Artifacts: USS Ranger 1960 Yearbook Flag and Other Departments

You can read about the Ranger on Wikipedia.  The ship appeared in several TV shows and movies, including Top Gun.  

The yearbook goes through the crew, department by department.  The ship is like a floating city with nearly 5000 aboard.  We start at the top with the Flag department on the conning tower.  

The Operations department has the coolest working environment.  A co-worker loved the picture of Commander Grimes.  "There's a guy I want in charge!"

   

                                     

Yes, even at sea, there's paperwork, thus an Administrative department.

The Chaplains on the ship are in this department.

You can still take a trip to the dentist on board.

The Medical department.

As soon as you're out of sight of land, it's a good thing you have a Navigation department on board.

The Photographic division.

The Radiomen.

The Signal division.

The top secret W Division.  (We think they're in charge of the nuclear codes, since some of the ship's planes were nuke-capable.)

There's also the Weather Division.  I'm thinking the weathermen here are held more accountable for forecasts than your local TV guys.

Artifacts: USS Ranger 1960 Yearbook Departure and Ship Life

With the ship ready for departure, the families gave their sailors tearful goodbyes.

The crew then settled into typical shipboard life.

There were some sports and music.

There was some time for relaxing too.

Artifacts: USS Ranger 1960 Yearbook Arrival and Dry Dock

The USS Ranger arrived in port in formation.

The ship went into drydock at the Alameda Naval Air Station.

The crew then went into training.

I think I can explain the disturbing graffiti on the plane.  I think it's from a squadron from another ship.  The Ranger sailors gave it a welcome.  The "Dependents" cruise allows friends and family of the crew to stay on board the ship.  They usually treated to an airshow while there.
 

Artifacts: USS Ranger 1960 Yearbook Intro

Meet Seaman Stanley "Dusty" Rhodes.  (Not to be confused with that wrestler guy.)  Mr. Rhodes was a former boyfriend of my mom.  He gave her his yearbook from returning from a tour on the USS Ranger aircraft carrier.  (I did do review of a magazine on carrier operations.)  After mom died, dad unsurprisingly didn't want to keep the book.  (Dad was also in the Army.)  Dad did make an effort to find him.  I did some Internet searching and talked to a relative, but to no avail.  So, I am now in possession of the book.

Inside the front cover were a few loose items, including the picture.  There were a couple of local news articles about the deployment and a Billboard Hot 100.  Are You Lonesome Tonight? by Elvis was #1 in the nation at this time. 

Inside the front cover in the upper left was Dusty's inscription to mom.

I photographed the pages in the book for these postings.  They're going to be a little rough, but if I'd tried to put this huge book on the scanner I'd never have gotten this done.

Artifacts: Extra Random Stuff

Once again, I present a few oddities I scanned.  (I've got some more interesting stuff coming up next.)

A co-worker gave me this a couple of weeks ago.  It is indeed too cool.  He found it at the Old Apple Barn outside of Cloudcroft, New Mexico.  He said there were other fake bills there with other themes.

Okay, this is sad.  I longer remember what comic book magazine this was the cover of.  The character is Concrete.  I'm not sure if this was commissioned for a Halloween issue or it was a cover of the comic book.  Whatever.  I like it.

Lastly, I have a couple of large anime wall hangings at home.  These were the inserted labels with them.  Here we have one of my favorite characters, Madoka, from Kimagure Orange Road, and the iconic Rei from Evangelion.

Artifacts: Random Stuff

Erm, yeah.  Just what the title says.  This was some stuff I scanned from mom's scrapbooks that didn't fit in with the other stuff.  So, let's get to it.

This was the first picture from the first scrapbook.  I'm not exactly sure why mom saved it, but it's a picture from the preschool I went to.  That's the teacher's, Mrs. Lamm's, daughter in the early 70's dress.  I like this picture because of the period wardrobe.  

  

Here's an article about my first Christmas Parade.

Here's my first movie.  I do not remember either flick.

Insert your Tiger King jokes here if you've seen the show.  (I haven't.)  This was an animal park I visited as a kid.  One quick Internet search revealed that it's still there, though under a different name.

Here's an essay I wrote as youngster blowing the lid off of the entertainment industry.  It was too hot to print then and even more explosive now.  Read if you dare to learn the truth.

Lastly, mom apparently saved an apology letter she sent to my teacher I guess after I'd acted up in school (probably preschool).  I wonder if the teacher sent it back with corrections.  I like the, "He seems so disinterested in writing," line.  Thanks, mom.