<blockquote id="quote"><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica" id="quote">quote:<hr height="1" noshade id="quote"><i>Originally posted by Marc Tuton</i>

One of my fellow mechanics at work got out of the Navy less than 2 years ago. He said that the Shellback Initiation has been shitcanned entirely due to the females onboard everything now. Said too many ambulance chasers were getting rich off sexual harassment suits from this bit of naval tradition.
I know when I crossed on Cochrane(74 I think... ), it was optional to participate. I remember "Gramps" Feltz, torpedo master extraordinare, opted out in the Sonar Gang, and nobody messed with him at all. I cant imagine in the politically correct above all else that is todays military, that this choice would not be available. Oh but all that quick lawsuit cash though...
I think its sad to scrap the entire tradition for those that wish to participate, to placate lawyers and political corectness.
Reckon Bruce "Bubbles" Benton is SOL now!!!
All the best from the Tuton house to all yall!
mt.
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I was a plank owner and we crossed the equator on October 9, 1966. I still have the card that was given to us when we crossed that time. However, I am almost certain that we had crossed the equator also in 1965; I need to check the ship's book to see or perhaps my wife's collection of love letters; they serve as a day to day log. I was on duty. If my memory serves me right, in 1965 we were heading to the Coral Sea Festaval and went to Australia to pick up amo; we didn't get liberty and never left the ship.

Wes, you would have had to be with us in 1965 when we were on a West Pack Crusie on the way to Australia when we got deployed to Viet Nam. Isn't that the time we were with the Coral Sea and blew a boiler and had to go to Phillipines then on to Sasabo Japan where we stayed for 6 weekd doingn boiler repair?

Doug

AS I REMEMBER IT THAR JUS WEREN'T NO CHOICE IN THE MATTER YOU PLAYED THE GAME OR YOU PLAYED THE GAME. ALL I CAN SAY IS TOO BAD. I JUST CAN'T SEE WHERE A COUPLE OF SKINT KNEES AMD A BIT OF AN ASS PADDLIN EVER HURT NO ONE. AND SOME GREAT MEMORIES TA BOOT SO TOO BAD!!! RUSSELL SEAMAN MMFA X 2 '78 TO '80. STILL AINT FOUND THAT RELATIVE BEARING GREASE???

<blockquote id="quote"><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica" id="quote">quote:<hr height="1" noshade id="quote"><i>Originally posted by Doug Lancaster</i>

I was a plank owner and we crossed the equator on October 9, 1966. I still have the card that was given to us when we crossed that time. However, I am almost certain that we had crossed the equator also in 1965; I need to check the ship's book to see or perhaps my wife's collection of love letters; they serve as a day to day log. I was on duty. If my memory serves me right, in 1965 we were heading to the Coral Sea Festaval and went to Australia to pick up amo; we didn't get liberty and never left the ship.

Wes, you would have had to be with us in 1965 when we were on a West Pack Crusie on the way to Australia when we got deployed to Viet Nam. Isn't that the time we were with the Coral Sea and blew a boiler and had to go to Phillipines then on to Sasabo Japan where we stayed for 6 weekd doingn boiler repair?

Doug
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Doug, I don't believe we went to Australia during my days on Cochrane. I'd have remembered that since I wanted to real bad. I believe we had plans to go a couple of times, but it never actually happened.
If my memory serves me correctly 1A boiler blew after we left Okinawa. We went to Subic for repairs. I think we were there for about a week. We ended up having to go to Yokosuka for 21 days to get the repairs done. I could have stayed there indefinately, but my money ran out before their rum and Coke did.

Hey Fellas,

I am looking at my shellback card as we speak. I crossed april 19 1984. I was on the USS Cape Cod AD-43in the early 90's. We crossed the equator. It was no fun. We couldn't even make anyone crawl. The only thing we could do was make the wogs wear their clothes inside out and backwards. We has shelele's but they were for show only.

I remember that when I went thru we had two royal babies. they were EM1 Jones and EMCM Epperson. They were enjoying themselves way to much.