wherever we were, and wait for the "all clear" before attempting to travel.

The Palaio Faliro (Faliron) district of Athens - this view is only a few blocks from the apartment in this story.

The apartment building had a roof access, being only a couple of blocks from the Mediterranean, so we immediately went up to if anything was visible. A mile or so to the west, along the King George Highway, there was a very large roundabout. There were a few half-tracks, and a couple of tanks, blocking traffic. We could see troops milling about.

But directly in front of the apartment building was a man in a black trench coat, with an ugly-looking black machine gun. (In my experience, any machine gun pointed in my direction is ugly.) He waved it in our general direction and shouted something in Greek. "What did he say?" I asked as we retreated down the stairs.

"He said 'get your butts back in the house'," Doc said. And so we did, post-haste.

The next day, AFRN gave the all-clear, and we traveled the 17 miles back to the city of Elefsina where the ships were ported, without further incident.

* * * * *
 
#2:

Soon after, we traveled to Souda Bay in Crete. While there, a shipmate apparently consumed a bit too much of the Greek or Cypriot drink called ouzo. The clear stuff they sell in the States is available there, but what the Greeks drink is a black liquid. It's based on opium, so we were told at the time, and the locals sip at a shot of the stuff over the course of an evening.

The shipmate in question drank a lot in a short time, or so we were told, and totally lost it. He threw Doc's office chair overboard, and had to be restrained ... okay, handcuffed to a chair on the main deck where others could keep an eye on him. He indulged in some other behavior which resulted in being also covered with a blanket. 'Nuff said. Once back inside the ship, he was first restricted to a small compartment with a cargo net over the doorway, and eventually handcuffed to his rack (bunk). The next day, or perhaps later that same day; I've forgotten, he was taken off the ship in 'cuffs. I personally never heard about him again.

* * * * *

 

#3:

Now, fast-forward a couple of years ... 

You may recall me mentioning that while McDonald's eventually made it to Adak, it wasn't there during my two years on the island.

In the Mediterranean, one nickname we had for "the States" was "the land of the round doorknob." The European lever-type knobs hadn't made it to the States yet. But both in the Med and on Adak, we also called it "the Land of the Big Mac". Sailors ... okay, American enlisted, period ... always wax nostalgic for whatever they can't acquire locally.

The 1970s ... remember, kids?

The idea of a Big Mac and McDonald's fries was a very appealing daydream to sailors stationed on the wrong side of the planet, where such was not available without making a very long flight, across multiple time zones. We talked about them frequently; you can trust me on this.

An example: in 1974, a shipmate brought back two Big Macs in his suitcase when he returned to Athens. Even 18 hours old, and a little smashed, it was the best thing I'd eaten in weeks. At least I thought so, at the time.

Before inflation...

So in late '75, a rumor began circulating wildly across Adak: some entrepreneurial officers had pooled their resources, requisitioned or chartered a cargo plane, and would fly in with 5,000 Big Macs.

This wasn't just a big deal; it was a BIG. DEAL.

The day the plane landed, there were hundreds and hundreds of sailors and civilians lined up. As soon as the plane taxied to a stop, the line formed almost at the foot of the stairs.

They sold those sandwiches, several hours old at that point, for five bucks apiece ... and sold out very, very quickly.

Me? I only bought five.

What's that?  Why yes, I did eat them all that evening. Didn't want 'em to get stale, don'tcha know.

* * * * *

#4:

The remainder of my free time on Adak was spent enjoying the out-of-doors. Hiking, camping, and occasionally fishing.

And of course, there was the four-wheelin' off-roading which all those dirt roads and jeep trails provided.

Of course, that required a four-wheel drive vehicle. I spent so much time putting chains on that old Galaxy 500, the first winter - and subsequently taking them off, every three days; wash, rinse, repeat - that I was determined my second winter there would be different.

I watched the Adak Eagle's Call (the base newsletter) for ads, and checked the bulletin board at the Navy exchange. Eventually, I saw that a Lieutenant on the Coast Guard cutter had a '67 Bronco for sale. We met, and I drove and bought it.

Solid mechanically; the body was bit the worse for several years of Aleutian weather, and Adak drivers. Still I thought it was the prettiest thing I'd ever seen.  "No more tire chains!"

There were about 12 or 13 miles of actual roads on the developed part of the island. That first weekend after buying the truck, I covered 189 miles ... literally a kid with a new toy.

The truck was a beater, but it had a powerful heater, good brakes and clutch, and the wipers worked. On Adak, those were necessities; anything else was icing on the cake.

I tried to stay on the established roads and paths, but not everyone did.

There were two off-road clubs: the Aleutian CB'ers (remember those?), and the Adak Four-Wheelin' Mud-Slingers.

The Mud-Slingers made a name for themselves - the wrong kind of name - in the fall of '76. They decided to take all dozen or so of their Jeeps, Land Cruisers, and pickups across a wide-open field. Travelling in a line abreast, they sank all 12 vehicles up to the frames in the thick, viscous mud gumbo which underlaid the tundra.

They radioed for help. Public Works sent a road grader to pull them out. It sank, too.

Then a Caterpillar 'dozer, which also became mired. Finally, two 'dozers, the grader, and several volunteers with four-wheel-drives were daisy-chained together, and pulled the Mud-Slingers out. One at a time.

The mess was horrible.

A side-note: tundra doesn't grow back. Well, to be fair, it does ... but very, very slowly. On Adak, there were bomb craters from WWII. The muddy bottoms were still exposed, more than 30 years after the war.

Captain Childers, Commanding Officer, was apoplectic, and issued a new directive. Henceforth, off-road travel was prohibited. We were free to follow any existing trails, but the next person to create a new one would be court-martialed.

Alrighty, then.

* * * * *

#5:

Yesterday, I solicited reader input for any final details, so I'll address a few now.

Q: Did you ever have something that constituted an actual military action or emergency (if such a thing can be told)?

A: I think being strafed by the Russian MiG in the Black Sea came pretty close. While 'Nam was winding down, we in the Mediterranean were in the Cold War. Our destroyers provided off-shore bombardment a few times, and coastal patrols (Yom Kippur War in '73, Cyprus uprising in '74). But the tin cans were primarily tasked with protecting the flat-tops - the carriers - so we chased a lot of submarines, and forced a few to the surface. But the number of times we fired ammo at live targets was pretty limited.

Q: How was your Christian persona received?

A: To be completely honest, I tried hard to run away from God in those years. He never let me get too far away, though, and always pulled me back ... sometimes kicking and yelling. But even at that, those closest to me knew I was a Christian, and I like to think that's responsible for the lasting friendships formed with those shipmates.

Q: How did you come to the pastorate?

A:  I was called to ministry at the age of 12; I still remember that day very clearly. At 18, our local church licensed me as a minister. I had been serving as a lay minister, co-pastor and/or music minister for 15 years when I was ordained in 2000.


That's all there is, folks. I've written now about everything that wasn't classified, so unless I suddenly recall something else ...

Thank you for reading these posts. It's been fun playing "Remember when ..?", and I'm glad you enjoyed it, too.