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UNITED STATES NAVAL ACADEMY

SIXTIETH GRADUATION ANNIVERSARY OF THE CLASS OF 1940

BACK TO SCHOOL

Normally, after four or five years of service, all line officers, surface, sub, and aviator, became eligible to request postgraduate training. The Navy had started, after WW I, an extensive program of postgraduate study, usually leading to advanced degrees in engineering. The Bureau of Ordnance dominated in numbers assigned to PG with "ordnance PG" frequently being found in flag officers' duty summaries. Ordnance PGs spent a year (sometimes two) at PG School in Annapolis then went for one or two years to MIT, Cornell, Rensselaer, Cal Tech, Carnegie Tech, Johns Hopkins, Lehigh, or Purdue, usually receiving a master of science degree. MIT became almost a second alma mater, with 75 of us as students. While BuOrd sent both surface (including submarine) and aviator officers to PG training, BuAer sent only aviators to aeronautical engineering PG courses. Following a year or two at PG School in Annapolis, aeronautical engineering studies were then completed during one or two years at MIT, Cal Tech, Minnesota, and other universities, with receipt, usually, of an MS degree. When BuWeps was formed, after our time for PG, this distinction lessened.

We have already seen those selected for the MIT course in Naval Construction and Marine Engineering, during WWII, become EDO on completion. Also, a few others of our class, including John Sims and Ajax Hiller, were designated EDO during WWII. Now, some of those who completed these PG courses, but only a fraction of them, would apply for and be selected for engineering duty only and spend the remainder of their careers in duties closely related to their studies. Some of the AEDOs were Ed Gillette, Jim Coyle, Bob Clements, Ike Blough, Ned Garrett, Lucian Hunt, Rex Rader, Ray Schneider, Earl McLaughlin and Vern Teig. Vern is one of the few AEDOs, along with John Sims and Bill Bottenberg, who were not trained as HTA pilots. Vern was in lighter-than-air during WWII. John's PG course was an MBA course at Harvard long after he was designated AEDO.

EDOs working for the Bureau of Ordnance included Ed Sledge and Lyle Keator, and some with duties in the Bureau of Ships were Benjy Frana, Tom Elliott, Bill Braley and Terry McGillicuddy. Most of those completing PG work continued a normal rotation to duties afloat and frequently went to duties ashore unrelated to their fields of study.

Johnny Chase, Scotty Goodfellow and Vince Healey did their Ordnance PG at MIT, while Bill Dobie and Bill McKinney went to Cornell. Pat Clancy and Ray Schneider (both selected for AED-aviation engineering duty), and Mike Michaelis (your normal carrier-commanding aviator) studied aeronautical engineering, Mike and Ray at MIT, Pat at Cal Tech. All those named made it to rear admiral and Mike to admiral, the top rank attained by one of our class. About forty-five of our class were ordnance PG's, about thirty aeronautical engineering PG's, together a substantial portion of the Class.

Jack Longino, an aviator classmate who made rear admiral, completed his PG course in social studies at Columbia. Herman Trum and Willie House, the other two non-AEDO aviator flag officers from our class, had no PG college work except war college--Naval War College for Herman, Staff College and National War College for Willie.

Ted Rodgers also completed his aeronautical engineering PG course at MIT, but retired early to become the Superintendant of the Maine Maritime Academy at Castine where he was promoted to rear admiral in the Merchant Marine Service.

Some of our class were electronics PG's, most doing all their study at the Navy PG School--few colleges had established electronics courses covering the advances of WWII--, but some going to various colleges, including MIT and the University of Pennsylvania. Bill Boehm, Dave Lewis, John Henry, Larry Fox (for the Marines), Wally Utley, Connie Carlson, Sam Edelstein (a non-graduate), Buss Moon, Tad Lothrop, Harvey Vogel, Ajax Hiller (who was the first to PG, in 1943), Bill Bush, Stu Swacker and others were electronics PGs. Sid Sherman, Bill Boehm, Sam Edelstein and Wally Utley became electronics EDOs.

There was a metereorology PG course at PG school which a number of our classmates attended. Champ Champion, Mat Cain, Bill Carpenter, Barren Chandler, Gat Egan, Jerry McCarthy, Bill Meyer, Carl Adams, Ace Barton, John Sullivan and Stookie Steuckert--who became a metereorology EDO--took this course and became weathermen.

Eight of our class became law PG's, going to Georgetown Law School. Art Esch of this group made rear admiral. Johnny Greenbacker, Bill Keating, Tommy Taylor, Monty Montgomery, Art Berndtson, Buz Biesemeier and Pat Gray were in the law PG group. Tommy Taylor was retired for physical reasons in 1964 and practiced law in northern Virginia until his death in 1983. Art Berndtson, after retirement, practiced in Washington. Several of our class went to law school on their own at night or after resigning, and practiced law, including Neil Rogers, Jack Newbould and Lou Mayo, who became dean of the George Washington Graduate School of Public Law.

Joe Morray, an eye unsat, finished Harvard Law School in the years before and after the seven years he served during WWII and Korea. He has written six books on foreign policy, taught law for eight years, and now practices law in Oregon. Pershing Wilson, a non-grad, went to law school at the University of Missouri and was commissioned in the Navy in 1942. He served as a legal specialist and retired in 1970.

Several of our class, Bob White, Jonse Hughes, Greg Bill, Bill Lattimore, Hersh Sellars, Jim Vellis, Bill Scott, Wes Westhoff and John Wier, completed Communications PG at PG School.

BuPers endowed a PG course in Personnel Administration and selected Bill Caspari, Dick Dickes, Mike Alpert, Sal Walline, Ash Little, Mark Varland and Roger Smith to take courses at Stanford, Ohio State, and George Washington. Other classmates received MBAs--Bob Quinn, John Sims and Joe Snyder in postgraduate business administration studies at Harvard, and Harry White, Mike Hanley and Bill Braybrook George Washington.

Some of our classmates earned their MBAs on their own time. Sam Edelstein, who failed his eye exam youngster year, came back in the V-7 program, was augmented to regular Navy, and, after PG School, became an electronics EDO. He got his MBA from Southern Oregon after retiring as a captain. Frank Hertel got his PhD in business administration in his "spare time" and, after retirement, was a professor and associate dean at the University ofWyoming. Terry McGillicuddy, an EDO, got his MBA by attending night school for four years at Boston and St. Johns, while Buss Moon, also EDO, received his MBA from Tulane after retirement. Ned Bent went to night school for his MBA while an engineer for Monsanto. Dusty Rhodes, his commission revoked when he married before the deadline, worked after hours, from his Union Carbide job, to earn his MBA from New York University. Swede Carlson earned his MBA while working for Lockheed and Steve Brody while a salesman for metallurgical products. Bill Lattimore, after resigning, won an MBA in banking and finance at Wharton. Skip Appleton got his master’s degree while working in OPNAV.

There were still other categories of PG training Three of our class, Hugh Vickery, Early Winters and Jake Heimark, were Naval Intelligence PGs. Jim Elkins earned a masters degree in international relations from George Washington.

A few of our class were assigned to PG studies in nuclear engineering: Dick Laning, Earl McLaughlin, Bob Roberts, Rosy Roseborough and Louis Saunders.

Ed Muhlenfeld completed two PC courses, first ordnance engineering at MIT, and then later operational analysis at PG School, five years of PG work!

Speedy Simmons won his masters degree in engineering from George Washington at night school, in 1957, while serving in BuPers, sort of a do-it-yourself PG. Harvey Seim did the same, earning an MA in international affairs at Maryland while assigned to the strategic plans division of OpNav.

Barney Barnett, an eye unsat who became the first of our class to transfer to the Supply Corps, was supply officer at Tulagi, where the PT boats that raided the Slot were based. After WWII, Roger Vaughn and Duck Snyder, both eye unsats, and Bill Thorpe, Joe Snyder, Puss Merrill, and Bob Wuest shifted to the Supply Corps, taking the supply officer course at the Supply Corps Schools in Bayonne. Claude Clefton didn't graduate with our class but came into the Supply Corps as a reserve, and retired regular Navy, Supply Corps.

While some were experiencing post-graduate college work, others, at sea, were coping with the problem of depleted and inexperienced crews. Almost all of us in the surface Navy either became the exec of a destroyer or commanded a sub, while aviators either commanded squadrons or air groups. Many became heads of department or navigators in cruisers and carriers. The commencement of the Korean War found most of us in one of these sea-going billets. Ashore, many of us taught midshipmen in NROTC units and at the Naval Academy.

Two of us, Jack Partridge and George Kittredge, took part in Operation High Jump, the Byrd Expedition to the Antarctic in 1946. George served as RADM Byrd's navigator. Bob Newcomb got his wings, and Mike Hanley and George Kronmiller switched from LTA to flying jets. JigJig Jackson was flag secretary to ComCruDiv Eight. George Block was navigator of NEW JERSEY and Bob Kirkpatrick of ST. PAUL. Vic Schrager was assistant naval attache in Rome. Harv Seim served on the SecNav Committee on Unification, under Arleigh Burke, and was a player in the "revolt of the admirals" in 1949.

We continued to suffer losses. Cy Radford was killed in a bombing accident at Culebra in 1946. Pete Parlett and Butch Haker were killed in plane crashes in 1948. In 1950, Bill Sampson was lost on an AJ-l ferry flight, Dave Purdon was killed in an AJ-l barrier crash, and Hugh Wood was killed in the crash of an experimental contra-rotating plane for which he was BuAer project officer.

During this time when many of us were attending PG School, some were being retired for physical reasons. Hooky Walker, felled by polio, and barely saved by a high speed destroyer run, retired and, after six years with Honeywell and eight years with Colorado Fuel and Iron as general warehouse manager, went into the real estate business in Philadelphia. Virgil Hancock, retired for arthritis, served with the Arizona Heart Association. Hal Williamson and Burke Gill also retired with crippling arthritis. Hal went with the Vitro Corporation and worked on the Polaris missile, among other projects. Burke was further incapacitated by Hodgkin's disease and died in Florida in 1973. Dave MacInnes and Hayward Smith had TB and were retired, Hayward going to work for Sperry, after being released from the hospital in 1945. Dave, who was retired shortly after graduation, wound up, in 1947, at the Naval Air Development Center at Johnsville, Pennsylvania. Chris Cochran was physically retired in 1960 and died in 1968. Jonse Hughes retired in 1961 after a heart attack and died in 1968. Duck Snyder retired in 1961 because of the ravages of diabetes and died in 1964.

Buck Buchanan, after his release from a Japanese internee camp, went to medical school and became an M.D., an anesthesiologist, practicing in Salt Lake City. Ex-POWs Marshall Hamill and C. D. Smith went into business, Marshall with Stone and Webster. Marshall became a vice president of Stone and Webster in charge of all European operations before premature retirement for health reasons. He died in 1988. C.D. worked with a construction materials firm in Memphis until he died in 1958. Earle Childs, who lost a leg in the Solomons, made sailing yachts in his backyard in Coronado and was master planner in National Steel's San Diego shipyard until his death in 1966.

Johnny Clagett, badly burned in the Solomons, went into the Foreign Service, but left to get a PhD at Yale, and then went on to teach at Middlebury College in Vermont and to author the impressive total of 19 books. Ed Malloy, physically retired in 1946, became president of Cheraw Cotton Mills and at last report was our only permanent bachelor.

About 78 classmates resigned from the Navy in this post-war period preceding Korea. Sunshine Lowerre went with Texas Instruments, Dave Lewis with Westinghouse and then 27 years with Bechtel. Gene Sheker also joined Bechtel. George Montgomery started making custom furniture in California. Bob Tackaberry became a salesman for utility equipment, later becoming an executive in a utility industry association. Bill Lanier, an eye unsat who became an aviator, resigned and, during a long career with McGraw-Hill became Vice-President, Planning and Development. Whiff Caldwell went with Douglas Aircraft, before it became McDonnell-Douglas. Crosswell Croft was president of Pyle National Corporation, and, in time, of several other companies. Searcy Farrior changed his name to Jim Fair and entered upon a most unusual career as Florida's champion of the little people. According to a magazine article, "He has been waging war on injustice for most of his life. Often as not injustice has won."

Our classmates, the "eye unsats," who were separated at graduation for eye defects and rejoined us to fight WWII, returned to their civilian employment. Virgil Gex returned to Procter and Gamble and got on with his 37-year career there, developing production machinery for diapers and potato chips. Ernie Sanford, after service in YORKTOWN during WWII, rejoined Bendix, but shortly left Bendix for Vitro Laboratories, then transferred to Kearfott and retired in 1984 alter 28 years. Joe Rinschler continued with Sperry in government contracts management. Bex Trimble who had worked in wartime on gyro compass production for Chrysler, Arma, and Sperry, went with GE and then, ten years later, settled with Allegheny Ludlum. Woody Woodside also went with GE. Mayo Preston returned to the Baltimore Gas and Electric Company and retired in 1982 as manager of the Fossil Fuels Department. Hedric Rhodes worked in the textile industry and then with Alden's (a mail order house), and finally Higbee, a department store in Cleveland, until he retired in 1981 and started spending his winters in Nakomis, Florida.

Lawrence McEwen, who left us youngster year and got his degree from MIT, then served as an officer in BuShips during WWII, commenced his long career with Chevron as a senior marine engineer. Bob Sweatt, who also parted from us youngster year, served in destroyers during WWII, and retired as president of Fulton Paper Company in San Francisco in 1980. Ed Dietrich, another youngster year loss, returned to command mine sweepers during WWII, then built up a full service lumber yard employing 60 people in Florida. He retired and turned the business over to his son in 1985. Bud Schafer also started a lumber business in 1946, in Manasquon, New Jersey, which also thrived and is now operated by his oldest son.

Thad Herrick went into the Foreign Service and started with a dream assignment in Tahiti. Less ideal postings followed, and he wound up with Avco, working on missiles. Billy Lewis returned to Ruston, Louisiana to manage his family's department store there. Eldo Bergman returned to his family's road construction business in Genoa, Ohio. Chick Obrist commenced his 35 year career with GE, retiring as Western Regional Sales Manager in 1982. Neil Rogers shifted from lighter-than-air to HTA in 1944, but resigned in 1948. He then went to law school and commenced the practice of law in Richmond, becoming finally a vice president of Chicago Land Title Company. Maurice Baldwin, Dave Breault and Kent Bulfinch went into the oil business, Maurice and Dave with Standard and Kent with Shell. Lee Swepston went into the wholesale fruit and vegetable business in Greensboro, NC.

Ajax Hiller stayed fairly close to home, as a civil servant with Naval Research Laboratories, as did Hatchet Wright, with BuShips. Bob Kirkpatrick became a vice president of Market Research Corporation of America, and Ed Morrison went with Bell Labs. Dusty Rhodes, whose commission was revoked in January, 1942 for being married, worked for DuPont during WWII then went on to a full career with Union Carbide. Whiff Caldwell joined Bowers Manufacturing in 1949, then, seven years later, went to Douglas Aircraft where he retired in 1984. Joe Weber, at the University of Maryland, became a leading authority on lasers and masers, and wrote a textbook on General Relativity.

Although almost all of our class got married in 1942 and 1943, there were a few holdouts to this period--and later--, Tom Elliott, Ned Bent, Bud Schafer and Bill Scott, until 1948, Dick Niles and Swede Carlson, 1949, GG Williams and Snuffy Lockett, 1952, Wes Westhoff and John McMullen, 1955, Mayo (John) Preston, 1961, and, of course, Ralph Gerber, who held out almost forever, until 1970. Those who lost their wives through death remarried, in most cases, widows, some divorcees, not too far from their own ages, and some of them married girls they had courted as midshipmen. Jimmy Cochran married his June Week drag, after loss of his first wife. Buck Buchanan finally married his high school sweetheart in 1974 after she retired as a Navy nurse and Norm Lee his high school sweetheart in 1983. Pat Gray married Ed DeGarmo's widow and Jake Heimark married Don Banker's widow.