Shell Back or Scurvy Pollywogg?

Slap 'em on the bar if you got them.

Include:

1. Location
2. Date
3. Ship

 

18, May 1990

Long 105' 30"

USS Peleliu LHA-5

 

You guys are killing me

 

I am sad to hear the "Scurvy" part, I had gotten used to "Slimy". As a MM 2nd (L), I never traveled oversea by anything but aircraft during my active USN time (68-72). No shellback for that.

My oldest son is one, since he did the crossing in '99 when his USS Princeton (CG-59) crossed the line as they headed to Australia on a return from "picket duty" in the Gulf area. Sadly there were protests going on in Sidney and Melbourne against the NATO intervention in Kosavo, and they were re-routed to Brisbane and even there not allowed off-ship for fear of intensifying a tense situation. His maternal Grandmother is an Australian national, and he was looking forward to spending at least some time in Australia on his way home. He was saddened by that turn of events, and was astounded by the number of pissed off Serbs that lived in Australia!

By '99 the "ritual" of initiation had gotten almost tame, and was even looked forward to by the sailors rather than dreaded as in the past. I had one brother-in-law who had not only crossed the equator, but had added the arctic circle crossing to his time. Forget what he called that, the Polar Bear badge? Sadly he passed away from Navy induced toxins to his system, which were more than likely for his cancers. Agent Orange was only one of them.

 

Scurvy/ Slimy: Tomatoes / Tomahtoes . You get points for raising your son right and keeping the sea faring tradition alive.

The "Hazing" stigma ruined the event and reduced it's meaning. Shellback Certificates, et al I think are far superior to the "Challenge Coin" mentality of the current military. Don't get me wrong, Challenge coins are cool and serve pretty much the same purpose; but, you can buy them on e-bay.

"Blue Nose" is what you get for crossing the Arctic Circle

 

That was it, Ean crossed the equator in the sixties to and from Nam, then ended up on an Ice Breaker duty deal in the early seventies. Too bad the agent orange he had to deal with in the sixties is what did him in.

He wasn't that "great a guy" really (sort of an arsehole if you know what I mean), but he was a member of our family and I thought he was treated poorly by the Veterans Admin. since he didn't get recognition for his Agent Orange symptoms until about a year before the exposure to the stinker killed him in the late ninties. Weird skin cancers, and one that got into his pancreas and liver. Not a "nice" guy before or after Nam really, but that was wrong.

 

Since I was not the nautical type, I never crossed the equator. However I did happen across the Arctic Circle, so according to that, I get the "Blue Nose" identifier. Here are the particulars to said event;

1. 27 Jun 78
2. Pump Station 5, along the Alaskan Pipeline.
3. Parachuted out of a C-130 into a 6 second DZ (a very tight fit between some mountains and a swamp). Missed the DZ, but luckily for me, some trees broke my fall before going into a stream.

 

Not to pic nits; but, crossing the Arctic Circle by Air doesn't count, It is a truly noteworthy event though and I am sure it is recognized in some manner by the dirt dart association......lol

 

Fine then, never mind....

We ran several patrols in the area, but I'm sure we stayed above the Arctic Circle the whole time. All we saw were buffalo, musk ox, mooses (meese?), mosquitoes and 18 wheelers going 100+ mph on the gravel road paralleling the pipleline anyway....

 

I was just thinking about this the other day. How is crossing the arctic circle by air any different than crossing the equator by boat? Did you jump out and swim over the line, hmmmmm?

And there ain't no "dirt dart association" as far as I know. There were two guys in my company who burned in, tangled in a main canopy and saved by a reserve chute, but we just called them "lucky mother truckers."

 

Well it's not nearly the same now as it was in 89 when I did it; but, there is a fair bit of tradition and hazing involved.

 

Guess I'm a Scurvy Woog but being former Air Force does that count. I did cross the international date line.....is there a name for that?

 

An "International Dateliner, or International Dateline Crosser" maybe....

 

It was a funny experience. It was a Thursday night and the ship's captain made an announcement that the next day would indeed be a Saturday. That was weird.

 

As long as you haven't fought in WWII this is only mumbo-jumbo!
Remember: this is a WWII Forum!

RAM

 

HMMMMMM Gee............I guess maybe that is why I posted it in the "Free Fire Zone"........Sorry that you took offense to it.

 

Maybe something was lost in translation....

 

USS Enterprise CVN 65
20 Nov 1982
44 degrees 33 minutes East.

That's the official one. I've crossed twice as an Honorable Shellback. The second crossing was a Golden one in the Pacific.

I also have an original copy of a Golden Shellback certificate from WW 2 from the USS General William Weigel on a Magic Carpet run dated April 1946.

 

Yeah...........we usually call them tourists