By Don
Doris was easily assimilated into the officer’s wives social circle and she soon learned the ranks of those ladies’ husbands and what everyone did socially. Most of this involved visiting other couples living ashore, visiting the Bachelor Officers Quarters (or BOQ) and especially happy hour every Friday at about 1700, 5 PM to you civilians. The O' Club bartender was a Bermudian and Leroy put your drink down as you sat and was quick to refill any almost empty glass. I was a rum and coke guy as was Doris. One evening, a LT arrived at the club in his Morris Minor and opened the front double doors. He drove the little car (they were all little in BDA) through the front entrance, turned right, turned left at the open double doors to the bar, drove up to the bar and said “Scotch and water Leroy, if you please.” He reported to the XO in the morning. A LCDR’s wife drank whiskey sours. Everyone knew how many drinks she had sipped as she kept the cherries in her glass. It was a place I have long remembered. There has never been a place even close to those memories. Hollywood would think it was fiction.
I was now a LT which meant I had been in the Navy for almost four years and that alone warranted a promotion. I was still the squadron Supply Officer and had three enlisted storekeepers to keep me from making mistakes. I challenged the one accounting line in an important report in which a few thousand dollars was kept there as a hedge for any errors. My guys were so good, I vowed to spend that money in that account on needed squadron equipment. One monthly report went to Norfolk taking the account down to a dime, scotch taped to the report. I was so proud of my troops. The CO knew what I had sent to Norfolk.
Trouble was, some equipment that we returned and listed as a credit was rejected by the Norfolk people and the result was that we, I...the squadron, had busted that report by around $100. I flew to Norfolk to explain my actions to a Supply Commander. To my CO, the amount was not the issue, I had sent an improper report. When the CDR called me into his office, I expected the worst. Instead he got me a cup of coffee and had me look down at about 20 cubes full of workers auditing reports. He told me most squadrons busted their OPTAR reports by thousands of dollars and if not for a lack of credit on some batteries, I would have been perfect. I flew back to tell the CO who said “OK Mr Lidke but no more dimes for effect.”
I was initiated into my first crew by being served a great looking plate of scrambled eggs, Joe Higareda did the cooking on 7-8 hour shifts. Most of the crew gathered around to watch as I dug into those eggs. Trouble was, Joe had put in a lot of Jalapeno peppers. I swallowed a lot of water as everyone laughed. Like all new pilots I started out as a Navigator. I did not know how to use a sextant but I was a crackerjack using LORAN and dead reckoning.
On one exercise, a Norfolk observer declared the first navigator dead and I took over. Problem was, when he died the dividers were under his body. No one can navigate without dividers and at a debriefing I was singled out as basically incompetent. The XO stood up and chastised the observer, telling him I was a new pilot, a jet pilot, and was a good officer. He also said that I was as good a navigator as some that had been trained as a navigator, which I hadn’t.
I eventually became a Patrol Plane Commander and had my own crew, usually a Co-pilot, a Navigator, a Plane Captain, an Ordnanceman, an Electrician, two Avionics technicians, and at least two others in training for those jobs. Always in training, always leadership.
P5M-2 flown by Don in Bermuda
The squadron's mission was to find Russian submarines which were located at the time by a top secret set of trackers around the Atlantic Ocean, one of which was on BDA. Any taxi driver knew where and what it was. In three years at BDA, I saw one Russian sub which was on the surface, holding “swim call.” By the way, at the time, the ever dangerous Albania also had a submarine. We had trouble finding our own subs even on a canned exercise. We went out at night using all sorts of electronic equipment including radar. When we found a sub or periscope on radar, we zoomed in at 200 feet and lit him up with a multi-million candlepower searchlight. One plane lit up the Bermuda Queen enroute to NY.
We flew missions when chimps like the famous Ham was sent into near orbit and recovered. We looked for downed planes and vessels in trouble and a few times worked with other planes and ASW Helos. We put Sunday papers and comics in sonobuoy tubes and when the sub we didn’t find surfaced when the exercise was over, we went down to 50 feet and dropped the floating tube just forward of the sub. It was immediately fished out. Those guys were at sea for a long time. I went aboard a sub when it was at a pier at our base. We deployed to Jacksonville, Port of Spain, Trinidad, the Bahia de San Juan, Key West, Corpus Christi, many days at Gitmo, and of course, my favorite, Pillsbury Sound in the Virgin Islands. While deployed, Doris lived alone in our cottage with Christian. She even could listen to our shortwave radio and hear us reporting to air controllers as we came home.
I got a prized new primary job as Division Officer of 120 or so crew members for all the squadron A/C. I loved that job and learned a bit of leadership in the process. Most of those men were great guys. Only two or three were problems and that was a great ratio. It was getting to be time for a set of orders to somewhere. I had requested a fighter squadron, on any coast, any type aircraft for “any nationality.” Naturally, the Navy sent Doris and I to Mississippi.