Dennis Hollingsworth

Admin/MailCall/USS Tommy T

Again, the boilerplate:

The Comments are still out of commission for the meantime, that's alright by me. I don't miss the insidiously neccessary despamming chores. People chime in via email (the address is to your left in the margin), and that's been working out fine.
The comment function will be restored soon enough, reliant as I am for the help of a good friend for this fix. I told him no worries, to do it as his own pace, and I meant it.

Tranquilo, hombre. No pasa nada.

In terms of blogging, this is an ideal blogger's summer vacation -not having to clean spam drek every day.

It might be that the years are reeling our nostalgia a bit, but a few old friends from my old Navy days started a back and forth with a few pics from our time serving together on the USS Truxtun.

In this Admn/MailCall, a stroll down memory lane:

That would be the USS Truxtun, CG(N)-35.

It all started when Bob Burnidge wrote in with a surprise attachment:

Dennis,

I was going thru some old pictures to send to Steve Strassman and found that drawing you did of me while on the
Truxtun. Scanned it and will share with you. Hope your wife heals OK, bummer about her fall. I can imagine one of your next 'Honey Do' items will be to fix the floor.

I dimly remember a slow midnight watch when I thought I could anticipate what Bob would look like when he got out of the service. He was "short" then, under a hundred days. I, however had thousands of days to go. I would recieve taunts: "Rocks don't live that long!" .

Yea, yea.

Then, Tom Lawson penned a note:

Merry Christmas to you to Dennis, I haven't heard from Harold D. since he mustered out. I can't remember if I told you about my job but I am a field service engineer working on photolithographic equipment in the semiconductor industry. If you have time you can check out the company @ asml.com. My home time is spent raising my 12 year old son Andy, fly fishing and working on an old Jeep that will probably end up killing me. You can check the old girl out at www.gotwillys.com.

Then the topic gets personal, so I edit for discretion's sake.

A subsequent line is right on:

It looks like you've had quite a ride. Funny how all of us seem to trying to reconnect now that we've discovered our mortality, hey?

Yes, indeed.

Then Steve Strassman caught fire:

Dennis..........yes it's me. Was looking for some old Truxtun photo's and
sent out an email to everyone I had an email for.....including Tom. I did
finally find some......will attach a couple to this email.
Christmas starting out well......just told my sister & brother to go screw
themselves and not come over for dinner. They said they would get back to
me........another Walton's family Christmas.
Gonna jump in the shower and get ready to face the wrath of the family.
Steve

The topic got a little personal, but I thought that Steve's voice in this email was so characteristic of him that I had to include the whole thing. Steve is a great story teller. I've asked him to write a few of tehm for this blog... I hope he does someday.

He attached a few pics:

Steve, in our berthing compartment. It was located in the fantail of the ship, directly above the ships' screws. When we were underway, the room would thunder. My bunk is above to Strassman's left.

That's me alright. I think that I was eighteen, maybe nineteen at the time. We were sailors once, and young. What is it with me and hanging out on the foxhole of ships?

Time to read Ecclesiastes, I guess...

9 Be happy, young man, while you are young,
and let your heart give you joy in the days of your youth.
Follow the ways of your heart
and whatever your eyes see,
but know that for all these things
God will bring you to judgment.

10 So then, banish anxiety from your heart
and cast off the troubles of your body,
for youth and vigor are meaningless.

(Ahem)... and Amen.

Then Bob Burnidge wrote back:

Dennis Hollingsworth, aka Hollywood...

Your 1976 artisty on the USS Truxtun was well done, and perhaps psychic.

I hope you agree when you see your handy work compared to the FAA ID picture of 1979.

Yes, that's right. They nicknamed me "Hollywood".

Dennis Cimino wrote in:

yeah, Hollywood always had a knack for maybe seeing some of the future
back then, eh?

I remember back in aftermath of the PATCO strike, when I was up in St.
Paul in 1987, I took the controller's test. About 350 or more of us
started it, and when those of us who finished 'completed' it, we had
been whittled down to about 50 or so. The abstract shit in that test
blew most of those pea brain's out...little did those F.A.A. test
fuckers realize that sitting on grey metal "Life in Dark Water" fun for
Truxtun boys who sat in C.I.C. for hour on end, is about as abstract as
you can get without getting ridiculous. :)

anyway, Merry 'Belated' X-mas' to you guys, I had a pretty decent
christmas here, albeit different for sure. Ate a pretty darned good
turkey dinner over at Strassman's house down in Lacey last night.

dennis c.

Alright then.
The jig is up.
Now the world knows....
I am psychic.

Then, Steve got crazy and emailed a flurrry of photos to all the fellas. Here's a sampling:

Of course, Steve sent a bunch of the pics from the crossing the line ceremonies. I opted out, dissident that I was am. I cna get a little cantankerous sometimes. "Stubborn" is what my folks used to way.

Hanging out in the berthing compartment. Rapier wit gonna cut you 24/7.

Then, Steve sent a bunch of shots of the crew at a local bar in Subic Bay. General debauchery a nightly condition there. I wasn't in this shot, I don't remember why.

"Hutch" was from Philidelphia. A real unique character, he once smuggled an Australian friend onboard as we cruised for the Philippines from a port of call at Melbourne. Captain Billy Talley could have thrown him in the brig forever but instead gave him a lenient sentence. That's our Captain, a good man he was.

I don't know why Hutch did it. I'm sure he didn't either.

Then, Pat Costello got into the act, sending more pics:

Steve Easley was/is from Texas. Here, he sits watch in C.I.C., Combat Information Center. I like to think of it as the cerebellum of the ship.

Yes, that's me.
Back in the day.

On that day, a group of us went to the far side of this recreational island in Subic Bay for an afternoon of scuba diving. I remember a very nice tropical day, but since Olongapo's river dumped out into the bay, I shouldn't have been surprised to encounter condoms at 100 feet (or thereabouts, I don't remember the depth but we did get down to a hundred that day.). I guess that's why they called it "Sh-t River".

And if this all isn't enough, I flipped open the WestPac cruise book:

Pete Groen standing bridge watch.

Steve Easly again. He would chew tobacco and spit in a cup by the scope. Some of the saltier guys would like to smoke cigars, especially as the seas got rough.

More handiwork.
I usually kept a sketchbook by my side.

There it is.
A small blast from my past.

Posted by Dennis at January 18, 2006 12:32 AM