Rick Larson, MMCM (SS)(Retired)

I joined the Navy in the spring of 1967 through the Delay Entry Program to allow time to finish some college courses.

In August of 1967 I was sent to Great Lakes Naval Training Command. Having not paid much attention to the earlier lectures given by the instructors concerning the various job opportunities, because I wanted to ride Swift boats in the Mekong Delta as either an Engineman or Quartermaster I thought it would be a shoe in. When the counselor looked at my record and saw all the science and math classes I had taken in college he asked me why I had not signed up for the Nuclear Power Program? My reply was "What is that?" which got me in trouble for not paying attention during the previous training lectures.

So having no idea about the program and getting some friendly (ha ha) persuasion from that Chief Petty Officer I enrolled into the program. The Nuclear Power Program had four job postings ET, EM, IC and MM and after some discussion the MM (Machinist Mate) rating seemed the most interesting. Still did not know much about submarines only that some of the graduates will go there and some will go to the nuclear surface fleet.

From Boot Camp just had to pack my sea bag and walk across the street to "A" schools there at Great Lakes. This was the winter of 1967 and I learn a valuable lesson about swapping duty sections. One of the guys in my group wanted to go see his family in Chicago and asked if I would take his weekend duty. I said I would. Not having the Weather Channel back then, I did not know we were going to get hit by a big snow storm that started Friday and snowed through the weekend. In typical Navy fashion the Duty Officer decide he wanted the sidewalks and grinders shoveled so for the next two days the duty section not standing barracks watch was put to clearing the snow. It was the coldest longest weekend I had ever spent.

After graduating from Machinist Mate A school they gave us two choices Bainbridge, Maryland or Mare Island, California. This was an easy answer yes warmer California over colder Maryland. So I attended the Mare Island Nuclear Power school for six months with plans of going to Nuclear Power prototype in either Boston Spa, New York or Windsor, Connecticut. The Navy decided I needed to go to Idaho Falls for the next six months of schooling.

After an eight hour day we had the joy of riding a bus for one to one and half hours back to town. For some of us that was sometimes the only sleep we would get.

From prototype I was selected to attend Engineering Laboratory Technician (ELT) school there in Idaho. Three months later I was ready to go to Submarine school in New London but the needs of the Navy overruled and I was kept as a staff pick-up instructor for two years. By this time I had re-enlisted for the big ship over bonus and an advance school on Air Conditioning. Some time between 1969 and 1971 the Navy stopped sending nuclear power sailors to submarine school and sent us straight to the fleet. I guess it was to save money because we had been in school for so long they wanted there money out of us.

When I left Idaho I had orders to the USS Jack SSN 605 in New London after I attended Air Conditioning & Refrigeration School in San Diego, California. San Diego was great, spent many a liberty hour in Tijuana, Mexico.

Upon graduation from AC&R school was getting ready to travel back East when I read my orders to report to the USS Halibut, SSN 587 out of Mare Island. Spent three years onboard and I can remember my very first day which happened to be my birthday. The duty chief welcome me aboard said happy birthday and you are in tonight's duty section report to Bruce VanFleet your section leader. After my three years onboard the Halibut, I can neither confirm nor deny any of the statements made about the Halibut in the book Blind Man's Bluff.

While on Halibut I got married and wanted some duty station where I only spent eleven months out of 36 months in our home port. On my dream sheet I requested duty in Holy Lock, Scotland at Squadron 14 aboard the USS Canopus AS-34. Was assigned to the R-5 division (Radiological Repairs) spent eight months in Scotland when the Canopus was relieved by the USS Holland AS-32. I was suppose to cross deck to the Holland but my Commanding Officer had my orders changed because I was the only First Class Petty Officer left out of a group of nine. So I rode the Canopus through the yards in Charleston, S.C., and took her to Squadron 16 in Rota, Spain.

After we relieved the USS Simon Lake AS-33 the navy transferred me back to Charleston and the USS Von Steuben SSBN 632 Gold crew for requalification as a nuclear power operator. Did three deterrent patrols while onboard two of them out of Holy Lock. But this time I was looking for shore duty and found it at the Fleet Ballistic Missile Submarine Training Command in the Engineering section. During my three years as an instructor I made chief, won a Navy Achievement Medal for my work on the preventive maintenance program and received the Training Specialist Award.

Having to return to the fleet I was sent to the USS Nathan Hale SSBN 623 Gold out of Charleston. By then the Navy started homesteading the families just to save on moving cost so it was easier to get a boat in the area. King Bay, Georgia had opened in the late 70's so I had ample opportunity to get a boat close by. After reporting to the Nathan Hale I thought I had it made because there was a very senior chief (E-7) who I worked for three weeks before he was medically dis-qualified from submarines and I was given the Machinery Division. It was a fly by one's pants for the first couple of patrols.

I had developed a great friendship with the A-gang chief because when things broke it was either him or me whom were pulled out of our beds to go and oversee the repairs to the equipment. The Blues Brothers movie was big then so everyone in the Goat Locker use to call us the Blue's Brothers because we had such bad luck on equipment breaking.

During one of our patrols the boat lost the radar due to the gears breaking in the circuit box that controlled the drive motor. The Captain was not very happy sitting dead in the water in a heavy fog bag in Long Island Sound. He knew about the USS S-51 being rammed back in the 1920's and did not want the same mishap occurring to his ship. The Navigations chief asked me if we in the machinery division could make a new gear since there were none in stores department. I knew we did not have anything that could make this small gear so I told my fellow chief I could repair it and get the radar working but it would not be to specifications and not to tell anyone until we got into port so it could be repaired correctly. He agreed and we started working on the emergency repairs. I found two can lids in the galley that were slightly larger than the broken gear and drilled and tapped them so they covered the gear. Did the same for the other drive gear and then found an o-ring to fit. The unit started work and after some minor adjustments we had our radar working and we could see again. After that patrol I received a Letter of Commendation from the Squadron commander for innovated repairs to a critical navigation system. To this day I still which I could have seen the technician's face when he opened that box and found my makeshift repairs.

During my time on the Nathan Hale I was prompted to Senior Chief and made the Engineering Department Senior Enlisted Advisor. Nearly 45% of the enlisted crew reported to the Chief of the Boat (COB) through me. This was fine until the COB found out that the engineering personnel would call me COBRA (Chief of the Boat Reactors Aft). The COB tried to stop it but the more he did the more the guys would continue to call me COBRA just to get at the COB.

By 1986 the Nathan Hale was scheduled to go to Newport News shipyard for repairs and determination if she would be decommissioned due to the SALT II agreements. Not wanting to move to Norfolk, I transferred to the USS Frank Cable AS-40 at Squadron 4, Charleston, South Carolina. My orders were to the R-10 (Nuclear Repairs Division) but the day I stepped aboard the Captain had other ideas and assigned me to the R-5 Division (Radiological Controls). When I talked to him about my orders to R-10 division the only thing he said was Senior Chief this is my ship and I will use you where I need you. So a two and one-half year stint in R-5 was repeated. In July of 1986 the entire Squadron 4 was transferred to the Virgin Islands for a three week advance deployment trip to see if we could supply the submarine squadron away from our home base.

By late 1987 I had learned I was making Master Chief which was a major accomplishment. The biggest advantage was being taken off the watch bill. Finally, after twenty years I did not have to stand any more duty sections. In 1988 we were deployed to the Mediterranean to La Maddeleine, Italy for eight months so I finally got a Med cruise in the easy way. Upon returning to Charleston that later that year our new Captain transferred me to R-10 Division due to the lack of available Warrant Officer to fill the assistant Division Officer billet. I finished out my career retiring in January 1990 with hope of working for the Charleston Naval Shipyard.

With the cut backs the military was going through all hiring was was stopped so I found a job with Martin Marietta in Piketon, OH where we enriched uranium ore for processing nuclear reactor fuel. I have been with the company since July 1990 and presently hold a position the Plant Shift Superintendents Office overseeing the Operations for the General Manager.

THE PATCHES

As for my interest in patch collecting started back when I went to Nuclear Power School at Mare Island. I obtained my first command patch to show the duty station I was assigned. From Mare Island went to NPTU Idaho and onto San Francisco Bay Submarine Group. They were shutting down the Group to move it to San Diego so I was not able to get a patch.

From there I went to USS Halibut and started collecting submarine patches from all the boats that were around. I wished I had collected more of them the first time I was at Mare Island in 1968. There were more diesel boats overhauling there then than 1972. So when ever possible I would get any submarine patch I could and this included the specialty patches that were designed for particular events or patrols. During this time period I meet many patch collectors who lived manly on the East coast and we would trade patches that we found.

Two people the come to mind are Barry Commons from BC Patch and Jim VanFleet (to me the King of Patch collecting) who passed away many years ago. I had the opportunity to meet Jim in 1982 and we spent many hours comparing the different patches. It was Jim who showed me the variations in a boats patch and he talked about how some patches told stories to the crew so they would remember that particulate time in their life.

He said the specialty patches the ones that show a West Pac cruise or a Med cruise were like the Battle Flags the WWII sailors made to honor their war experience. Since we were the silent service we could not talk about where we went what we did or what we saw. So the patch was a way to remember that patrol or time onboard the boat with out giving away any details.

The cruise patches generally denote the time frame and Ports visited. All information our enemy would have know from there spy network. Jim also showed me variations in the design of the ships crest and this depicted the different task/jobs the submarine was assigned. A good example is the change of the ship' designator. From SS to SSK, SSR, SST, AGSS etc., all these changes represent different crews different time periods. Even the nuke boats had their changes, SS(N) submarine nuclear early days to SSN present time, the only SSR(N) Triton to SSN as an emergency shelter for the President. We had our SS(G)N Halibut the only Regulus guided missile submarine until 2006 when four SSBN's were converted over to SSGN's

Battle flags of WWII were each boats individual character and accomplishment. There developed a code system to depict what type of ship was sunk or other activity such as rescuing pilots, shelling shore establishments blowing up trains (USS BARB SS-220) and even a crude rocket attack on Japan ( the beginning of the missile age for submarines. On various submarine websites one may find the the history of a boats Battle Flag or variations in their ship's patch. What we are trying to do here at PIGBOATS is to put all this information at you finger tips for information and your enjoyment. I have met a few WWII vets who have told the origins of their boats patch and with their permission relaying this oral history to data bits for other generations. So if you have any knowledge of how a boats patch was designed, or by whom or what the design meant please share this information with us. You will be given credit for your story. Remember we are losing our WWII vets at an alarming rate and their history as well as our will disappear without a concern effort to record it. If I do not have your ships patch or specialty patch on display please write to me at Rick AT pigboats.com and send along your information. It will be added to the listing as soon as possible after receipt.

Ric Hedman started out small with his early submarine pictures and over the years many people have contributed to his site. I am hoping the patch site can generate the same type of interest along with the information. So please enjoy the entire website and when possible record our history.

Thanks,
Rick Larson, MMCM (SS)(Retired)
© September 2007