My three boats were the best ... of course.
USS Salmon SS-573 we won seven battle efficency E's in a row Admiral Nitmiz presented us with the fifth gold E in person at Mare Island naval shipyard. He grabbed my wife's hand, at the reception afterwards, and with both of his hands on my young 17 year old bride he says, "Well bring on the rest of the pretty girls"
He must have been in his early 80's and I think he lived somwhere nearby in San Francisco ... the date was August 1964. Plus we pulled a North Pac that will never be forgotten montoring Russian missile test with some spooks (CT's) on board.
USS Ethan Allen SSBN 608 blue crew first ship of her class, first FBM designed from the ground up to be a FBM (the other's before her were SSN's cut in half and missile decks added on) We fired seven A-2's in a row back in 1968, off the Canary Islands in the direction of Rossvelt Roads, P.R. We fired them one minute apart and all 7 hit within 50 yards of the down range (2,500 miles) targets. We were the first boat to ever do that.
The captain surfaced after the test, plus we had just pulled a 80 day patrol in the Med and we had an old fashioned picnic. We were flying a big 7/up flag too when an English ASW patrol plane caught us topside. We just waved and laughed at him as he circled us.
USS Sam Houston SSBN 609 blue crew for firing the first live warhead A-1 Polaris misslie wiping out Christmas Island in 1961, but I got on board 9 years later. Still one of the best crew's I served with for keeping it's sanity at sea. We had a ships newspaper and yours truly was the ships radio disc jockey for the latest news, sports and who cared about the weather at 200' and 4 kts.
I know ya'll believe me, right? I never doubted that, but just in case here's some picture proof.
USS Salmon SS-573 just fresh out of overhaul April 1965
Those three shark thingy's are PUFF's sonar for tri-angling a range.
350' long world's largest diesel boat (in service) and don't give me that
crap about the IJN's sea plane boat's, either.
This is the USS Ethan Allen SSBN 608's blue crew on the mission
I described above. That's the picnic and the crew going home. We flew
back and forth from Groton, Conn to Rota, Spain to change crew's.
This was from the patrol book the ships personalman put together
for us ... That's me in the lower right hand side under the huge 7/Up flag.
Want to see a real sonar gang in a real sonar room no less.
Here's seven of us ... That's Chief Ski in the middle I'm on his
left side (the white guy). Chief Ski died back in 76, but the rest
of us are still kicking. That was the sonar gear behind us, three
units, BQS-4, BQR-2B, BQR 7 and the BQQ-3 was in front of us.
By the way that black guy was so cool he use to press his dungree's.