When we visited Japan, after the Yorktown's last combat cruise in 1968, the Captain allowed us to buy motorcycles and transport them back to the USA chocked down in the hanger bay. I bought a Honda 90cc motorcycle for $199. My aunt and uncle from Fontana, Dorothy and Roy Cork, met the Yorktown at the Long Beach US Naval Shipyard and took a picture of me, riding my Honda 90cc on Pier E. The Yorktown afterbrow is in the background.
I was tall and skinny. Six foot one inch and the motor cycle was awfully tiny. Did I look ridiculous?
I was in a second hand shop in Long Beach and saw a Rear Admiral's dress uniform coat with tails. It was just my size. As it was second hand and being sold in a junk shop I bought for $5. I wanted to ride my Honda 90cc motorcycle on the streets of Southern California wearing a Rear Admiral's dress coat with tails flapping in the breeze.
But the clerk could NOT let me out of the shop until she snipped off the Rear Admiral's strips. I argued with her "But I'm in the Navy!" She said, "But you're not a Rear Admiral and you will arrested by the Shore Patrol for being out of uniform." After a few minutes this reasoning finally sunk into my 18 year old brain.
I had great fun riding around on my motorcycle with the Rear Admiral's uniform on with the two rows of brass buttons. I thought of putting my third class petty officer "crow" on the dinner jacket but probably out of laziness didn't get around to it.
I stopped at a red light in Ocean Blvd. in Long Beach and in the other lane was the Air Boss of the Yorktown! It was a very long red light as I sweated out the wait as Air Boss looked at me, then squinted at me as I sat there wearing a Rear Admiral's dinner jacket, dungaree pants and a US Navy aviator's helmet I "borrowed" from the Yorktown photo lab.
PH3
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