Late in the afternoon on November 16, 1965 I reported aboard the USS Ashland LSD-1.   A scared kid from Los Angeles I never heard of the Amphibious Navy better known as the Gator Navy, I never heard of a small Naval Base outside of Norfolk VA called Little Creek, but here I was, not knowing a soul and scared to death.   I came from a family of proud Americans.   My dad served in the Navy as a Gunners Mate during WWII and that’s all he spoke of when recanting his Naval days in the South Pacific.   He was proud of his oldest son’s decision to keep a tradition that he started.   But I was still scared.

As I reported aboard I was turned over to the Master at Arms who was a nice man until he became tired of my continuous referral of him as “Sir”. He politely explained to me in a firm but somewhat respectful manner that he was no officer and if I said “Yes Sir” to him one more time that my first night aboard the Ashland was one I would never forget. Unbeknown to him, forty-two years later I still haven’t forgotten that first night and the following two weeks thereafter.

After looking at the red stripes (FA) on my arm the Master at Arms escorted me to the bunking area belonging to the Boiler Tech’s and told me to stay here until tomorrow and then he would figure out where I belonged. Damn I thought I really pissed this guy off. You see, there was a boiler overhaul going on and when the BT’s returned from their shift they were sweaty, smelly and covered in black soot and not looking real happy. Needless to say they weren’t very talkative neither. I didn’t sleep much that night, with the constant snoring and other noises caused from the apparent food served earlier in on the mess deck.

The next morning one of the FN’s took me under his wing and said come on lets go to chow and then I’ll give you a tour of the boiler rooms where you are going to be working. After chow we headed to the bawls of the ship called the boiler room. The one we were in was still operational because we weren’t of shore power at the time. As we entered I noticed a rather large man sitting with his arms crossed and holding a very large 24” crescent wrench. He was the BT2 on watch and was sitting directly under the fresh air vent so to keep cool. He had two precipitating pumps on either side of him that were steam driven and making this loud sound, Kacha-------Kacha-------Kacha. My new buddy the FN was showing me what gages we were responsible to read when I asked him what the BT2 was doing there just staring straight ahead. He told me that he was watching the pumps on either side of him and also making sure that everything was operating correctly. I then asked why the big wrench he was holding. The FN said, just watch and you’ll learn. In other words, stop asking so many questions. About that time I heard a Loud Kathunk and seen that the pump to the right of the BT2 had hung up and stopped. Without hesitation the BT2 swung the large wrench, smacking the pump at the housing base and it took off, Kacha-Kacha-Kacha-Kacha-Kacha like bat out of you know where. I thought to myself, what a job, I could do that!

About half way through my tour which had turned into a watch, the Master at Arms found me and said come on, you're in the wrong department. He took me up to the main deck and then forward towards the folk Sal. He opened the hatch and took me into a shop of sorts with sheet metal tools, workbench’s and a television and several swabies standing around drinking coffee. What a change, these guys even had pressed dungarees. As we entered he introduced me as the new striker for the shop and I met the Chief, Albert A. Jackson. A slightly gruff individual that apparently had been out rather late the night before and was in no mood to chat. He turned me over to a 2nd Class Diver named “Hatch” and said, find him a bunk and a job and keep him busy until Redman gets back from leave. I didn’t know what a Redman was, I later found out it was another 2nd class Shipfitter and not a person with a severe sunburn. After moving my gear from the BT’s area to where the “R” Division personnel slept, Hatch took me to the shop and introduced me to the new tool of my trade, the plunger. Yep, I had moved up in the world from BT wannabe to a Terd Chaser. The plunger was what it was, a wooden stick with a red rubber cup on the end of it. I don’t remember how many toilets and urinals there were on the Ashland but she had a bunch! After weighing my options and reflecting upon the first night I had spent aboard with the BT’s, I decided to become the best toilet plunging terd chaser the Navy had ever scene. After chow and muster every morning, I began my quest and I kept going until every waste-handling fixture aboard was functioning to it’s potential.

Two weeks had gone by and upon reporting to the shop after chow in the morning, there was a new face, a tall thin guy with a New Jersey accent telling everyone about his adventures, it was Redman returning from leave. As the Chief showed up, the shop quieted down. Someone introduced me to Redman and said this is Botonis, he went to the same school you did Redman! I looked really hard at Redman and for the life of me I couldn’t remember him from my school days so I said, “Really, you went to Simi Valley High School?” The shop kind of laughed and the Chief said no dummy, Shipfitter “A” school! Not thinking I responded, I haven’t been to any Shipfitter “A” school and then there was silence.

A few hours later, it was discovered that someone had put on my orders that I was a shipfitter instead of a shipfitter striker. The division officer was then called to the shop where he and the Chief along with others including the Master at Arms were discussing my future. All I heard was the BT’s are short handed and could use him! About that time Redman spoke up and said that he had been talking to Hatch and others and that this kid (meaning me) had shown great promise of being a premier terd chaser and they felt that we should give him a chance to excel at his newly found profession, besides Calvin Nichols another FN could use some help dragging welding leads around the ship.

So there I was, with a new family which included a short stumpy carpenter with gold hash marks that dragged the ground named Pop Swazy, a diver named Hatch that had a profound obsession with tattoos that his wife hated, a DC man named Bill Law that felt sorry for this kid away from home for the first time so he and his wife had me over to their place on my birthday, and a Chief Petty Officer that decided to show me the ropes of partying in a community that really didn’t care that much for sailors, Norfolk Virginia in the 1960’s. It was a great time in my life and a time of setting values and priority’s. A time of becoming a man in a world among some of the greatest men I would ever meet, my shipmates, my brothers.