TBD 3Column - USS Slater

Volume 16 Number 3
Third Quarter 2010
CHAIRMAN'S REPORT
By Sam Saylor
HE HAS SAILED INTO THE SUNSET
USA. Prior to that, while I was President of the Destroyer
Escort Sailors Association, Marty was a great asset to me in
DR. MARTIN DAVIS, PhM 3/c, USCG
revamping DESA and bringing it under proper management.
USS PETTIT, DE 253
Neither of the two above tasks could I have done had it not been
A dear friend of mine and many, many for Marty’s able assistance and knowledge of how to deal with
more members and friends of The Destroyer Governments and how to make a business successful. At no
Escort Sailors Association and The Destroyer time, during our working together, did we ever have a disagreeEscort Historical Museum, has missed muster ment we did not resolve.
since July 27, 2010. We have called his name
The Members of the DEHM Board and its Officers, the staff
each day since then but he has not answered.
Dr. Martin Davis, known to his DEHM and DESA friends and of DEHM, the Volunteer Workers, friends of USS SLATER and
my wife, LaVerne, and myself join in
shipmates as “Marty” is gone. He is
sending Marty’s wife, Shain, and her
not here and we shall miss him.
family our most deepest and sincere
sympathy on their loss of a husband,
Marty died of a massive heart
father and grandfather. Shain will
attack on July 27, 2010. While he
continue to stay a part of DEHM and
served many years as a Trustee on the
DESA. For the present and until she
Board of Trustees of DEHM, he also
decides what she will want to do, she
served as Parliamentarian of The
has moved to Sarasota, Florida and
Destroyer Escort Sailors Association.
will stay with her daughter, Pam.
He and I had been reworking the
DESA By-Laws and we finished them
My heart aches because my friend
on July 27th. I spoke to him about a
is gone. However, the aches grow eascover letter to send with our finished
ier to bear because I believe in the folwork around 11AM on the 27th. After
lowing, “We Destroyer Escort Sailors,
1PM I was notified he had suffered a
who remain to carry on, do not think
heart attack and had died about 1PM.
of our shipmates as departed from us
Needless to say, I was shocked and
but rather as having been transferred
saddened.
to a celestial ship or station where we
hope we all will be Shipmates again.”
I am sure that many of you know
that Marty and I, along with others,
I know that Marty’s biggest wish
were involved in bringing USS Dr. Martin Davis and retired Rear Adm. Sheldon
SLATER DE 766 back to Homeport, Kinney aboard the Brazilian Museum DE BAURU was to live to see SLATER go into dry
in Rio de Janeiro.
continued on page 23
A View From the Bridge
By Frank J. Lasch, DDE847, President DEHM
Where There’s a Will There’s a Way;
Insuring the Legacy of the USS SLATER
Sam and Tim have spoken eloquently about the loss of Marty
Davis. I will direct my remarks to
what we can and are doing to see that
his work lives on.
Over the past several months the
Museum has been the beneficiary of
several large donations that were in
the form of bequests, annuities and
gifts of securities. The endowment
continues to grow thanks to your
generosity. In addition, a solicitation
of our major donors to help launch the hull find drive has resulted in receipts of almost $200,000 in donations and pledges.
There are many ways to support the USS SLATER and the
Destroyer Escort Historical Museum. Charitable giving accomplished with appreciated securities instead of cash makes good
sense. Making the gift during your lifetime provides two extra
benefits over charitable bequests - seeing the results from your
gift and realizing a potential income tax deduction based on the
full current value of the asset. This is something you may be
considering as we enter the last quarter of 2010.
It may seem easier to simply write a check for charitable
contributions than to deal with the assumed-to-be-complex
details of making gifts of appreciated assets, plus deciding
which assets are most appropriate to include. In fact, it is very
easy to make gifts of appreciated securities, and the Museum is
willing to assist you in accomplishing your goals. If the securities to be gifted are stocks, bonds, or mutual fund shares and are
held by your broker, it is very easy for that firm to electronically deliver the assets directly to the brokerage account of DEHM.
If you hold certificates representing your ownership of the securities to be donated, we can help you through that transfer
process, as well.
Don’t forget matching gifts. Many corporations have programs to match gifts to charitable organizations made by their
employees and retirees. Remember, DEHM is a 501(c)(3) organization and, in most cases, qualifies for matches. This is one
program, however, that you must initiate. Contact your employer’s human resources office and ask if your company matches
Endowment Campaign Report
As of 9/2/10
Endowment Fund Goal - $1,600,000
Monies Received - $935,320.06
Percentage of Goal - 58.46%
employee donations. If they do, request a copy of the matching
gift form. Review the program guidelines to determine if
DEHM is eligible to receive matching gifts. If you have questions, call us. Complete the form and send it to DEHM. If your
company does not currently match employee donations, ask it to
do so. Companies that have matched donations recently include,
General Electric, IBM, Eli Lilly & Company, ExxonMobil, and
Bank of America.
And as we lose more and more of our shipmates, please
don’t forget a charitable bequest. While many may think philanthropy is reserved for a select few, the truth is that every
bequest to the Museum makes a lasting impact. In fact, the charitable bequest is the most frequently utilized planned gift
method in America. Simply stated, a charitable bequest provides for a distribution of cash or property to charity upon a
donor’s passing. The charitable bequest provision is usually
contained in or can be easily added to a donor’s will or revocable living trust. Consult with your attorney if you are considering one of these ways donors may make bequests.
The USS BOWERS DE637 following the tragic kamikaze hit
that killed 48 of her crew.
The Destroyer Escort Historical Museum is an educational and charitable foundation, organized under the laws of the State of New York, to
increase the knowledge of the general public about our naval history and heritage focusing upon the specially designed Destroyer Escorts and the men who
sailed them through World War II, Korea, Vietnam, and the Cold War. The
Museum proposes to do this by the dissemination of educational materials on
historic sites, on city, state and/or Federal government facilities. Its programs
are non-political and non-partisan. The Museum is a non-profit 501(c)(3)
charitable organization funded entirely by contributions from members, corporations, and private foundations. All contributions are tax deductible to the
extent allowed by law.
page 2
Development of the Huff/Duff
By Jerry Jones, Former ET/1c USS MISSISSINEWA AO-148
In the early months of the “Battle of the Atlantic,” German
U-boats were sinking convoy ships with their precious
“lifeblood” cargoes of food, and war materials literally faster
than they could be replaced. The well- armed convoy escort
ships were able to effectively deal with the submarines with
gunfire, or more often, with depth charges, when, and if, they
could locate them. Too often, the first hint that a sub was nearby was a “torpedo in the water” and the sudden sinking loss of
one or more convoy ships.
In the early years, shipboard radars were primitive, not very
accurate and unable to detect surfaced submarines at a range of
more than a few miles. Sonar was getting pretty good at detecting submerged subs within a
few thousand yards, but the
heavy sea states in the
Atlantic often masked targets on both radar and sonar.
Earlier detection was needed with the possibility of
changing the convoy’s
course to avoid a sub or a
“wolfpack” of subs operating together. One method of
locating them was to listen
for their frequent high frequency code radio transmisA Huff/Duff operator at work.
sions using a direction finding
antenna. Radio direction finders were used in World War I, but
the technology was cumbersome and it would take a radio operator a minute or more to get a bearing on a radio signal. Admiral
Karl Doenitz required his subs patrolling the Atlantic to “break
radio silence” with reports of “contact with Allied convoys and
ships,” plus daily position reports including a weather report.
Now the Germans knew about radio direction finders and they
had their own. They also knew that it took a minute or more for
a radioman to take a bearing on a radio signal. So, if they kept
their radio transmissions very short, say, fifteen seconds, it wasn’t possible to take a bearing on them, or so the Germans
thought.
Before the war, the “state of the art” of direction finding
consisted of a loop antenna located on the outside of a ship or
radio station, connected to a steering wheel with a dial reading
in degrees of the compass. The operator listened to a signal in
his earphones and watched a signal strength meter while he
rotated the steering wheel back and forth to find the direction of
the strongest signal. An improvement on that system used two
diamond shaped antennas connected to a “goniometer” set of
coils, but still required the operator to manually rotate a dial to
search for a peak in the signal. About 1942 the British devel-
oped an electronic version of the high frequency direction finder which did not require the operator to physically swing the
loop antenna or dial back and forth. Instead, it instantly displayed the compass bearing in degrees on a cathode ray tube
somewhat like a radar or sonar scope. Reading a bearing no
longer required the sub to transmit for a minute, but a bearing
could be taken (in theory) on a transmission as short as one second! Now, if a shore station in Canada, Iceland or the British
Isles got a bearing reading, and a ship escorting a convoy got a
bearing reading, the two bearings would be drawn as lines on a
map of the Atlantic and the fix where the lines crossed, was
where the U-Boat was! Knowing the subs position now made it
a matter of avoiding it or attacking it. The American Navy
developed and improved its own version of this high frequency/direction finder (hf/df) and it became known as “HUFFDUFF.” But only to the Allies, as long as the Germans didn’t
know we had the huff-duff, they continued making 15 to 30 second long radio reports which were giving away their positions!
We didn’t have to understand their “Enigma” coded messages;
we just needed to know where they were! Of course, this is an
oversimplified explanation, and the exact design of the antenna
and the method of amplification and processing of the radio signal was the heart of the secret. Also,
the difficult and necessary methods of
calibrating and compensating for the
distortions of the signal caused by the
ship itself were part of the secret.
The very name huff-duff became
one of the “Top Secrets” of the war.
The double diamond shaped “birdcage” antenna on the after mast was a
“give away” to those who knew the
secret, but a mystery to those who did
not. The British credited the huff-duff
The business end of a
as being involved directly or indirectly Huff/Duff Antenna.
in the sinking of twenty-five percent of
the German U-Boat fleet (plus the battleship Bismarck). In one
documented instance, a U-boat surfaced near Bermuda to make
its radio report, ventilate ship and charge batteries. Its very short
radio transmission was picked up by five huff-duff receivers on
shore stations and ships with bearings taken providing a sharp
position fix. A Navy patrol bomber out of Bermuda happened to
be close by. It popped up over the horizon, made a bombing run
and straddled the sub with two bombs, promptly sinking same!
The USS SLATER has an original huff-duff model
DAU/DAQ of the type used in about 1943 to 1945 on U.S.
Navy Destroyer Escorts like the SLATER. The last time it was
actually operated was probably 1945.
page 3
Frank McClatchie's DE, USS NEAl A SCOTT DE769, in heavy seas showing her Huff/Duff antenna to good advantage.
Now, Frank McClatchie enters the story. Frank was a Navy
radio tech working on a high priority and top secret project in
the Naval Research Laboratory, Counter Measures Unit, in
Washington in 1943. The Luftwaffe had made a large investment in developing radio controlled “glide bombs”, some of
which were boosted by rocket motors and were actually the first
cruise missiles. Early testing of these bombs showed great
promise of this deadly new weapon and they were actually put
in production by four different German aircraft manufacturers
for use against Allied ships. Frank helped develop the radio
spectrum analyzers which could quickly detect the radio frequencies used to control the bombs while in flight. Then radio
jamming transmitters very effectively caused the bombs to go
out of control and miss their targets. Two Destroyer Escorts, the
USS Frederick C Davis and the USS Herbert C Jones, were
equipped with this countermeasure jamming radio equipment
and arrived in Italy to participate in the battle landings at Anzio
in 1944. The Davis and the Jones achieved “spectacular results”
in jamming more than 40 glide bombs launched toward Allied
ship targets. Not one of these bombs struck their target! U S
Navy – 40; Luftwaffe – zero!
Later in 1944 – 1945, Radio Technician McClatchie served
on board the Destroyer Escort USS Neal A Scott DE769. The
Scott was part of a submarine hunter-killer group and was
equipped with a huff-duff, which he had an opportunity to operate. As an electronics engineering-type person, he was very
interested in this top secret huff-duff technology partly because
it contained a sort of radio spectrum analyzer – his special area
page 4
of expertise! While on the Scott, at the end of the war in May,
1945, they captured the U-boat U1228. Because he was the only
man on the Scott who spoke fluent German, he was put in
charge of the boarding party, and that turned into a real adventure when the sub’s captain refused to surrender to a petty officer! You can read more about that in the new book “Shepherds
of the Sea” by Robert F. Cross, who is a member of the Board
of Trustees of the Destroyer Escort Historical Museum.
Mr. McClatchie visited the USS SLATER a few years ago,
and spent much time in the radio room recalling “sea stories.”
(He has a large supply). He also looked over the SLATER’s
inoperative DAU/DAQ type huff-duff, and remarked “wouldn’t
it be worthwhile if its operation could be simulated in a working demonstration? I think I will build one.” True to his word,
he went home to California and designed and built the electronics unit, utilizing 2010 technology (all solid state integrated circuits, programmed microprocessors, and field effect transistors). Viewed on a cathode ray tube, it simulates the same display as shown on the 1943 Navy huff-duff. It demonstrates how
the scope pattern shows the direction (bearing) to the radio signal and its reciprocal, and how the sense antenna function
removes the ambiguity. It also lets us hear the code (CW) signal
being sent by the German radio operator and encrypted by the
German Enigma machine. The SLATER volunteer crew is now
packaging the working electronics and preparing the demonstration exhibit and we will keep you posted on our progress.
Our thanks to Frank for all his help with this article and the simulator.
Frank McClatchie. back row right, and the prize crew that
boarded U-1228.
Collection Concerns
A question for the DE torpedomen!
Would this Mark 31 Torpedo Director be a type used aboard
a DE during WWII? Made by Bristol & Martin of New York,
NY, this director was purchased at a flea market and eventually
donated to the DEHM in the late 1990s. Please contact us with
your input! We would greatly appreciate it. We would like to
hear from WWII DE torpedomen regarding the fire control gear
for the old triple 21" torpedo tubes.
Here are a few Dos and Don’ts to consider if you
would like to donate your artifacts to the DEHM:
Remember to always call the museum to discuss your
donation BEFORE sending it. The DEHM has very limited
storage and cannot accept and maintain every item sent to
us.
Do NOT stick address labels to donation items. Not
only does this diminish the authenticity of the artifacts but it
speeds up the deterioration of the item it is adhered to, especially those made of paper. The DEHM will make sure that
every donor receives the proper credit for the donation.
Please refrain from writing in pen on either side of photographs or paper artifacts. Any provenance information
should be conveyed directly to the collections manager. This
information will be recorded in the file on the donation. Pen
will eventually bleed through photographs, ruining them for
future generations.
Please do not attempt to write in pen on any artifact.
Once again, it detracts from the authenticity of the artifact
and often is impossible to remove. Donated items should
only display markings which were originally located on
them at the time of their use.
page 5
Archives and Special Collections
Accession Report
July 2010 through September 2010
USS BROUGH DE148: Long johns worn aboard ship and a shell
fired from the ship on 12 November 1953. Donated by John Ertz of
Moneta, Virginia.
USS GEORGE A. JOHNSON DE583: Photograph collection and
a letter opener made from shells by a German war prisoner in
Bizerte, Tunisia. Donated by Walter Grinspan of Plainview, New
York.
USS HEYLINGER DE510: Colortone print of the ship arriving in
San Diego, California – 1945. Donated by Ronald York of
Altamonte Springs, Florida.
USS HISSEM DE/DER 400: USN issue flat hat. Donated by
Horst Ammon of Andover, New Jersey.
USS LEWIS DE535: Photographs, poster and artifacts associated
with the ship. Donated by Ronald Grizzle of Normal, Illinois.
USS SLATER DE766: Photographic print of the ship’s commissioning party - 1944. Donated by Clifton W. Woltz of Houston,
Texas.
USS SLATER DE766: Collection of oral histories, correspondence
and personal accounts from members of the crew of the USS
SLATER DE766. Donated by Eric Weidman of Colonie, New
York.
USS STOCKDALE DE399: Photographic negative and microfilm
reel. Donated by Robert Eaton of Salem, Oregon.
Photo of USS HEYlIGER DE510 sent by Ronald York.
USS TOMICH DE242: Photographs and Chinese currency.
Donated by Howard Drexler of West Milford, New Jersey.
USS WYMAN DE38: Photographs and scrapbook pages featuring
Lt. Cmdr. Edward Parker during WWII. Donated by his daughter
Diane Bolman of Prescott, Arizona.
WELCOME ABOARD to “new” ships represented by artifacts during the last quarter: USS LEWIS DE535 & USS STOCKDALE
DE399!
Deck scene on USS TOMICH DE242 sent by Howard Drexler.
page 6
SLATER SIGNALS
by Tim Rizzuto
The SLATER’s ensign flew at half mast on Wednesday
June 28th to mark the passing of Trustee Emeritus Dr.
Martin Davis. He passed away the day before, on Tuesday July
27, 2010. An hour before his death, our DESA parliamentarian
had been working on the revised DESA by-laws with Sam
Saylor. To say his death was unexpected is truly an understatement. For those of you new to the project, Marty was one of the
key individuals responsible for bringing the SLATER back from
Greece. He principally dealt with all the bureaucratic requirements to transfer the ship.
Marty enlisted in the Coast Guard on his 17th birthday
in November of 1944, and served as a pharmacist’s mate
aboard the Coast Guard-manned USS PETTIT DE235 until
her decommissioning at Green Cove Springs. Following his
retirement from a long career in public education, he became
DESA’s long time parliamentarian and their director of historic
projects of the DESA board of directors. In this capacity, over
the years he did a great deal of research, presented many historic
programs, wrote books, developed videos, and developed at
strong relationship with the Intrepid Sea-Air-Space Museum.
Marty definitely changed my life, because it is doubtful
that the SLATER project would have happened without
him, and my wife and I would not be in Albany now. It goes
back to the DESA convention in Buffalo in 1992, long before I
met Marty, when the DESA membership charged their officers
with finding a DE and establishing a museum. As the Director
of Historic Projects, Marty took the lead.
Our paths were to cross in an unusual way. As acting
director of the USS KIDD in Baton Rouge, my first encounter
with DEs came in 1987 on a trip to Galveston. There I saw two
ships, the beautifully restored sailing barque Elyssa, and the
much neglected USS STEWART DE238. The beautiful Elyssa
with her shining brass and varnished spars didn’t do a thing for
me, but when I saw STEWART rusting away, it was love at first
sight.
That interest in STEWART eventually caused me to get
in contact with DESA, and Marty Davis. It was explained to
me that DESA had held a convention in Houston and a memorial service aboard the STEWART in 1984. DESA had
approached the Galveston folks about getting involved with the
STEWART’s preservation back then, but there hadn’t been
much response, and now DESA was out to find their own DE.
I don’t know how Marty first became aware of the
SLATER’s availability in Greece. I do know that he traveled
to Uruguay in 1988 with retired Admiral Sheldon Kinney to try
to save Sheldon’s old ship the USS BRONSTEIN, which had
The Fall 2010 Field Day Crew.
page 7
seen a great deal of action with the Atlantic hunter killer groups.
They arrived too late to save BRONSTEIN, which was already
being cut up. They then set their sights on USS BARON
DE166, but they couldn’t get her out before hurricane season,
and she fell to the scrapers torch in 1990. On the same trip they
visited Ex-USS McANN, restored and on display in Rio, a
beautiful exhibit that inspired them in their efforts to save a DE
for DESA. Somehow they heard about SLATER and shifted
their sights on Greece.
Marty and his co-conspirator, Sam Saylor, visited the
USS KIDD in Baton Rouge in the early nineties to see how
we did things down there. While visiting, they related their
plan to bring an old destroyer escort back over from Greece.
They even went so far as to ask if we would be interested in
mooring their ship alongside the KIDD in Baton Rouge. By that
time I’d been in the historic ship business about fifteen years,
and I’d heard all kinds of crazy plans to preserve ships. I wrote
those two guys off as two more lunatics. I knew they didn’t have
a snowball’s chance in hell.
The red tape required to save a ship from the Navy is
unbelievable. Talk about bringing one in from overseas, and
you triple the problem. Marty and Sam were undaunted. Sam
tackled raising the money and Marty tackled the bureaucrats.
Marty arranged for the donation from the Greeks, at no cost. He
arranged for the hull and tow survey. Somehow he got the
Greeks to drydock the SLATER and do the work necessary to
tow the ship at no cost to DESA. He arranged for a Ukrainian
tug to tow the SLATER at a cut rate since they were coming
over anyway to tow two ADAMS-class guided missile destroyers back to Greece. Along the way he got the US State
Department to buy into it all. He worked to create the DEHF as
a not-for-profit educational corporation. As DESA was a last
man organization at the time, he saw the need to create an organization that anyone could join to support the ship in perpetuity.
so hard to acquire. He knew that her Greek pennant number was
“01”, and he was relieved when he looked over the side and saw
they had sent a ship with the number “10.” He knew they must
have sent the wrong ship.
He asked me to come up and do a survey of the ship. I
came up to Manhattan the October after the ship arrived.
The ship had been pretty much gutted inside except for the
machinery spaces and I went compartment by compartment listing all the parts she would need to make her complete again. I
developed a task list and material list to do a 1945 restoration.
She gave new meaning to the word scow. But I guess I look at
neglected destroyers the way most people look at lost puppies.
I want to adopt them all. Marty sensed that and tried to get me
to leave the KIDD and move to New York. My response was
two weeks was enough. You couldn’t pay me enough to live in
New York City.
But a lot of people live in New York and loved that ship.
The SOLDESA Chapter, CONNDESA, and members of the
Garden State chapter took SLATER under their wing and cared
for her for four years doing an incredible amount of work. Guys
like Lou Yacullo, Teddy Prager, Phil Prainito, William
Smith, Bill Humienny, George Craig, Earl Gillette, to name
just a few, and a host of others did the lion’s share of the chipping and the ripout of Greek modifications. And we must not
forget the ladies who were right on board with their men.
I knew where a lot of the parts they needed were, from
all my years of scrounging for KENNEDY and KIDD, so I
spent the next four years as a volunteer helping them to
locate the parts they needed. Then I started to have a personal stake in making sure the restoration went correctly, and parts
went where they were supposed to go. Marty certainly encouraged my input.
And he had to find a home for the SLATER. They talked
to us in Baton Rouge. They talked about Providence, Rhode
Island. They had an engineering study done at Patriots Point,
South Carolina that they paid big money for. And, it was finally thanks to the vision of Larry Sowinski at the Intrepid SeaAir-Space Museum, that the SLATER was given a berth in
Manhattan, close to Marty’s home where he could keep an eye
on her.
In the spring of 1997, the Intrepid management decided
that the USS Slater did not fit into their scheme of things
and told the volunteers they would need to find a new home.
Marty swung into action again and almost had a deal to move
the ship to New London, Connecticut with a free berth down at
the riverfront and a City grant to help get the project started. The
project had progressed to the point where the city electrician
was calling me in Baton Rouge to see what kind of electrical
plug we wanted to hook up on the ship. Marty and I even went
up to New London and testified before a City council meeting
together. Everything was falling into place when the local newspaper wrote an editorial asking why the City was considering
bringing this “Rustbucket” to New London when they couldn’t
take care of the properties that they already had to maintain.
That killed the SLATER berthing in New London. I wish they
could see the “Rustbucket” today.
When the great day came and the SLATER arrived in
New York, no one expected her to look as bad as she did.
Marty used to delight in telling people the story of how he
couldn’t believe that HNS AETOS was the ship he had worked
About that time some of the Manhattan volunteers
wrote to Governor Pataki seeking help in finding a permanent home for the USS Slater. The letter was forwarded to the
Division of Military and Naval Affairs and ended up on the desk
His biggest problem turned out to be ATF. There was no
provision for bringing the SLATER’s weapons back into the
country for museum purposes. They physically had to be cut up.
He actually got the State to accept custody of the weapons and
then loan them back to the Museum. This satisfied ATF as the
weapons were now owned by the government.
page 8
"Super" Dave Mardon, Tim Benner and Barry Witte make progress fabricating roller loader number 6.
of Kevin Lynch. He contacted Mayor Jennings and asked
about bringing the SLATER to Albany. The City kept an open
mind and a group went to Manhattan and toured the ship. Their
tour guide was none other than Marty Davis, and he must have
done his best sales job ever because the group came back to
Albany and reported that the SLATER was a do-able project and
would be great for waterfront development. Marty made several trips back and forth to Albany over the spring, summer and
fall of 1997. Meetings were set up with all the agencies including the Corps of Engineers, the New York State Department of
State, Division of Inland Waters, the City and County of Albany,
the Office of Parks, Recreation and Historic Preservation,
Capitalize Albany, the Downtown Albany BID and
others. When the SLATER arrived, mooring her was an issue,
and Marty miraculously made the 16 wooden camels appear. Of
course, we spent the next twelve years filling them with
Styrofoam, but they served the purpose. He obtained the dogtag
machine and got us set up at Crossgates Mall, an enterprise that
enabled Les and Annette Beauchaine and their helpers to
make us thousands of dollars over the years.
Marty and Sam made another run on me at this point.
When they decided to move her to Albany, they again asked me
if I’d come work for them. My wife and I talked about it, and I
said, “I’ll give you a year to get things off on the right foot.”
That was October ‘97. That one year leave of absence is now 13
years.
Marty stayed active for several years until health reasons caused him to retire from the DEHM board two years
ago. In recognition of the role he played in helping to establish
the museum, he was voted a Trustee Emeritus by the DEHM
Board of Trustees. I never realized the mountain of paperwork
he had dealt with to save the SLATER until last summer when
he donated all his archives to the museum. I don’t know how he
had the fortitude to stay with it. Frank Peter is in the process
of putting all the letters in chronological order so the history of
how the SLATER was acquired will be understood by anyone
who cares to take the time to read the story. And, as we say in
the trade, acquiring the ship is the easy part. Once you have her,
the problems are just beginning.
No discussion of Marty would be complete without mention of his devoted wife Shain. Shain remains one of the most
patient and caring people I know. Marty always had an air of the
absent-minded professor about him, more ideas in his head than
he could keep track of, and it was Shain who was there to be to
keep him centered, grounded and focused. Our deepest sympathy goes out to Shain and the whole Davis family.
page 9
will come about. In the blink of an eye, Mr. Van Amburgh
contacted Linda inviting her to a meeting. Together, Linda
Wruck and I walked “up the hill” to meet with Mr. Van
Amburgh for a wonderful talk about schools, content, and outreach.
Ever with an eye to the future, the Education crew is
developing several new ideas. With the help of Jim Kuba,
Glenn Harrison, Jerry Jones, Tom “Stretch” McLaughlin,
and Linda Wruck, we’re working out a way the many Scouting
groups can earn merit badges and hold ceremonies, such as
Crossing Over, at the SLATER. The history of the USS
SLATER is a tangible example of civic responsibility and we
are ready to help the Scouts meet their ongoing challenge of
earning new badges and celebrate their organization.
Bob Dawson explaining the high line chair to his tour group.
During the Korean War, Bob survived being in a damaged compartment when USS WAlKE DD723 was hit by "a mine doing
forty knots."
A major part of Marty’s legacy are the educational programs that now exist on the SLATER today. As a team, we
get to do things like redesign webpage information, create and
test new public and school programs, and engage visitors in the
onshore activities that demonstrate the life of a sailor. The tour
guides give outstanding educational, informative, and entertaining tours. In the very hot, humid, and stormy month of July,
more than 1,900 visitors came to see us. We owe a great debt to
all our tour guides who persevered during the hot South Pacificlike weather.
In an ongoing effort to connect with the educational
needs of Albany schools and network with museums, Linda
created the Museum in a Bag program. Original sea bags are
packed with variously-themed lessons in civics and government
and sociology. Carefully selected groupings of documents and
artifacts support and represent the lesson units taught in the
classroom. Homeschoolers will also benefit greatly from use of
the Museum in a Bag program. The new program is free. While
working on the program, Linda contacted the Director of
Education, Ms. Tab Broyles, at Colonial Williamsburg. A great
discussion on mass appeal with a specific focus led to Ms.
Broyles’ suggestion that Linda contact CW’s very own consultant for social studies content. The consultant turned out to be
none other than Mr. Bob Van Amburgh, the Executive
Assistant to the Mayor of Albany! Mr. Van Amburgh served
as Albany’s Instructional Supervisor of the Social Studies for 38
years!! Wow, you just never know who you’ll meet, and how it
page 10
Our tour guides have fun with visitors on the observation deck before they board the SLATER for a tour. Among
the unsung heroes who haven’t been mentioned elsewhere are
the faithful guides Les Beauchaine, Jack Madden, Bob Bull,
Bill Scharoun, Floyd Hunt, Joe Burke, Leo Baehler, Alan
Fox, Bob Dawson, Russ Ferrer, Grant Hack, Gordon Lattey,
Chuck Marshall and Chuck Teal and we have several new
faces including Herb Marlow, Carly Crewell, Chris Lecce
and Tony Pazzolas.
Jack Madden and Linda are creating a traveling presentation on the Battle of the Atlantic and the SLATER. The goal is
to introduce the public to the SLATER’s mission and recruit
new volunteers. The presentation will also talk about the priceless camaraderie enjoyed by all on the observation deck
between tours and chipping paint. Our new Education webpage
is growing by leaps and bounds! The public will now have easy
access to our education collection of museum artifacts and documents as Linda is happily scanning many objects and images
to create digital versions of the Museum in a Bag series. Links
to all of our resources will surely provide teachers and families
with a menu of choices for all of their needs. Anyone who wishes to learn more about the forthcoming availability of materials
can send a message to Linda through the new email address,
Education@ussslater.org
While meeting the demands of giving non-stop tours and
working on restoration projects, volunteers stepped up to help
Admiral Czesak with our annual presence at the Altamont Fair.
Linda Wruck rounded up and worked with the usual suspects
at the fair over the course of six days and nights. Thank you
Gene Jackey, Jack Madden, Bob Bull, Heather Maron,
Herb Marlow, Don Shattuck, Clark Farnsworth, Bill
Haggart, Katie Kuhl, Alena Kryukovskaya, Chris Soulia,
Fred Sirois, Tom Beeler, Tom Reilly, Jim Gelston, Jim
Kuba, Mike McEnteggart, Floyd Hunt, Andy DeSorbo,
Nelson Potter, Super Dave Mardon, and Glenn Harrison for
meeting and greeting all fair-goers. We are happy to report that
Smitty’s new and improved tent withstood the horizontal torrent of rain that makes every fair, a fair.
Several new faces have joined our line up of regulars.
New maintenance volunteer Bill Wettreau is an electrical engineer who seems to keep finding himself with a paint brush in his
hand. Tour guides Penny Hutton and Mike Paulmeno are college students who bring a passion for history and some experience with museums. We broke them in early with their first
overnight on August 28th. Kudos to Penny and Mike for a very
successful first time out! Thank you Grant Hack, Tom
“Stretch” McLaughlin, and Jack Madden for seeing to it that
everything went smoothly! One hiccup did occur; Grant and
Linda, accompanied by Penny and Mike, went into the bowels
of the B-2 engine room compartment to see why the timer for
the ships’ running lights did not kick on. George Gollas was
also on hand to assist in Operation Where-Is-The-Timer.
Katie Kuhl and her most recent intern, Alena
Kryukovskaya, a SUNY Albany student working on her
Master’s in Information Science, have been hard at work on
multiple Archives and Special Collections projects. Not only
have they been continuing to consolidate and organize the
museum’s extensive reference archive collection, Alena has also
volunteered to re-catalog the entire library located in the briefing room. Furthermore, this dynamic duo has been developing
an oral history webpage to add to the USS SLATER website,
allowing any interested person with a computer to have access
to the numerous oral histories which have been collected by the
SLATER’s volunteers and staff over the years. Their efforts
have been invaluable to the DEHM’s mission to become the
premiere research center for destroyer escort history. In addition, Frank Peter has been cataloguing all the documents
donated by the late Marty Davis, relating to the acquisition of
the SLATER and the founding of the museum and putting them
in chronological order. This will give us the most complete history of the Museum we have ever had.
For the second year we welcomed the Chief Petty
Officers from the Nuclear Power Training Unit in Ballston
Spa who used the ship as a rite of passage for the new Chief
selectees from their unit. In return the selectees turned to and
performed a day of maintenance aboard the SLATER. One
group cleaned out the lower sound room to use for educational
material storage, and then cleaned out the old storeroom under
the head. Two more agile sailors chipped and primed under the
starboard depth charge projector roller loaders, a place none of
our oldsters can get to anymore. Gus Negus, Mike Dingmon
and Gary Lubrano were in hog heaven as they supervised a
gang working in the aft machinery spaces as they continued the
seemingly never-ending job of cleaning and priming in the
bilges. Another crew went over the side and worked off the
paint float to finish scaling and priming the section of boottop
between the two mooring dolphins. Since then, Tommy Moore
has gotten the prime coat on all of it. Another crew lifted out the
bathythermograph boom, carried it to the work bench and
scaled and Corrosealed it. That has since been top coated with
haze gray and is ready for reinstallation.
The most significant work was done by two selectees
who went to work down on the reefer deck and scaled and
Corrosealed the deck of the last reefer that Gary Sheedy is
planning to restore. This evolution had been holding up Gary’s
progress all summer. At least that’s what his latest excuse was.
The following Monday, Don Miller and Walt Stuart primed
the space. Gary was so overjoyed when he came in the following Saturday that he gave me several hugs over the course of the
day, manly hugs to be sure, but hugs of joy nevertheless. It’s so
great to be able to make at least one person on this ship happy.
No more excuses for Gary. The preservation is done and it’s
time to start putting the reefer deck back together.
Boats Haggart has been using anybody he can get his
hands on to help with lifeline turnbuckles. His usual helper is
Paul Guarnieri. His project to replace all the non-Navy turnbuckles with the Navy standard is about 70% complete. The
shipfitters, Clark Farnsworth, Gene Jackey, Super Dave
Mardon, Tim Benner and Chuck Teal have made considerable
progress on number six roller loader, despite the absence of
their leader Mr. Tanner, who has been out of town this month.
George Gollas was back in town to spend a day helping Barry
with the B-3 switchboard restoration and even stayed to help
with an overnight. Chris Fedden and Ron Mazure completed
the chipping on the fo’c’s’le and the area is in the process of
being primed and painted. Barry Witte finished the overflow
alarm in the forward head, so we’re just waiting for Doug to get
back into town to bless it and Benner to christen it. I know
Stretch McLaughlin has been waiting four years to let his
overnight campers loose in there. Rocky has been keeping a
watchful eye on the whaleboat and Ken Kaskoun and Larry
Williams have been exercising it every Monday. Sailmaker
Angelo Bracco has been working on canvas covers for the
ready service racks in the 40mm tubs. Jerry Jones has been
working to coordinate the installation of the TBL transmitter
with Tom Horsfall, scheduled for the last week of the month.
And Jim Gelston keeps the clocks wound and Chief Smith has
been keeping us fed.
While all those guys were working in the heat I was off
gallivanting and partying at the annual Destroyer Escort
Sailors Association in Warwick, Rhode Island. At least that’s
what the crew thought. It was great to see so many old friends
and supporters again. The event always gives us a chance to
update our DESA friends on our progress. There are way more
people than I can single out here, but we are especially indebted to Steve Hoback for the generous donation he arranged
through his firm, Dealers Financial Services, and to Phyllis
Gruber and the members of the DESA Ladies Auxiliary for
helping the SLATER through their annual quilt raffle. I took
advantage of the convention to visit my old friends at Battleship
Cove and visit my first restoration project, the JOSEPH P
KENNEDY JR DD850. I also spent a day in Boston, where the
National Park Service has just put the museum destroyer
CASSIN YOUNG in drydock, talking to their surveyor Joe
Lombardi and trying to prepare for the day we can do the same
for SLATER.
page 11
Speaking of DESA, the members of the SOLDESA chapter made their annual sojourn up to Albany to see how we
are taking care of their ship. Teddy Prager, Betty Dalton,
Phil Prainito, Marty Newman, Sophie Knudson, Williard
Darrel, Jerry McClosky, Bill Smith, Jeanie Gracey, Joe
Iadevaio, Greg Smith, Ciara Smith and Coral Smith all made
the journey from Manhattan and enjoyed a bag lunch on the
observation deck, with a few hardy souls heading below to the
messdecks to eat despite the heat. This is the group that put so
much of themselves into the initial restoration of the ship during those first four years when she arrived from Greece and lay
alongside the INTREPID. They seemed well-satisfied with the
progress we are making. Teddy had the sad news to report that
one of their own, Willard Darrell, passed away the Tuesday
after the visit, for him, his last visit to the SLATER. We’re glad
we could be there for him.
Ceremonies continued aboard the SLATER. The month
of August started with our Salute to the Coast Guard’s
birthday 2010. August 4th was hot and humid; an obvious
affront to the service that mans Arctic ice breakers, but in the
best traditions of the service the show went on. MC Steve Long
started the ceremony at 1100, with ordering the SLATER Color
Guard, consisting of Andy De Sorbo, Clark Farnsworth,
Dave Mardon, and Don Shattuck, with Dick Walker in
charge, to present the Colors. Jerry Jones played the National
page 12
Anthem on the 1MC. Paul Czesak then introduced the honored
guests. Bill Kraus read the Governor’s Proclamation, followed
by County Executive Mike Breslin and Congressman Paul
Tonko acknowledging the many roles the Coast Guard plays in
protecting the Nation. Mike Breslin and Paul Tonko also cited
our seven Coast Guard veteran volunteers for their work on the
SLATER. The SLATER is fortunate in having seven highly dedicated Coast Guard veterans in our volunteer crew. Joe Burke,
Gene Jackey, Nelson Potter, Rick Pavlovic, and Grant Hack
were introduced by Dick Walker and as they came aboard they
saluted Capt. Jeff Bull, USCG (Ret), and then “manned the
rail”. CAPT Bull made his remarks, followed by Assemblymen
Tim Gordon and Bob Reilly. Jerry Jones then played
“Semper Paratus” on the 1MC, and Erik Collin, assisted by
Eric Rivet, who just happened to be in town visiting from New
Orleans, fired the 3”/50 gun salute. Linda Wruck made the
closing remarks and invited everyone to have a piece of the
birthday cake. Doug Tanner came aboard just in time to join
CAPT Bull in making the first cut of the cake using SLATER’s
ceremonial sword. The program concluded with a documentary
featuring the Coast Guard Ice Breaker WEST WIND. Gene
Jackey was a crew member at the time the movie was made.
September began with the USS ALBANY Association
holding their 20th Anniversary Reunion here, and the
SLATER was honored to play a role. Wayne VanAmburgh
Prospective Chief Petty Officers painting over the side.
coordinated the event that included a memorial service at the
SLATER. It was one of the largest reunions we have held here
at the SLATER. The group commemorated the five U.S. Navy
ships named Albany.
Most of the attendees were from the fourth ALBANY; a
heavy cruiser (CA-123) built by Bethlehem Steel Company,
Quincy, Massachusetts. She was commissioned in the Boston
Navy Yard on 15 June 1946. During her twelve years of service
as a heavy cruiser ALBANY visited nearly every major
Atlantic, Caribbean, and Mediterranean port. On 30 June 1958
ALBANY was placed out of commission for conversion to a
guided missile cruiser. Effective 1 November 1958 her hull
classification and number were changed to CG-10. Exactly four
years later ALBANY emerged from the yards as a guided missile cruiser. She served in the Mediterranean and North Atlantic
and became the flagship of the Commander of the 6th Fleet.
She was decommissioned in Norfolk, Virginia in August 1980.
The veterans made an effort to try and save the cruiser here in
Albany, but sadly it was unsuccessful. The fifth and present
ALBANY (SSN-753) is an attack submarine. She was commissioned on 7 April 1990. She incorporates the latest in stateof-the-art combat systems, vertical launch tubes and Arctic ice
break-through capability.
On the 11th we hosted our Patriots Day commemoration. Master of ceremonies Steve Long ordered the SLATER
Color Guard under the direction of Ken Kaskoun to Present
Colors as Jerry Jones played the National Anthem over the
1MC. Dick Walker did the Invocation, followed by a moment
of silence. We were honored to have Mayor Jerry Jennings and
Assemblyman Jack McEneny present, as well as Michelle
LaRock, Deputy Director NYS Division of Veterans Affairs
who read the Governor’s Proclamation. Erik Collin directed
the 3” gun salute assisted by some very sharp looking RPI
Midshipmen. Our own Katie Kuhl played TAPS.
Over the course of the month we hosted reunion groups
that included the USS LEWIS DE535, USS OSTERHAUS
DE164, USS BOWERS DE637, DESDIV 15 DEs and the
USS SWEARER DE186. We also hosted guests from
Smithsonian Magazine’s Museum Day on Saturday the 25th. A
big event for me was attending the Historic Naval Ships Annual
convention in Baltimore. Needless to say, the crew is always
suspicious of these annual “junkets” but it’s a chance to connect
with other ships and share their problems. I was tapped to give
two presentations, one on scrounging parts for historic naval
ships, which the crew would agree that I have some knowledge
of, and the other on creating the volunteer environment, with
which, given the conditions they work under, leads my crew to
wonder why anyone would think there was anything to learn
from me. The fact was that after I sketched outlines, both presentations were put into PowerPoint by one of our volunteers,
the ever-dependable Paul Czesak.
While in Baltimore, I did see what a really well run volunteer program could accomplish as we were taken out for
a two-hour evening cruise on the restored Liberty ship
JOHN W. BROWN. I was allowed to go into the engineroom
while the engine was being slowly turned over, and to see those
pistons going up and down was an awesome sight. My thanks
to Captains Brian Hope and Mike Schneider for the access
they gave me. I also noted that BROWN was the only ship that
had the same Mark three inch gun mounts SLATER carries with
director control. BROWN acquired them from Crane in the
nineties, so they were not original outfit. Now understand, we
just recently found out that the designation of our mounts with
the director control was a MK- 31, but no other information was
available, even with the efforts of Chris Wright. I took the
opportunity to ask who was the BROWN’S expert on three-inch
guns and if by chance they had a manual. Well, I talked to one
Joe Colgan, a Vice Chairman with Project Liberty Ship. Now
these promises often have a way of evaporating, but a week later
Joe called me in Albany and said he did have the manual in hand
and would make me a copy. Two weeks later the copy arrived.
Rosehn promptly made three copies of the valuable document,
which now rests in our archives. The most enlightening seminar
for me was presented on the underwater hull preservation
presently being undertaken aboard the carrier MIDWAY. The
conference was excellent. My only complaint was, the more
expensive the hotel, the fewer free amenities they offer. Internet
access was like a dollar a minute, so I owe a great debt to Paul
Cora who allowed me Internet access aboard the famed Coast
Guard Cutter TANEY every morning at 0700 before breakfast,
so I could keep in touch with the folks back home and not get
too far behind.
A week after I got home, the Fall Work Week Crew
arrived on Sunday September 26 and went to work. It was a
tough week for the crew as it showered every day but
Wednesday. “Michigan” Dick Walker led Ron “I hate to
paint, but I’ll needlegun forever” Mazure, Gary Headworth,
Mike Marko, Jim Parker, Tom Horsfall, Laird Confer,
Butch Warrender, Frank Heckart, Jim Ray, Gene
Hermanson, Tom Skufca, Gary Dieckman, John Yocum,
Gus Negus and his new striker Tyler Kelley. Read his father's
letter in Mail Call.
page 13
"Next year you'll be supervising." CPO Selectees help take care of SlATER from keel to truck.
Ron Prest, Roy Brandon, Guy Huse, Larry Stiles and firsttimer Stan Dickstein.
The most important billet was filled by one of our regulars, Chief Smith. Smitty volunteered to cook for the crew,
three meals a day, all week long. He was supported by Larry
Stiles who kept the messdeck squared away and helped with the
shopping and food prep, and a rotating series of messcooks who
served for one meal each, regardless of rate or rank.
The big job was getting the TBL transmitter and motor
generator aboard. If you’ve missed the story, when we got the
SLATER there was not one piece of WWII radio gear aboard.
Through begging, borrowing and theft, we obtained all the
proper equipment with one exception. We did not have the right
radio transmitter, the refrigerator-sized 800 pound TBL.
Instead, we substituted a refrigerator sized 700 pound TAJ
transmitter we obtained from the USS GAGE. In 2006 we located the proper TBL transmitter on the USS CLAMP in the Suisun
Bay Reserve Fleet in California. USS PAMPANITO volunteers
Tom Horsfall, Rich Pekelney, Aaron Washington and Jim
Adams determined that we needed to have the proper transmitter on the GAGE, and removed it for restoration. Ashore, Tom
Horsfall spent two years restoring the unit to operational condition.
This summer we shipped the TBL and motor generator
east, and stored it temporarily in Hal Hatfield’s fabrication
shop. Two weeks prior to the arrival of the out-of-towners,
Doug Tanner, Rich Gallagher, Dave Mardon, Tim Benner,
Mike McEnteggart, Jerry Jones, Joe Breyer, and anyone else
who stumbled by during the operation successfully extricated
the TAJ transmitter and motor generator from the radio room.
They dollied the units to the 01 level aft where they sat under
cover for two weeks. In the meantime, trustee Hal Hatfield
used his resources at Maximum Security Products to load the
crated TBL transmitter and motor generator aboard his crane
truck and we offloaded them to the wharf here in Albany. Tom
flew in from California for the Work Week, and on Sunday the
26th we uncrated the units and Tom got together with Doug
Tanner and Jerry Jones and they ironed out a plan to get it
aboard. And you know what they say about opinions.
The next morning the crane arrived on the pier and we
offloaded the TAJ transmitter and its motor generator unit,
and hoisted the TBL and associated MG set aboard. We
tipped the TBL onto a furniture dolly and rolled it forward to the
first obstruction, the amidships 20mm ready service lockers. At
this point Doug had to leave but he left all the rigging tools to
do the job. Using jacks and cribbing made from the TBL crating, Laird Confer, Tom Skufca, Tom Horsfall, Butch
Warrender and several other passers-by jacked the TBL up 21
inches above the deck so it cleared the 20mm ammo locker supports and the stack base, and just squeezed between the stack
and the 20mm gun tubs. After getting through that choke point,
page 14
rolling into the radio room hatch was easy.
The next morning Tanner showed up to rig it into the
radio room. Rather than pat us on the back for all the work we
had done in his absence, his comment was, “You’ve got the
wrong end in the doorway.” Since it was still on the dolly, turning it was no problem, and the rest of the morning involved
jacks, slings and chain falls as Doug carefully lifted the 800
pounds through the two doors into the radio room and its final
location. The crew then moved aft and hauled the motor generator set forward, which, after moving the transmitter, was the
proverbial ‘Piece of cake.’
While all that was going on the painters prepped their
areas working through intermittent rain. Gary Dieckman,
Ron Prest, Roy Brandon, Ron Mazure and John Yocum
worked on the port side amidships prepping and priming the
waterway and the freeboard between the mooring dolphins. Up
on gun two, Frank Heckart worked with Gene Hermanson
and Jim Ray on lubrication of the train and elevation systems
and preparing the gun for painting.
Up on the flying bridge, our lead Firecontrolman Dick
supervised the installation of new supports for the platform
on the MK-52 director which had rotted away. Working with
Gary Headworth, Jim Parker and Tom Skufca, they cut new
pipe supports and welded them to the platform. They made the
platform removable so they could maintain the deck underneath
in the future. Down below in B-4, Guy Huse and Stan
Dickstein worked on the reassembly of the fire and bilge pump.
When they got it all back together, they tested the motor and
found the bearings were very bad. With support from the rest of
the crew they hoisted the motor out of B-4, disassembled it and
removed the bearings. We then called on Karl Herchenroder to
pick up new bearings, which he had aboard by 0900 the next
morning. By the end of the week the motor was back together
and running smoothly.
The sun finally came out on Wednesday, and all hands
turned to painting. We accomplished everything we had hoped
to accomplish including painting the portside amidships, the
waterways on the portside, and gun two in its entirety. The rains
were back for Thursday, so John Yocum and Ron Mazure went
to work scaling the propulsion generators in B-4, and Ron Prest
went into the bilge priming the areas on the portside that had
previously been prepped by the Navy students from the Nuclear
Power Training Unit. Jim Ray went into the anchor windlass
room and spent two days cleaning there where he said he was
The last leg of the 3,000 mile four year journey as Tom Horsfall's restored TBl transmitter is gently moved towards radio central.
page 15
happy to be alone. Mike Marko and Dick Walker, rained off
the flying bridge, spent the two days doing touch up work and
cleaning in the forward head, which is now operational. I am not
at liberty to say who christened it at the end of this five year project. The most miserable job was rigging the spring wires. The
new mooring dolphins have a provision for mount spring lines
to a floating steel collar on top of the fenders. Laird Confer,
Butch Warrender, Jim Parker and Mike Marko rigged four
¾” steel wires from the collars to the main deck, with Roy
Brandon and Ron Prest on the paint float, making the hook ups
down below, spending a lot of time waiting in the rain.
Fortunately it was warm rain. There were a couple other notable
accomplishments. Jim Parker got a new faucet installed on the
deep sink in the aft head, and Tom Skufca rebuilt the firing
solenoid box for gun two which had completely rotted out.
There’s probably more, but they don’t tell me everything they
do.
Here’s some important information for our 3,000 members. With Sam’s retirement from the membership business,
there will be some changes in how we handle your memberships. These were necessitated by a need to simplify the
process. Sam’s retirement leaves us short one full-time employee who wasn’t costing us anything. So rather than hire someone
to take his place we are simplifying the process. The hand-typed
laminated membership cards and stickers will be a thing of the
past. The new membership card will be computer generated,
non-laminated and a new card will be issued every year. The
card style and letterhead have changed to be consistent with the
letterhead we generate here in Albany. For you life members,
your old cards remain valid and won’t need to be replaced. The
first batch of renewals has already gone out. There may be some
glitches, so bear with us as we learn the ropes and try to keep all
you members as happy as Sam did.
Finally, Marty Davis wasn’t the only shipmate we lost
this quarter. We want to extend our sympathy to Earl, Karl
and Natasha Herchenroder and the rest of the
Herchenroder family at the loss of Michael after a long illness. And I do not like the regularity of this, but we lost another of our close shipmates this month, Al Van Derzee. Al died
suddenly at his home on. August 20. He was only 78, too young
by our standards. He had just been back to visit a couple weeks
prior assuring his shipmates that he would be back giving tours
soon. Al was raised in Rensselaer, N.Y. and attended St. Johns.
He graduated from Siena College with a degree in business.
Later he earned both a master’s and a doctoral degree from
SUNY Albany. He was employed for over 30 years by the New
York State education department. After retirement, Al was a
professor of economics at Hudson Valley Community College
in Troy, N.Y. for many years. Al served in the Navy during the
Korean War and was rated a nuclear ordnance man attached to
The EVARTS class USS DOBlER DE48. NAVSOURCE photo from Pieter Bakels.
page 16
This was Katie Kuhl's mystery ship of the month. She thinks she figured it out. Can you?
the Navy’s first nuclear attack squadron VC-5. In his later years,
he volunteered his time on the USS Slater and in 2006 won the
Capital Area CPO Association’s Slater Volunteer of the Year
award. He was also the athletic trainer for LaSalle Institute’s
football team from the 1970s up until the late 1990s. Al also
coached the LaSalle Middle School basketball team for several
years during that time.
the ship. We also would like to commend the fine efforts of the
Destroyer Escort Sailors Association that has dedicated themselves to restoring the DE 766. You have all done a great job!
Stephen and I are considering becoming volunteers to help with
the restoration and refit of this ship. Thank you very much for a
great day at sea.
Al never lived down a letter of appreciation he received
from a visitor who referred to him as our “Tour Guide
Extraordinaire.” The letter received back in 2004 said,
Al had a passion for watching Notre Dame football
games on his portable TV on weekends between tours. His
lack of patience with small children was legendary, but he
always bought them souvenirs at the end of his tours, probably
his way of making up for threatening to feed the “troublemakers” to the sharks lurking in the river. He was a wonderful story
teller. Among his favorites were the time, as an airman recruit,
he was called to the base commander’s office. Upon arrival, the
orderly smirked at him and told him to enter. Inside he found his
mother chatting with the full captain, checking to make sure that
the Navy was treating her son well. On another occasion he went
up for a hop in a, unknown to him, partially mothballed TBM
avenger. Unaware that the hydraulic oil had been drained from
the ball turret and replaced with cosmoline, Al was able to rotate
the turret just enough to block his exit hatch before it froze.
Upon landing, his extrication from the turret was covered by the
local media. Of course, Al told these stories with a flair that I can
never match, and for that and for a host of other reasons, he will
be missed by the crew.
“Dear Sir or Madam,
This is to acknowledge the exemplary efforts of Mr. Al
VanDerzee, tour guide EXTRAORDINARE of the DE 766. On
Friday, August 20, my fiancée and I took my parents to tour the
ship. My dad will be 90 in March of 05 and my mom will be 85
in November of this year. Dad is visually and hearing impaired
but is as sharp as a tack. Al introduced himself, welcomed us and
began the tour. His voice was clear, loud and distinct. He took
special precautions with my parents and guided them through
the ship as if they were his own family. He also took time to
answer our questions. His enthusiasm and passion for the history of the 766 made the tour very exciting and educational; we
truly felt like we were the crew of the ship during the war. We
were extremely impressed and emotionally absorbed with his
personal tales of WW II and how they related to the history of
Sincerely, Christina Radz and Stephen Benya”
page 17
LETTERS TO THE EDITOR
August 28, 2010
Dear Tim,
Thanks for the nice letters. You are correct, when I
said I was a member, I was referring to DESA. I didn’t realize
the SLATER was a separate corporation until I got your letters. I am sure I have heard that before, but it just didn’t register and I did pick up a copy of “Trim But Deadly” at our annual DE day celebration in New Jersey. Anyway, I am very glad
to be a member of the SLATER organization.
September 10 2010
Thanks to everyone who participated in the Memorial
Program. It went off smoothly and was a fitting tribute to all
deceased veterans who served aboard the Albany. Great job
guys and gals and to the crew aboard the Slater who performed admirably.
Once again, Job well done! Thanks
Dick Desrochers
USS ALBANY CG10
Sincerely,
Lew Anderson
2 September 2010
Dear Tim
Thursday, 16 September 2010
Dear SLATER Crew,
It’s hard for me to believe that it has been nearly 2
weeks (and will be more than 2 weeks by the time you receive
this) since I along with many other people from the USS
Albany Reunion had the privilege of visiting the USS Slater; I
am so grateful for all the time and hours that have been spent
restoring the ship. (I only wish that the same fate could have
happened to the USS ALBANY CG10).
A special thanks to Rob Nielsen for the very interesting and informative tour, it was a nice touch in the Captains’
stateroom to have the personal family photo on the
desk…..everything looked as though he could return any
minute.
Also, after the interesting tour of the Albany, Mr.
Gordon Lattey was our tour guide leaving the USS Slater to go
to the arsenal in Watervliet and I want to personally thank him
for giving me directions to the Albany Exhibition at
Quackenbush Square; without his help I would not have found
the USS Albany Exhibition before closing time on that Friday,
3 September 2010. (He also graciously offered to anyone that
was too tired to go onto the Saratoga Springs event to just go
ahead and take their betting money from them, to save them
the trouble of going through all of that hassle!)
Please find my check enclosed for a two-year membership……now I have to ask, will that include sending some
cooler air down this way?!?
I’m into old radios and wondered (should have paid
more attention) what is the make and model of the short
wave/medium wave radio in the Officers’ wardroom?
Curious, in St. Pete! Thanks again to everyone at the USS
Slater and all the best in future endeavors.
I want to thank you and the crew of the Slater for the
outstanding job that is done aboard her, day in and day out.
On this past trip a special thank you and BZ to Erik Collin,
Larry Williams and Gus Negus. I myself had the unique
opportunity to serve aboard the USS Tweedy DE 532. Joining
her Select Reserve Crew at age 17 before even beginning my
senior year in high school.
Our small but extremely gratifying relation with the
Slater is but three years old. Living in Florida we only get up
to Albany once a year. Tyler is my 10 year old that is completely absorbed in history. He particularly likes studying
WWII. He is constantly on the lookout for memorabilia or
artifacts he can afford and I must say his collection is growing.
It also keeps him reading and studying and this is a great
thing! His number one passion is the U.S. Navy in WWII.
His grandfather served in the WWII Navy and although he
was deceased before Tyler was born, Tyler has pictures of him
during his service that he cherishes dearly. Since returning
from the Slater this past trip, he has joined the Naval Sea
Cadets.
Tyler is planning a presentation and will ask his school
for permission to present it and show pictures we have taken.
His plan is start a drive for “Pennies from Chumuckla
Elementary” to support the continuing needs of funds required
for upkeep. He may or may not be successful but I am proud
of his effort and hope this will meet your approval. He is
already setting aside a percentage of his allowance money so
he can send money for the winter fund. I promised him to
match what he saved. He proudly wears his Slater ball cap
and self proclaims himself as part of the reserve crew.
I am sending a few pictures for your guys to view one
happy kid when he is aboard and working.
Donn Tillman
USS ALBANY CG-10
Regards,
Doug Kelley
page 18
Dear Tim,
My grandson, Patrick, and I visited and toured the
USS-SLATER on the morning of the 15th. I compliment you
and all the volunteers that have accomplished what an “OLD
SALT” sees when driving into the parking area and viewing
the SHIP. It truly is a great sight.....THANK YOU so much to
all of you.
Thank you so much for lighting and opening all compartments, also allowing us to visit the bridge and the flying
bridge. My grandson while in the engine spaces stated it sure
was hot. How did they cool them during WWII?
There is only one answer ...THEY DIDN’T. His reply
was “your sh-tting me”. I read Robert Cross’s book
“Shepherds of the Sea.” What a great well written book. My
thanks to Linda and Katie for the courtesies extended during
our entire visit.
Thank you for your monthly newsletter
Smooth Sailing, Tim
Frank Hart
USS DOBLER DE-48
August 25, 2010
Dear DEHM,
On July 24, 2010 my father Frederick W. Biermann
passed away. Dad was a World War II veteran and served
aboard the USS Roche DE-197. He was proud of his military
service and was a member of DESA and DEHM. We visited
the USS Slater when she was berthed in New York in 1997.
Our plan was to visit again this summer so Dad could be our
tour guide and show us where he bunked and worked but
unfortunately God took him home before we were able to
visit. In honor of Dad I would like to join as a lifetime member and a check for $500.00 is enclosed. As a memorial to Dad
I have enclosed a check for $2000.00 for the Endowment
Fund. Please place it in the Endowment Memorial Fund in
memory of Frederick W. Biermann, USS Roche DE-197 from
his proud family.
Sometime this year I plan on touring the USS Slater to
envision what Dad and his shipmates endured during their
Navy years.
Thank You,
Thomas F. Biermann
August 10 2010
Dear Tim,
Thanks for the reply and the information. After having
read and reviewed a lot of information on the internet and your
web site, I have caught the “DE766” bug! Some time after I
moved to upstate from Mass I had the chance to spot her on
one of my trips down to Albany. I am beginning to think I was
on a DE in my last life! Ever since my Navy days in the early
70’s I have not been able to shake it!
While owning a ski lodge up here near Gore Mountain
has left me hardly any time for myself, I am going to try and
change that! I will be joining as a member and I hope to get
down to the ship in the near future. My plan is to become a
volunteer with your organization.
After leaving the Navy Hospital Corps I spent the next
25+ years as a EMT and emergency medicine instructor. So, if
you can use a ship’s corpsman, you got me! I also spent 25
years as a volunteer Director of Emergency Services for the
Red Cross in Mass. After having read about the Slater’s history and your own with the project, I can empathize with the
funding troubles. We were successful in some unique ways in
raising money for our program that I have been adapting to the
Slater in my head. I have a couple of ideas that might be of
some interest. Hopefully, when I get down to Albany I could
get the chance to meet with you and share some of them.
Again, thanks for getting back to me. I look forward to
being able to put some Navy utilities on and grabbing a wire
brush and scraper!
Sincerely,
Jim DeCota
Mon, August 23, 2010
Subject: DE construction
Hello Tim;
A month ago you very thoughtfully took the time to
show me around areas of the Slater not otherwise accessible. I
see why you are successful. You may remember that I was a
SoM2/c on the Sutton, DE 771. I have a small matter that may
be of interest.
When I graduated Key West sonar school as 3/C I was
sent to pick up the Sutton at the Boston Navy Yard. Having
grown up during the Great Depression I had hardly been outside of Ramsey, NJ so this was a great adventure. I’d just
turned 18.
page 19
After getting my bunk assignment and dinner, I
walked down the dock to see the Sutton. I wasn’t reassured
when I found her forward 3 inch gun pointing skyward. The
seas against the forward gun bucket had rolled up the deck
plates, much like opening a sardine can, leaving a gaping hole.
It was fixed and off we went. A few months later, in the midNorth Atlantic it happened again. I was bunked in the compartment immediately forward of the enlisted mess hall, nearly
under that spot. As the ship buried its bow deep into the next
wave it would hang there for a moment, shuddering under the
weight of all the green water and, as the wave passed under us,
break free; normal everyday stuff. This time the plates rolled
up again and the North Atlantic began pouring down the hole.
Off duty, I was in my bunk. I jumped up and the force of the
water slammed me against the bulkhead. Within moments the
bow grew heavy and it seemed we would soon founder. It took
a few minutes for the captain to get permission to withdraw
from the group and turn the stern to the seas. The Bos’ns
Mates appeared with the portable gas powered pumps and
hoses and tried to keep up with the water coming in. But, even
having turned around, the heavy seas minimized their effect.
The hole had to be closed.
Next, more bos’ns mates appeared with 2X4s, long
and short which I had never seen on the ship. I helped as we
struggled to strip dozens of mattresses from bunks, laid them
on 2x4s and brace them into the hole with the longer ones.
While much water still came in, it held and the flow was
reduced. The gas pumps ran day and night for a time. We
backed for a day or so until we reached calmer water. The
nearest port was Ponta Delgada in the Azores which was just a
primitive harbor with a breakwater and minimal repair facilities but our machinist mates managed to force the plates back
down and weld them again within a week or so and off we
went again. It was a neutral port and a U-boat usually lurked
around the approach to sink allied shipping.
Since DEs were of flimsy construction and, I think,
this was a design flaw, I have always thought this must have
happened to others as well. Have you heard of it? Were any
DEs sunk by heavy seas?
Bob Worsfold
USS SUTTON DE771
am glad to have met you personally; been following your
efforts since the USS Kidd down in Baton Rouge. Thanks for
your kindness.
Very truly yours,
W.A. Van Houten RM3
October 1, 2010
Hi Tim
I eagerly await all your Newsletters, but the last two
were really great. Dr. Martin Davis and the back story on the
Slater is a classic and one to go down in the record books. And
what a wonderful letter of appreciation for Al Van Derzee! I
can’t get over the range of activities—- all the way from the
new website for oral stories to every last bit of authentic
preservation. Original life line turnbuckles!!!
And here is the Bathythermograph coming into its
own!! What memories!! That was my baby, and for my
Shellback inauguration, August 29, 1944, I was roundly
whacked for disturbing Davy Jones by towing that gadget
through HIS ocean. My one gold stripe didn’t mean a thing
that day, as I ran the gauntlet, but I got my revenge the next
five times we crossed the equator.
We had two BTs on board, and I lost one when the
USS Steele (DE8) rolled and the cable got severed by the
screws. For a long time, until we next got into port, I had
nightmares expecting to see 100 yards of cable wound around
the starboard screw. Launching and recovering the damn thing
was a nightmare in a rolling sea, especially when the skipper
refused to slow down. Recovering the last 5 yards might wind
up with the BT whizzing in circles in the air. Everybody
duck!! But I like to think that the hundreds of little graphs on
the smoked glass have gone into archives somewhere, adding
at least one tiny bit of information about temperature gradients
in the Pacific.
All the best
David Stuntz
USS STEELE DE8
Dear Tim,
A day the Slater was closed to the public, your
thoughtfulness in allowing myself, son and grandson aboard
for a self guided tour was appreciated. Having served on the
DD700 Haynsworth & the DD756 Beatty, both Sumners from
49 thru 9/52 & being a Tin Can Sailor member since the 70s, I
have followed the doings of the Slater since she came alongside the pier just forward of the USS Edson. She has come a
long way from those days; she looks neat & trim. Further I
Summer tours aboard the SlATER
page 20
New Donations To U.S.S. Slater Endowment Fund
DONATIONS AS OF
September 2, 2010
$935,320.06
A bracketed figure appearing after a name is the
total dollar amount given to the Endowment Fund
by that group, by a Person or persons.
When a memorial donation is received, unless otherwise requested, it will be placed in the Endowment Memorial Fund.
MEMORIAL DONATIONS
IN MEMORY OF
Harry W. Epp, CCM, USS ALVIN C. COCKRELL
DE 366 from Shipmate George L. Clark
100
Bob Comer. MM3 & John Springer from Ramona
Moore, USS CURRIER DE 700
100
Sidney Morrow, USS O'FLAHERTY DE 340
from Tony Polozzolo, USS WHITMAN DE 24 25
John S. Moore, USS GOSS DE 444, from
Shipmate John R. Moore
50
Richard Huffman, FTC, Archie R. Thompson,
WT 3/c, Billie Lee Shields, from their
USS GUNASON DE 795 Shipmates
75
LT Arthur John Hauschild, Jr., from his
USS CONNOLLY DE 306 Shipmates
25
Harry L. Parker, Y 3/c, from his
USS CONNOLLY DE 306 Shipmates
25
Howard W. Friedmann, USS STRAUS DE 408
from his son, Tom Friedmann
200
Hopping Williams and Captain Louis F. Loutrel, Jr.
from Kathy and Louis Loutrel
200
Walter E. Stearns, GM 2/c,
USS JOHN M.BERMINGHAM DE 530
from his wife, Marjorie Stearns
100
Dr. Martin Davis, PhM 3/c,
USS PETTIT DE 253, from his friends and shipmates in the Garden State Chapter of DESA 25
LaVerne and Sam Saylor,
USS CONNOLLY DE 306
100
Cold Spring Harbor Retired Teachers Association`
100
Sandra Kawson
50
Robert Mayer, Sr., EN 1/c, from his
USS SWEARER DE 186 Shipmates
40
Anthony Terrameo, from his USS SWEARER
DE 186 Shipmates.
40
Departed and past USS GUSTAFSON DE 182
Shipmates from
Edward C. Sherman, RdM 1/c.
100
Ronald E. Stewart, SoM 2/c & George Shuford
from their USS STRAUB DE 181 Shipmates 50
Edward Lambert, MoMM 1/c,
USS EVARTS DE 5, from Ann Kremer
100
Louis Grasek, Sr. WT 3/c, USS REEVES
DE 156/APD 52, from Michael Thomas
75
Dr. Alfred C. Van Derzee,
VC-5 US Navy Air from Louis D'Ambrosi
20
Clarkson B. Farnsworth, CV 32
25
Hon. Gerald D. Jennings,
(Mayor of Albany, New York)
100
The Ellisworth Family
50
Frederick W. Biermann, MoMM 1/c, USS
ROCHE, DE 197 from Thomas Biermann 2,000
Chester Garlicki, USS ENRIGHT
DE 216/APD 66 from Robert Frye
100
USS OBERRENDER DE 344 Shipmates from
Shipmate CAPT John F. Murphy, USNR (Ret.) 25
Chester Isaacson, from his USS HILBERT
DE 742 Shipmates
50
Edward C. Wilson, from his USS MANLOVE
DE 36 Shipmates
25
James E. Everin, EM 2/c, USS EMERY DE 28
from Carol Garrish
100
PLEASE NOTE:
METHOD USED IN REPORTING DONATIONS
At times we receive an additional donation from
you after you have sent your initial donation. We
will record your total donation behind your name
and list the additional donation in the money column.
*Appearing before your name denotes a donation
is divided between two or more ships.
DONATIONS FROM OUR 563 SHIP FLEET OF
"TRIM BUT DEADLY" WARSHIPS
USS SMARTT, DE 257 Paul Hodges ( $450) 25
USS WALTER S. BROWN,
DE 258 Marie & Bob Dolfi, ($675)
250
DE 306-USS CONNOLLY Mrs.Joyce Ginsberg25
DE 346-USS EDWIN A. HOWARD, DE 346
Harold Hyde
50
DE 534-USS SILVERSTEIN
Gregg McBride-($450)
50
DE 634-USS WHITEHURST
Shipmates ($1,850)
500
DE 676/APD 76-USS SCHMITT
Hartley Rowan-($300)
100
DE 176-USS MICKA, DE 176 Lucille & Hal
Berndt, ($1.015)
100
“THE TOP 50”
As of August 25, 2010, these are the amounts the top fifty ships have donated to all programs benefiting our Memorial
Destroyer Escort, USS SLATER A donation made to two or more ships is divided between the named ships.
# 1-DE 330 ----------------$204,987
#18-DE 534 ----------------$ 16,430
#35-DE 140 ----------------$ 12,035
# 2-DE 766 ----------------$ 87,640
#19-DE 136 ----------------$ 15,646
#36-DE 47 ----------------$ 11,585
# 3-DE 640 ----------------$ 53,360
#20-DE 424 ----------------$ 15,555
#37-DE 704 ----------------$ 11,215
# 4-DE 186 ----------------$ 47,690
#21-DE 639 ----------------$ 15,245
#38-DE 449 ----------------$ 11,046
$ 5-DE 305 ----------------$ 40,665
#22-DE 150 ----------------$ 14,662
#39-DE 699 ----------------$ 10,845
# 6-DE 769 ----------------$ 36,613
#23-DE 148 ----------------$ 14,335
#40-DE 366 ----------------$ 10,587
# 7-DE 763 ----------------$ 33,402
#24-DE 216 ----------------$ 14,273
#41-DE 244 ----------------$ 10,461
# 8-DE 306 ----------------$ 32,751
#25-DE 184 ----------------$ 14,193
#42-DE 155/APD 51------$ 10,287
# 9-DE 320 ----------------$ 23,670
#26-DE 209 ----------------$ 14,060
#43-DE 42 ----------------$ 10,227
#10-DE 130----------------$ 23,107
#27-DE 59 ----------------$ 13,765
#44-DE 636/APD 58------$ 10,194
#11-DE 29 ---------------$ 21,854
#28-DE 442 ----------------$ 13,282
$45-DE 132 ----------------$ 10,115
#12-DE 242----------------$ 21,312
#29-DE 700 ----------------$ 13,235
#46-DE 218 ----------------$ 10,002
#13-DE 191----------------$ 21,185
#30-DE 184 ----------------$ 13,193
#47-DE 346 ----------------$ 9,507
#14-DE 667----------------$ 20,970
#31-DE 253 ----------------$ 13,095
#48-DE 718/APD 134 ----$ 9,395
#15-DE 326----------------$ 19,225
#32-DE 165 ----------------$ 12,410
#49-DE 183 ----------------$ 9,355
#16-DE 585----------------$ 18,840
#33-DE/DER 57 -----------$ 12,270
#50-DE/DER 393 ---------$ 9,307
#17-DE 246----------------$ 17,498
#34-DE 121 ----------------$ 12,070
What will it take to have your ship join the “Top 50”? From time to time we print the “Ship Donation List” which
is a complete listing donations from all 563 in our “Trim But Deadly” Destroyer Escort Fleet. When we next print
this list, check to see what it will take to have your ship listed in the above “Top 50.”
page 21
MUSEUM DONATIONS
From July 2 To September 1, 2010
(CF) Coffee Fund Donations
(MG) Matching Grant Program
(HF) Hull Fund
(IMO) In Memory Of
(PFS) Pennies for SLATER
(DF) Distinguished Friend
(IHO) In Honor Of
Note: Ships are listed numerical by their DE hull number. If a person served
in a DE that was converted to an APD, the number of both is listed with the
hull number he served in printed in BOLD type.
WHITE HAT-$1 TO $25: Edward C. Wilson, USS MANLOVE DE36 *
(WF) Joseph Torcellini, USS SANDERS DE40 * (HF) Lucille Bennett, USS
ROBERT E. PEARY DE132, (also DE 594/APD104, USS WILLIAM J.
PATTISON) * Dick Waldron, USS SIMS DE154/APD50 * Charlie Morris,
USS OSTERHAUS DE164 * Lucille & Hal Berndt, USS MICKA DE176 *
Patricia Roberge, USS SWEARER DE186 * Robert Fulton, USS O’NEILL
DE188 * David Greenwald, USS OTTER DE210 * (CF) Bill Camp, USS J.
RICHARD WARD DE243 Walter Kukelhan, USS SLOAT DE245 * *Paul
Hodges, USS SMARTT DE257 * (WF) Frank Scherl, USS ROY O. HALE
DE336 * (WF) Wilbert Huebner, USS LANSING DE388 * Frank Roche,
USS WILHOITE DE397 * Charles Touzell, USS DENNIS DE405 * Donald
Fankhouser, USS EDMONDS DE406 * Francis Misna, USS AHRENS
DE575 * Belva & Timothy Bernhardt, USS ENGLAND DE635 * Sal
Tornatore, USS GENDREAU DE639 * Charles Cutler, USS DAMON M.
CUMMINGS DE643 * Dick Knoernschild, USS WISEMAN DE667 *
Everet Suchland, USS MEYERKORD DE1058 *
WHITE HAT-DESA CHAPTERS: (CF) Philadelphia Keystone * (CF)
Keystone Philadelphia Ladies Auxiliary *
WHITE HAT- FRIENDS OF USS SLATER: James Bodell * John Marino,
UNITED STATES ARMY * Kirsten Russell * Karen Ruthig * Miriam
Horton *
CHIEF-$26 TO $50: Bill Riemer, USS FREDERICK C. DAVIS DE136 *
Jack Ramalay, USS PARKS DE165 * Francis McMonagle, USS KENNETH
W. WILLETT DE354, (also DDE508) * George King, USS THADDEUS
PARKER DE 369 * George Snyder, USS RHODES DE384 * Gregg
McBride, USS SILVERSTEIN DE534 * (HF) Charles Wagner, USS
SLATER DE766 *
CHIEF-FRIENDS OF USS SLATER: Joan Salem * Jaqueline Hale * David
Wilkie * Patrick Ryan * Sandra Lawson *
ENSIGN $51 TO $100: Thomas Hendrix, USS MITCHELL DE43 * Tom
Lee, USS WESSON DE185 * Anne Ackerson, USS BAKER DE190 *
Howard Drexler, USS TOMICH DE242 * Bill Camp, USS J. RICHARD
WARD DE243 * (HF) Bill Camp, USS J. RICHARD WARD DE243 *
Donald Reid, USS DIONNE DE261 * Virginia & Billie Wall, USS
THOMAS J. GARY DE326 * Howard Hyde, USS EDWIN A. HOWARD
DE346 * Leonard Nowak, USS KENDALL C. CAMPBELL DE443 * (HF)
Earl Moorhouse, USS LANSING DE388/WDE 488 * Ralph Lake, USS
McCOY REYNOLDS DE440 * George A Martel, USS PAUL G. BAKER
DE642 * (HF) Al Butkus, USS HANNA DE449 * Russell Miller, USS
GREENWOOD DE679 * Robert Lowe, USS HILBERT DE742 *
ENSIGN-FRIENDS OF USS SLATER: Spyradon Karagiannis, D-01
AETOS * Angie Chase * United States Coast Guard Auxiliary * RADM
Edward K. Walker (SC), President, US Naval Memorial *
page 22
COMMANDER-$101 TO $250: ESCORT DIVISION 14 (Herbert E. Hohl
) * Lew Shelton, USS HUSE DE145, (also USS TWEEDY DE532) * Bill
Camp, USS J. RICHARD WARD DE243 * Henry Petersen, USS CABANA
DE260 *
COMMANDER-DESA CHAPTERS: NORTHEAST ($222.38) * Hudson
Mohawk Military Vehicle Collectors
COMMANDER-FRIENDS OF USS SLATER: Earl Smith *
COMMANDER-DESA CHAPTERS: $101 TO $25: (HF) Garden State
Shipmates *
REAR ADMIRAL: $251 TO $500: Shipmates of USS DONNELL DE56 *
(HF) CAPT James P. Jamison, USN (Ret.) and Mrs. Jamison, USS FOGG
DE57 * LTJG Lewis G. Anderson, USS BRISTER DER327 * June & Robert
Lamb, USS JOHNNIE HUTCHINS DE360 *
REAR ADMIRAL-FRIENDS OF USS SLATER: Brown & Small VFW
Post 5434 *
VICE ADMIRAL: $501 TO $1,000: (HF) Mrs. Patricia Perrella, USS
THOMAS J GARY DE326 * (HF) Al Butkus, USS HANNA DE449 * (HF)
Alison & James Brown, USS DANIEL A. JOY DE585 * Margaret & Donald
Connelly, USS KLEINSMITH DE718/APD134 are monthly contributors
whose donations place them in this category * (HF) Donald Koontz, USS
WESSON DE184, ($1,000) * (HF) LaVerne & Sam Saylor, USS CONNOLLY DE306, ($1,000) *
VICE ADMIRAL –FRIENDS OF USS SLATER: Rhodes Memorial
Fund, * The Miles Fund Program (Steve Hoback)*
ADMIRAL: $1,001 TO $5,000 : (HF) Howard Hoffman, USS OSTERHAUS DE164 ($2,000) (HF) LT Neal M. Allen, USNR (Ret.) and Mrs. Allen,
USS DARBY DE 218, (also USS SNYDER DE745) ($5,000) * (HF) Sharon
& Jack Berckemeyer, USS HAAS DE424 ($5,000) * John P. Cosgrove, USS
GENDREAU DE639, ($5,000) * (HF) Captain Harold N. Poulsen, USS
SLATER DE766 and USS FESSENDEN DE142, ($2,000) * (HF) USS
SLATER DE766 Shipmates ($1,800) *
ADMIRAL: FRIENDS OF USS SLATER: (HF) Bill Hickman, ($1,500) *
(HF) The Ladies Auxiliary of the Destroyer Escort Sailors Association
($1,500) * (HF) William J. Krackler ($4,000) * (HF) Cohoes Savings
Foundation ($5,000)
FLEET ADMIRAL: $5001 + : (HF) Dorothy Hamilton , daughter of John
Cann ($10,000) and (HF) William Cann, Son of John Cann, CMoM who
served with pride aboard USS JACOB JONES DE130 * ($10,000) * (HF)
Alden J Laborde, USS BLAIR DE147 and USS KLEINSMITH APD134
through the Almar Foundation ($10,000) *
Double Your Dollars!
If you or your spouse’s company has a Corporate Gift
Matching Program, you may be eligible to double, or
even triple your gift to the U.S.S. SLATER. Many
times, this benefit also applies to retirees. Please contact the employer’s human resource officer for more
information on this corporate-sponsored benefit.
Chairman’s Report - continued
dock. He and I shared this wish. Marty, don’t give up that
dream. I do believe if I too sail away before our dream comes
true, you will be waiting on the other side of the harbor with a
plan to put her in a shipyard over there.
Marty was always able to see some good in everything we
did. When SLATER arrived in New York, was pushed into place
and tied up, I was invited to be the first to go aboard. I asked
Elam Slater, Frank Slater’s brother (He served aboard SLATER
during WWII) to come with me. Remember, this was a ship in
“Cold Iron.” When you stepped inboard, it was as dark as
Hades. We each had battle lanterns and after looking around,
Elam said to me, “Sam, those people out on that pier are going
to kill you when they see what you spent nearly $300,000.00 of
their money on.” After saying that, he went back on the pier and
spoke to Marty. I waited about five minutes, getting my nerve
up enough and I went out on the pier. In that five minutes I waited, Marty had organized a cheering section and all I heard was
“You did good,” “Great job Sam,” and “soon we will have her
looking as if she just came out of the building yard.”
Farewell Marty, may you always have fair winds and a following sea wherever you sail.
Sammy the Sail. (Sam Saylor)
Visit The DEHM/USS Slater Website:
http://www.ussslater.org
Trim But Deadly
The Quarterly Newsletter of the
DESTROYER ESCORT HISTORICAL
DEHM, USS SLATER
MUSEUM
PO BOx 1926
ALBANY, NY 12201-1926
PHONE: (518)431-1943 EMAIL: INFO@USSSLATER.ORG
Samuel L. Saylor - Chairman
Frank J. Lasch, Esq. - President
Capt. S. G. Krawczyk, USN (ret) – V. Pres.
Harold M. Hatfield, P.E. – Treasurer
Anthony Esposito – Secretary
John P. Cosgrove – National Rep.
Barnaby D. Bullard, MSBA, CFP - Trustee
B. J. Costello, Esq. – Trustee
Robert F. Cross – Trustee
Alan Fox, CLU, ChFC – Trustee
Earl F. Johnson – Trustee
Mark P. Lasch - Trustee
Don Norris – Trustee
William Douglas Tanner, CWI - Trustee
John R. Vero, Esq. – Trustee
Ray Windle – Trustee
Gregory M. Wolanin - Trustee
Clifton W. Woltz - Trustee
Paul Czesak, CPCU, ALCM – Trustee
Emeritus
Timothy C. Rizzuto – Executive Director/Editor
Rosehn Gipe - Business Manager
Linda Wruck - Education Coordinator
Erik Collin – Restoration Coordinator
Katie Kuhl – Collections Manager
“Trim But Deadly” Layout and Design - Richard Andrian
VOLUME 16, NUMBER 3 THIRD QUARTER 2010
Visit Albany and USS Slater!
The Albany County Convention and Visitors Bureau stands
ready to assist you in planning your trip to Albany, New York
and surrounding areas. Individuals and reunion groups can
obtain information by contacting:
Jeanne Toth, Director of Sales
Phone: 1-800-258-3582, Ext 106
Frank Heckart, Gene Hermanson and Jim Ray repainting gun 2. Jim says he normally doesn't go to parties
where he's the oldest one there.
page 23
DEHM/USS Slater
PO Box 1926
Albany, NY 12201-1926
NON PROFIT ORG
US POSTAGE
PAID
PERMIT NO. 317
ALBANY NY
Address Service Requested
Trim But Deadly
The Newsletter of the Destroyer Escort Historical Museum
For all you APD sailors who complain that you don't get enough recognition, here is the USS BOWERS APD40 after being converted from DE637 following a severe Kamikaze hit. Another photo of her appears on page 2. Her crew was with us for a
reunion this fall. NAVSOURCE photo via Rick Newman for his father-in-law Frederick lampman FT3 USS Bowers.