Cameron Park Fire Department, the beginning.

This is the dedication plaque that was placed on the new fire station on Country Club Drive.

This shot shows the Chief's 57 pickup, 51 Dodge grass truck, 1956 P.G.&E. pickup, and the brand new 1969 Ward LaFrance. All in Herb's front yard. For the life of me I can't see why the neighborhood would complain!

Here I am loading hose in the back of the P.G&E. pickup. We had not acquired the other rigs yet.

The Chief's pickup in downtown Placerville, December 1969.

Cameron Park Fire Departments first fire chief, Herb Owen, moved up from the bay area a few months before he asked me to make the move to help start the fire department. I moved up on March 28, 1969. My first official day would be April 1, 1969. Who would have thought that I would start a new carer on April Fools Day! Oh well Ill worry about this in about thirty or forty years. When Cameron Park Fire Department board of directors signed a contract with The California Department of Forestry to manage the fire department in 1998, I saved some of the early logbooks, so the dates I use are accurate.

The first two weeks I lived at the fire station in El Dorado Hills, At 990 Lasson Lane. Herb and I finished a room at his home in Cameron Park that I would live in while on duty. It was seperate from the main house, and had an exit to the garage and to the fire equipment that we would be picking up soon.

After a few weeks I made the move to the chiefs house, 3870 Los Santos. We didn't have a fire engine yet, but we got started by equipping a 1956 green ford pickup that used to belong to the phone company. It had a utility bed and a covered pickup bed with a metal sliding top. We loaded first aid, and rescue equipment in the side compartments, and a hose load in the pickup bed. We would have to take every fire with a hose lay from a fire hydrant. No pump on the old pickup. We also had a 1957 Chevy pickup that we painted red and lettered up as the Fire Chiefs vehicle.

Within a couple of months Herb went to a California Fire Chiefs meeting in Sacramento. At these meetings a lot of vender's show up to sell there newest equipment. One of the vender's was showing a brand new 1969 Ford cab over triple combination fire engine. It was gas powered, 750 gallon water tank, a 1000 gallon per minuet two stage pump and ground ladders. Just what we needed and it was available within a few weeks. It still needed to be seen at two other meetings in other states. It was built as a demonstrator model for show and tell. Herb also placed other orders at the show. Things like air packs, hose, nozzles and turn outs for the firemen to wear. We needed everything that a new fire department would need.

Back at Herbs home I set to work placing 4X4 posts in front of the house and pulling canvas over a frame to keep the engine out of the weather. Herb also picked up a 1951 two ton Dodge truck that had been a Forestry unit way back when. on May 20Th 1969 I turned it back into a wild land fire rig. It looked a little silly, but it would really wet down the fire line. I put electric switches on nozzles under the front bumper, and had a one hundred foot, one inch reel line mounted on a 450 gallon water tank. At a military surplus store we found a self contained 500 G.P.M. pump and motor that I mounted behind the cab, with remote controls inside the cab. The new Ward La France engine was delivered on May 26, 1969. The last thing Herb found and brought home was a well used 1947 American La France fire engine from the Sacramento Fire Department. It had been Sacramento Engine #2. Sacramento was having a public auction and Herb picked it up for $500.00. We nick named it "smoky Joe" This is why I was here, to rebuild things. What fun, a 1947 American La France V12 motor! And I get to take it apart and put it back together.

The neighborhood started to take notice of the new hobby that Herb took up on Los Santos. One of the family's in the house behind us was a Realtor and developer in Cameron Park, Richard L.V. Smith. He had a piece of property just off Cameron Park Drive, on Hacienda Road that had been set aside for a Middle School sometime in the future. It had several acres on somewhat flat ground. At the end of October 1969, deal was struck, a Mobil home bought, and with the help of our volunteers we put up a two car garage to keep the engines in. One of the El Dorado Irrigation District guys, Curt Wiesenhunt and I put in a water meter and service to the mobile home. P.G.& E. ran power to a pole we put in. I was driving through Folsom and saw a Shell Gas Station being bulldozed and I grabbed the overhead doors for free. We now had a fire station to call home until we could float a bond to build the station on Country Club Drive. We would camp out on Hacienda Road for about two years.

Within the first few months we had handed out emergency phone stickers and put in the "HOT" line for in coming emergency calls. Cameron Park had an agreement with Shingle Springs Volunteer fire department to respond to all emergency calls until the new fire department was in place and prepared to respond. Chief Owen had his hands full setting up a new department and training me as well. I was very new to the fire service. I may have been a good mechanic, and had put my service time in the Army, but now I needed to be taught a whole lot in a very short time. I was good at first aid, but fire science and tactics I was lacking in. Herb was very patient with me, and we got lots done in a very few months. I have a lot to thank Chief Owen for.

Herb had picked up a radio monitor so we could listen how El Dorado County ran their calls. If something was dispatched in Cameron Park, we would also respond. What we found out was, we were always the first one to arrive, even though Shingle Springs was dispatched. This was because we were at our station, listening, and ready to respond. Shingle Springs was still a volunteer department.

The first call we self dispatched to was a grass fire on Hampton Lane and covered eleven lots in all. The first official emergency call we had was a furniture fire in a structure on December 10, 1969. Little girls and candles caused bedroom fires on a regular basis. From April 1, 1969 to June 30, 1970 we had 38 emergency calls. We have more than that in any week now. Thank goodness it was quiet so we could get everyone trained and equipment built. We put out the word for volunteers and had about six men sign up for training. The problem we had was very few worked very close to Cameron Park. We had two gas stations, Sams Town, and a little hamburger joint called the Burger Soloon. Gravel parking lot and all. After hours we could expect some men to respond, but during the day it was all but zero response from our volunteer force.

My first few months were spent clearing, flow testing and mapping every fire hydrant in and around Cameron Park. Many hydrants were not visible from the street. They were ether covered over with brush and grass, or buried under dirt with, maybe the top visible. Lots of shovel work, and lots of swing blade work. My evenings were spent putting together a volunteer training schedule for evening drills. With Herb training me as we went. I was about as green as you could get. Both Herb and myself were certified in first aid and C.P.R. from being in the fire department in Alameda. We would find out very soon that we were the only two in the whole county that were certified in C.P.R. No one did that function! No pulse, and you were dead. It was as simple as that.

El Dorado County used the mortuaries to transport patients when the need arose. It was handy when there was no pulse. Finally the county hired one ambulance to post itself in and around Placerville. Foothill Ambulance had two men that did basic first aid, and transported patients. Pollock Pines built there own rescue van that had a gurney,ropes, and spair fire equipment, but in the early days only transported in there own fire district. In the late sixties there were eighteen fire districts in the county. El Dorado Hills and Pollock Pines were the first to staff stations. We all had our own emergency phone numbers, so we all needed to have someone sit by a phone. The answering service in Placerville filled in that gap for several districts, and dispatched out the volunteers by radio, and phone trees.

Herb and some of the other fire chiefs started fire training nights for training officers so we could all do the evolutions of firefighting the same way. This was something new for all of us. I ended up being the Chairman for the American Red Cross for a few years. I taught the first aid, and C.P.R. class's for most of the county. We finally got a few more instructors in some of the stations, so I only had to clear the paper work and issue certificates for some of the fire districts. I think school bus drivers were trained better than fireman in first aid back in those days. I had a ton of first aid background from the department in Alameda, and from the Army before that.

The fire service in those days used radio codes instead of what we use now, clear text. When we got our new engine, I installed the county fire radios, and I asked the Placerville answering service for a radio check. In Alameda we called that a (signal 1000) so that's what I asked for. The answering service said (10-4) Cameron Park. For the next few minuets tone after tone went off letting every department around us know that I was asking for a (signal 1000) This is when I found out that the code I used for a radio check is what this county used for an aircraft down. I figured out what was going on very quickly and cancelled everyone. We laughed about this one for a few years.

The Chief and the board of directors put a bond vote together for the voters of Cameron Park. With lots of foot work on our part, it passed. We had secured $100,000. to build the fire station on Country Club Drive. Some residents called it The Taj Mahal. It was also mentioned, how can anyone spend that much money on one building? Wow do times change or what? Herb and I worked with the builder so we could run all the wiring we would need for radios, speakers, bells, and such.

Chief Owen filed for an O.E.O. Grant. (Office of Economic Opportunity) and with that grant we were able to hire two brother's, Pete and Leon Misamore. They could earn a living, and keep going to school at the same time. This was a super opportunity for the two of them. They were 16 and 17 years old when they started with us. With their help we poured concrete until the entire station was circled with driveways, walkways, and patios. I lost count of how many yards we poured, but it was lots. Leon stayed with us for several years and then moved on to something else. Pete on the other hand stayed with us until about 1999 and left on an early retirement.

Because of the low response from our volunteer force during the day, Herb started the (RESERVES) an all female volunteer firefighting force. My wife, Gwen was one of the first to help fill this gap for daytime response. This was something new to the fire service, and worked very well. We had some very memorable calls being backed up with the reserves.

In 1972 our board of directors changed fire chief's. For me it was a huge loss. The Chief was a good friend and mentor. The new Chief was brought out of retirement from the Sacramento City Fire Department. Our new chief was Lewis Cassaglia. Talk about someone with tons of background. Lou started with the McClellan air field during the Second World War and after the War was hired by Sacramento City Fire Department. Lou did several things that changed our direction. One of the programs Lou started was a building plans review for commercial properties. Lou also contacted another government program, C.E.T.A. (Comprehensive Employment Training Act) .With this program we had several young men at a time show up for training in all things related to the emergency service. At one time we had 21 young men to equip and train. Quite a few went on in fire service career's. A few that I remember; Matt Jenkins retired as a Unit Chief with Cal Fire. Henry Ogg, retired as a fire Captain with Sac Metro. Bruce Prender, out with an injury as fire Captain with Cameron Park. Jack
Royal retired on a medical. Bill Sanderson, retired with an injury from Cameron Park. And Lou Motto retired as an Engineer from Sac Metro.

Our board of directors researched a better way to administer the fire department, and came up with a solution. We went under contract with C.D.F., now called Cal Fire. This didn't go over well with some of us, but in the long run it was best both for the district and the employees. It opened lots of doors for any of us that wanted to try another type of fire service opportunities. I went to work in Georgtown at a fire camp. After some training that covered working with State Inmates, I ran fire crews that fought fire with nothing more than hand tools all over the State. I got to hike mountains that I had never heard of. Too bad they were all on fire. It could have been a nice walk in the mountains.

I was there for the building of the new station, and years later I was there when it all but burned down. I had stopped by to see someone and was standing out in the back talking with a fire captain that had his inmate fire crew doing some maintenance work. The district had hired a company to hot mop the roof. While I was visiting, a man came running down from the roof speaking in Spanish. One of the inmate crew members came up to me and said "Capt, he's telling you that the roof is on fire." I yelled over at the station captain about what was going on. I was in shorts and flip flops. As the firefighters were gearing up, I moved an engine into position, set the pumps, and while I was setting up ladders, the inmate crew started pulling hose lines and getting a water supply ready for the firefight.

Additional engines were called in from surrounding departments, and with all that help the fire still worked it's way from the roof, through the mansard siding into the lower levels of the building. It was a long hard firefight. The only blessing from all this loss is, Cameron Park has a wonderful new building that they can be proud of.

I will add to this post as I find other pictures.

Maraschino cherries

I was about seven, out playing in the rail yard field when one of the big guys from the next block came walking down the tracks. We knew each other and most of us got along pretty well. We were throwing rocks at a tin building and making lots of noise. We got board with throwing rocks and took off looking for some other mischief to get into. I don't remember the kids name, but he must have been twelve or so. I know he was older than my big sister, Shena. As we were walking between the box cars the kid asked me if I knew what was inside them? At seven I had no idea. So, he said lets open one up and find out.

There were no locks on the big doors, just little tin Tye's of some kind that were crimped down so you could tell if the door had been tampered with. And tamper we did. As the door was pushed open all I could see was cardboard box's, lots of cardboard box's. The big kid wiggled a box out. It had smaller box's inside it. "Maraschino Cherries", the big kid said, lots of maraschino cherries! What little kid has ever had his fill of maraschino cherries? You might get one, or even two at one time, but a whole box would be out of the question. Jars of them, all for me to eat until I puke!

I found a nice quite place in the tall grass and started popping lids. At first they were like the greatest thing you could eat. After several jars, they started tasting not as great as they did when you only got to eat one or two at a time. I was able to gag down a few jars before I started getting that flushed feeling and a rolling stomach. I think maybe I should have chewed these things a little better the first time I saw them, because the second time I got to see them it was gross!

I ditched my stash of maraschino cherries and headed for home. Dad was due home from work, and dinner would be ready right then. I was a little lite headed when I got home. I ran into my big sister as I was walking down the driveway. She looked at me in a stranger way than usual. I looked at her and asked "what?"

She asked if I had fallen out of a tree or something.

No, I said, why?

Because it looks like you've been bleeding from your mouth, and down the front of you.

"Oh oh, cherry juice"

Linda cleaned me up once I told her what I had been doing. Good old Shena, taking care of her little brother again.

Mom and dad couldn't figure out why I wasn't hungry at dinner. Shena kept quite about my adventure with the boxcar. It took years before I could look a maraschino cherry in the eye.

The box kite

When I was about ten years old, dad brought a kite home. Not just any old kite either. It was huge! Instead of little wooden pieces wrapped with paper, this one used aluminum poles and was wrapped with nylon, like from a parachute. It was six feet tall, three feet square and a really bright orange. It came with 1/4 inch rope that was coiled up in a large pouch. Dad said it was used as a signaling device and gunnery practice during the war. If a plane was shot down near an island, the pilot could fly the kite and be seen from miles away and he could be rescued.

The instructions were quick and to the point! (yes I read the instructions) I had lots of time to kill waiting for the right conditions. The instructions said to tie the line off to the kite and a tree before assembling, and wear gloves, as the line could cut into your hands as it caught air and lifted off.

It didn't take long to assemble, or take apart, and we had the best place to fly it. The wide open field out in the middle of the railroad yard. Now all I would need is a weekend when the trains were not out running around, and of course some wind. Do you know how long it takes to have the stars line up with a weekend, with wind? To try running to get it into the air would be impossible. It was way too big for that. I had a couple of false try's because of my eagerness and the lack of wind on weekends.

Finally, a Saturday, some wind, and my buddy Rob from the next block over gave me a hand. We carried everything out into the field. I tied the line to a power pole that was in the middle of everything, stretched it out and started assembling the kite. I had some garden gloves that were a little lite duty, but that's all we had. We were both used to having to run with a kite, not just waiting for it to lift off. We set everything up and waited. Nothing was happening. Maybe not enough wind? We didn't know, we were only like ten years old. Rob said, why don't we run with it like we always do with little kites? I said if all else fails we'll do it our way! Well, nothing was happening fast enough for a couple of ten year olds.

We left the end of the rope tied to the pole. The rope was really long, so we thought we could get the kite to lift off and then let the rope out until all of it was out again. We tried several times. Not enough wind. This kite is way huge, and were just going to tear it up trying to fly it. We need a weekend with real wind. Maybe next time. We took everything apart and hauled it home. We had wind during the week, but too much train activity, and too many people walking around.

The day finally came! A weekend with wind. As Rob and I left with our arms full of everything we needed, my sister Linda watched as we went down the driveway. Just the look she gave us stopped me. I asked "WHAT?" She was a teenager now, and knew everything. Rob and I, on the other hand ,just did whatever. Linda said something like, "that thing will drag both of you all the way to the end of the field" NO, I said, we will have it tied off to that power pole that's in the middle of the field. The last thing Linda said as we took off was something about power poles and wires that hang on them.

Everything was ready, the rope was tied off, the kite was assembled, and just like the instructions said, it lifted off. Rob and I went back where the rope was tied off on the power pole and tried to hold the rope and go hand over hand to walk it down some. We had these chinsey garden gloves but they didn't do much. As we went hand over hand trying to bring the kite down, it started lifting both of us off the ground. Just a little, but lots of fun. We told each other to not let go. For sure it would lift one of us off really easy. We were both laughing like any couple of ten year old kids would. We were gaining, but the kite had lots of rope. A few hundred feet more and it would be down. Then the kite started drifting to one side toward the power lines. We had to either let it back up, above the lines, or do the hand over hand thing to get below the lines really fast. You know all those little hairs all over your body? You don't really know they are there until something like this happens. They all stood out like we were porcupine's.

The Alameda Times Star headlines said something about kids and a huge kite that tripped the overload switches. Rob and I were all eyes as the kite drifted into the wires and the aluminum tubing made contact with live lines. It was spectacular! Sparks, melting aluminum, and us holding a very limp rope. I had to convince Rob to help grab everything and run. He didn't want to be involved in the grabbing part, just the running part. I wanted the evidence gone. We didn't have to unassemble the kite. It came down very well unassembled.

Linda was waiting down the driveway as we ran past her. She had that look again, like now what did you two do? and why is the power off in the house? "We don't know nothin as we ran by, ditching everything in the back of the garage. Our kite flying days were over. At least the big metal ones. We'll stay with the paper and stick ones. Who would have thought?

The scooter motor

I think I was about fourteen when dad brought home an old scooter motor. He said it had been sitting around for some years and had no idea if it could be made to run again. It was a little heavy, about thirty pounds or so. It had a single cylinder, and dad showed me, as the flywheel turns it would engage an impulse magneto that would go "CLACK" every other revolution and thirty thousand volts would go to the single spark plug. Really cool old motor.

I carried the motor over to the picnic table and set it on some old cardboard and went about taking it apart to clean and service it. I pulled the spark plug out, took all the sheet metal off, put some oil down into the cylinder and turned the motor over a couple of times. Dad said that it was a good sign that the motor turned over freely.

Dad went off to do something else and left me to keep cleaning the motor up. I chased all the spiders off and started wire brushing the years of paint and rust. I was wire brushing the flywheel, turning it a little, wire brushing it some more, and turning it some more. You know how Levis have those brass buttons on the front fly? The spark plug wire was off the spark plug and hanging down loose. As I turned the flywheel and the impulse magneto went "CLACK" thirty thousand volts went from the spark plug wire, to the brass button on the front of my Levis. My life flashed before me. It was a short life, and so far had been filled with fun. I think I saw God that day.

Dad heard me yell, as did the rest of 8th street. He came running and found me standing there holding the wire brush and wondering, what just happened! And am I going to live. How do you tell your dad that you just electrocuted your privates. It took dad some time to stop laughing. He was almost crying he was laughing so hard. He explained something about low amps and high volts or something like that. I did recover and learned the term (walk it off).

I had the old scooter motor running in a few days, and started gathering parts and pieces for the building of a go cart. On a very limited budget I had to make do with what I could gather. Old pieces of tubing from the rail yard scrap pile, an old mercury car steering box from the machine shop around the corner, and dad found some wheels, sprockets and chain. I could do all the welding at the shop at my high school.

When it was all together and running I was ready to try it out. I pushed it to the huge open paved lot alongside the Webster street that goes through the Posey tube. I think it was Bob Perata that was with me, pushing to get the motor fired up. Once it started I found out that it was geared a little to high. The motor started going chug, chug, chug, trying to gain R.P.M. As the speed increased the motor started smoothing out and off I went. The pavement was un-even and a little rough. The seat I was sitting on was just sheet metal welded to the underside of the tubing. This was the first weld that failed. Just the back part of the seat dropped to the pavement. I had a quick lesson about metal scrapping on pavement. It produces heat. Lots of heat!

I let off the throttle and started slowing down, but I wasn't slowing down quick enough. By the way I hadn't put any brakes on this thing yet. I thought I would add them some time later. I held myself up off the seat until I came to a stop. We found a piece of plywood to sit on and ran around until we ran out of gas. Another good day. No one got hurt, and with a little welding and a gear change, and just maybe a brake of some kind, we would be back at it again soon. Boy do I love building stuff and making things run. I know now that learning these things as a young boy set my course in life. I have been fixing stuff for as long as I can remember. "Thanks Dad for taking that time with me when I needed it most".

The pager incident

About 1998 a good friend, Phill Dold gave Gwen and I the use of his boat slip in Tahoe Keys for the summer. We had a 26 foot MacGregor sailboat at the time. It made it so easy to just drive up and hop onto the boat, be on Lake Tahoe in a matter of minuets. No towing, launching, or rigging the mast and sails. Friends could meet us at Tahoe Keys and we could be on the lake like, whoosh.

On one trip, I was up on the lake alone. I had sailed around most of the day and had sailed into Emerald Bay just as the winds had kicked up and the lake had turned into a churning, white capped monster. Inside Emerald Bay tho, it was as calm as glass. I went deep into the bay and as I backed into the West shore I dropped the anchor, kept backing to set the hook, and got within ten feet of the shore. I shut off the motor, and with the stern line tied to the back of the boat, jumped in and swam to shore, looped the line through a root of a tree, then swam back to the boat. If any of you have gone swimming in Lake Tahoe, you know this is no small feat. The water is about fifty degrees on a warm day.

I had enough daylight left to set up the barbecue, cook a nice steak, sit out under clear skies and watch the changing colors as the sun set. I also had a 12 volt T.V. VCR set so I was watching a movie, Star Wars I think, when someone rowed up behind the boat to see if I had any spare propane canisters. He ran out on his barbecue before he could finish his meal. I tossed him a spare bottle and he paddled back to his boat. His wife yelled a thank you from about a fifty yards away. It was so quite in the bay that I think you could whisper and be heard. What a wonderful day this was. Tahoe has a beauty all of its own.

About nine o'clock that night my pager went off, beeping. The only cell phone I had was wired into the truck back at Tahoe Keys. The pager just shows numbers, and if you have the right program on your computer you can send a text message. Well, we didn't have that at home, just a phone calling a pager and leaving a phone number. This one was from my wife. No message, just the phone number. Well Gwen knew where I was so I figured she just wanted me to check in with her in the morning as I was out and about. A few minuets later the pager goes off again! The same thing, my home phone number on the pager. I figured, OK she just did it twice to be sure I got the page. A few minuets later, a third beep, beep, beep, and its home again. OK, there must be something going on at home that required three pages in a row. Three of anything in a row means get moving.

Thank goodness I looped the stern line around that tree root so I didn't have to go swimming at nine thirty at night. I started my motor to warm it up, pulled in the stern line, went on deck, and as I was pulling in the anchor, the fellow I had given the propane to yelled over to me to see if I was having a problem. I told him that I had just gotten three pages to call home, and that I was heading over to Tahoe Keys. He waited a moment, then asked me if I knew what was going on out on the lake. It was sooo quite where we were that I had forgotten that a wind event started as I pulled into Emerald Bay. I asked him if he knew anything. He yelled back, thirty five to forty mile an hour winds from the West! Well, twenty five mile an hour winds are a white knuckle event if your under sail, so I thought I would just use the motor and scoot back to Tahoe Keys.

I yelled a thank you for the heads up to my new propane friend as I finished pulling in the anchor. I motored out to the mouth of Emerald Bay. As I cleared the mouth of the bay and made a slow right turn, I couldn't make out anything on the far shore. I had my running lights on and with the back lit compass I took a heading that should get me close to the entrance to Tahoe Keys. Unless you run into another boat, there is nothing to run into. And what idiot would be heading out on a night like this. So far, just one.

The waves were somewhere between four and six feet high. I was looking up at water when you should always only have to look down at water. The wind was howling like a banshee. I throttled the motor back to a fast idle. I had both rudders down and locked, and no sails were up. The mast alone was pushing me along faster than I wanted to go but I needed the motor pushing to keep control of the steering. I was going just a little faster than the waves, so I would climb up and surf down each wave. As you do this the boat tries to do something that is called "broaching" which means diving into a turn as you descend each wave. If you allow this to happen the boat will roll over as it hits the bottom of the trough. Its a game of playing with the throttle to maintain control. The bow plow's into the wave, then you climb up and surf down the other side and have to throttle up again and plow into the next wave. It could be fun if you were looking for something like this. I wasn't! It was a great lesson on boat handling tho.

When I was within a quarter mile of the Eastern shore I finally saw the entrance lights to Tahoe Keys. As I approached the shore the waves fell to a reasonable size and steering became easier as the boat went into the channel to the marina. Inside the marina the wind slowed down some, but all the boats that had masts were clanging and banging with loose sails and rigging. It was nice to be tied up to a dock. It took about an hour to cross the lake. I felt like I had just crossed the North Atlantic. I was cold, wind blown and worn out. A very exciting trip, but my thoughts were with my wife and what might be going on at home. It was about quarter to eleven by the time I got to the truck and made the call home.

After a couple of rings, Gwen sleepily answered.
I asked, "what's up?"
Gwen answered, "what do you mean?"
Well you paged me three times.
Oh, sorry, I just wanted to be sure you called when you got the chance.
False alarm, but a very exciting night time sail.

All of our rings.

After I proposed to your mom and she accepted, I put a diamond engagement ring on her finger. It wasn't very big, but I was in heaven with my sweetie on my arm. We had been dating for about a year and I had just bought a new Porsche. A guy has to have his priorities.

At some point after our engagement we went to a drive -in show. We were watching the show when I spotted a mosquito flying across my side of the front windshield. I smacked at it with the back of my hand, but I missed. As it flew across to the right side of the front window, your mom took a swipe with the back of her hand. screeeeee. That's the sound of a diamond on a window. Boy its a good thing this girl is cute.

When we got married your mom had a Chevy Nova. A 1963 we think. I worked on it for awhile. Looking back we should have kept it, they're a hot item now. We sold it and bought a red sports car. An 850 fiat Spider convertible. What a fun little car. You should have seen your mom with her Saint Bernard sitting next to her with the top down driving all around El Dorado County. What a hoot! I had traded in my Porsche for a International Scout 800 4X4. Another fun ride. We did the four -wheeling thing with it.

Your mom and I took her sports car down a dirt road to the river once to go swimming. The road dead ended and I couldn't get any traction to back out. It was a small car so we just picked up the back end and sort of bounced it around so we could drive out. The diamond in your mom's ring fell out and is still in the sand down that old dirt road somewhere. See, buying a small diamond was a good thing, right?

A few years later we started having babies and your mom's ring was leaving marks on you kids. We opted for plain gold bands. We put the white gold and diamond things away. Your mom and I have picked up some other rings over the years, and we both had some gold things from before we met. A ring that had my first name on it was gold, and quite heavy. My Dad and your Grandma Eloise bought it for me years ago and I had about worn it out. We also had a small gold necklace that had belonged to your Grandma Eloise. Lots of memories in all that stuff, but it was just sitting around not being used.

A few months ago your mom decided we should do something with all our old gold stuff. We went to a place in Burk Junction and had two new wedding rings designed. We had the shop use all our old gold stuff to make the new wedding bands. How cool is that. All the really meaningful things we both grew up with are now built into our new wedding bands.

I have been doing battle with a wisteria vine that I planted 22 years ago in our front yard. It has just about surrounded the house. I call it the "big green thing". Both of our rings are designed around the big green thing. Very appropriate for both of us. Two kids and four grandsons later, 38 plus years of marriage, and all those memories built into these two new wedding bands. How cool is that?

Life at sea

When I went to sea in 1961 I don't think I was ready for the work routine that I would be working. It was way different from anything I had heard of. Four hours on and four hours off. At first it sounds alright. Work four hours and do everything that you think you should do for the next four hours. Things like eat, do your laundry, clean your bunk area, go on deck and see whats going on. If you spend your time working way down below deck in an engine room, you really look forward to seeing sky, clouds, waves, breathing air that's not filled with diesel mist from the injectors.

The engine rooms, and there were two of them, each had two Fairbanks Morris diesel engines that produced one thousand seven hundred and fifty horsepower each. And they did this at about seven hundred R.P.M. Running at slow speed the propellers would only turn about sixty R.P.M. The noise was so far above what is now allowed in a work area. No one used any hearing protection. We used hand signals to communicate. If we needed to talk to each other you would have to cup your hands over the other persons ear and yell, so when you went on deck, you really enjoyed the quite and the fresh air.

Each engine room, like I said had two engines and powered one propeller. The ship had two propellers, one prop shaft came from each engine room. During your four hour duty shift, a log was kept, showing about a hundred different readings from the gauges on the control panel. Other areas of the ship also needed to be checked every hour. One of these places were the shaft alleys where the prop shafts went from the diesel engines all the way to where the shafts went through the hull to the propellers.

To check the closed areas and to be sure that nothing serious had occurred since the last check was always a little unnerving. You would open a hatch, go through, close the hatch and so on and so on. There were lights everywhere, but bulbs did burn out once in awhile. Really, really dark down there when the lights go out. The shaft alleys were big enough to walk through if you stayed bent over. There was enough room to walk on ether side of the propeller shaft, about three feet on each side and about four feet above the shaft. The shaft itself was about eighteen inches in diameter, and was supported by huge bearings encased in what is called a pillow block that has an oil sump that needed to be checked every hour also.

Here's one of the games us young men played on the ship. When we were going at slow speed, you could wrap your arms and legs around the prop shaft and see how long you could hang on. About one minute was about the record. You think the teacups at Disneyland are bad, try riding the prop shaft. We got caught riding the prop shaft and were told to not do that anymore. We ran the ships' Captain crazy with some of our antics. One other game we were told to not do anymore was jumping up while the fantail of the ship was at its highest point. You could get ten to fifteen feet in the air as the bow climbed the next wave and the back of the ship fell. Way cool as long as you landed on the deck and not too close to the edge of the ship. We never did this alone. It was a little dangerous, but fun. Keep in mind, we were seventeen and eighteen years old, and there were about ten of us at this age. It kept the old guys on their toes!

Along with two main engines in each engine room, the aft engine room also had two huge generaters that powered all the electrical needs, and a steam boiler for heating needs throughout the ship. The steam boiler also was used to run an evaporator that took sea water and distilled it into fresh water.

This ship was a research vessel. We had a bunch of scientists on board that were doing things like mapping the bottom of ocean, logging the sea temperatures at different depths, and dragging a huge net, way deep and seeing what was living at those depths. It was always exciting when the net was brought on board. The deck crew would sort out all the big things with teeth and stingers, then the scientists would jump in and start sorting the rest out. We would stop in the middle of nowhere and take bottom samples of the sea bed. It would be like five miles deep. It would take three days to drop the cable, and another three days to retrieve the tube that would fire itself into the sea floor as it made contact.
Once in awhile it wouldn't fire in straight and we would have to keep the ship in one place and do it all over again. Another six days in one place. It was during one of these extended times that us kids got the Captains' permission to swim off the fantail of the ship. Two engineers would stand by with 30/30 rifles while we dove off the deck. It was sooo clear that you couldn't swim down far enough to go out of sight. Keep in mind that we were in five mile deep ocean. Really a cool thing to have done.

While we were lowering and raising the cable for a bottom sample we would have these huge lights at night pointing down at the ocean. You should see what comes up to that light for a look see. We would see a really big fish come up to check out the lights, and, whosh, something bigger would snap it up and disappear. Now I know why the Captain had two engineers standing by with rifles while we were diving off the stern. Kinda like, whosh, and we would have been gone. Ha, 30/30 rifles? we needed something way bigger than 30/30's after seeing how big things get way out there. Of course we would have see it coming with that really clear water. If someone would have yelled, "something really big is heading up for you", Ill bet that would have been exciting! especially if gun shots, yelling and screaming were involved. Kinda makes those little hair's all over you stand up thinking about that one! Ill just remember how much fun it was swimming in five mile deep water that was so clear and clean!