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no better. My shipmates called a cab and sent me back to the ship. For three days I was light-headed and had a bit of trouble working my eight hours during the day. When I went ashore again I stayed out of the dives and visited the museums and other places of interest. I even managed a trip to Brussels, the capital city, alone. Two ABs (able-bodied seamen) had had a fight aboard the ELKHORN and the loser decided to jump ship in Antwerp. As a result, when we sailed for the U.S. I moved up from OS to AB -another real break because it meant a ten dollar increase in salary. ABs stood four-hour watches, two hours at the wheel and two hours working on deck in the daytime and two hours lookout on the forepeak deck at night. If a man ever got close to God and experienced total peace of mind, it was under the stars or moon with the feel of a rolling sea under his feet as he walked across the deck at the extreme bow of his ship. The chief mate, Mr. Edgerly, was a fine gentleman, and it was a privilege to be on his four to eight watch. Edgerly was a lonely man and seemed to enjoy engaging in conversation with me during my stint at the wheel each eight hours. He had a wife and two sons in New Jersey and a lovely home, which he seldom saw. I learned something of navigation from his lessons on the blackboard in the wheel-house.
We stopped in Tampa, Florida and the IRS agents came aboard to search the ship for contraband. They found nothing then but the very next day returned and went straight to fifty cases of French champagne which were hidden under a cord or more of firewood in the salon-deck cargo hold. A pip squeak second assistant engineer who held a grudge against the chief engineer had squealed on the chief and the mate, who owned the champagne. Fortunately, the ship agents did not prefer charges against them. Instead they promoted Mr. Edgerly to captain of one of their ships on a South American run. The chief engineer accompanied him. Edgerly told me on the cruise from Tampa to New Orleans that in order to keep up his home in New Jersey and send two boys to college, it was necessary for him to deal in a little contraband. A year later I had dinner with him when his new ship was in New Orleans. In answer to my query, Captain Edgerly told me his new racket was gold. He traded Woolworth trinkets to Indian mine workers for pieces of gold. As captain he had a better salary but because of additional
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expenses he was still involved in a little smuggling. He also informed me that he had written my mother imploring her to discourage me from making the sea a career. She did!
About the fifteenth of August, Coach Gaddy came by the house and told me to pick up two CC pills, take them that Friday, and report for football practice on Monday morning. That Saturday afternoon I was playing tennis when Coach drove up and asked if I had taken the medication. When I told him that I had forgotten, he said, "Take them tonight. I don't want you to get sick about the time we play our first game!" I was stunned! Did this man really think I was capable of making the first team when he knew that I had never played football? What a psychologist! And what a challenge to me! I did play in that first game, and nineteen more before I left GCMA. We also had a great baseball team in the spring of 1924. The teachers I met along the way who impressed and influenced my character most, were Mrs. Bethel (grammar school at Long Beach and high school at Mississippi City), Coach Gaddy, Captain Pattilo, Major Butler, Major Payne, Major Martin, and Mr. Warrington. My closest friends at GCMA were not athletes but fraternity brothers in Phi Lambda Epsilon - Keith De Kalb, Peter Folse, Sheik Lewis, and Chauncy Tonner.
I graduated from high school in the spring of 1924. After graduation I accepted an offer from GCMA to particpate in athletics again by enrolling in their post-graduate course, the equivalent of a freshman college year. Since I had returned from Europe in time to report for football practice, I had no trouble getting back into shape. During the 1924 football season we lost only one game in regular play and one post-season fracas to Pensacola Naval Air Station. The Pensacola team was ready for us because of their loss to us in 1923. In addition, they had All-American guard Country Moore and All-American halfback Captain Fisher, both graduates from the Naval Academy. Moore played right tackle and he was equal to the whole side of their line. He handled tackle Ned Lewis and me like we were little boys, but we made him respect us. When the final whistle blew, Moore invited Ned and me to a dinner dance at Pensacola's San Carlos Hotel that night. We met Country at his quarters and had a drink. Then we got into his Cadillac sport roadster and drove over to his
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