Enlisting in the Navy

Carl rode the train with his fellow recruits out to basic training in California. When he stepped off the train in San Diego, he was overwhelmed. It was the first time he had seen the ocean, palm trees and California sun. He loved it!

After getting processed at the base, one of the first things Carl did was stow his good civilian clothes in a YMCA locker downtown. Carl didn’t want to be identified as “just a sailor”. He prided himself on dressing nice and keeping a civilian identity.

Just days into boot camp, the drill sergeant found out that Carl had 4 years of National Guard experience and he made Carl troop leader. Even though his fellow recruits teased him, Carl enjoyed the experience and found he gravitated to being a leader.

When Carl enlisted, he told the officer he was interested in flight training school. Carl had been fascinated by aviation since he was a boy; reading stories of the Wright Brothers and newspaper accounts of barnstormers and air shows. This interest was all academic though, Carl didn’t actually see an airplane until he arrived in California!

Immediately after boot camp, Carl was approved for flight training and was sent across San Diego bay to North Island. Carl didn’t complete high school, so this was his higher learning. The trainees studied aeronautics and took flying lessons. With the prospect of following his dream of flying and the close camaraderie of his class, this was one of Carl’s favorite times. After six weeks of training, Carl soloed and completed his training. He was sent to Aviation General Utility School at Great Lakes, Illinois for 3 months to train with sea planes.

After flight training, in Oct 1929, Carl was assigned to the carrier Saratoga, where he performed aircraft engine maintenance. The Saratoga was one of the first aircraft carriers. Naval aviation was so new that the Saratoga was initially built as a cruiser, but in mid-construction, was converted to a carrier. In fact, the first time a plane had landed on a moving carrier occurred just 15 years before Carl’s arrival!

Since aviation was still developing, there were some brutal accidents aboard ship. Carl witnessed a terrible mishap where an airplane that was landing on the deck broke the steel cable that was supposed to hook the aircraft and slow it down. The cable snapped with such force that it lashed out and severed the legs of a dozen men standing on the deck.

Many planes erred on takeoff or landing and plunged into the ocean. One airplane hooked the cable, but veered off the landing platform and went over the side. The plane was suspended against the side of the ship with the cockpit underwater. The pilot couldn’t open his hatch against the force of the water and was drowned.

Carl proved to be a quick study and was anxious to start flying missions, but unfortunately Navy Command issued orders that profoundly affected Carl’s career. They decided that new aviation recruits shouldn’t go directly into flight training after boot camp because they weren’t qualified to do any other job, so they changed pilot qualifications. In late Feb 1930, all pilots-in-training, including Carl, were disqualified and removed from the program.

But the disqualifications happened in an indirect way. In Carl’s case, a routine physical exam revealed that he had a “deviated nasal septum” and was he was disqualified from flying. This was a major disappointment for Carl. He was demoralized and bitterly disappointed. Adding insult to injury, he was reassigned to mess duty on the Saratoga and had to serve food to the very guys he used to work and fly with! Carl considered leaving the Navy when his term expired. But as disappointing as this was, it would have profound implications later in his career.

Carl threw himself into acquiring other training. When a Chief on the Saratoga realized Carl was available, he put Carl to organizing the office files. When he wrapped up the task in short order, the Chief told Carl that he had the makings of a yeoman. In June, 1931 Carl qualified as Gun Range Operator and was promoted to Yeoman 3^rd class. Soon after, he qualified as an Expert Rifleman. The next few years Carl divided his time between the Saratoga and the base in San Diego.

In 1932, the Saratoga stopped in the territory of Hawaii (which became a state in 1959). The men were anxious to go ashore in Honolulu, but the commanding officer had a problem. It was dangerous for the men because, just a week before, a sailor had caught his Hawaiian wife and her lover in bed together and killed them both. The natives in Honolulu were so upset that it was dangerous for any sailors to go into town. The captain decided to let his men go ashore in Maui instead. Maui was so underdeveloped, there wasn’t even a pier to dock at, so Carl and his shipmates had to swim to shore!

Carl remembers there was only the small town of Kihei and lots of sugar cane and pineapple fields. It may have been boring for most of the men, but Carl enjoyed the pristine beaches.