It was a family trip to San Diego. One of my sons, a 7th Fleet Sailor like me, was getting married to a lovely woman with a marvelous family on Point Loma, whose cliff are the last sight of America to tens of thousands of us who rode those proud ships. That is one reason The Midway Museum is so special. Of the three big ships I had a chance to ride, “Forrestal” is a part of whatever you shaved with this morning. “Coronado” is a reef, deliberately sunk not to be “the most advanced Command Ship,” but to be a reef for fish.
“Midway” was a different matter, and my sons made a point of reserving some of the precious time, occupied with joy and celebration, to take the Old Man back home. It had been a long story. When her long time as The Best Damn Carrier in the Fleet was done, she sat at the Inactive Ship Facility up in the PACNORWEST with her sisters, awaiting Navy Department determination of her fate. I followed the long process with interest, the intensity rising as the Department decided to donate her to the Midway Museum group who promised to give her historic life. Following her voyage south was fun, because it celebrated her survival.
I have not seen a number for my shipmates over her long service. Normally there were about 3,500 of us onboard for two or three-year long tours. Since she was commissioned in 1945, that means there were 45 years of service, and thus around 63,000 deployed in her steel embrace. It was unearthly to see a flash of her long bulk of gray in the downtown area, on approach to Lindburgh Field. It was even more astonishing seeing her rise up above the ancient sailing ships along the waterfront.
A word here about the wonderful people who make CV-41 still live. There are hundreds of folks involved, some of them former Midway Citizens, but many others who want to make Midway live as a symbol for her proud but discarded sisters. To sit in the back of our Ready Room with my sons is one of those times that turns the mind on its head, half lost in memory, half appreciating the status of her now, and the fact that the Hangar Bay that I remember as a crowded and complicated place is truly vast. The F4F that decorates her forward space would have been something to see on the way from sleep (01 Level, Frame 41) to meal in the Dirty Shirt Wardroom below the Hangar Bay, to work in the Carrier Intelligence Center amidships on the 01, to work-out down by Elevator 1, then back to work and eat and sleep in an endless, stately procession lit by florescent light and sometimes the endless field of stars over waves.
Going ashore was pretty special. The volunteers and docents do a marvelous job, and tossing the Quarterdeck, I half expected Yokosuka, or even better the wild raw fun of Subic Bay to await us. Instead, it was San Diego, America’s neatest big town. In the image immediately above, you can see our shipmate LTJG Winky, who has recently returned to Midway after forty years slumber in a footlocker. He is alert and happy to change duty stations. That group of people below him include members of the VF-151 Vigilantes, their wives and the working girls at the Club Rufadora in Subic City, 1980. We worked, too. The crowd of dungaree-and-wash-khaki is one of the dozens of Ship-Air Wing teams that helped make her a place that changed many lives.
Including mine.
Copyright 2021 Vic Socotra
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