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Dear ’mates:
I’m not sure if
it’s an effect of the summer doldrums, the fact that we’re in the quiet
“in-between” in the reunion cycle, or if y’all just don’t love me anymore, but I
had to beg for good gouge for our column this month. Fortunately, several of
you came through with flying colors. That means we can avoid my contingency
plan (printing my speaker notes from a talk on global warming that I gave to the
local Optimist Club in July). So everyone say thanks to Brian Curdy,
Les Edgar, Rick Udicious, and Matt Rick ’94 (XO of DONALD COOK
DDG 75).
Last month we
covered the presentation of the Class of 1975 Leadership Award, presented
annually to an officer assigned to DDG 75. XO Matt Rick forwarded some more
photos, including a cool shot of a Tomahawk launch during pre-deployment work
ups. (See our class web page.) COOK’s Change of Command ceremony was held
underway on 2 July. CDR John Esposito was relieved by CDR Bill Parker. The new
skipper is a distinguished military graduate of the government playschool in
Colorado where he was class president. (I do believe that life on board will be
quite interesting during the week before the Navy-Air Force game.) Wisely, CDR
Parker elected a Navy commission and has an absolutely stellar record. The
photo below shows XO Rick, CDR Esposito, CDR Parker, and Command Master Chief
Fotenot. Congratulations to CMC Fotenot’s daughter who is a plebe in the class
of 2011.
<photo 75#1:
Underway on USS DONALD COOK>
Rick Udicious
checked in on behalf of the Upper Midwest Chapter of USNAAA. Alex Plechash
is president of the chapter and Neil Tollesfrud is his VP. Rick is the
Shipmate correspondent. If you’re in the north central part of the
country, check out
www.usna.com/Chapters/US/MN/UpperMidwest
and let Alex, Neil, and Rick know how to find you.
16th
Company Rep Les Edgar helped get the word count up with a quick update. Here’s
what Les had to say:
“Jeff
Winston and I just finished our 10th
year with Raytheon on the Tomahawk Missile Program. I’m in Lexington Park,
MD and Jeff works out of our Crystal City, VA office. ADM Tim Heely
(PEO(W)) and John Moran (SAIC) are the other 75’ers working Tomahawk
down here in Southern Maryland. I’m now two years out from my second stem
cell transplant for Non-Hodgkins Lymphoma but doing great compared to a lot
of folks with this disease. I’m on a short leash with the doctors in
Seattle but life is returning to normal somewhat. My golf game still stinks
but that isn’t anything new and Rick White is always game to drive
over from Manassas, VA to humiliate me at the USNA golf course!
My roommate from USNA, Mike Stephenson, just completed the MS150, a
150 mile bicycle ride from Duluth, Minnesota to the Twin Cities to raise
money for Multiple Sclerosis. “Ironman” survived but wasn’t above
complaining about the 20kt headwinds for the 1st 75 miles! This was his 5th
year participating in this worthwhile event. Speaking of worthwhile events,
I’m a Team Captain for the “Light the Night Walk” on Sep 30th in support of
the Leukemia and Lymphoma Society in Annapolis, so mark your calendars and
join my team. I’ll get the info to the webmaster when available. This will
be my second year supporting this group in gratitude for them supporting me
with information and financial assistance over the past many years. Last
year Anne and Richard Thomas and their daughter participated in the
walk on my team as well as a former member of the class of 1972, Bob
Stecher, also a transplant survivor.
Rob Ganze
just checked in from Tucson, AZ. He likes the desert environment but in his
words “It is hot as hell and dry, but peaceful and quiet”. He’s looking to
give that up to move again, possibly back to San Diego.”
I always look
forward to reading e-mails from the Class’s Swiss correspondent, Brian Curdy.
In fact, I think it’s high time we presented Brian with the Coveted Scribe’s
Award. [As you may remember, the Coveted Scribe’s Award entitles the winner
to free room and board and all the Abita Amber you care to drink when you visit
us in sunny Pace, FL – airfare not included.] Brian reports e-mail contact
with Bill Dixon, Bob Zakula, Nelson Bendeck, Tom Kapurch, Jaymie Durnan,
and his old roommate, Doug Martin. So take a deep breath and
settle in
for the fascinating Curdy report from Switzerland.
Doug Martin outranks me (as almost everyone in the class does) so I will not
pretend to offer news or progress reports beyond what the proper authorities
have so delegated. I can say that Doug is a fighter. Like Doug's Deb, I am
an "RN" registered nurse—not Royal Navy. My Maryvonne is also a cancer
warrior, so after 7 months of "virtual fire support," things would
be looking great in Kansas, were it not for the problem of shoring up the
Missouri River in light of recent climatic complications. Well, as most
classmates are aware, my duty station, or home port, for most of the past 30
years has been near the source of the Rhòne river, far from the Severn, the
Missouri, the Mississippi, the Tennessee, the Ohio...or the Merrimac for
that matter. Any Classmates familiar with the Neva, Drin, or Shkumbin
rivers?
Maryvonne (my one and only better half) and I have managed some recent sea
service in the North Atlantic, Switzerland's lakes, the English Channel, the
North Sea, the Baltic, the Black Seas, and especially those beautiful Ionian
and Adriatic waters in the Med. We feel obliged, therefore, to insist that
we are in no way responsible for Switzerland's second America's Cup trophy
won at Valencia this year (or recent world tennis triumphs, either). I am
still lacking in physical coordination and apt to turn Marine Corps-green
beyond 10° list, be that to port or to starboard. But at 56 I still have
some cannon-cocking OORAGH left over. Maryvonne and I manage shore parties
as community social volunteers. Community volunteer work, in any form, is
service. We service people know that means interesting people as
friends, comrades, or “brothers and sisters in arms."
A relatively recent Balkan acquaintance, who has since become a friend and a
classmate in the “graduate school of hard knocks,” is a 65
year-old volunteer educator and social worker in Tirana, Albania, named
Frederik Tashko. Odd as it may seem, Frederik's uncle and my Dad (now a 98
year-old retired LCdr, USNR) were fellow students in Boston University's
Graduate School of Education from 1931-34, majoring in French and modern
Romance languages and literature. Frederik's uncle had earned his
undergraduate degree in Vienna, Austria, and my Dad had earned his
first bachelor's degree in Canada in 1929. As years passed, the world became
smaller. I left the Marines with a physical disability and moved to
Switzerland (where my family originated) and became active in the Cold War
Albanian and East European diaspora while working and studying. Rapidly
mastering French and the rudimentary working basics of some other foreign
idioms (I hope USNA professors Rau, Mangano, and Tolstoy are as proud of us
as I am of them), I eventually crossed paths with Frederik Tashko. Frederik
was born in Albania and was an early graduate of the Warsaw Pact sponsored
aviation officer's preparatory school or "NAPS-equivalent" in Tirana. With
the rank of "aviation cadet," he arrived as a foreign student at
the Technical University of Military Aeronautics at Kiev in 1958 to
study engineering and aircraft design, while completing requirements for a
junior lieutenant's commission in the Albanian Socialist People's
Army aviation branch. Albanian cadets in the Soviet Union were dispersed
singly to assorted military aviation school pipelines from Leningrad to
Volgograd for the additional purpose of honing individual mastery of the
Russian language through immersion. To this day, Frederik's Russian is as
good as my English. The Sino-Soviet split forced him to return to Albania
where he and his family were subjected to 30 years of imprisonment and
internal exile. He was never tried or convicted of any crime. He was
detained by the leaders of his own country as an apparent security risk
because of "political errors" by a close family member. Frederik could have
remained in the Soviet Union by means of political asylum but he has no
regrets over returning to his native land to share the fate of his parents
and sisters. Today he helps support his wife (a high-school music
teacher) and their 10 year-old musically inclined son with a small Albanian
state pension awarded to "formerly persecuted persons" while coaching local
youth in mathematics.
Frederik also works hard in a non-profit, non-governmental organization
which he helped found. They seek to combine recreation, education, civil
aviation, and civic awareness for “Albanian youth of all ages.” A prominent
co-founder is an American printer and publisher with a soft spot for
aviation modeling and promoting social and economic development, Mr. Lee
Church. Mr. Church and his wife are long-time Tirana residents,
well-integrated in the neighborhood. He and Frederik collaborate with other
veterans and aviation enthusiasts of Tirana's Civilian National Airport,
adjoining military aerodrome, and air fields around the country including
both NATO and Albanian military and civil units. Other devoted
collaborators include the legendary MiG pilot (and one time "plebe" to
Frederik) LtCol Koço Biku. Colonel Biku completed studies in China before
acquiring wide flight experience and thousands of hours in numerous
aircraft. He earned his tactical reputation by chasing off Yugoslav
incursions into Albanian air space in the late 1960s and early 1970s. The
AAC (Albanian "Eagles" Aviation Club in English—Aero Klubi Shqiptar "Shqiponja"
in Albanian) collaborates with internationally recognized Albanian
educational institutions to provide thousands of hours of teaching in
mathematics, civil aviation, history, and social awareness. They have a
small army (or air force) of volunteer instructors and overseas contacts who
work to orient youth away from the streets and back into schools as part of
a long run to rebuild a society shaken by wear and social upheaval. Anyone
wishing to contact the ACC can e-mail Lee Church
at
lchurch (at) abcom-al.com
or Frederik Tashko
ftashko (at) hotmail.com
Meanwhile, back in Annapolis … football season is here. Go Big Blue! N – A – V
– Y … Gooooo NAVY!
--- ’75 Sir! Larry |
