News From Fort Schuyler

August 6, 1998 - Volume 2, No. 35

NICE VENUE - News of a scholarly nature comes from ED DANGLER, Class of 1949. Ed writes, "I will be presenting a paper titled: 'The Impact of the United Nations Convention on Law of the Sea on Marine Scientific Research' at the OCEANS '98 conference to be held in Nice, France in September." The OCEANS '98 conference, organized by the IEEE Oceanic Engineering Society, will focus on the theme of Engineering for Sustainable Use of the Oceans. The final program will be posted later this month at: http://www.ifremer.fr/oceans98/

THE LONGEST TRAINING CRUISE EVER? On May 4, 1915, the NEWPORT left New York on its annual "practice cruise" and did not return until January 3, 1916 -- seven months and 25 days later.

The highlights of SST 1915 for the cadets were to be transits of the Panama Canal (which had only opened for business nine months earlier) and celebrating July 4th in Hawaii at the crater of fiery Mount Kilauea. On the return leg, after scheduled stops at San Francisco and San Diego, the NEWPORT sailed to Balboa for a September 15th transit, only to find that a landslide on September 11 had closed the canal. Slides, apparently caused by seismic earthwaves, were a troublesome and not infrequent problem during the early years of the canal, especially in the Culebra and Guilliard Cuts. The result for the cadets and crew of the NEWPORT, led by Captain Frederick S. McMurray, Class of 1898, was 3 additional months of Pacific sea-time off Balboa while the problems in the canal were corrected by extensive blasting, excavation, and dredging. The canal was finally opened to eastbound traffic in mid-December. The NEWPORT was given the honor of leading the parade of detained ships back to the Atlantic.

BTW - Graduation for the forty-three cadets of the Class of 1915 was held at its regular date on October 30 in New York on the floor of the Maritime Exchange. The cadets had been sent back to NYC from Balboa by train and ship. (IMPETUS - Our reference desk calendar page for August which noted the 8/15/14 opening of the Panama Canal.

SOURCES - Annual Reports of the NY Nautical School, NY Times Index, clippings from the archives.)

WEB-BASED CATALOG UPDATE - Now it just takes ONE click to view the most recent beta version of the Luce Library catalog, featuring graphics of the EMPIRE STATE VII and Fort Schuyler.

Set your web browser to: http://olis2.sysadm.suny.edu/marit/ click and input your search term.

CARL Family - Henry 54 - John 79 - James 84

DOOLEY Family - Austin L 68 - Austin P 96

OAKSMITH Family: David E. 22 - Dave 54

PETERS Family - Otto Peter 17 - Kenneth D 54

TREUBERT Siblings - Werner 54 - John 55

WEAVER Family - Bob 69 - Paul 92 - Mike 95 *corrected*

Contributors: John Carl, Austin L. Dooley, Ken Peters.

PLACEMENT OFFICE SERVES ALUMNI, TOO - In what is almost a "tradition" the most recent data show that graduates of the Maritime College continue to enjoy a very high rate of success in finding employment in their fields of training, i.e. a 95% placement rate within three months of graduation.

Did you know, however, that the Placement Office also receives many notices of job opportunities of interest to alumni who are in the job market? For example, MIKE LYNCH, Class of 1985, recently forwarded a job listing to the Placement Office for a "Marine Transportation Safety Specialist" at the State of Washington's Department of Ecology. (If YOU know of some good openings send them along to Placement.) In order to keep abreast of such opportunities, alumni can subscribe to the bi-weekly Job Placement Bulletin ($20 per year payable to the Ship's Store) which is currently distributed by snail-mail. Alumni can also submit their vita for the Resume File that the Placement Office maintains.

Staffed by Director of Placement, ANTHONY PALMIOTTI, Class of 1979, and Assistant Director, PAUL BAMONTE, Class of 1989, the Office can be contacted via e-mail at pbamonte@sunymaritime.edu.

HOW DID YOU FIND ME? This is a question that some recent recipients of "News from Fort Schuyler" have asked. The answer: "WE LOOKED FOR YOU." Every so often, most recently in May, a search is made on e-mail search engines like Yahoo411 using key words/phrases like: Fort Schuyler/NY Maritime/SUNY Maritime, even NY Nautical. Anything to expand the address list!

NAMING NAMES - The January 23 issue of NFFS reported that the First Class Mess had been renamed the Catering Hall. The new name was apparently not catchy enough, since, according to the August edition of the college "Facilities Use" schedule, it is now called the "Special Events Room." Still lacks that nautical flavor, doesn't it? Let's hope the food doesn't.