Notes from the February Meeting

Here are a few items of interest from our February meeting.

In addition to these items, be sure to review the previously posted information on Social Security and your military service.

Traveling Dolphins
Western District 4 Commander John Mansfield shared information about a new program in our district called The Traveling Dolphins. It is established to encourage visits to other bases within our district and here is how it works:

South Sound Base Commander David Richards
with the Traveling Dolphins

The Traveling Dolphins plaque will be held by a base until they are "captured" by another base. The Traveling Dolphins can be captured by your base by having at least three members from your base attend a meeting of the base that currently holds the Traveling Dolphins (note that at least one of the three members of the capturing base must be an elected officer of your base). Then you get to take the Traveling Dolphins to your base meetings, keeping the plaque until captured by another base. John mentioned that he was going to add that the capturing base members had to tell one of their best sea stories in order to complete the mission, but he would leave that up to the visiting members.

John noted that it would be a good idea to alert the base holding the dolphins of your base’s intention to attend the meeting. In the event two or more bases send participants to capture the dolphins; the base with the most number of members will take the plaque home. In case of a tie, there will be a coin flip to determine who takes the plaque home. Also, as a primary member of South Sound Base, the WD4 Commander will count as one participant for the base in seeking to capture the Traveling Dolphins from bases other than his own.

Thanks and a hearty "Bravo Zulu" go out to Mike Robb, carver extraordinaire, for the excellent job of making the Traveling Dolphins. Everyone have fun, get out and attend meetings of other bases and share the camaraderie within our organization.

South Sound Base currently holds the Traveling Dolphins. But John shared that there is a rumor that members from Yakima Base are planning on attending the next South Sound Base meeting.

Visit to Blueback
John Mansfield is organizing a day trip down to visit the USS Blueback at OMSI in Portland OR on February 26. If you are interested in going along, contact John ASAP by e-mail (johnss377@yahoo.com) or phone (360-569-0507).

Upcoming Event Dates
Base Commander Keith Watson shared the dates for some upcoming events. Be sure to mark them on your calendar:

• May 21 - Armed Forces Day Parade, Bremerton WA
• June 10-13 - Smokey Point Rest Stop Event, Steve Shelton will have sign-ups at upcoming meetings
• July 4 - Independence Day Parade, Kirkland WA
• August 20 - Tolling of the Boats Ceremony, Kirkland WA
• September 5 - Labor Day Parade, Black Diamond WA
• November 12 - Veterans Day Parade, Auburn WA

2011 Base Booster Fund
Pat Householder in heading up the new Base Booster Fund and wanted to pass along the following message.
Make a $10.00 donation or more and get your name listed in each month’s issue of The Dolphin Brotherhood for the year. The booster donations go into the general fund to offset the costs of newsletter production, mailing and other base expenses.

Make your donations to Jim Harper, Treasurer, (that guy at the meetings with the green eyeshade…). Be sure he knows it is your gift for the Base Booster Fund. We've collected $110 dollars so far.

February Program
Don Ulmer presented an interesting program about rescue of a B-29 crew off the coast of Japan by USS Springer (SS-414) during World War II.

Storyteller Don Ulmer

Don spun the tale of how on July 26, 1945 the B-29, nicknamed 'Dyna-Might', was on a bombing mission from the base at Tinian to Japan when it was damaged by Japanese aircraft. The damage forced the bomber crew to bail out, but only 8 of the 13 (12 crewmen plus a reporter-passenger) got out of the plane. One crewman, having heard that Japanese pilots would shoot at Americans in their parachutes, delayed opening his parachute and ended up landing about 2 miles away from the rest of the crew. Unfortunately, the radio operator wasn't able to get off a 'Mayday' message before bailing out and the crew didn't think they had much of a chance of being rescued. Luckily for the crew, an air-sea rescue plane spotted the bomber as it was going down and let USS Springer know about the crew.

Springer moved into the area and pulled the 7 crewmen aboard and started the search for the 8th crewman. This was a risky move, since Springer was only about 10 miles from Japan at the time. They found the last crewman, who had lost his life-raft, as he was about ready to give up.

After the story, Don showed a film (in color!) that Springer's crew took during the rescue. Don also showed us the bottle of wine that the rescued crewmen presented to Springer's CO during one of the Springer reunions.

The wine from the rescued crewmen

A close-up of the wine bottle showing the photo
and names of the rescued crew

It was a fascinating story about the little known, but important, role American submarines played in the rescue of downed airmen. Thanks to Don for sharing the story with us.

Be sure to check back for meeting announcements and other information.