: Hey Mike, your post brings back many memories of electronics school. I arrived at TI December 1969 for ET “A” School after BEEP school in San Diego. We were all wondering whether we’d get to go home on leave for Christmas, but that didn’t fly. But the new barracks were plush. I remember the circular, slanted pathway around the central atrium. Every day after school the TV room would be crowded with guys watching re-runs of “Star Trek.” I left in the summer of 1970 for the fleet before returning to Nuclear Power School in January of 1972. After I washed out of Nuc School because of poor eyesight, I ended up at the transit barracks at Treasure Island. I was a MAA at the administrative building buffing floors and telling guys to get haircuts while I awaited orders. After a couple months of this duty I got orders to the USS Tutuila ARG-4, which was anchored in the Saigon River 10 miles south of Saigon. I got the chance to use my radar training to install and repair pathfinder radars. I didn’t get to use my SPS-10 radar training until I reported aboard the USS Joseph Strauss DDG-16, homeported out of Pearl Harbor. I wrote a novel about a Westpac onboard this ship entitled “Steve McQueen Would Be Proud.” Read about it at www.westpacstories.com.
Steve: I was on board Treasure Island in December 1969, attending ET School (Communications). I arrived there in May 1969 and had the pleasure of living in both the old barracks and the new barracks.
What a change from the old WWII fire traps. Winter was brutal in the old barracks - no heat, and you could feel the air coming in the cracks in the walls. The new barracks were luxury. I left TI in July 1970, assigned to USS MORTON DD-948, homeport Pearl Harbor. I remember being berth outboard of the JOE STRAUSS (our old man had to be junior to every other captain in the world). MORTON made three cruises to the lovely Tonkin Gulf while I was aboard. Many wonderful memories of my time at TI, San Francisco, and on board MORTON - I would not trade it for the world. I look forward to seeing TI and the city again.