Loading...
HomeMy WebLinkAboutBen Roper TranscriptionCity of College Station Heritage Programs Oral History Interviewee: Ben Roper Interviewer: Jared Donnelly Transcriber: Brooke Linsenbardt Date: August 13, 2014 Place: College Station, Texas Project: Veterans of Aggieland Jared Donnelly (JD): Alright this is Jared Donnelly. I’m here with Ben Roper. Today is August 13th and we are going to talk about your time in the service. Um, I remember from your email you were in the navy from ’79 to ’04. 00:00:15 Ben Roper (BR): That’s correct. JD: Alright, great. Um, I guess a little biographical detail um to start us off. Um, when and where were you born? 00:00:22: BR: Uh, I was born uh July 29, 1955 in Ganado, Texas which is down uh closer to [unknown Texas city name]. JD: Right, yeah. Down um towards the coast I guess. 00:00:30: BR: Yeah. Down, kinda headed down that way. Uh, my dad worked construction uh, so we moved around quite a bit. Uh, various areas uh, when I was—I don’t remember exact age—probably about four or so, he was working on some of the uh ballistic missile silo construction that was going on in the Wyoming, Colorado. That, that area where they were putting in, I think it was the minute man um, missiles and all that. So we spent probably three or four years in northern Colorado, southern Wyoming. Uh. JD: Isolated areas. 00:01:15: BR: Area, and all that. Yeah, some, some small towns up there and then moved back to, to uh Texas--Clifton, which is just north of Waco. Stay on highway 6 and keep going. Uh, uh. When I was in fifth grade. So I grew up there in Clifton, went to Hill Junior College. At that, as, as it was called at that time over in Hillsboro for two years and then got my bachelor’s at uh Stephen F. Austin over in Nacogdoches. Uh, graduated in ’77 uh, went to work for a, a. My, my bachelor’s degree was in agriculture. I grew up on a farm, all that good stuff so. Um, went to work for a company there in Nacogdoches. Um, Texas farm product’s company and worked for them for uh, almost two years. Um, first half was in quality control and their lab doing quality control for feed and fertilizer, all of their products. JD: One second, sorry. We’re having a. Okay, we’re back. 00:02:16: BR: So anyway um, uh, I worked for them in doing quality control for about the first year they had a sales position come open and asked me if I wanted to, to give it a shot. And I said, “Sure.” Hated it! I mean hated it. Uh, to the point of you know you wake up every morning and say, “Not again.” And that kind of a thing and say, “Hey, life’s too short. I’ve got to do something else.” JD: I think some people are cut out for sales and some people aren’t. 00:02:41: BR: Yeah, that’s exactly right. And it’s uh, and I wasn’t. [laughs] And so I did a sharp right turn and joined the navy. JD: So just this is going to be totally different. I know it’s going to be different, so I’m going to go ahead and do this. 00:02:54: BR: Yeah, something like that. I, I was never really that interested in any of the military services. If somebody had told me in college that I would be going into the military services, I’d say that they were nuts. Um, but for some reason it just, the idea just kind of, kind of dawned on me. I went in and talked to a recruiter. I knew I didn’t want to do the, go into the army and, and for whatever reason I just, it wasn’t attracted to that. But, liked the water, and said, “Let me go talk to the navy and see what they got to offer.” And. JD: Was your dad in the service? 00:03:24: BR: He was not. JD: No? 00:03:25: He got a deferment during World War II, he was working in the ship yards. JD: Oh sure. 00:03:28: BR: Uh, so his service was more, more valuable there. And, my uncles were all in the army in World War II. And uh, but um. No, no career military that I’m aware of, at least a couple of generations back. But anyways talked to, to a recruiter and, just was talking and, and so I was looking at, going into advanced electronics field as, as an enlisted. And he said, “Well.” And then it just, it dawned on me that, “Well, what do you have to do to be an officer?” “Well you got to have a college degree.” “Well got that, what else?” [chuckle]. “You got to make application.” So I made application and, and was accepted and, and went to, to OCS—Officer Candidate School in Newport, Rhode Island. In August of 1979. JD: So do you, going in as an officer or, or straight into OCS, you don’t have to do boot camp then. 00:04:27: BR: No the, it’s the OCS’s, the officer’s equivalent to boot camp. JD: It, it’s all put together. 00:04:30: BR: Yeah. JD: Yeah, okay. 00:04:31: BR: Yeah, sure is. And I had never really been out of the state of Texas other than when I was really young like I say, when my dad worked construction. So certainly had never been up to the northeast. So uh drove up there and, to Newport and went through Officer Candidate School, and graduated and was commissioned as an NCN in, on December the 21st, 1979. JD: Alright. 00:04:58: BR: So that, that kinda started the, the process. JD: So you saw the navy as a, an opportunity to do something different with your life, kind of like different work. 00:05:07: Absolutely, absolutely. At that time wasn’t looking at a career or anything along that line. So yeah. JD: So you were thinking four years and, or whatever. 00:05:14: BR: Right. JD: So at this point this was uh, peace time. Maybe. Uh, seven years removed? Six years removed from Vietnam? 00:05:24: BR: Right. JD: Um, so I guess you really weren’t really concerned about. Ehh, well you know, Cold War’s coming on so I imagine there was a little bit about that. 00:05:31: BR: There was a little tension at times. Yeah. JD: Right. Right. But you weren’t, you weren’t necessarily worried about anything. 00:05:34: BR: No. I, you know, I, I think you probably think about it to a certain degree but uh, not, not, not something that I dwelt on. You know. I mean there’s always a possibility of something happening at any one time and, and you never know. So. JD: What was OCS like? 00:05:54: BR: It was different. JD: The Texas way I guess, being up in the northeast. 00:05:58: BR: Yeah. It, it, it was certainly different um, uh, like any you know boot camp type of, of environment, a lot of yelling and, and that sort of thing. This was before things were kinder gentler like they are now. So definitely a, an experience. I, I. It was, it was something completely different than anything I had done. And, and in spite of the, the, the rigors I guess, I actually enjoyed most of it. [chuckle] Not all of it, but most of it. JD: The challenge. Or there was so many cool different things. 00:06:32: BR: The, the challenge and, and being exposed to, to different things and the people. Um and I think if you’ve done these, these as you, I know you have for various groups and whatever, there is, there is a, a comradery that, that develops uh in, in folks that serve in military units. And, and some of that was, even though relatively short, a few months in OCS, um you, those bonds still developed. And that. So I, I had never been exposed to any type of environment where that, that happened previous to that. So, so it was, definitely a learning experience. But, but somewhat of an enjoyable one. JD: Sure. Did you know how to swim before you went in? 00:07:20 BR: Uh, a little bit. JD: Yeah. 00:07:22: BR: A little bit. JD: Bet you figured that out by the time you’re done. 00:07:23: BR: Right, right. Yup, yeah. JD: So um I know with the army once you’ve finished your basic you go into, you work for an MOS, or you train towards an MOS. Did this, was it similar to you? 00:07:37: BR: Uh, somewhat. Uh the, the navy has two main, well there’s actually more than that but there’s two main branches. You’re either what they call lines, surface line or a line officer, or a staff officer. Uh staff includes such things as the J.A.G. Corps which is the lawyers, the supply corps, the doctors and nurses, and all of those folks. The line are those, if you move into the line you are potentially eligible for command at sea at some point. Either of a submarine or surface ship or a, an aviation squadron. Something along that line. I was in the line, uh line-up and to be more specific, the surface line as opposed to aviation or submarine. Uh, so, I went, after I, I was commissioned uh, I went to another training school for surface warfare officers. It was called Surface Warfare Officer Basic at that, that point. It was also in Newport but it wasn’t going to be until, it wasn’t starting until three months later so they stashed me, uh I got temporarily orders to, ship John Hancock was based in Charleston, South Carolina. So after, my, my parents came up and saw me commissioned and then we drove back down to Texas. And after Christmas holidays and that sort of thing. I, I drove to Charleston. And served three months on the U.S.S. John Hancock just as a, kind of a temporary storage. Um. JD: Right. Did you have sea at all? Or was it? 00:09:20: BR: A little bit. Uh, we, we actually, right after I got on board the ship, literally the next week we, we went up to, to New York City for a port call. There was some event coming on, I don’t remember what it was, it was associated with fleet week or something along that line. Uh, and in coming back Cape Hatteras is known for its storms and all that. Hit a, a monster, a whopper of a storm coming around Cape Hatteras. And, and it was probably sicker than I’ve been in. [laughs]. JD: Yeah. [chuckle] 00:09:51 BR: At any other time during my career and, but I had a lot of good company because everybody on board was sick. Yeah. JD: Really. What kind of ship was it? How big? 00:09:58: DR: It was a Spruance-class destroyer. JD: Okay. So. 00:10:00: BR: And you know 580 feet. Yeah. Yeah. JD: Wasn’t small. [chuckle] 00:10:05: BR: No. And, but yeah we uh, we rolled around pretty good. And, so then went back up, finished S.W.O.S. and was uh, got orders after Surface Warfare Officer’s School. S.W.O.S. for, is the acronym. To the Dwight D. Eisenhower, an Nimitz-class carrier. Joined her in uh, the Indian Ocean. This was during the Iranian Hostage Crisis. JD: Okay. 00:10:36: BR: When the, during the time that the, American embassy employees were being held hostage. JD: Right. During the 444 days. 00:10:44: BR: Right. Exactly. Nimitz was the first carrier that was, that was out there monitoring all of that. In fact it was Nimitz that the, the ill-fated uh rescue attempt. JD: Eagle Claw. Yeah. 00:10:58: BR: Eagle Claw was, was launched off of from the deck of Nimitz. We relieved or I relieved Nimitz and I joined her during that deployment. JD: So did they fly you out there I guess? 00:11:09: BR: They did. JD: Yeah. 00:11:09: BR: We, we went to, I went to, from, after S.W.O.S. uh, I, I got a little bit of leave. Went to Texas and then, flew from, from Texas to Travis Air Force Base in California and then we made a round of, almost literally, around the world-type, type journey. Flew to, to, uh, Japan, refueled, the Philippines. Had an overnight in the Philippines and flew to a small island in the middle of the Indian Ac-, Ocean called Diego Garcia, and then from there flew to uh Masirah, Oman and was [inaudible] out to the ship. That was a staging point for supplies and personnel and all that sort of thing. So uh. JD: Okay. Was it all military? Or were you flying commercial at all? 00:12:00: BR: No, it was all military flights. JD: C-13s and stuff like that. 00:12:02: BR: Uh, C-141s at that time. Yeah. And, we did have coming from, from the Philippines, there was a USO troop that was uh, doing some entertainment and was actually headed the same way so flew that time. This USO group was Miss America. JD: Oh yeah? [chuckles] 00:12:26: BR: And Miss America and several of the Miss America contestants and all that. So they were putting on a show and we round up traveling with them. JD: That’s some good company. 00:12:35: BR: It is some good company. Yeah. JD: [Laughs] 00:12:37: BR: Very much so. JD: Uh. So about what time did you arrive on Ike? 00:12:42: BR: I arrived, I don’t remember the exact date but it was in July of 1980. JD: Okay so, trying to think of my time frame here. Um. So that would have been after the crisis had ended. 00:12:56: BR: No it was still going on I believe. I believe it was still going on. JD: Oh right. Election would have been in ’80. 00:13:00: BR: Yup. JD: Reagan took office in January ’81. Okay gotcha. Right. So, what was your job coming on and then also tell, tell me a little bit more about how, how things felt as a junior officer showing up in the middle of basically the biggest crisis the military was facing. 00:13:16: BR: Well first off all you need to understand about that, the, the carriers. I mean it’s a floating city literally. Five thousand plus people. You got the air wing and then the ship’s company that supports them. And, and the whole idea is supporting the air craft. That’s what it’s there for. So it, it’s a little bit of a strange environment for, for a surface officer. Um, I, I was pretty excited. I, I mean I remember relatively distinctly the first night on-board. I was down in the ward room which is uh, you know, flight deck is, is I think if I remember correctly, it was on the O-9 level. So you have your decks up and down the main deck and everything above that is O-1, O-2, O-3. So the flight deck is, is on. JD: In the big tower. 00:14:03: BR: Yeah. The, the island structure. Flight deck is on, I wanna say O-7 actually I think. Ward room was on the third deck uh, which is where you eat. And still I, you could, they were launching aircraft and, and because you did almost round the clock flight ops. And the way the catapult goes when it launches the aircraft there’s what they call a water break that’s slows the catapult down, but it jars the whole ship. JD: Really? 00:14:34: BR: When you, I mean you can feel it until you hit the. JD: On a carrier? 00:14:39: BR: On a carrier, yeah. JD: That big of ship? Wow. 00:14:40:BR: You can feel this, this (imitates noise—boom) and things kind of shake a little bit. And, so I, I remember asking somebody you know, “Are they launching? Are we launching aircraft?” And everybody else would, “Well I guess,” you know. [chuckles]. It was just, just nothing new to them, but it was kind of exciting to me. And, so yup, I was uh assigned to weapons department. Normally what you would do, uh an officer, a junior officer NCN on, on-board ship uh, their first tou-, tour is as what’s called a division officer. So on, on-board ship you’ve got your administration and then it’s broken up into departments—navigation, weapons, operations, supply, engineering, um. I did not have a division, I was in administrative part of the weapons department on the, on the aircraft carrier. Later I was assigned to a division, but initially I was kind of disappointed in that because I really, I didn’t have anybody working for me so I wasn’t you know, learning how to JD: Be an officer. 00:15:41: BR: Work with people and be an officer and that sort of thing. On the plus side, one of the, first qualifications that a surface worker’s officer has to do is obtain their surface warfare qualification. So it’s the, the, the pin, the surface warfare pin. Ship and crossed swords and all that sort of thing. Well there’s a very extensive qualification process that you have to go through. So not having a division meant that I had, you know I did essentially a, a standard workday. It’s a little more than eight hours on-board ship. But, then I didn’t have really any requirements so I spent a lot of time on my qualifications and was able to, to get ahead of some of my peers in that respect. Um, a highlight on, on board Eisenhower was I actually qualified as officer of the deck which is, means that officer deck-under-way is really in charge of the ship from a navigation standpoint. I mean there’s a navigator and all that but he’s the guy that’s on the bridge uh, um in charge of the ship. And I, I qualified as officer-of-the deck and, and stood officer-of-the-deck watches. Um. JD: Wow. As junior officer like that? 00:16:49: BR: As, as a junior officer like that. JD: And so it’s pretty uncommon for somebody that early in their career? 00:16:53: BR: It, I was a little bit ahead of, of uh, of a good number of folks. But it, it, it, it was a little bit uncommon to qualify as an NCN which I did. Um, and. So that was, that was kind of exciting. JD: Yeah. So being there during the crisis um, what, what was, I guess what was your mission more or less? Just support if anything happened? 00:17:21: BR: Yeah, that was pretty much it. Uh, it, you know there were, we did daily flight operations in support of reconnaissance and, and had you know, aircraft up in case something happened. Uh, but manly intelligence and uh, reconnaissance type missions were the main things that were being flown. JD: Um, no, you mentioned, did Eagle Claw happen prior to you arriving or after? 00:17:50 BR: Prior to. JD: Prior to, okay, right. So what was the feeling like that, you know, so the mission, the rescue mission had been tried, it was bungled horribly, um disastrously, end, ended disastrously. So did, did guys in the service, you’d be around it, did you talk about it, “Well we should go again, we should try this.” I mean what were, what was the feeling like? Was it a lot of anger? 00:18:08: BR: Yeah, oh. I, not that I remember per say, it was more, I think it was, it was certainly some frustration. But part of it is, is that, you, you know, you, you just kind of get into a routine you know. There’s, there’s more than enough stuff to do from between training and, and you know day-to-day operations and all of that sort of thing so it, it was, it was more, we need to do something and doesn’t look like anything’s being done. So their frustration factor I think was probably the biggest thing. JD: Was there frustration you think with the military or with the administration? If you remember. 00:18:43: BR: Uh. I, I, really hard to say. Yeah. JD: Yeah. These um, there’s a lot of talk at least when it comes to sort of you know talking about the history of the moment and how you know Reagan comes in, smashing victory, people are excited. Uh, he’s going to bring America back to prominence and sort of clean the slate and all that. Did you feel that I guess? I guess politically when, when that went down. Now, okay, now we’re finally going to do something. 00:19:11: BR: A little bit, yeah, a little bit. Uh some of that, was the, as I guess as the relatively junior member and all of that, you’re probably insulated more but I, I do distinctly remember the, the Reagan coming into office and, and, and there was kind of an excitement that yeah he’s going to, you know, make a lot of changes and what have you. Uh in all of that I think was, was positive or at least what was felt to be positive as far as where, where we’re going. You know right after he got into the navy, or got, got into office, the navy went, and all of the military went through kind of a, an examination in the, in the concept of the 600 ship navy which was born during that time. From the navy’s stand point which led to the, you know, the building up the services and the, the recommissioning of the four-aisle class battle ships and, and that sort of thing. I was really excited about that. Uh, and, as it turns out, as I was getting ready to leave the Eisenhower after my tour of, of two years. Uh wanted to, to, to go to New Jersey. Well so did every other Surface Worker Officer in the navy. JD: Right. Wanted to get on the battle ship. 00:20:30: BR: To, to the battle ship. Uh as luck would have, the, the, the captain, [Ed Kleckstin], was the commanding officer of the Eisenhower. Unbeknownst to be, I, I put in my letter to my, my detailers saying, “Hey this is what I would like,” type thing, knowing it would, you know, probably didn’t do any good. But as an official letter, it had to be endorsed by the, the captain and I, I think the captain actually wound up making a phone call. And I got orders to the New Jersey. JD: Alright. 00:21:06: Which was, was really really exciting. JD: Uh, can you explain a little bit the, the attraction of serving on a battle ship? Um, as far as I understand once the Iowa-class are decommissioned, there weren’t anymore. 00:21:15: BR: That’s correct. JD: So battle ships were a thing of the past. They weren’t going to happen again and then they come back. So what’s the attraction I guess for a surface worker officer? 00:21:21: BR: Yeah, I mean it’s, it’s kind of like the, the, that was the pinnacle from the surface warfare standpoint. Nine sixteen inch guns, you know. Built to take a hit. You know all of that kind of stuff. Uh, just, just an amazing, amazing platform. Even some 1940s technology uh and, and a lot of updating. But still it was, there was, it was built in the 1940s. [chuckle]. JD: Right, right. 00:21:54: BR: And, but it. From a, a surface standpoint it was, it was just exciting. JD: Yeah. I guess that, that’s sort of the classic ideal of, of what navy’s do. [Inaudible] 00:22:09: BR: And, and power and all. Exactly, exactly. Even though that, even and then that really wasn’t going on. I mean, you know. You— JD: Right, right. Who would you have shot at? I guess the Soviets. But. 00:22:19: BR: The last, yeah, the last time there was a you know, a surface to surface engagement was World War II and, and, but just the, the I think the idea was pretty exciting and it certainly was to me. And, and I, I was thrilled to, to join New Jersey. JD: When you were on the Eisenhower, did you stay in Indian Ocean the whole time those two years? Or did you guys get out? 00:22:37: BR: Oh we left, we left there in December. Uh, an interesting thing about that deployment. There was, during that, it was a nine month deployment for the, for the Eisenhower. April to, to December. And. JD: And you joined it in the summer. 00:22:50: I joined it in the summer. JD: Of ’80. 00:22:50: Of ’80. And there was only one five day port call in Singapore. And it was just before I got to the ship. And the navy had a policy that I believe after sixty days at sea, continuous days at sea, you could get permission from the Secretary of the Navy for, to serve two beers, to, to, to the crew. So that happened once before I joined the, the Eisenhower and twice after. So that was the first six-pack cruise that I, that I think even to this day, has ever happened. JD: Wow. 00:23:33: BR: On a, on a navy ship. JD: Six whole beers. [chuckle] 00:23:36: Yeah six whole beers. JD: Yeah. 00:23:36: Two at a time, spread over you know several months. JD: So flew in a bunch of pallets of, of Budweiser’s or something. 00:23:42: BR: Uh, I’m not sure where it came from. JD: Do you remember what it was? 00:23:44: BR: Uh no I don’t. JD: [chuckle]. Was it cold? 00:23:47: BR: It was cold! JD: It was cold, there you go. Alright. So, so you made it out of the Indian Ocean. Did you? 00:23:55: BR: In, in, in December. We got, we got back to Norfolk if I remember right like December the 21st or 22nd of , of 1980 so. JD: What is it now, I think it’s crossing the equator when you do the shellback. 00:24:08: BR: It was. And we, at that time they weren’t sending the carriers through the Suez Canal so we had to go around the horn of, of Africa. And, and coming back up of course we crossed the equator. And I did shellback initiation which was no fun and that’s one that you want to, you, you might want to do once, but nobody ever wants to do it no more than once, even though now it’s tamed down a lot but at that time, it was no fun. [laughs] JD: I, I’ve heard shellback stories from a Marine who served in the late seventies, uh a guy who’s still in the navy who did it, I guess probably within the last decade. Let’s hear your shellback story. 00:24:45: BR: Well. JD: I guess explain it a little bit so we have it on record. How that works. 00:24:46: BR: In, in crossing the line, you you’re a- JD: The equator. 00:24:52:BR: You’re a, you’re a, equua-the line is the equator, absolutely. Until you’ve done that, you’re a, a pollywog—a slimy no-good pollywog. And. JD: Even officers. 00:25:04: BR: Even officers. And upon crossing the equator and going through the ceremony, you become a crusty shellback. And there’s this whole tradition kind of thing and the, the shellbacks, put it on and there’s a, a series of, of events—humiliating events—that you have to endure, to, to earn the right to be a crusty shellback. I was a little bit sparred that because on the, the crossing the, the line ceremony they get you up like in the middle of the night right after midnight. And, and the, the, the festivities start. I had the four to eight watch on the bridge and so they couldn’t come get me until I was off watch. JD: Right, they need you sharp for that. 00:25:50: BR: So that, that was good. But then, you, you go and put on some old clothes and then like I said, you have to go through all sorts of. JD: Like down the garbage chute. 00:26:01: BR: Down the garbage chute and kiss the Royal Baby which was, you know, some fat guy with, with grease on his belly and uh, other stuff. JD: [chuckle]. Yeah. 00:26:14: BR: Meanwhile you have shellbacks that have what are [shillelaghs?], which are links of firehose that, that they use to, to beat the hell of you quite frankly. JD: [chuckles] 00:26:28: BR: And, yeah. It’s no fun. JD: Yeah. You have any idea how old the tradition is? I don’t. 00:26:34: BR: I do not. I do not. JD: Yeah. But it always happens. And so how does somebody know whether or not, I mean do people say, “Oh yeah, I’m a shellback.” 00:26:41: BR: No it’s in your official record. JD: Oh really? 00:26:43: BR: It becomes part of your official record. JD: This is [inaudible] institutionalized. 00:26:47: BR: Yeah. If it’s not in your record, you’re not a shellback. JD: Alright. So if somebody and goes and checks all the records. 00:26:50: BR: You dan-burn right. The shellbacks. JD: So there’s a list of people. 00:26:54: BR: If they, if they’re, if they’re, if they know they’re going to be crossing the equator before they leave, they make darn-sure that that’s in the record. That, if not, they get whatever they need to do to make sure it is. And when, when I went to the Indian Ocean across, of course they crossed the equator, there were only a few shellbacks. JD: Really? 00:27:10: BR: Or you know a couple of hundred. But there were thousands of, of pollywogs. Well when I went through it was, those numbers were flipped. You know, there were a few of us that had joined during the cruise that were pollywogs and a whole bunch of shellbacks. So yeah. JD: [chuckle]. Was, were there women serving on ship at that point? 00:27:29: BR: No, there were not. JD: Okay, I was wondering how much that’s changed the shellback, or the yeah. Interesting. Alright. So you did that on the way back. That was all kinds of fun. 00:27:38: BR: We did. Yeah. JD: How, how senior of an officer do you know of, I guess it doesn’t matter if you’re, if you’re a pollywog. You’re a pollywog right. 00:27:50: BR: There were, there were captains that, that, they went through the, the ceremony. JD: Oh my gosh. [chuckles] It was crazy. Right, so cruising through the Atlantic at this point and it’s going back home. And where did you go to port? 00:28:00: BR: Norfolk. Uh, Ike [Eisenhower] was unported in Norfolk. Kind of an interesting side story there that the, one of the other folks in, in weapons department that, I served with was Daniel [McCreedy?]. I, not married and, and so it wasn’t, wasn’t going home so I didn’t take leave right after we got back in like, like a lot of folks did. So he invited me over for Christmas dinner to his home, he lived in Virginia Beach. And his sister had moved from Italy to, to Norfolk and was, was living with them at the time. And so we met there and turned out later we’re married. And so that’s how I met my wife, at Christmas dinner in 1980. JD: Right when you got back. 00:28:49: BR: Right when we got back. JD: Yeah, yeah. So then did you stay on the Eisenhower or were you sent elsewhere? 00:28:53: BR: I stayed on the Ike [Eisenhower] for another, roughly year and a half. In, in 1981, we did a Mediterranean deployment, and so I did one more full deployment on-board Ike [Eisenhower]. JD: Were you sent for anything specific or just put on a ship in the Mediterranean. 00:29:13: BR: No it was pretty standard. Just a Mediterranean deployment. JD: Any, any interesting port calls? 00:29:18: Uh, Naples that we, I remember. The carriers can’t go into that many ports but we, we, they did Naples. Went to, to Israel. And at that time, things were not quite as chaotic as they, they are now. So just the tours to Jerusalem and, and all of that. At that time you were actually able to, to go up to—on, on the area that’s the old temple foundation where the Dome of the Rock is now, which of course is uh, a Muslim holy site. Which you can’t even get up there now if you’re not, if you’re not Muslim. But at that time you could. You couldn’t go in, but you could get up there. JD: Yeah, I believe that’s the sight of the Ascension of Muhammad to heaven I think. 00:30:04: I believe that’s right, yeah. JD: Um, so Naples and, and, and Israel. 00:30:09: BR: Israel and I. JD: Portugal? Lisbon I guess. 00:30:15: BR: We did, we did make a port call in Lisbon. You’re right. JD: Yeah. I was in Lisbon in February. And there was a MEU I guess, Marine Expeditionary Unit and I, I was stunned because bunch of jarheads running around and I couldn’t quite figure out what was going on. I’ve traveled a lot in Europe and I don’t, I don’t remember ever seeing these servicemen. I mean of, of course incredibly obvious who they are. But it seems, I guess Lisbon’s a pretty common port of call for you guys. 00:30:39: BR: Yeah. Yeah. I remember we had a lot of trouble anchoring there because it’s, you anchor in a river. Lisbon is, is not on the coast. It’s up the river a little bit. JD: T-something I think it’s what it’s called. 00:30:47: BR: I don’t remember the name. Yeah and I know we had a lot of trouble getting the anchor to hold. JD: Really? 00:30:52: Yeah, sure did. JD: Well, it’s a big, big ship so. 00:30:54: BR: Yeah. Yeah, exactly. JD: A lot to push around. Um. So on these, little bit about the port calls I guess so I imagine not everybody goes obviously at the, the same time. So people are in ships and whatnot. Were you as an officer, were you in, I guess you’re not in charge of anybody when you’re, off, off ship. You do whatever you want. You’re at liberty right? 00:31:12: BR: Pretty much, yeah. And that. JD: Like a day? Twenty-four hours? 00:31:15: BR: That was, that was pre-9/11 and all that so some of the rules on, on a, you know, they really at that time, the navy wasn’t stressing the buddy system like they are now and, and all of that so you could, you could literally, if you didn’t have duty, you were generally in three-duty stations or three-duty sections so you know, one day is your duty day so you got to stay on-board ship, stand watch and, and all of that sort of stuff. Then the next day you’re off, the next day you’re off and then it’s your duty day again. So a third of the ship could potentially be off. You know once you get off duty, you could go and say check yourself into a hotel room or, and, and stay ashore. And do whatever you wanted to. Nowadays that, you know you got to say where you’re going and all that so it was a little freer then. JD: Was it common for people to stay onshore rather than the ship? 00:32:06: BR: It was, yeah. JD: I guess a little bit easier than having to try to go back and forth. 00:32:09: BR: That, but especially from a carrier because you never pulled pier-side so you always had to ride the boats, and boating was always a, a little bit of a, adventure. JD: Yeah. 00:32:18: BR: Yeah. JD: How long, so you get how long was your port call generally? Or did it vary? 00:32:23: BR: Usually three days, three to four days. JD: Okay so everybody got at least two days. 00:32:26: BR: Right. JD: On shore. 00:32:27: BR: Yeah. JD: But, not always together. So all forty-eight hours. 00:32:30: BR: Oh yeah, yeah. JD: So being a kid from Texas, hardly having been anywhere, the port calls I imagine, were a good opportunity for you to go see some stuff. 00:32:36: BR: They were. They were. I took a lot of advantage of tours you know, and the, the, they always put on some tours and that. JD: The service did? 00:32:44: BR: The service did it and the ship did. Each ship has, you know, well their own welfare-rec department. Part of the proceeds from the ship’s store goes to fund the welfare and rec fund and then the, you also get funds from the navy and so they use those funds generally to, to support tours and that sort of stuff so that, you know, a tour may cost back then, $30 dollars, they would only charge you $5 dollars or $10 dollars, and the rest would be paid for by the welfare and rec fund. Subsidized it. JD: Um, was this the first cruise you’ve been on? Call it cruise right? 00:33:17: BR: Right. JD: That you did a port call? Since you missed the Singapore one the first time around? 00:33:21: BR: Yes. Yeah. Well yes. There were, we were supposed, when I was on Ike [Eisenhower] in the Indian Ocean we were supposed to pull into Mombasa, Kenya and that got cancelled. Then we were supposed to go to Perth, Australia and that one got cancelled. I’m really sorry about that because my whole career I wanted to go to Australia and never did get the opportunity so. JD: Never got the chance. 00:33:37: BR: Never been to Australia so. JD: So, do you remember anything like, in your first few, which what, which was the first call? Do you remember, those three? 00:33:48: Uh. Actually it was, was Portsmouth, England. Because we, we did a, a, when we went on that Mediterranean, the first part of it was, we, went up to the north Atlantic. Did some exercises. At that time, the, it was still hot and heavy Cold War and all of that. JD: So NATO stuff? 00:34:07: BR: But one of the concepts of, of NATO-wise, was that carriers would operate in, in the Norwegian fjords. And, that provided some protection from our radar masking standpoint. JD: And they’re deep enough too. 00:34:23: BR: And, and they’re deep enough. And, and big enough. Best fjords was one of the, the, the best, the most well-known ones. So anyway we, we, our, our actually sailing was delayed because of a hurricane that had come up, and I don’t remember the name of it, but up the east coast and it hadn’t come ashore but was just off-shore. And so because winds and that sort of thing was some delay. We were delayed one day getting underway and we followed that damn hurricane all the way up to the, to the, to the, way up in the north Atlantic. Lousy, lousy weather. Uh. Had a couple of accidents with aircraft on the flight deck, and actually lost one plane, an A-7 at that time had come in and landed and was taxing off of the uh landing area. Lost breaks or something, don’t know exactly what happened, but the plane never stopped, hit the edge of the deck, flipped over upside down and sank promptly. Lost the pilot. JD: Really? 00:35:34: BR: Yeah, yeah. JD: What kind of plane’s an A-7? 00:35:36: BR: It’s a tact-craft. A-7 [inaudible]. JD: A fighter jet. 00:35:40: BR: Uh. No more of a tact-aircraft, not a fighter. JD: Okay. 00:35:44: BR: At that time, the fighters were they, they. JD: So [inaudible]. 00:35:47: BR: They were F-4s, Phantoms, were the, the predominant. But they were, they were getting into and mainly we had on were F-14 Tomcats were our, the main fire. JD: So this was like a close-air support type. 00:36:01: BR: Close air support, yeah. JD: To support [inaudible]. 00:36:03: BR: And some bombing and that sort. JD: Okay, I gotcha, okay. Wow. Huh. And, and, so it, do you think the weather played a role? Or was it? 00:36:11: BR: Oh undoubtedly. JD: Okay, yeah. 00:36:12: BR: Yeah. JD: Yeah. So that must have been pretty rough for everybody. 00:36:14: BR: Yeah, it was, it tough. JD: Did you recover the plane? 00:36:17: BR: Did not. JD: Just down there somewhere. 00:36:18: BR: It promptly sank, yeah. In deep water. JD: [Sighs] 00:36:22: BR: Yeah. JD: Wow. So Portsmouth. 00:36:26: BR: Yeah and we sw—and coming back out of there we, we stopped in Portsmouth, England and, and then went down in the Med., so that was the first real navy port call. JD: Yeah. So what was your, like for, for your first time. I mean, wh—did anything stand out for you? The experience? And England’s not, I mean people speak in the same language so it’s not that different. But, I imagine, I thought Lisbon was ridiculous when, but I’ve never been to Italy. I’ve never been Israel either so I imagine it’s pretty different. 00:36:50: Yeah. Not, not really stood out. Some people went to London, I didn’t get to go up to London. So just kind of sightseeing there in Portsmouth and that sort of thing. JD: [Inaudible] what everybody was looking for in port calls. Didn’t matter where it was. 00:37:04: BR: Yeah, yeah. They were, most people did. JD: Yeah. 00:37:07: BR: Looked forward to it. JD: Huh. So I see, the, the second tour here in the Mediterranean, nothing much going on. So just a [inaudible]. 00:37:15: BR: Yeah nothing really stood out other than, like I say that, that instance that we had with the rough weather. JD: Were you doing the same job? Or did, or did you have a different job? 00:37:23: BR: Uh, at the time, I actually, just before that deployment I was assigned to, to deck division. Uh, I don’t remember the, the which division it was. First or second, I don’t know. Anyway, but I was in charge of the boats. The small boats, which were used to, to ferry the crew back and forth during port calls. We would hire ferries also but we supplemented that with ship’s boats. So a different, different job. JD: Where are these boats stored when you? 00:37:54: BR: In the hanger deck. JD: Really? 00:37:56: BR: Yeah. JD: So they’re lifted up and then dropped into the water? 00:37:57: BR: Lifted up. They got, they’ve got, uh a cradle in hole, two boats, one on top of the other one. And yeah, lifted up with the ship’s crane called B&A crane—Boat and Anchor or uh, I’m trying to remember now, I forgot what the A stands for. But anyway, so yeah. JD: How big are these boats? 00:38:19: Uh, fifty-foot. Fifty-foot utility boats. JD: Wow. Yeah. Okay. It was pretty serious then. 00:28:24 BR: Yeah, they hold about a-hundred, a-hundred and twenty people. JD: But they’re not intended as life boats or anything like that. 00:38:28: BR: No, no. JD: Okay because I was going to say you have to crank them out of the hanger deck. You’re not going to have any time to do that. 00:38:35: BR: No. JD: Huh. So then what would your job be when you’re not at port call or something? What was? 00:38:37: BR: Maintaining the boats and getting ready for the next one. Training. JD: Okay so you would never use them when you’re at sea? 00:38:44: BR: No. JD: Yeah. Gotcha. Okay. So after that tour or cruise? 00:38:50: BR: Uh. I left a, let’s see, I don’t remember exactly when we got back from that one but I, I think actually I left the Eisenhower, in fact I did, right before the end of that cruise. And, flew off and went back to the states to get ready to go to Long Beach, where the, the New Jersey was, at Long Beach Naval shipyard for, refitting. She hadn’t been commissioned yet. That was a kind of a highlight during the commissioning because Ronald Reagan came out. You know it was the first battle ship and he was the commissioning speaker. JD: Right so you, you were part of the crew when it was recommissioned? 00:39:28: BR: I was recommissioning crew. JD: So that’s a, a bit of distinction there. Yeah, yeah. So it was refitted there in, in, in where did you say Long Beach? 00:39:39: BR: Long Beach. JD: Long Beach. And intended for the Pacific or? 00:39:44: BR: Yeah, that was the, the initial intent. Uh, so yeah. We were going to be, didn’t know it initially where she was going to be home ported, but it turned out she was home ported there in Long Beach so we moved from the shipyard over to the Navy, naval station and, did our, operational tour out of there. JD: Right, what was your job on that? 00:40:06: BR: Uh, I was initially a, an electronic warfare officer, was my first job. And, again kind of exciting, you know, battle ship and all that sort of thing. And, but yeah, good times. And then we, our first call on the New Jersey was actually up to San Francisco. We went up to San Francisco. And had, had a great time. Uh, you know, the, the saying, even during that time in San Francisco was, was pretty liberal, but say, wear your uniform on-shore and lots of guys did all that sort of stuff. And, and had drinks bought for them and, and all of that. JD: Yeah. 00:40:55: BR: One of the stories, we had a Marine detachment on board and the, the EXO [inaudible] was out with some of the other guys and they were walking down, down Main Street there, or Market Street, excuse me, in San Francisco and this whino comes out of an alley and, looks them up and down. And at the top of his voice, and, and it was all navy guys except Stan [Bennet?] who was the EXO of the Marine detachment. And, looks them up and down and says, “Hey fleet must be in. You boys are looking pretty good, but where did you get that damn marine?” [laughs]. JD: [laughs] 00:41:34: BR: Stan was hot man, he wasn’t [inaudible]. And, but, yeah. JD: So that guy must have been a, a navy vet too. 00:41:39: BR: Yeah, yeah. Must’ve been. Yeah. JD: Geez. 00:41:42: BR: Yeah. JD: So imagine a port call in your own country is a little different? 00:41:45: BR: It is, it is. It, that’s somewhat routine. But not, but it was exciting because it was a battleship. And then we were, shortly after that we went on, what was supposed to, a shake-down cruise. So it’s been three months, we were going to the western Pacific. JD: And its first big cruise? 00:42:06: BR: First big cruise, it was, like I say, just kind of a, it was, it was termed a shake-down cruise, you know. Just make sure everything works, show the flag and all of that sort of stuff. So, we stopped in Hawaii and then went to the Philippines and it was, it was really kind of interesting ‘cause, ‘cause we made almost the identical journey that, that New Jersey made during World War II. JD: Really? 00:42:24: BR: And as we were going through the, you know, the straights there in the Philippines and whatever, they, they, there at various times they would get on the announcing system called the 1-MC and would say, “At this time, New Jersey is steaming through you know, such and such a place in, in 1944.” You know, was, “she was involved in,” you know, “strike group operations.” And, you know, gave some history and all of that sort of thing. So that was kinda, that was kind of neat and exciting. JD: So there was a lot of consciousness of the history [inaudible]? 00:42:52:BR: Oh absolutely, absolutely. JD: That’s cool. 00:42:55: BR: Vey much so. JD: Yeah, a lot of pride wrapped up in that all I imagine. 00:42:57: BR: Yeah, yeah. JD: Huh. Because by that point you’re almost forty years from when it was, really last doing anything. 00:43:01: BR: Right, right. Yeah. JD: How long had it been decommissioned do you know? 00:43:06: BR: I don’t know because the exact time. She was brought back for, she, she was re-decommissioned after World War II. Was brought back for Korea, was decommissioned again and brought back for Vietnam. And, and so I, ’69, ’70, somewhere in there. I, I don’t know the exact, when she was decommissioned before coming back. JD: Did it feel like an old ship? Or they’d done a lot of refitting to? 00:43:30:BR: They did a lot of refitting. There were still some things. You know when she was built there was no air conditioning on-board ship. So we had air conditioning, but trying to get the ventilation balanced and all of that was still a challenge. So there were places where you’d go and. JD: The south Pacific. [chuckle] 00:43:47:BR: And you know, to open, to open. Well it, but to open a door was like you were pulling against this vacuum type of thing because it wasn’t all balanced and all that so. But yeah. One of the, the interesting things was that, my collateral duty on-board the Eisenhower was welfare and rec officer so, so, or the, the New Jersey. So whenever we’d go pull into port I would arrange the tours and all of that sort of thing. Well one of our stops, one of our first stops overseas was we pulled into Manila. In the Philippines, anchored. And, I was, my Sea & Anchor detail was junior officer of the deck so I was on the bridge. Of course, people came aboard, the first boat came aboard with all of the folks that arranging all of the services and, and then of course the folks for the welfare and rec. So I got word, “There’s someone in the ward room they want to talk to you about tours and all that.” I said, “Fine, tell them I’ll be there as soon as I get off, you know, as soon as the Sea & Anchor detail ends.” So I went down and, and uh, there were several groups there to, to talk to. But one of was, at that time in, in Manila, there was, there was still a Playboy club. There weren’t any in the States, but there were still some internationally, and one was in Manila. And, they were having a big, we were there over the Fourth of July. JD: Oh wow. 00:45:13: BR: And, so. This was July 1983 and, we were, like I said we were going to, and had a big show, Fourth of July show they were putting on and so they had some very discounted tickets. It was a meal and all of this, plus the, the show. And a, great deal. Like $10 bucks for a ticket. And, so arranged for that and, and that sort of stuff. And then the guy says, “Well we got some people that want to see the ship.” Well everybody wanted to see the ship. I mean the battleship and all of that sort of thing. And I said, “Okay, well can you meet me at fleet landing in the morning? Nine o’clock?” “Yeah, nine o’clock sounds good.” And, “I’ll bring them out and they can, give them a tour.” Well there were two things he didn’t tell me. He didn’t tell me the people that were coming were the bunnies. And he didn’t tell me that they were coming in full uniform. JD: Oh my gosh. [chuckles] 00:46:03: BR: So, so nine o’clock I get out there at fleet landing and here they show up. JD: Oh wow. 00:46:07: BR: And it’s this, this guy and, or one other person and five bunnies and. JD: Is every, is, so a third of the crew’s on-shore by this point? 00:46:17: BR: Yeah. JD: Missing out. 00:46:19: BR: Yeah. And there was, I was thinking, “Well, how can I, how can I do this? This is not good.” JD: How are you going to get back off that ship. 00:46:27: BR: Yeah, it’s, it’s. Well that and then how do I get on. Well the only boat going back at that time was, the, the only ferry that was, that was heading to, to the, to the New Jersey was one that had a bunch of DVs on it—Distinguished Visitors that were coming out to see the ship. So I load up my bunnies with the DVs and we get back to the ship and we, we go ashore and, and the EXO meets me at, the, the, the landing, uh-quarter-deck and had one of these one-way conversations, finger-in-the-chest and said, you know, I was trying to explain how innocent it all was and he wasn’t having any point of it, wasn’t listening. And, and, “There better not be any pictures mister. I don’t want to see any bunnies on the battle ship.” And in fact and I said anyway, “Yes sir, yes sir, yes sir.” JD: What rank were you at this point? 00:47:14: BR: I was a lieutenant, junior grade. JD: Okay. 00:47:17: BR: And. So we did our tour and all that and the crew was just loving it, you know. [sings] “Way to go Mr. Roper hey” and all of that. So but I got my bunnies on board and we gave them a tour and, and I got them off the ship. And, no harm done. JD: You were the hero of the cruise. 00:47:33: BR: But yeah, every, every port call after that was, “Where’s the Playboy club Mr. Roper?” Yeah, yeah. JD: [chuckles] That’s great. Huh. How long was that tour? 00:47:43: BR: It was two years. And. JD: Really? Two years at sea. 00:47:46: BR: Well no, no. We weren’t uh, that, it was just a three month shake-down cruise, supposed to be. But the other thing that was going on during this time was down in Nicaragua. You know, there was, there, the, the Communist government and, the Iran-Contra stuff and all of that sort of stuff that was, that was coming later. But you know it was to fund the, the Contras and the, the revolt there in Nicaragua. So we were, we were sent from [inaudible] off the coast of Nicaragua for a naval blockade that was, that was going on so we did that for a couple of months. And then the Lebanon was going on and Beirut and then the civil war there so we went through the Panama Canal which was pretty interesting. JD: Yeah, you could barely fit right? 00:48:41: BR: Exactly. Two of the design specifications for the, the Iowa-class battleship was that it had to fit under the Brooklyn Bridge and it had to fit through the Panama Canal. The Panama Canal is 110 feet wide, we were 108 feet wide. So there’s not a lot of room on each side. In fact we had to take off all the overboard discharges and that sort of stuff or they would’ve gotten knocked off and we still round up scratching a little paint going through. JD: I bet. A foot on either side of the battleship. 00:49:08: BR: Yeah. That was, that was really interesting. And so we went through the Canal. Had a change of command because the commanding officer made admiral and was, was being flown off. And uh, at sea change-of-command and then went to the Mediterranean. Spent six months in the Mediterranean. So it round up being actually an eleven month cruise. It, at that time it was the longest cruise since World War II of any naval ship. JD: Wow. 00:49:31: BR: And during that time of course, we were off the coast of, of Beirut and, and probably ended up. Most memorable thing that, that happened there was on, on October 23rd, Sunday morning, when the, the barracks was bombed. JD: Oh, you guys were already there. 00:49:46: BR: We, we were on stationed. Right. In fact, I had to watch the bridge watch that morning and was on the bridge and saw the smoke and then got the radio reports that, about the, the suicide bombing. And lost 243 people I believe. JD: Hmm. What was the feeling on ship? Anger I’m sure. 00:50:08: BR: Oh it was, yeah absolutely. In fact one of our ship mates, a, a, a electronics’ technician chief had gone ashore to help repair a radar that was, being used by marines to track incoming shells to find where they were coming from and that. So he was actually there and was killed. So we had a shipmate that, that actually died during that, the explosion. So yeah, pretty, pretty sad time. JD: Hmm. How long were you guys there off of Lebanon? 00:50:36: BR: Uh. For the entire time that we were in the Mediterranean. Almost six months. Yeah. JD: And you’d already been there once since you’ve been in the Mediterranean. And you’ve been to Israel so that’s right next door to Lebanon. 00:50:45: BR: Yeah. Yeah and we did another Israeli port call on, on the, the New Jersey. Went to Alexandria, Egypt. JD: Oh yeah? 00:50:52: BR: And then also to, uh I’m drawing a blank—Villefranche. JD: Okay. 00:51:03: BR: On the. Just, just across the peninsula from Nice and Cannes. Very close to Cannes. JD: What, what was the reception for, for when you guys when in port call? I imagine most of Western Europe was pretty warm. But what about the Middle East? 00:51:17: BR: At that time was, was actually not bad. JD: Yeah. 00:51:20: BR: Yeah, not bad at all. JD: There wasn’t, and, and I guess as rec officer, or rec and welfare you, you were. If had there been something you needed to tell the guys, you would have been the one in charge of that. 00:51:28: BR: To get the word. JD: The, “Hey okay, don’t go or do this” or whatever. Yeah. 00:51:32: BR: Yeah. JD: Yeah. Interesting. So but at that time even with all the stuff going on. 00:51:36: BR: No, it wasn’t, wasn’t that bad—even in Israel it was. JD: I imagine the Israelis would have been pretty friendly. 00:51:42: BR: Yeah, yeah. JD: But, huh. 00:51:45: BR: And you didn’t have you know. Terrorism was there but it wasn’t as prevalent as it is nowadays. You know, we, at that time it was a rarity to have a bombing and that sort of stuff. Whereas now it, un-unfortunately, it’s almost routine. JD: Right, right. So an eleven month shake-down cruise. 00:52:06: BR: Yeah, yeah. My first son was born while I was on that cruise. So. JD: Wow. What kind of communication did you guys have at that point? Because I mean now, people can email [inaudible]. 00:52:12: BR: No email and all that. We had pretty much MARS you know which was the, the, the H-F radio. JD: Oh really? 00:52:19: BR: Yeah, run by volunteers. And then snail mail. You look forward to mail call. JD: Yeah. No phone calls? 00:52:26: BR: Not unless you were ashore. Yeah, not unless you were ashore. And then they were very expensive of course. JD: Yeah. So how long was it till you found out that your son was born? 00:52:35: BR: Well we had. Generally whenever there’s a birth or something like that you would get a Red Cross message. So you’d get a message, a written radio message. You know, uh “Wife so-and-so gave birth to…” and that sort of thing. So I got the radio message. JD: Yeah. So gosh, you must have been on tour for the majority of the pregnancy. 00:52:57: BR: Yeah. Absolutely. Yeah. JD: Wow. And any. That was, I, I guess, relatively unplanned to be gone that long. 00:53:03: BR: Yeah it was, well I was supposed to been back for the birth and that didn’t happen of course. JD: Yeah, dang. Well, that, that’s got to be disappointing. 00:53:11: BR: Yeah. JD: So you made it back after eleven months. How old was your son by that point? 00:53:14: BR: He was. He was born in November and we got back in May so, so he was six months old. JD: Wow. I have a fifteen month and I, I being gone three or four weeks or longer seems like a really, really long time. I can’t imagine missing the first six months. Geez. Huh. 00:53:33: BR: Yeah. JD: Alright. So you make it back. This is what ’84. 00:53:38: BR: This was ’84. Yeah. And. JD: Your son’s my age. 00:53:43: BR: I went to my first shore duty which was a, as a Navy Science Instructor down in Galveston—at Texas A&M Galveston. JD: Oh really? Cool. So what was that, what was that all about? Or how’d that go? 00:53:53: BR: It went well. Uh. Much smaller campus than it is now. [laughs] JD: Was this your first involvement with A&M? 00:53:58: BR: It was. JD: Yup. 00:54:00: BR: Yup. Sure, sure was. And, uh so, like I said, I was assigned there as a naval science instructor and general naval science for their ca-, their cadets which were, are all folks going into merchant marine. JD: Merchant marine. Okay. Yeah. 00:54:19: BR: Now you could get a commission into, to services or to the active duty services, or reserves, active reserves. So, most, most of the cadets were pursuing not military service, but merchant marine. These areas, engineering or deck officers. JD: So is this a posting that you specifically sought? Or? 00:54:41: BR: I, I wanted to go to a NRPC-type billet. JD: You were tired of being at sea? 00:54:47: BR: Yeah. Yeah I was. Definitely was. JD: So for the family you would rather. Yeah. 00:54:50: BR: So I, that’s what I asked for and then, I quite frankly I, I didn’t even know about A&M at Galveston at that point because it was called Texas Maritime Academy. Although it was a branch A&M, it, it was, I think they, the bonds now are tighter than they were then. And. So, but yeah. JD: So by this time, you probably spent total, a couple of years at sea. 00:55:12: BR: Probably more than that actually. Probably about 70% or so I would think. JD: Wow. That is a long time at sea. 00:55:18: BR: It is. And. So I did two years there at Texas Maritime Academy and then came real close to getting out of the navy at that point and, and waited over, decided to stay in. Um, so, then I, did my two division officer tours. One on Ike [Eisenhower] and on, back New Jersey. And then went, to, department head school. Back up to Newport. Newport was kind of the mecca. If you went, you know, you always went back to Newport, Rhode Island for surface warfare officers. JD: But you went back to both the two ships that you’d been on? 00:55:50: BR: No, no I. JD: Had done that? 00:55:52: BR: I had done that. JD: I see what you’re saying. 00:55:55: BR: And then went, then went to, to department head school in, in Newport and that’s a six month school so they PCS you—a permanent change of station orders to, to Newport. JD: So family moves? 00:56:06: BR: Yeah. Of course family moved. We spent the winter in Newport. JD: Did you have any more kids at that point? 00:56:11: BR: We did. I had, my second son was born actually in. We were living in Webster, Texas, just south of Houston. So he was born then. And so we had two, two boys. Went to department head school and then got orders to U.S.S. Paul—a [inaudible] down in Mayport after department head school. So went to Mayport, Florida. JD: Family moved down there? 00:56:34: BR: Family moved down there. JD: About what, about time is this? 00:56:39: This was, see ’84, ’85, ’86. This was in ’87. JD: What rank were you by this point? 00:56:46: BR: Uh, lieutenant. JD: Oh, so you moved up quite a bit. 00:56:47: BR: You, you ranks start off as NCN, spend two years an NCN. Lieutenant junior grade, two years. And then a lieutenant. And then you’re a lieutenant for a long time. About five years. JD: Hmm. That’s the equivalent of what? A, I guess a captain? 00:57:01: BR: A captain. Yeah, yeah. In the other services. JD: I have a friend that’s a L.T.C. and it took me a little while to figure out that he’s basically a colonel. Yeah. [chuckles] 00:57:11: BR: Telephone colonel. “This is colonel. Colonel or lieutenant colonel? Oh lieutenant colonel. Oh, okay.” Telephone colonel. JD: Oh, oh no. Lieutenant commander, right, which is the equivalent of, of. 00:57:19: BR: Is, yeah. Yeah and that’s a, that’s a major in the other services. JD: Oh major. Okay, major, yeah. 00:57:24: BR: But that’s yeah, that’s a, that’s the equivalent, that’s a telephone commander. JD: Yeah. 00:57:29: BR: Lieutenant commander. Is this commander? BR: So you decided to stay in. So was this where you re-up and sign another contract for x-amount of year, time. 00:57:36: BR: No at this point, you just stay in until you’re asked to leave. The only real thing there that I had to do was, and I, I think I did this on Eisenhower if I remember. Everybody comes in to the, to the reserves. You’re on the active reserves, meaning you’re serving on active duty. But you come in as a reserve officer, USNR. And you had to apply for augmentation into the regular navy, which was just USN. And I did that, I think it was on the Eisenhower, I don’t remember for sure so. At that point you’re in until either you do thirty years or they kick you out or you ask to leave. And so. JD: Were you at the rank where they sort of had quotas on how many guys they could have and that. Were you at that point yet? 00:58:18: BR: Uh, not really. That, I think that starts happening at lieutenant commander level. JD: Right. Where you know that I’m going have to spend x-time here and if I don’t get bumped up here, I’m done. Kind of thing. 00:58:27: BR: Yeah. JD: Right. Yeah, okay. So you didn’t have to worry about that yet. 00:58:30: BR: Yeah, not yet. JD: No, no. 00:58:32: BR: So I went to Mayport, spent about eighteen months there. Did my first department head tours, operation officer on, on U.S.S. Paul. JD: Where did you guys go? 00:58:42: Mediterranean deployment. JD: Yeah? 00:58:44: BR: Yeah. JD: Same ports call again? 00:58:45: BR: Pretty much, yeah. We did go into Tangier uh, which was different. Not a lot of port calls down there. This was kind of a special deal and security was really high and all of that. But. And then Morocco, I think we went to Morocco. Other than that Spain, [inaudible], which was really nice. JD: Yeah. 00:59:13: BR: Yeah. JD: Yeah, I bet. You know the Mediterranean pretty well know. [chuckle] 00:59:16: BR: Yeah. I, I’ve been around for, on, on the Med., Med. side pretty well. And, then went to Charleston for destroyer squadron 20 was my next tour. I was the [inaudible] officer for DESRON 20. And the destroyer squadrons at that point were training squadrons. They would, they would be given the next group of ships that was going to deploy and they were in charge of a particular aspect of training and getting that group of ships ready to deploy. And would then deploy with one of those ships. In other words, they would go on one of those ships. So got to Charleston, did some routine ops, various things training-wise, and then uh, went with a group of ships. And I was on the, we deployed on, through train-up and then on the John Rodgers, another Spruance class destroyer, just like John Hancock which was my, my first ship. And, deployed to the Mediterranean with that group again, and went, went through that. [phone rings] 1:00:21: BR: And. JD: If you’re running out of time, we can wrap it up. 1:00:26: BR: Yeah I’m going to need to, to wrap it up here in a few minutes. JD: Well let’s fast forward to, to 9/11. Or yeah, finish what you. 1:00:30: Well, let me, let me just finish right, right quickly so. So did that work up, and then, one thing that happened while I was on there was that on DESRON 20, was the, the explosion on the Iowa. The, the turret on the Iowa. JD: Wow. 1:00:49: BR: And the, the officer that was [phone rings] 1:00:52: BR: So the explosion that occurred on the, on the Iowa and the, the officer in charge of that was, Admiral Richard Milligan, who was the second C.O. on the, the New Jersey. JD: Oh. 1:01:08: BR: And so he, since I was on DESRON 20 in Charleston, which was where he was based, he reached out and grabbed me to participate in the investigation for the. JD: I bet that something. 1:01:20: BR: Yeah. I didn’t mention this but on the, when I was New Jersey, I started out as an electronic warfare surface officer. When we were ordered into the Mediterranean, I moved down as turret-1 officer. So I knew the, the gun-turrets pretty well. And the functioning as, the functioning of those and, and what have you. Because, during the, our time off Lebanon, we, we fired quite a few 16-inch rounds in support of the Marines that were there. JD: Really? 01:01: 45: BR: Yeah. JD: Oh wow. 01:01:46: BR: Absolutely. It was. JD: I bet that was something. A good chance to get the destroyer in action. Or the battleship in action. Yeah. Wow. Yeah. 01:01:53: BR: So anyway, fast forward that happened while I was on DESRON 20. And then I went from, from there, after I left there. This was in ’91 I think, just before the Gulf War started. But I went to Monterey Naval plus graduate school. Went through a master’s program at, at post graduate school, spent. JD: Great place to go to school. 01:02:20: BR: Oh it’s a great place. Monterey is, is amazing. But spent a couple of years there, almost two years. Went through, got the dual master degree there. And then went to [inaudible] executive officer school back in Newport. And JD: Moving [inaudible]. 01:02:39: BR: My family, my family stayed. I was a lieutenant commander at that point. I made lieutenant commander just before leaving DESRON 20. And. So I was a lieutenant commander at Monterey. And then. JD: Advanced degrees are getting required by that point. 01:02:50: BR: Pretty much, yeah. Pretty much. And I went through a dual program. I got a, a degree in, a systems engineering, which was a general engineering degree and space systems operation, which was a technology related-type degree. Systems technology. And. So, went to do my executive officer tour on the, the John Rodgers. We, we had deployed on with DESRON 20, out of Charleston. Had a, we did a unit tossed deployment which was a, a, a circum-navigation of South America. And you operate with many of the South American navies as you circum-navigate South America. So we started out in Venezuela when we had better relations with them. And then Columbia. Back through the Panama Canal. And then to, with Peru and Ecuador. Chile. JD: All the way down the bottom, yeah. 01:03:50: BR: Went all the, down the bottom. JD: Get close to Antarctica down there. 01:03:53: BR: Went. Yeah, went through the, the Straight of Magellan and Chilean inland waterway and back up to Argentina, Uruguay, and Brazil. And so, several port calls. JD: Yeah. So you really have seen the world. 01:04:07: BR: And Rio and, and all of that. Yep. And then, and back up. I left John Rodgers and EXO, my EXO tour after, not quite, I think seventeen months. Then of course the Navy says, “We sent you to postgraduate school. It’s payback time.” So they sent me to the Pentagon for three years. JD: Oh, wow. 01:04:32: BR: And uh, so we moved from Charleston up to southern, or northern, Virginia. And. JD: This was the mid-nineties. 01:04:37: BR: And did the three years. The mid-nineties, yeah. This was ‘9… [phone rings] 01:04:46: BR: You know, went. Spent three years in the Pentagon which was interesting. Really got to see a side of the Navy, you know, the budgeting process and how that worked. I was on the joint staff. And since I done, gotten the space systems ops degree and the engineering degree I was assigned to, to J6S. J6 is communications, joint communications. And S is satellite. So I was in the satellite communications’ office during my time there. JD: So lieutenant commander? 01:05:10: BR: Uh. Made commander just as I was headed up there. So I was, I was full commander at that point. JD: And that’s the equivalent of colonel right? 01:05:18: BR: That’s the, that’s the. No, that’s the light colonel. Or equivalent light colonel. JD: Okay [chuckle] 01:05:22: BR: Lieutenant colonel (anyway). And so, was a commander. Did three years. Was selected for command. So left the Pentagon in, in January of ’98. And, went to San Diego to take command of U.S.S. Rentz uh, of a Oliver-Hazard Perry class, fast frigate. Or a guided missile frigate. And, so took command in June of ’98. Uh. Quite an experience. I mean anybody that, that’s had the, the privilege of command is, is a. It’s a, it goes by fast and, goes by too, too quick. But a lot of responsibility and all that. But. JD: Yeah, you started from the bottom, all the way up. 01:06:15: BR: And. [sigh]. Just had a great time. From my tour there. The only, my only regret was that I didn’t get to deploy. We did a counter-narcotics deployment, but it was an independent ops so I didn’t get to deploy into a battle group operation. So, but we did the counter-narcotics deployment. Luckily, we had some success in that. We were able to intercept some stuff and stop some, some shipments and put some bad guys away, that kind of a thing. Uh, my, I, I was in assigned. We, the Rentz was assigned to a battle group so went through all the work-ups and the training. And, I knew I was going to leave, or supposed to leave the ship, for the deployment. And, and a lot of times what the Navy would do is they would relieve you so that they didn’t have a change of command in mid-deployment. They would relieve you. I, I pulled in whatever favors I had and all that and said, “Let me take the ship,” because we were going into the Indian, or the Persian Gulf. Said, “Let me take the ship into the Gulf and, and, and have our change of command in the Gulf and, and fly off it. I, I’d really like to do that.” And was able to get permission to that. And then the navy said. We went to San Diego. We’d never done back-to-back tours. So we, we moved everything. We, when we went to San Diego, we bought a house and said, “We’re going to do, we’re going to stay in San Diego for at least two tours.” Well the navy said, “Mr. Roper, we would like to send you to the Six Fleet unported in Gida, Italy. And, we really want you to do that.” And, my wife was Italian. She was born in the States, but her parents divorced right at, when she was real young. And so she grew up in Rome, Italy. JD: Wow, so she says. 01:07:58: BR: And so, her and her cousin was there and all that. So anyway, we talked about it. And decided to go ahead and take those orders. But I said, “My,” both of my sons were, were in, in [inaudible]. We had son number three at this point. Thirteen years between number two and number three. Number three was also born while I was out on that narcotics deployment. So I missed two of the three births. JD: [chuckle] Oh. 01:08:21: BR: And. But anyway we said, you know, “I’m not going to make my kids move in mid-semester. If you’re going to move me to Italy then you’ve got to do it during semester break.” So as hard as it was from a professional standpoint, I had my change of command in, in December of 1999. And my relief took the, the ship on the deployment and so we moved to Italy right at, at the end of, of 1999. And were there for year 2000, which you know, if you think fireworks and stuff were something here, you should have seen the Italians. JD: Yeah [chuckle] 1:09:00: BR: And they, they have some stuff that’s illegal over here. [laughs] And, so we spent two years in, in, in Italy. JD: So you were in Italy during 9/11. 01:09:11: BR: During 9/11. JD: Yeah. 01:09:13: BR: And of course everything changed from a security standpoint. Where forces could go. Force protection became much more, prevalent, regarding you know, port calls and security and in general. And where you could go and travel and, and that sort of stuff. Everything tightened up significantly after that. JD: I imagine it was late in the day in Italy when that happened. Were you on duty when, when the towers were hit? 01:09:40: BR: I was, I. It was late in the day, afternoon. I was, we were in, in Port Gita. And like, a lot of the navy, we immediately had orders to get under way. So I was able to run home real quick and then, you know we all put to sea because they, they, you know, didn’t know at that time was this, you know, a wider-organized things. Were attacks going to be playing on bases and stuff elsewhere and all that so. JD: So they sent everybody to sea. 01:10:07A: BR: Every, sent everybody to sea pretty much. So you go. JD: So not only…? 01:10:10: BR: I don’t know about in the United States but all of the [inaudible] deployed forces went to sea. Yeah. JD: Were you in command of a ship at this point? 01:10:17: BR: Oh no. I, I was the, the Assistant Chief of Staff for the Sixth Fleet. I was working for the fleet commander. JD: Oh for the fleet. Right, so you were on the flight ship I guess. 01:10:23: BR: So we were on the flight ship. Yeah, yeah. JD: Yeah. So it, it wasn’t just to get them out of port and make sure nothing happened to them, terrorist-wise. But also maybe to respond to something. 01:10:31: BR: But be ready to respond, yeah. JD: Wow. That must have been something. 01:10:34: BR: Yeah. Yeah it was. And, you know, all the, of course the emotions that everybody went through, we went through. And uh. That was of course a turning point event and remains so till this day. From a, a fleet standpoint. JD: Of course. Certainly a watershed. 1:10:54: BR: A watershed event. And. So did sort of a, a routine operations there in, in, you know, in the Mediterranean theatre. I was in charge of communication for Six Fleet, which for us, spanned everything coming into the theatre, the Mediterranean theatre at the Gibraltar—all the way over to, to Israel. And then you know, southern Europe to northern Africa from a communications standpoint. Oh, we did get to do one, uh thing I had. Even to the, the traditional port calls in the Med. and, and that sort of stuff. We, we went up actually into the Black Sea, which I had not yet done. Because, and, and you know going up through the, the Dardanelles and the, the straights. JD: That would have been difficult to do during the Cold War. 01:11:40: BR: It would. And, although occasionally it was done through a, you know, from a freedom of navigation type thing. But we went up, and this was after the of course, you know the Berlin Wall was taken down and all that. We actually made a port call in Novorossiysk, Russia. JD: Oh yeah. 01:11:57: BR: And, and that was something that wasn’t done. And, and uh, just look at how things changed and all that. Of course we had you know, meet-and-greet, and, and all the official functions—you know, Six Fleet commander and all that sort of stuff. And I remember, you know, we were there with our Russian counterparts and all this and drinking vodka and you know, those guys were putting it down like water. [laughs]. You know. I’m like, “I had two drinks and that was enough for me.” JD: Yeah. 01:12:26: BR: But, but just looking back over, you know, from a career standpoint and change. How much things have changed and whatever, but. JD: Very interesting time. Yeah. 01:12:30: BR: But, but really interesting. And overseas because of the shipping point on, on the Black Sea and that sort of stuff was really, a fairly prosperous area. But still contrast-wise, was pretty dramatic. And you know, at, at dusk, there was a light here, and a light there. And, and that was it, you know. Streets weren’t lit up, like in, in the States and, and most of Europe and that sort of stuff. So you, there was still a huge contrast from a, from an economic standpoint. And that sort of thing. So that was interesting. And so. But finished up my tour there and uh, in uh, June of 2002 and, got orders back to Norfolk, Virginia on a, another staff of fleet forces command in the N6, the communications area and finished up my, my career there. You know. JD: Decided to end it. 01:13:26: BR: Retired. Decided to end it. I mean it was a twenty-five year point then. I was not selected for major command. So really what I was going to be doing was be working for some admiral somewhere, on his staff. And I just didn’t want to do that for the next five years. And. JD: Twenty-five is plenty to retire on right? 01:13:44: BR: It was, it was. Oh yeah, you can retire at twenty. And. But twenty-five I figured it was time and so pulled the plug. As things would work out, came to College Station as the assistant IT director and when, when Olivia retired in 2007 was asked to take the director job. Been here ever since. JD: Been land stationed now. [laughs] 01:14:05: BR: Yeah, yeah. This is, you know, we, we joked because you know, when we here after three years, that was the longest place we’ve ever been in any one spot, you know. Since [inaudible] since we’ve been married and all that sort of thing. JD: How long’s it been since you’ve were on the water? 01:14:20: BR: Uh. Well from a navy standpoint of course, when I left, when I left Six Fleet in 2002. And, you know, I still miss it. I miss the operational aspects of it. I don’t miss the staff work of it, but I miss the operational aspects of it. I always enjoyed going to sea. The family separation is the hard part, being gone and all that sort of stuff. But, being kind of in the, the thick of things. Knowing what’s going on, which is more than what you see on CNN and reading the newspaper and that sort of thing. JD: Cruising in the world’s most powerful navy. 01:14:58: BR: And, yeah. Yeah, absolutely. So that’s about it. I know I went over our time [inaudible]. JD: Oh no, no. Its. No, I’m, I’m fine. I’ve got plenty of time. Thank you so much for your time for sure, this is really great stuff. 01:15:14:BR: Yup.