RustyBattleship

Methinks one of the moderators on this board is also a docent on the ship.

__________________
Able to leap tall tales in a single groan.

RAL's_pal?

No kidding? A Moderator, or someone who has just been hanging around WAB since 05/12/05?

Dreadnought

Hmm. You know I have heard of this guy before. Barely a docent, heard he serves the descretion of the OOD and his minions. Heard he also likes staying below decks and out of sight out of mind too. Sharp,bittchy ( ) and sometimes humorous but overall respectfull in his nature.

Hmm lets see, who is this person....

Sarge? No
Rosemary the telephone operator?, No.
Henry the mild mannered janitor? Could be.

I'll see what I can scare up from him.

__________________
Fortitude.....The strength to persist...The courage to endure.

Dreadnought

Found em, Just missing his sidekick Spot

Attached Images

hongkongphooey.jpg (47.7 KB, 42 views)

RustyBattleship

I have a business meeting in a few minutes. But after that I'll dig into my photo file of the ship's conversion and try to find a pic of it for you.

RAL's_pal?

Seriously...


Trying to find a battleship or locomotive stroller at Toys R Us?

RustyBattleship

I couldn't find a picture of the remaining portion of the gun tub for life boat rack support, but this picture was taken by Sophie Chase of our photo lab, dangling in a box suspended by a crane when the NJ first came into the shipyard in 82,

You can see by the outer curve of the tub shield that we were able to mount 3 life rafts instead of only 2 if we cut the overhanging deck off flush to the bulkhead.

Attached Images

BB 62 pool.jpg (174.1 KB, 39 views)

Dreadnought

Directly outside the Captains In Port Cabin 01 Level Starboard side. Yes Mr. L. well familiar with that area. Although "If" I was one of the crew swimming I would have chosen the port side. Who wants to be under the old mans eyes.

By the way I like the new avitar.

It appears in that pic that someone was working on Sky 1 (Forward looking radar for the 5"/38's) judging by the cable/hoses ran up there and the scaffolding around Sky 1. It also appears that welding is being done somewhere in the area of the original FC station in the Conn on the open Nav bridge. I also notice the Conn still has her shields over the vision slits. Scaffolding also appearing at turret 2's telescopic range finder shutters and upfront on the turret itself.
Nice pic.

RAL's_pal?

Geeze............ok then, what pier was it on at the time?

Dreadnought

Tough question Pal, But I'm will to take a stab and say Pier B at the entrance to the turning basin channel. Probably incorrect but figured I would give it a shot.

RAL's_pal?

Before I answer the question, any other guesses out there?

Ok, looking at the picture closely, I can see that the picture was taken a bit after 1 in the afternoon PST, in the late summer of 1981. It's on the west side of pier 1, probably at the 400 ft mark.

Dreadnought

Well given my choices, I knew she wasn't in drydock and whatever pier she was tied to appeared to be open water on the opposite side of her. Given the fact that they would not normally back her into a drydock for any reason gave me the impression that whichever pier she was tied up to she was facing bow first towards the navy yard, But I guess for all intensive purposes she could have been spun around and tied to a per say a former fitting out pier.

RAL's_pal?

As far as I know, the Iowa class was always backed into dry dock 1. All the plans in the docking office for the ship (that I saw) were drawn that way.

The Jersey came in summer-late summer of 1981 and since it was on the west side of the pier, sunlight on the west side, it had to be early afternoon. There are no bodies around, and just hoses and staging, the ship hadn't been in long. There were no assigned sailors to the ship at that time either. Lunch ended at 12:10, but if you expected to get a crane operator to do something on a virtually dead pier before 1, you had to be dreaming, especially if you were to meet the yard photog there. (Sophia was a really sweet lady, got to know her from the shipyard bowling leagues and she never failed to say hi if she was in the area).

Dreadnought

Wow, big difference from PNSY. They were to be drydocked from bow first only. Perhaps maybe the difference in currents along the different rivers for incoming or outgoing tides or the Dockmasters preference. Here in Philly it was always bow North or forward and always the same drydock #3 although PNSY had 5 drydocks at one time only 3 of them could fit an Iowa class. Very interesting. We are actually very fortunate to have such a drydock but 2-1/2 miles don river.

RustyBattleship

Sorry guys. But when that picture was taken she had just been towed in from Bremerton as was at the South end of Pier Echo. But as soon as we installed a wide gangway aboard her, about 200 yardbirds stormed aboard her and started work on chipping paint, marking up access cuts, inventoring wood decking that needed replacement, hooking up shore power, running fire hoses to strategic locations, etc.

One weekend we opened the ship up to the public. Fortunately I got my family down there early. The PR department screwed up and didn't have enough porta-potties out there. When we left the ship the parking lot was full and there was a triple line of people strectching all the way from the end of Pier Echo to Bldg 300. Going up the freeway cars were stalled in the Southbound lanes trying to get into the shipyard. They were backed up past Alameda Blvd and almost to the Pacific Coast Highway.

During the following week, we had a number of people in plan files who couldn't see the ship and normally would not have any business out there but were going nuts sorting and filing all the plans and making up the booklet of drawings index. So I talked to Bob Blount (our PR man for design) about taking them out there in two groups. He said, "Let me get my hard hat and I'll go with you."

So I was their tour guide for that morning and they finally got a chance to see a real BATTLESHIP. I let John Shuey (plan files supervisor) pick up a couple of pieces of broken teak decking for souvenirs.

Ahhh. The good old days.

By the way, on my new avatar, that is me climbing up the mast of the USS Wisconsin (BB-64) on July 26, 1989 while she was in drydock in Philadelphia. I know the date as that was my birthday.