Horton Deakins's Blog, page 30

Aloha oukou

Aloha Tower, Honolulu

Aloha to you all.  I took this shot from the deck of our cruise ship just before it departed Honolulu in September, 2006.  Perfect photo op.

I won't mention which cruise lines we took, but if you know which one sails under the US flag … we'll never patronize that company again.  The service was unbelievably horrible.  A high percentage of the service crew was required to be American, and I'm ashamed to say the work ethic of these folks was substandard in every way — and I'm being generous.  We paid a lot of money to have our first trip to the islands all but ruined; yes, it was quite the disaster.  We even complained to the company to get a portion of our non-voluntary gratuity returned, but our pleas fell on deaf ears.  My guess is they get a lot of similar requests.

Our first cruise, on the other hand, was wonderful.  We sailed the Caribbean with Princess about nine years prior to this trip, and the service was exemplary.

And now, to end on a higher note, feast your baby blues on this waterfall from a garden we visited on Maui.  One of my better low-light shots, if I do say so myself.

Maui Waterfll

Bienvenidos

El Dorado Royale, Mayan Riviera

Nice, quiet, scenic place with courteous employees – except the ones trying to sell you a time-share.  Just don't drink the water, and you'll be fine, but Pepto Bismol is sold in Mexico, too.  Yes, as long as the driver who takes you back to the airport doesn't get you killed.  Nevermind the rude customs officials; I'm sure they must have been having an off day.

Certainly was beautiful there.  That was way back in 2004.  Haven't repeated the trip.

Thine alabaster cities gleam

Illuminated crystal in Alabaster Caverns, Oklahoma

I took this photo of a crystal in Alabaster Caverns, Oklahoma, in July of 2010.  The cave lighting had been redone not too many years ago to replace it with cool lighting placed a bit more artistically.

Cool, eh?

Not all gloss is glass

Some call these the "glass" mountains, but I believe they are more properly called the "gloss" mountains.  They lie somewhere between Oklahoma City and Alabaster Caverns, just sort of stuck out there on their own.

Nice, eh?

Baby Pelican

Baby pelican on Marco Island, Florida, October 2007

A wonderful bird is the pelican,

His mouth can hold more than his belly can.

– Dixon Lanier Merritt (1879-1972)

From warring to waitstaff

Rest at the Restaurant

I shall conclude this wartime waxing nostalgic with a little R & R at an appropriately-themed restaurant where we had dinner one night in Nashville in December of 2004.  It was much like a war just getting there, as we chased a terrible ice storm all across Arkansas and much of Tennessee, nearly having to spend the night near Little Rock in our vehicle and arriving in Nashville the next day much later than we planned.

Most of our photos from this trip have a Christmas theme, so perhaps those are best left for another time.  There are some, however, that cannot wait, and for those of you who do not know about this particular Nashville attraction, you may well think this scene is located in Greece:  Behold, the Parthenon.

Nashville Parthenon

 

Laments of an ART

No photo this time, but I wanted to share the poem Dad wrote about his work on the Douglas Dauntless SBDs (short for Scout Bomber Douglas).  It was first published in the Naval Air Station's newspaper, Delandings.

With the Yagi antennas hanging down under the wings near their tips, any rocking of the wings during landings or takeoffs could, and often did, result in breaking off the antennas.  The cables for these antennas had to be routed through tight spaces in aluminum wings with sharp edges everywhere.  And work always needed to be finished an hour ago.

Laments of an A.R.T. (Aviation Radio Technician)

My body is full of pain

From so many odd positions

And I've lost so many friends

From my change in disposition.

My hands are being scarred

From the scratches that I get,

And my morale is lowered by

"Aren't you through with that job yet?"

Don't want to be called lazy,

Much less to be a quitter;

Don't mind repairing receivers

Or even a transmitter,

But this is the sad story

Of a disgusted gob.

I hope to hell I never get

Another antenna job.

Horton Deakins, Sr., October 30, 1943

Where I'd like to be right now

Lake Tahoe in the summer of 2004

My wife took this photo on a business trip seven years ago.  It looks so calm, cool, and inviting — it almost makes me forget about how hot it is right now where we live.

Slow But Deadly

SBD Dauntless Dive Bomber at San Diego Aerospace Museum

This is the primary type of plane Dad worked on to install and repair radar equipment.  The radar antenna, notably absent here, hung down near each wingtip and both could be rotated to fix a bearing on the target.  The type of antenna used by the radar was called "yagi," named, ironically, after the Japanese who invented it.

Note also the radio antenna mast in front of the cockpit, and the antenna wire that trails back and is affixed to the tail.  Behind the pilot was sat the gunner, and you can just make out the twin .30 calibre machine guns.

There is another unusual feature here that sticks out like a sore thumb, namely the perforated, split dive flaps.  They are the red panels full of holes on the rear edges of the wings.  The pilot used those to slow the plane's airspeed to begin the dive bombing run. 

Most, if not all, the dive bombers in DeLand, Florida, where my dad was stationed, had been removed from combat and were used only for training.  That didn't mean there weren't hazards, though.  Dad had to stand guard once in the swamp where a pilot and his gunner were killed when the pilot was unable to pull out of his dive.  The bodies had already been removed, but the classified radar equipment was still with the plane.  Curious thing, though — they didn't give him a gun.  The part that seemed to be most vivid in his memory, however, when he recounted the story to me was that he and the other fellow guarding the plane were dying for a cigarette.

Bok joy

Bok Tower in Florida

This painting will never hang alongside Monet or van Gogh, but it's special to me because it was painted by my father.  It is the Bok Carillon Tower, known as the Singing Tower.

I believe the date was 1945, and at that time that he was stationed at DeLand Naval Air Station in Florida.  He was a chief petty officer and an ART (no pun intended), or Aviation Radio Technician.  That was a bit of a ruse, however, since his main job was to repair and install radar equipment, which was considered top secret at the time.  Oh, he could fix radios, as well, but that's not what they sent him all over the country to learn about.

Although the war in Europe had ended, the outcome of the war in the Pacific was still uncertain, and estimates were emerging that, should we have to invade Japan, we could expect casualties of over one million men.  Not long after he created this painting, Dad was transferred to Alameda, in California, leaving behind his wife and his first two daughters, while he awaited orders to sail for Guam.  From there, he would probably have been assigned to an aircraft carrier (also known as kamikaze bait) to support the invasion.

His orders did come, but fortunately for me (because I didn't come along for several more years), on August 14 (15th in Japan), Japan announced that it would surrender.  The announcement came on Dad's birthday, and in a letter to my mother he said it was the best birthday present he had ever had.  He closed his letter by saying he was going out into the streets to witness the revelry, since he would "likely never see anything like this again."  And he didn't.  After Dad was discharged from the Navy, he never once got on another airplane.