Another Wonderful Ebabe's Christmas...

This year, the variety was most impressive at Mary Ann's store, Ebabe's Gifts. I thought you might enjoy a sampling. You might have to wait a few seconds for the slideshow to load...



Speaking of Ebabe's, one of our local TV stations, WHNT, is running a "Best of the Valley" competition, and Mary Ann's store has been nominated! If you have shoped here and would like to vote, simply go to www.whnt.com, go to the menu item "Best Of" then to "Shopping," and then to "Gift Shops" to cast your vote. We sure appreciate your support!

Sunday Surprise...

One of the Internet forums that I visit is the "Early Plymouths" site at www.earlyplymouths.com. A few weeks ago, they announced that they were going to produce a calendar and invited members to submit photos. I sent a few in, never thinking that any might be selected.

Well, this morning I got a chance to see the calendar for the first time. Right there, in the month of June, was one of the photos I submitted.

That must mean that the roadster is now world famous. Wow!!!

The Siloo Engine Flush Incident

In the mid 1970's I went through my "retractable" period. I purchased, in succession, several Ford Skyliners of 1958 and 1959 vintage. These were Ford's so-called "retractable hardtops," in which a steel top was articulated and mechanized to disappear into the trunk area. One of mine was a very low mileage yellow and white one just like the one in the picture above. It had belonged to a young man who had been killed during his army basic training. The boy's father had stored the car for several years as a memorial to his son. After he sold the car, I became its second subsequent owner. The car had about 20,000 miles on its odometer.

The problem with a car that has been static for a number of years is that the deposits on the inside of the engine dry out and harden. The engine on my car suffered from that situation, but a friend of mine recommended a product called "Siloo Engine Flush" to remedy the problem. You merely let your engine oil get a quart low. When you're ready to change oil, you add a quart of this engine flush to the crankcase, run the engine at fast idle for a few minutes, and then drain the oil. Out comes the oil along with some of the built-up crud that was residing inside the engine, waiting to do harm. Nothing could be simpler!

So, for the next several times I changed oil, I used this stuff, and consistently I got lots of garbage out of my engine. (I believe that the product is now sold as CRC Engine Flush)

On a certain Saturday, it was time for my next oil change, but I was on my way from Pascagoula over to Pass Christian, Mississippi, to pick up a date. I stopped at my favorite Gulf station in Ocean Springs and asked Bill, the owner, if he had time to do an oil change on my retractable. "Not a problem," he replied.

I explained that I would like to flush the engine first. He was familiar with the Siloo product and told me to go ahead and put it in the engine and run it for a few minutes, which I did. Then, I pulled the car into the shop bay over the lift and turned off the ignition. Bill raised the car, drained the oil, and replaced the drain plug. He lowered the car and asked me to release the hood. I popped the hood open. Then the excitement began.

Bill leaned over the fender and removed the filler cap from the Cal Custom polished valve cover that I had installed on the car's Police Interceptor 352 engine. He set the cap aside and jammed the metal spout into the first quart of oil. As he began to pour the oil into the filler hole, the back edge of the can must have touched the battery terminal, causing a spark.


A gigantic explosion erupted from the engine. A ball of fire enveloped Bill's head as the can of fresh oil spun wildly out of his hand arching upward and spewing oil in every direction. Instinctively, I closed my eyes, but when I opened them, I saw that Bill had been transformed. His eyebrows were gone. His beard was reduced to ashen stubble. His hair was gone back to a point on his head where the fire had apparently reached. He looked like some occult monk. What neither Bill nor I had thought about was the fact that the engine flush had left lots of explosive vapors in the crankcase. They had ignited in a most impressive display.

Bill said more than a few choice words. He invited me to never bring this #@*&%$) car into his shop again. I looked at the label of the engine flush later on and it read like a recipe for environmental disaster -- acetone, esters, aldehydes, xylenes, butoxyethanol... -- a soup of carcinogens.

I never again found it necessary to use Siloo's most amazing product.

Happy New Year!

As we start the new year, considering all those new leafs we want to turn over, let's not forget to give thanks for all the blessings we enjoy. And let's have a great 2010, one day at a time.

Miss Guernsey and the Amazing Explosion...

Oneida School, with gratitude to thee, Our hearts offer you this melody...

I attended Oneida Junior High School (now known as Oneida Middle School) in Schenectady. We were blessed with many wonderful, dedicated teachers -- Ms. Gladys Wise in languages, Mr. Schneck, the shop teacher, Ms. Tuttle my homeroom English teacher, Mr. Gay the math teacher and half-blind sponsor of the audio-visual club (remember the 16mm Bell & Howell projectors?), and so many others whose names I simply can't remember. But one stands out above all others -- Ms. Mildred G. Guernsey, the best algebra teacher ever. She would prefer Miss Guernsey, thank you very much. She would never be one to pussyfoot around with an ambiguous title such as Ms.

I had Miss Guernsey for 8th grade algebra. On the first day of her class, most of the rules were made quite clear. We would be addressed by our proper names -- one full name, one initial, and our surname. I became Robert M. Mead. I still use that formal name today on most of my work, thanks to Miss Guernsey. Andy Silber begged her to let him remain "Andy," since his proper name was Cornelius Anderson Silber. There was no compromise. He became C. Anderson Silber in Miss Guernsey's world.

Her teaching was superb. There were countless stories through which she taught the principles of algebra. One day, while we were about to address the subject of remainders, Miss Guernsey asked me to stand. "Robert M. Mead, if a fellow had guests over and was about to serve them apple pie for dessert (Not that I approve of apple pie), and if this fellow realized that he had cut all the pieces the same size except for one piece that was noticeably bigger, what might he do?" The answer she was looking for was to trim down the last piece to match the others -- thus a "remainder." My answer was a little more self serving: "Miss Guernsey, I would pass the pie plate to all my guests. If they were polite, they'd all take the smaller pieces and I'd be left with the biggest piece!" Her response was immediate.

"Robert M. Mead, you are a rude, selfish pig. And perhaps that explains those extra pounds around your middle. For every extra pound you carry, your heart has to pump blood through an extra 2 miles of blood vessels!" It was classic Miss Guernsey.

There were countless other math-teaching parables. We measured Mr. Peterson's house "from the basement to the ridgepole" using the rule of sines. In the process, we learned that Mr. Peterson grew prize geraniums and had spoken once to Miss Guernsey's garden club.

We would naturally stand when spoken to or addressing the class. We would form our written numerals with great care. If a 0 or 6 or 8 was not "closed" properly, points would be deducted. We were taught to make our 5's in one stroke so there could never be a detached top stroke. Penmanship was important.

So was homework. It was 10 points off for every day late and after 5 days, it didn't matter. All scores went to 0. And homework made up half of our grade.

Miss Guernsey was also a disciplinarian in other ways. If she snuck up on you while you were talking to your neighbor, you could expect to have her clap on your back several times with a chalk-laden eraser (or two). If she caught you chewing gum in class, you might expect to stand outside (rain, shine, sleet, snow) for the remainder of the class. When she rendered judgement, she would poke the offender in the solar plexus repeatedly with her bony, gnarled index finger as she lectured the poor victim. We tended to behave.

Which brings me to the great explosion incident. One of my classmates, Steve Anonymous, had decided to make some pipe bombs and use them to attack teachers. The first victim was a woman who lived near the intersection of Rankin Avenue and Eastern Avenue. The bomb blew her house off its foundation and damaged several neighboring houses. As the police were trying to locate the culprit, he struck again, this time attacking Miss Guernsey's house.

My recollection is that she wasn't at home and that the explosive device was placed in a bay window in her dining room. It removed most of the bay window. When Miss Guernsey arrived home, she noticed an acrid smell in her house and it was cold. She then discovered the damage and police were soon on the scene. Within a couple of days, they captured and arrested Stephen W. Anonymous. Steve's father was a prominent local businessman. Steve was given probation. We all felt that he had gotten away with the bombings because of his father's political connections. But all the influence in the world couldn't protect him from Miss Guernsey's wrath.

The first day he returned to class, Miss Guernsey wasted no time. "Mr. Stephen W. Anonymous, stand and come forward. Steve, trying to be cool, shuffled forward and mumbled, "Yes, Miss Guernsey." She maneuvered him into the corner and the Index Finger went to work. Poking him hard in the chest, she began, "Mr. Anonymous, you are nothing but a coward and a common criminal." She lectured him in front of the class for 5 minutes. "Are you so afraid of a little old woman that you have to try to kill her? Did you think you wouldn't be caught? How could you be so stupid?" He broke down in front of his class mates. Miss Guernsey had made her point.

As a footnote, I found a more recent article about Steve on the Internet. He is apparently still trying to learn his lesson. I also found a wonderful page of recollections of Miss Guernsey -- gone but certainly not forgotten.

A Christmas Memory...

The Wallace Company, shown on an old postcard

Three of my grandparents had died by the time I was 4 years old. I have very faint memories of my grandfathers Mead and McLaughlin and no memory at all of my grandmother Mead. But I remember my grandmother McLaughlin because she lived with us for many years. "Nana," as we called her, lived in my parents' house from 1944 until she passed away in May of 1957. To say that Nana spoiled us kids would be an understatement. She lived her life to love and cater to us three grandchildren -- my sister Ann, my brother Bill, and me.

One of the fondest memories I have, usually around this time of year, is going shopping with my grandmother. In the late 1940's, Schenectady still had a thriving downtown commercial area. State Street boasted three major locally-owned department stores -- The Wallace Company (Est. 1892), The Carl Company (Est. 1906), and the H.S.Barney Company (Est. 1855). These were elegant centers of retail commerce. I recall that each store had certain features we no longer see:

• elevators that had real human operators who announced each floor and it's departments
• a well-maintained cafeteria for patrons
• departments in which salespeople knew most of their patrons by name
• exquisite merchandise displays, especially at holiday seasons (often animated figures in their main display windows)
• doormen at the main entrance to each store
• Carl's featured "Gold Bond Dividend Stamps" through which you could "earn" additional merchandise
• delivery service

My Grandmother would bundle us kids up and we'd proceed a block away to the bus stop at the corner of Gillespie Street and Union Avenue. We'd each want to put our own token in the box as we boarded the number 9 bus headed for "Downtown - State Street" as displayed on the sign above the windshield. And off we'd be on another excursion with Nana.

The stores were brightly lighted and always crowded. This was, after all, a city prospering in the postwar commercial boom. We had the world headquarters and main plant of the General Electric Company and the headquarters of the American Locomotive Company. (No one could foresee that in ten years, GE would "decentralize" much of the Schenectady operation and that ALCO would be KO'd by General Motors' Electromotive Division.) It was a carefree, joyous, happy time.

As we entered each store, we kids would of course want to head for the toy department. I usually wanted to see the latest display of Lionel electric trains. Barney's and Carl's had the very best toy departments. And the toy department manager at Barney's was Miss Mayer, who happened to be a patient of my father, so we usually got extra special treatment there (it was on the fourth floor, to the right of the elevator). And of course, each store had to try and outdo the others in the lavishness of it's Santa Claus presentation. These were premiere times for a little kid!

Invariably my sister and brother and I wanted way too much for Christmas. My parents tried to maintain some moderation in gift giving to try to keep us focused on the nativity as the reason we were celebrating. But my grandmother didn't always share that sentiment and often went in a direction of extravagance. I've already written about my Gilbert Atomic Energy Lab. I received it for Christmas in 1951. But there were other times that Nana went overboard in my parents' eyes. I can still recall many of the gifts. But the shopping trips are just as precious in my memory as the Christmas mornings.

Barney's is now an apartment complex

A Ride on a Nuclear Submarine

USS Seawolf (SSN-575)

In 1963, I was serving aboard the USS Hugh Purvis (DD-709). I was in the engineering department, serving as Damage Control Assistant (DCA). We had recently returned from Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, where we had been sent for the Cuban missile crisis. After returning to Newport, Rhode Island, our home port, for a few weeks, we found ourselves now serving in the operating areas near Key West, Florida.

We were one of the first destroyers in the fleet equipped with the QH-50C, Drone AntiSubmarine Helicopter (DASH). Our assignment while serving in and around Key West was to test the operational effectiveness of the DASH and the newest version of the Mark 44 torpedo. We had a target ship assigned to this mission -- USS Seawolf (SSN-575).

USS Hugh Purvis (DD-709)

The method used to test the weapons system was straightforward. Seawolf would approach us from a distance while submerged. We would locate her using our sonar. We would launch our DASH which would carry one or two Mark 44, Mod 0 torpedoes without explosive warheads. These torpedoes had telemetry instrumentation in lieu of real warheads. Once we dropped the torpedo into the ocean, it would activate and start searching for the target. The telemetry would record every detail of the system's performance -- the acquisition of the target, the homing system's performance, battery performance, and so on.

The torpedoes were preprogrammed to not descend below a certain depth. That way, we could avoid impact of the dummy torpedo with the submarine. I believe that was intended to avoid damaging the screws of the target vessel. We learned by experience that the depth-limiting feature didn't always function correctly.

We had a navy pilot, Lieutenant Don DeLude, aboard as our DASH officer. Don would stand in a small wing of the 01 deck adjacent to the DASH launch area and fly the drone helicopter by radio control. He would launch the helicopter and guide it to a point several hundred yards from the ship visually. Then, control of the DASH was transferred to the ship's Combat Information Center (CIC). The strategy was to fly the helicopter to a location above the perceived location of the submarine and drop the torpedo. By dropping the torpedo close to the sub, it reduced the amount of time the submarine had to take evasive action. It was interesting and exciting work.

The Seawolf was a most unusual ship. She was originally built with a superheated steam boiler system and nuclear reactors cooled by liquid sodium. Both of these proved to be very expensive to maintain and in 1958, barely a year after her commissioning, she returned to Groton, Connecticut for a 2-year conversion back to a more conventional water-cooled reactor system. The ship was a one-off design, longer than a football field and displacing over 4000 tons when submerged.

One day at the conclusion of testing, Seawolf surfaced not far from Hugh Purvis. Her skipper appeared on the sail (conning tower) with a bullhorn. He hollered across to our bridge that it might be fun to exchange a couple of officers "to see how the other half lives." I was standing watch along with Lou Grassini, a Lieutenant from Philadelphia, who was the Gunnery Officer. Our Captain, Commander James C. Linville, looked at Lou and me and told us to get our reliefs up on the bridge and pack a duffle bag for a couple of days on Seawolf. I couldn't believe it!

Lou and I got ready in no time and the Seawolf launched a small rubber raft that picked us up and delivered us a few hundred yards away to their ship. I remember how slick the hull was as we stepped out of the raft which was sloshing against the round hull. We greeted the Captain, LCDR Thomas B. Brittain, Jr., and went below. Lou and I were probably like a couple of kids at Disneyland.

One of the first impressions I had was one of great spaciousness. I had made a few short cruises on World War II era diesel boats while I was a Midshipman. They were incredibly cramped. This vessel was huge by comparison. I recall at one location there was actually a small staircase instead of a ladder. Many of the interior surfaces were covered with wood-grain formica which gave the interior a homey feeling compared to most combatants. Our bunks were roomy. We were given a tour of the ship, including parts of the reactor operating area. That fascinated me because I had served as Main Propulsion Assistant on Purvis for two years.

The next morning we started the testing exercises. It was very different as seen from the perspective of the attacker who suddenly comes under attack. We would go to some predetermined depth, silently try to sneak up on the Hugh Purvis using only passive sonar. Suddenly we would hear a splash and then hear the torpedo motor winding up. The conning officer of the Seawolf would take evasive action. We would suddenly be descending at a steep angle and everyone would watch the depth indicator until we leveled off at some depth in excess of 500 ft. Then we would accelerate to a speed in excess of 20 knots, zig-zagging, in an attempt to avoid or outrun the torpedo. Sometimes we succeeded.

After a couple of days, Lou and I had to return to the surface navy, but what an unforgettable experience we had been privileged to share.

Interestingly, within a few days, our evaluation was cut short when one of the dummy torpedoes made a direct hit on the screw of the submarine. It did enough damage to one of the blades that the sub had to limp into port to get the screw replaced.

** After I initially published this item, I heard from a former Hugh Purvis shipmate, Bill Leslie. He was our Operations Officer while I served with him. He reminded me that it was during one of these torpedo testing exercises that we were informed of President Kennedy's assassination. I remember that vividly because I was Junior Officer of the Deck at the time. Bill Leslie had the unenviable job of using our underwater communications system (known as "Gertrude") to inform the submarine of the nation's loss. We returned to Key West to observe the days of mourning.

3-22-2016 -- Today I corresponded with Peter Papadakos, the son of the gentleman who founded the Gyrodyne Company of Amaerica, builders of the original DASH.  He was kind enough to send me the following photographs, taken when the DASH development team was aboard Hugh Purvis:

Lt(jg) Harry C. Royal III ("Trip" Royal), ASW Officer, and
Lt(jg) Don Delude, DASH Operations Officer

Lt(jg) Don Delude and the DASH flight detachment
aboard USS Hugh Purvis (DD-709), late 1962

Lt(jg) Don Delude and unidentified telephone talker during
DASH flight operations aboard USS Hugh Purvis (DD-709)

DASH hovering near Hugh Purvis (DD-709), 1962