Shipmate Column
November 2001
CLASS OF
1963
Pres: Stephen M. Duncan
Sec'y: Michael H. Shelley
25 Sweetwater Lane, Pisgah Forest, NC
28768
h: 828-862-4245 e: Class.Secretary@USNA63.org
Web site: www.USNA63.org
Remember that you can click on any underlined
Classmate's name to link to his Current Biography.
Among the
current biographies added to our web site recently was this submission from Richard Sidford who, we
learn, is our only
classmate with Australian citizenship..
Having
read several of the recent offerings, especially the one from Twitch (Miller Detrick), I am encouraged to bring everyone
up to date with my past.
After graduation, I was assigned to engineering on EVERSOLE (DD-789) out of
Long Beach, CA. Among the USNA graduates aboard were Warren Hoppe ('61)
and Bob Luckey ('61), Dave Hutchinson ('62), Jim Barnes ('62) and Bill Pawlyk ('63). I had two tours of Westpac and then was
transferred to INTREPID (CVS-11) out of Norfolk for another Westpac tour.
Classmates Miller Detrick and Dave Thornhill were part of the air squadrons. I
used
to eat with them in the wardroom instead of with the ship's company officers, who
thought me a traitor.
In 1967, I left the navy and, in 1969, I migrated to Australia. I married an
Australian
girl, and in 1973 became an Australian citizen (in the process
losing my American citizenship). I worked in three educational institutions
during 12
years in South Australia, the last five at Roseworthy Agricultural
College (now part of the University of Adelaide) as Academic Secretary, the senior
administrative officer of the College. The opportunity arose to
undertake a law degree at the University of Tasmania, which I completed in 1982.
I
later was admitted as a Barrister of the Supreme Court of New
South Wales.
Following completion of my law degree, I joined the Australian Public
Service,
heading national fraud investigative units in the Departments of
Veterans' Affairs and Employment, Education and Training. Utilizing my graduate
computing qualifications, my last positions before retirement in
1997 were in the National Crime Authority and the Attorney-General's Department,
as Senior Adviser on Information Technology to the
Commonwealth Law Enforcement Board. While in Tasmania, I joined the Royal
Australian Naval Reserve and was given the rank of Lieutenant (pronounced
Leftenant, of course). I served in the Naval Control of Shipping branch before
moving for employment reasons to Canberra which had no reserve unit. As the
RANR requires 8 years of active reserve service before promotion, I was ineligible
for further advancement. Consequently, I remained a Lieutenant - 35 years without
a
promotion! The RANR retired me in February, 2001, when I reached 60 years of
age.
My wife and I divorced after 25 years of marriage, and I remarried -- this
time a
woman from two houses away from my mother's house in
Pioche, NV. After two years in Australia, she wished to return to the U.S., which
we
did upon my retirement. After some delay, I obtained permanent
residency (the INS wouldn't restore my American citizenship). My wife was
diagnosed with a degenerative back condition and (unlike Australia)
medical care here is very expensive. I returned to work, mainly to obtain medical
insurance coverage, and am currently employed as a Correctional
Casework Specialist at the local prison in Pioche. My wife died in August last
year.
I have two children: my son Robert is undertaking a Master's degree at
Utah
State University, having graduated Summa Cum Laude from
Southern Utah University in 2000. My daughter Bronwyn lives in Adelaide, South
Australia.
.
When word of
Bill Naiva's death reached
us in February, Frank Hilton contacted Bill's widow, Sandra, to make her aware of
potential assistance to their family from the Class of 1963 Foundation. Frank
received this response from her:
Thank
you so much for your kind letter dated February 28, 2001. We have been in such a
state of shock with Bill's passing. He was a man of integrity, caring, and love
and we
miss him so much.
What a beautiful way to honor the classmates who have passed, with the
scholarship assistance program. Thank you for making me aware of this
fine program. I have spoken with our children, Scott, Matthew, and Suzie to tell
them
about it too.
When this all happened on February 13, we were in Vermont waiting for the birth of
our daughter Suzie and her husband Brian's second child. Bill
was helping a neighbor of theirs to sand an icy Vermont hill and it happened then.
Our grandson Palmer William Bajari was born a week later -- a
healthy baby, but a bittersweet time.
Reunion
Coordinator
Bill Earner asked me to
share with you this information about an exciting project which needs your
participation, beginning now:
Our
Fortieth Reunion committee recently reviewed a video presentation done for the
40th reunion of the Class of 1960. It was something of a collage of their
midshipman
experience. We would like to compile a similar video for our own Fortieth
Reunion.
We have "recruited" a few volunteers who have begun work but cannot go much
farther without help from the Class. We need pictures, negatives, slides, movies,
and audiotapes of our experience as Midshipmen. Already digitized material or
items converted to video tape would be appreciated. (16mm. film would be difficult
but doable for really good scenes.)
This will be an events-oriented production built around a few general themes:
(1) Plebe Summer -- Arrival at USNA, swearing in, before and after haircuts, our
new life in Mother B, all Plebe summer events, Parents' Weekend, etc. (2) Plebe
Year -- Come arounds, pep rallies, Plebe sports, Herndon Monument, Hundredth
Night, etc. (3) Third and Second Class years -- Summer cruises, life in Bancroft
Hall,
classes, Army-Navy weekend, Ring Dance, etc. (4) First Class year -- Our Plebes,
their come arounds, P-rades, life in Bancroft, sports, our Hundredth Night,
Graduation, first salute, weddings in the Chapel ( really good would be pictures
of
classmates married on Graduation Day.), etc. (4) General -- Good scenes and
action shots focused on group activities and sports, Christmas leave departure,
the
Yard in Winter, the Yard in the summer heat, etc. We are looking for both
historical
and humorous coverage (all in good taste, of course). None of the above
descriptors is meant to be all-inclusive. We need things of general interest to
all of
us.
Please send any materials to Mr. Jim Leeper (aka
Speed), 1676 Wingspan Way, Winter Springs, FL 32708; Ph. 407-359-7783; e-
mailjleeper@flir.com. All materials will be
returned in the same condition as received so everything must be documented with
the sender's name, return address, e-mail address, date(s), narrative of what the
pictures are about. This is very important. Good documentation will aid in final
selections.
All contributors will be listed in the production. Let Speed know
if
you want a digitized copy of any film sent. Pricing will be available later. All
material will be acknowledged by e-mail upon receipt.
Copies of the production will be made available in CD movie-formatted disks.
(DVD is too costly for us.) We are not trying to recreate our
Yearbook. We are looking back from 2003. These are our memories. With your
help we can restore some faded memories to vivid color. Go up to
the attic now and dig out those pictures!
Len Eaton sent this letter about a reunion after a
separation of more than three decades.:
In
August, I had the opportunity to visit with Ken
Nisewaner, a classmate and fellow Marine whom I had not seen in 34 years.
Ken and I lived together in San Clemente, CA, when we were stationed at Camp
Pendleton in 1964 as young infantry officers training with transplacement
battalions.
Little did we know at the time that it was not Okinawa but Vietnam where we would
eventually find ourselves.
For bachelor officers, living in Southern California was indeed the good life!
Ken
introduced me to the Marine Lacrosse Team. For someone like me
who never played a varsity sport at Navy, it was a great experience to have the
opportunity to play lacrosse with a number of former All-Americans.
They were very encouraging and I believe that I responded with a lot of hustle and
determination to do my best. I thank Ken for encouraging me to
participate.
I last saw Ken in June 1967 in Riverton, WY, when he showed up to see me get
married. I really appreciated him doing that and never really got the
chance to properly thank him. In those days, I was stationed at Marine Corps
Schools, Quantico, VA, and I was lucky to get a week off to get married.
As some former Marine said, "If the Corps wanted you to have a wife, they would
have issued you one."
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|
Ken Nisewaner and Len Eaton reunite after 34 years
|
Earlier this year, I received a surprise e-mail from Ken inviting me to visit
him in
San Francisco the next time I had a business trip that would take me
there. The opportunity presented itself in August and we met on Friday evening,
August 10. Ken lives in Millbrae, very close to the San Francisco
airport, with his lovely wife Kris. They have two adult daughters who both live
and
work in California. Ken is a very active tennis player and is still at
work consulting for a few companies in the Bay area. Ken and Kris treated me to a
very nice dinner at Kincaid's in Burlingame where we had a very
nice view of the Bay. It was a lot of fun to see Ken again and I hope to see him
again
at our 40th reunion if not sooner. I always carry a camera when I
am on business trips so was able to get a picture of Ken and me that does us both
justice.
The ever-alert
Dave Moore spotted
mention of our classmate Gary
Smith in a technical magazine and sent me this note:
Gary is
the Chief EDA Analyst at Dataquest. The August issue of the magazine EDA Vision
includes a major writeup about him. If you are like me and not a cyberspeak
person,
you might need to know that EDA stands for Electronic Design Automation (but do
not ask me what that means). Anyway, you might want to take a look at their
website
at www.edavision.com. Gary's a member of
the Los Gatos Blues Band and is a
sometimes-bass player with the industry music standardbearers, the Porch Dawgs.
Check out the web site
www.losgatosbluesband.com. There you'll find, among other useful images,
two photos titled ScaryGary1 and ScaryGary2 -- bass-slung-low Gary "Marlon
Brando" Smith at his best and baddest.
Jan and Pete Quinton enjoyed their
last visit to Europe and couldn't wait to go back for more.
Jan and I
went on another river cruise in April. This time it was a cruise through Holland
and
Belgium for 14 days. I was wearing my '63 ball
cap that first day and as we were boarding a "bearded" gentleman stepped up and
said: "I recognize that hat!" It turned out to be classmate David DeHoll, who was there with his wife Donna. I had
never met David before so it was an opportunity to meet one more classmate
whom I had not met
either while at USNA or during our respective stints in the service. David's a
Marine
who left the service after four years for medical school. He is
currently an orthopedic surgeon living in Iva, SC.
 |
|
Pete Quinton and Dave DeHoll |
 |
|
Pete and Jan Quinton, Dave and Donna DeHoll |
This is the second year in a row where Jan and I have met classmates (whom we
did not know before) on cruises. Travel is fun and it is double fun
meeting classmates. We all had a great time touring Holland and Belgium. We saw
all kinds of weather including a snow storm as we left a dinner at a
castle in Belgium on Easter Sunday! April is definitely an interesting time to
travel in
Europe. We had a great time and highly recommend it to all of
our classmates.
John Dolby comments on
the impact of the work our classmates have done in recent years to facilitate and
encourage communications:
The effort
that was put in creating the Class of '63 web site and the compilation of e-mail
addresses has acted as a stimulus for those of us in the
14th company to stay in much closer communications. As a result we were able to
make contact with Joe DiFiflippo, who went through
Plebe Year
with us. When Dave
Moore and I found that Joe was relatively close by and was a golf player we
started planning a get-together. In early June Joe
invited Dave, Doc Varanini, and me to be his guest
at his club in Fresno. We had a great day reliving our time together on the
Severn
and catching up
on the years that have passed since. After leaving the Academy, Joe received his
degree in Pennsylvania and then made the trek west to California. He
and his wife Barbara have been active in the Fresno community and are now empty
nesters. Joe is involved in a family business shipping baskets of
fruits and flowers from the area. (Secy's note: Check out the Gold Pages section
on
the 1963 web site for complete info about Joe's business.)
Even though Doc Varanini doesn't share our passion for looking for little white
balls,
he made an excellent cart driver and regaled us with stories about
his time in Vietnam in the USMC and his time working for the State of California
on
power issues. He assured us that if they had listened to him the
only power crisis in California would be David's and my driving. I'm not sure if
Joe is
just a great host or if Dave and I have a real knack for bringing
folks down to our level of play as we all ended up with an identical score that
shouldn't be talked about. To cap it off, we were as good with the camera
as we were with the clubs and none of pictures came back in focus. It must have
been the heat!
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|
Enjoying good company in Palo Alto |
A few weeks later, Dave and I and our wives Lana and Ginnie joined Gail and Ed Hartford for dinner at a wonderful restaurant in Palo
Alto. Ed and
Gail married in 1980, so they are still in the process of putting there children
through
school -- not something that Dave and I envied. We did have
better luck on the picture front at this outing. (I think it was because we asked
the
Hostess to take it) so am enclosing it. From left to right: Gail, Ed,
my wife Ginnie, myself, Lana, and David.
 |
|
Phil Marsden and Skip Lynch dining in the Big Apple
|
Thanks to Phil Marsden for this note and
photo:
Here's a
photo of two 9th Company classmates, Skip Lynch
and myself, toasting to continued good health and fellowship. Martha and I
were on our way to a vacation cruise in Northern Europe and spent a few days in
New York to see the sights and catch a few plays. Skip is always the
gracious host ready to treat "out of towners" to a tour of his fair city. Part of
the tour
includes an introduction to fine cuisine at one of his favorite
restaurants. Martha stood us up in favor of braving the long lines at the "Jackie
O"
exhibit at the Met. Priorities ...?
Here's a note
from Colorado native and long-time Virginia resident Lou
Simpleman, who says he will be returning to the Rockies soon:
Jo Ann
and I have advanced our plans to move from northern Virginia to Colorado and will
be relocating this fall -- probably around October. The Institute for Defense
Analyses has offered me a position in Colorado Springs, so I will be working at
the
Joint National Test Facility on the Ballistic Missile Defense command and control
system. We intend to keep our place in New Bern, NC, so we will maintain our ties
in the east.
 |
|
Denny Vaughan, Bill Pawlyk, and Mario Fiori |
Mario Fiori, who was recently
sworn in as Assistant Secretary of the Army for Installations and Environment,
sent
this brief note and
accompanying photo:
Denny Vaughan and I visited Bill
Pawlyk this February. He's in good health, his spirits are good, and he
works
both as a tutor and for
a technology company that has a manufacturing line in the reformatory. I am still
collecting for a legal fund to help him when his lawyers think it
appropriate. This picture was taken during our excellent visit with
Bill.
 |
|
German-American soccer club |
From
Germany came this sports note from Charlie Newkirk:
This
photo explains how I spent much of my free time for the past quarter century. It
shows a German-American soccer club of which I was a co-founder 26 years ago.
The players range in age from 17 to 61 and include local Germans and soldiers from
the 1st infantry Division (The big red One). We play every Saturday in every kind
of weather at the Big Red One's headquarters at Leighton Barracks in Wuerzburg. I
am the young guy with the beard kneeling at the far right.
Have a
wonderful Thanksgiving season with your family and friends. After the big meal,
why
not pick up the phone and call a classmate you haven't spoken with for a while?
You'll both feel better for it..
QUALITY - '63
