We've been gaining new members, and you will find a listing of them in this newsletter. And as usual, you will find a number of interesting articles in this newsletter. There is a listing of some additional pages that have been added to the web site. This includes a new web page for our new ship's store. We will use this ship's store to sell some of the things you used to be able to get in Buchanan's ship's store, as well as some new Buchanan items. You will find a report from a recent OE/OI division reunion in Omaha, along with a photograph of the attendees. There is the first part of a two part article about the development of the US Navy uniform. It provides answers to such questions as, "Why on earth did the enlisted uniform have bell bottoms?", and "What was that flap on the back of our jumpers for, anyway?" And, of course, their is the usual "Sea Story of the Quarter."

Plans are afoot for the next local Buchanan reunion, to occur in June of next year in Pensacola, FL, and there is some information about that in the newsletter. Plans are also being made for the next national reunion which will be held in late February, 2002 in San Diego. In regards to the San Diego reunion, Rob Browning is in touch with ML&RS. This is a company that will assist us in the planning of the reunion. They will do all of the organizing and make all of the contacts for us, and take a lot of weight off of our shoulders before and during the reunion. Shortly, members of the Buchanan Association will be receiving a questionnaire from ML&RS. This is for you to indicate what your preference will be for the reunion, such as how much you want to pay for a hotel room, what your wishes are for a banquet, what kind of tours and activities you would like to see offered, etc. Please fill this out and return it to ML&RS as soon as possible.

On a final note, we are now requiring a yearly dues of $14.00 for membership in the organization. Most have been on top of things and have sent the dues on to our treasurer along with a membership form. If you haven't done so yet, please take the time to fill out the form and send in your dues. If you need a membership application, please let me know at: malonedave@aol.com, or you can leave a message at (315) 568-2991 Ext. 29. I'll make sure that we get one to you.
Dave Malone: Editor

Saturday afternoon we met at Claude's house where we joined in on his son's graduation party. His son had just graduated from college with a BA in History. The "old folks", that's us, gathered in the backyard and were treated to some great mid-western, home style cooking of fried chicken, Stoysich sausage (my wife and I picked up $40 worth to take back to Denver with us), and a slew of side dishes, including that famous Nebraska corn on the cob. After everyone had eaten and had a few "cold ones", we chased the youngsters out of the air-conditioned house and gathered around the television set to watch the movies "Dino" Meyers had brought with him.

To warm us up, we first watched the movie, "Who Needs You Buchanan?", a movie made for the Navy in the mid-60's. It was a tale of how the Buchanan was able to save a downed pilot from the sea after he had to eject due to an emergency onboard his aircraft. This "jet jockey" got to see close up exactly "who REALLY needs you Buchanan". After that was the actual movies taken of the SINK-EX before the ex-BUCHANAN joined Davey Jones. It made us all proud to see how the "old girl" stood up to that barrage of firepower. It was during this showing that several of us developed colds or allergies because there sure was a lot of sniffling and wiping of eyes. The last movie was taken by a shipmate during the 1972 cruise showing leaving our homeport of San Diego, a few ports along the way, beautiful sunset shots from the fantail (remember those?) and actual combat scenes of both "out-going" and "incoming" rounds.

After the movies, more conversations and refreshments, the group split up with some going across the Missouri River, into Iowa, for a little gambling and others back to their hotel rooms to rest up before meeting back at the DAV. The big winner for the trip was Pam Glidewell (Mel's wife) who walked away with a little more than $1,000 in winnings for the trip. Prior to heading out for dinner, we were met by one more shipmate, Al Shaper (RD2), who could not meet with us Friday evening. After visiting awhile with Al, we headed off to Piccalo's Steak House and were treated to thick steaks, prime rib, or seafood. After the dinner we returned to the DAV for a nightcap and bid farewell to a few who were catching flights out in the morning.

For those of us who stayed on until Sunday, we were treated to a cookout at Dan Stoysich's house. The beer served was compliments (leftovers) of the keg the graduate and friends had left behind from the day before. Lunch was Dan's famous char-broiled burgers on the grill, more corn on the cob, potato salad, coleslaw, and delicious homemade peach cobbler or cherry pie. The highlight of the day was the "all hands" working party which mustered in Dan's front yard to load my Harley back onto my pickup. It seemed to go a bit smoother with six guys loading it than it was with only Carl England and my son at the start of the trip.

With the Harley safely loaded and strapped in, it was time to bid farewell. I'm sure I speak for everyone in extending a great big "Bravo Zulu" to Claude and Dan (and lets not forget their wives for putting up with us) for a great time and hospitality. It was sure great seeing everyone again.

Jim is busy makes plans for this reunion. For information, contact Jim at (850) 838-1623. Use authorization number 13 when asked for it.

The following are new members of the USS Buchanan (DDG-14) Association who have joined us since our last newsletter was published. I'm sure that you will join me in welcoming them all aboard.

Fog Watch
Late in 1968 the USS Buchanan DDG14 was working on a special assignment to test out a new advanced missile tracking system for our on board missile threat tracking system. Every Monday morning we would put out to sea to spend most of the week testing this new advanced system. The crew quickly settled into a work routine not that much different than what we had on WestPac 68, with the exception that we didn't have all of the Sea Dragon operations. Where we kept having to go to battle stations every time the 1MC crackled the call, "Battle Stations, Battle Stations, all hands man your Battle Stations." All the while the General Quarters Bells were ringing. Thinking of the sound of those bells will still raise the hair on the back of my neck and makes the adrenaline flow. See the movie "In Harms Way" with John Wayne to see what I mean. However, on this day in late November, 1968, the USS Buchanan's 1MC and General Quarters bells were quiet. Instead we patrolled the waters off of San Diego and ran mock attack drills to see how our new missile tracking system was working.

As many of you may remember, this time of the year off the coast of San Diego. The fog builds quickly, usually after sunset, and lingers till after sunrise. On the night in question, it had been decided by Ensign Allen that the ET's could share the fog watch with Boatswain Mates while the Buchanan prowled through the night, lurking and waiting for the dawn.

Just before settling in for the night, the 1MC had crackled out its message, "Now set the fog watch." On this night I knew that I had the mid-watch and so I quickly settled into my bunk to try and grab a few winks before going on watch. The next thing I remember was the Boatswain Mate messenger coming around, trying to find the mid-watch relief for the next watch. He first tried ETRSN Dan Stoysich, next he went to ETR3 Champion only to find out these were the wrong guys. He misunderstood when Champion pointed to my bunk and so he dropped down and tried to wake up Wopie. His real name escapes me, but you couldn't wake Wopie up in the middle of a hurricane! Just then, I reached out and touched the messenger's shoulder causing him to jump with a startle. By this time he had figured out it was my turn to stand fog watch.

Never having stood this watch before, I was not sure what to expect, but I got dressed quickly in my undress blues and grabbed my peacoat from its locker. We wore our undress blues because within minutes of taking your post the fog would have you soaking wet. At least the wool of the uniform held in some of your body heat. Someone, months before, had left his peacoat on board as they left the crew. The ET's had taken this coat to be the fog watch coat.

I slowly made my way up the two ladders to the main deck and then exited through the starboard hatch onto the weather deck. Everything that I had been told about the fog watch was correct. It was like pea soup out there. You just about had to feel your way forward to the hatch in the weather break, and then onto the main deck next to the number one gun mount. I found the side railing and worked my way forward to my fog watch station.

Just then the signal horn on the Buchanan started to blow with a defining roar. I was to find out that any ship underway in a fog had to sound a prolonged seven second blast at least once, every two minutes while underway. This first blast, however, just about caused me to jump overboard! My fog watch station was as far forward on the bow as a sailor could get, right up where they flew the Union Jack from a mast while we were at anchor. I met the ET that I was suppose to relieve and we quickly swapped peacoats. I remember that there were two men on this watch and the other guy's relief had not yet showed up. He handed me the sound powered headset that allowed us to talk to the Boatswain Mate of the watch on the Buchanan's bridge. As we plowed along at about five knots, you could hear the bow wave below us as the knife edge of the bow split through the water. Gradually my senses started to adjust to where I was. A voice crackled over the headset asking if the watch had been changed, and instructing us to listen for other fog horns, whistles or bells and report their relative positions. I quickly figured out that you wanted to turn down your white sailors cap so it covered your head the best it could. They were right, the fog was thick and very wet. As I sit here writing this story, I remember what it was like for Leonardo Dicaprio and Kate Winslet to have stood on the bow of the Titanic with reduced visibility on the darkened waters of the North Atlantic.

As you may realize, this got to be a very trying job, with the horn blowing every two minutes and then listening for other fog horns. About a half hour into the watch we started to hear another fog horn and reported the sound's relative bearing to the bridge. It seemed that they were more interested in finding out if we were standing up at our post and not sitting on one of the capstans. The fog was so thick that the bridge watch couldn't see us or our position on the bow. It amused me that they kept calling on the sound powered phones to make sure that we were still with them. Where did they think we were going? We reported again the fog horn that we heard and with each report the watch communicator grew more agitated with us.

Just then I heard the strangest sound. The sound seemed like someone blowing air off from an air compressor. I ask the other guy if he heard that noise. I started to report what we heard, which by then was much louder and seemed to be coming from more than one source. I felt the ship shutter and heard a terrible commotion below us. An urgent voice crackled on the headset, with all the excitement of James Cagney from the movie Mister Roberts, "What the hell was that?" Although I was barely able to see the surface of the water, I could see the white trashing of the water below. I heard the other man on watch say, "Oh, NO!", and then I realized that we had run into a whale. The poor creature must have been having a time of it, because the commotion in the water was horrendous. Just then, the ship's whistle blew. The collision must have really caused a commotion on the bridge. I reported that we had run into a whale and it was blocking our path. In fact, we had sailed into a pod of whales and they were all around us. In my mind, I could hear the sound of the engine telegraph ringing out "All Stop" and expected to hear the collision alarm any second. However the alarm never came and one of the bridge Quartermasters joined us quickly on the bow. We just sat there for several minutes while the whales swam on, waiting for our path to be cleared. To this day I can still remember the shuttering feeling of the bow as we plowed into that whale and all of the excitement that went along with it.