Globusz^® Publishing 

Once I graduated from high school, I had to look at the world and my new challenge and future home. Since I had turned eighteen, I was eligible for the draft. I did not want to join the Army, so enlisted into the U S Navy. My brother was in the US Army. I had no idea what I was getting into, but the thought of all the world travel to different countries and ports made it an easy decision to join. I am glad to this day I picked the Navy. There were four of us graduating and we decided to join together under a so-called buddy system. That system did not hold up and we were split after being sworn in. This was due to my heart murmur being detected from illness from ISSCS.

Right away I found out a few things about myself. First the IQ test showed that I was above normal. This was important for the navy to place me in a class A school in San Diego right after I completed boot camp at Great Lakes Naval Training Center. That was a rather boring thing to go through. I was very excited about moving to southern California. I knew little about California except they had earthquakes. To graduate from boot camp required us to spell...United States Naval Training Center, Great Lakes, Illinois in semi fore. It was easy and can still do it. My singing developed under Mrs. Ward in Washington Cottage paid off in the Navy. I sang in the chapel choir at the Great lakes Naval Training Center. I still have the award for doing that.

One day while I was sitting in a Mobil type classroom on the US Destroyer base in San Diego there was an earthquake. I had never been through one and was more excited by it than scared. I remember the desk shaking and the Chief Petty Officer in charge of the class telling us to get out the building and to an open space outdoors. The after shocks allowed me to see fences wave back and forth along with light poles. I was really enjoying all the excitement of my first earthquake. Later I would be facing more and some very big ones.

After a sixteen-week course on foundry methods and metallurgy, I graduated with a promotion to fireman or E3 in the Navy. I was transferred to a destroyer tender, the Grand Canyon AD 28, at Fall River, Mass. on the east coast. At this point I suddenly wanted to learn more about metallurgy, science and mathematics. It was a proud moment to go aboard and become a crewmember of a United States Navy ship. I still remember that day very clearly. I have some pictures of the ship including a document showing me as an official Blue Nose. That meant I had crossed the Artic Circle on the USS Grand Canyon AD28.

When being transferred from the west coast to the east coast, I was able to go to San Francisco for the first time. I had an uncle and aunt and their three children who wanted to meet me. I learned a lot about my real family and the reasons we were placed in the home at Normal, Illinois. I also was surprised to find out this was the home and house my real father had committed suicide over the loss of his marriage and his two sons, my brother and I. I learned that my brother was only a half brother from my uncle. Over the years this became my closest real family and my remaining male cousin is almost a brother to me.

Although the time this happened it sounded somewhat strange but not too bad. My two young cousins pointed and told me the spot in my Uncles garage where my father was found hanging. My uncle was really upset about them saying this. I never forgot this and that spot in the garage. That house has been sold and is no longer in the family name.

My uncle told me I should buy a house there in San Francisco at that time on the GI bill. They were selling on an average of twenty thousand dollars. I thought that was a poor idea since I would never live there. Another mistake, since have lived there before my final move to Hawaii. That same home would have sold for around seven hundred thousand dollars today.

I was stationed on the USS Grand Canyon AD28 in Fall River, Mass. in 1956 and stayed on her till 1959. Before leaving I had reached second-class molder or ML2. I found that was unusual for anyone to advance that fast and was pleased to know that. I was not destined to stay in the Navy. However the concept of schooling and education was changed for me. And it was acceptable and a challenge to me.

It was not a good thing for the old timers to see a young and new sailor advance that fast. Many of them we still junior in rating but had a lot more years in the service. It did create some bad feeling, but I outranked them and them and they did not press it. I really loved my tour of duty on that ship. Have had a few on line contacts with others who served on the ship. In 1987 the ship was decommissioned and scraped.

We made two med cruises and one Caribbean cruise and a northern European cruise. This let me see many countries like Italy, France, Spain, England, Cuba, Porto Rico, Norway, Greece, Sicily and Lebanon. I manage to see Rome, Paris, London, Izmir, Athens, Tromso, Wheymouth, Guantanamo and the French Riviera including Monte Carlo. The med cruises were for a six-month deployment and we did two of them. To visit all these places and take special tours, which included train rides, hotels, meals and guides only cost me a total of around $100 out of my pocket. I could not even get a plane ride today, one-way to any of these. I signed up for every tour trips available to sailors in all countries. On an income of only $89 per month, it was a true barging. The most expensive one was the Rome trip of a round trip train ride from Naples to Rome, 5 days and 4 nights in a good hotel with meals and guided tours. It cost me $45 out of my pocket! It was cut short of half a day because the Suez Canal crisis, we had to get back to the ship and join the fleet.

Being a true young sailor I managed to find those houses of repute and the ladies in them. It was funny but the married old-timer sailors show me the way to all of them. I did get a nasty round of venereal disease once and had to take the famous shots to get rid of them. Now I really had a good working knowledge of sex! It did verify that I liked women too, which I was not too sure of before that. I was no longer a naive little farm boy.

One major problem was facing me while in the Navy. I still had urges to do something with a guy my age sexually. I really did not know what and was both ignorant and scared to try anything. There was no "Don't ask and don't tell" policy, just be kicked out if they found you to be gay or bi sexual. I behaved! The ladies keep my sex urges under control. It was not easy to do. We had a doctor on the ship that seemed to think men should be circumcised. I ended up being one of the sailors he circumcised before he was ordered to stop it unless it was a true health problem.

During the time on the ship, I found time to start reading books on comparative religions, social science, human history and various types of philosophy. After the Navy, I pursued it more. At first I wanted to stay in the Navy, but fear of being found out about my sexual urges made it safer to get out and pursue a civilian life. The time in the Navy allowed me to get funds for my education under the GI bill. It also gave me the use of the VA medical care, which I use today.