News From Fort Schuyler

May 15, 1998 - Volume 2, No. 22

GRADUATION - As I listened to EDWARD VILLELLA, Class of 1959, give his thoughtful, down-to-earth, moving, and motivational graduation address (Dr. Villella, is there more than just a similarity between being the artistic director of a professional ballet troupe and being the coach of a professional sports team?) I was reminded once again of how the core experiences that Fort Schuyler graduates take away are so often cherished in retrospect. Over the years some alumni have told me that they vowed never to return once they received their diploma and license, and only over time did they come to realize how formative and valuable an experience their time at Maritime had been to them.

GRADUATION HIGH FLIERS - Two cadets spoke at the May 9 graduation: Class Valedictorian, MARK J. BAUMMER and Regimental Commander, JOHN R. BOYCE. I must single out one award winner, Cadet ZAFER AYED AL-SHAHRANI, for winning the Humanities Department Award to the cadet who has consistently performed outstanding work in the Humanities. This seemed to me to be an extraordinary accomplishment for someone working with English as a second language and coming from a very different culture. Cadet Al-Shahrani is one of the first graduates of a contingent of 24 Royal Saudi Navy Forces cadets who are enrolled at the college.

GRADUATION FINALE: "The bells of St. Mary's. Ah! Hear! They are calling/The old lads, and the new lads who have gone to sea;/Our dear Alma Mater, we hear your voice calling./The ship's bells shall ring out - ring out for you and me."

EMPIRE STATE V STATUS REPORT - On Friday, May 8, BARRY D. MARSH, Class of 1986, went aboard the EMPIRE STATE V (after first visiting the NS SAVANNAH ) at the James River Reserve Fleet (JRRF) at Fort Eustis, Virginia. He filed this report on the MARHST-L list serve on May 13:

"Next was the TSES V, which I had sailed aboard as a cadet at the College during the 1980's (she's been at the JRRF since 1990). (For reference, TSES V was one of three sisters designed for American President Lines round-the-world service in the 1950's. All three were taken up as Navy troopships before completion and never saw commercial service; all three later served as merchant marine academy training ships.) I've visited her at the JRRF several times over the past few years to do research for a model.

TSES V is in very poor condition now. She has a several degree list to starboard. She is very rusty and dirty, with long strips of peeling paint, mold and mildew, pigeon droppings, and trash everywhere. Some of the weeds in the scuppers and growing out of the wood decking are 2 feet tall. For the past few years, the US Army and FBI have been using her to practice shipboard hostage rescue, something they decided they'd better learn after the 1985 ACHILLE LAURO hijacking. Thousands of rounds of spent (and some live) paint-ball ammunition are scattered in nearly every space. I was just a little startled to find a silhouette target of a man pointing a gun at me when I opened one stateroom door!

Both ships are scheduled for scrapping sometime within the next few years; TSES V first. SAVANNAH may take a while longer, as her reactor has to be removed." (Barry works at the naval architecture firm, George G. Sharpe, Inc., which designed TSES V and the SAVANNAH. Two of his EMPIRE STATE scratch models are already on display in our Maritime Industry Museum, located in the corridors of Fort Schuyler, with four more EMPIRE STATEs to go. - Ed.)

FAMILY TIES KEEPING COMING IN - We are still accepting additions and corrections.

BULLOCK Siblings: Howard 48 - William 57 HORAN Siblings: Vincent 83 - Darcy 84 (Cousins to TOM KEATING 83 and MICKEY MORTIMER 84) O'REILLY Family: Edward 50 - James 83 - Thomas 87 WINTERS Siblings: Wesley C. 69 - Dan 86

Contributors: Vincent Horan, Jim O'Reilly, Hap Parnham, Dan Winters.