Vietnam

I recently talked to my dad about the years he spent in the Navy during Vietnam, and I now I want to record some of the details here for posterity. And what more fitting time than the week after Father's Day to write about my Dad's military career :)

A few days before my dad turned eighteen, he enlisted in the Navy. The U.S. was in the midst of the Vietnam War, and Dad wanted to serve his country but did not want to be drafted in the Army. He was also keenly interested in traveling and seeing the world. For these reasons the Navy was very attractive. When he enlisted, he really wanted to go through submarine training school and serve on a nuclear powered submarine, but sub school required a six year commitment and he wasn't ready to commit that many years. So he signed up for 3 years and headed off for three months of boot camp in San Diego. After boot camp, he spent approximately six months in electronics tech school in San Francisco.

After his tour in San Francisco, Dad was assigned to the aircraft carrier, the U.S.S. Midway. (Interestingly, the U.S.S. Midway is now a popular museum destination docked in downtown San Diego.) After enlisting, Dad flew from Travis Air Force Base to Hawaii and stayed in Hawaii for about a month awaiting a flight to the Philippines. The plane flight from Hawaii to the Philippines took about 11 hours. From Clark Air Force Base in the Philippines, dad boarded an old bus that traveled along a jungle road for several hours. When he arriving at the Subic Bay Naval Base, he first laid eyes on the U.S.S. Midway, the ship that would be his home for almost a year.

The Midway was stationed just off the coast of Vietnam. He remembers the ship being terribly hot, due to the fact that there was no air conditioning. Duty was 12 hours on, 12 hours off; 60 days at sea and then 7 days at port. Water was rationed, so showers were cold and short. The food was decent, but Dad was particular about what he would eat, always declining anything that was powered (milk, eggs, etc). His food preferences and a very bad heat rash resulted in him losing 55 pounds during his first tour of duty in the Gulf of Tonkin. During the Vietnam tour, the Midway was given permission to visit the city of Hong Kong for seven days. The Midway anchored several miles from the port and the sailors were transported by local ferries to Hong Kong. Everything was cheap in Hong Kong and the sailors spent a lot of money on clothes, electronics, etc.

On the Midway’s return voyage to San Francisco, stops were made in Japan and Hawaii. The Midway was decommissioned and put in dry dock at Mare Island Naval Shipyard for a five year renovation. Dad's next assignment was on the U.S.S. Fox, a brand new guided missile cruiser which was just being completed in Long Beach, CA. During his three years in the Navy, Dad participated in something that few sailors ever experienced: he was part of both decommissioning a ship and commissioning one. When he was assigned to the U.S.S Fox, it was still under construction in dry dock in Long Beach. Once it was officially commissioned, it was assigned to three months of trials in the waters around Seattle, WA.

The remainder of Dad’s time in the service was aboard the U.S.S. Fox. After the completion of sea trials, the Fox was sent to Vietnam. During the Pacific crossing, the Fox stopped in Hawaii for several weeks, and then made its way to the Philippines. After several more months of duty in the Gulf of Tonkin, Dad was temporarily stationed in Subic Bay, awaiting a flight back to the States. A couple of weeks before his 21st birthday and the end of his 3-year commitment, he was honorably discharged at Travis Air Force base near San Francisco. He got married about two weeks later, and the rest is history :)