Louis G. Cranford

"Worked in ComNavFe in Tokyo from December 1947 to February 1949. Transfered to Yokosuka Fleet Activities until November 1949.Worked in the communication room in the Administration Building near the main gate in teletype and occasionally handled the…"

"Hi Ron,Just looking over the Navy Vets site and came across your blog about Ping golf clubs. I did not know that you played golf. How about that. I have been at it for longer than I care to remember. I even broke 80 once. In the last few years I…"

"Hi Ron, Read some your exploits in boot camp. Seems no matter where you go there'll always be someone in the crowd who is a prankster. Did you do any "short-sheeting"? That one always worked, and the victim was always mad as hell when he realized…"

Glad to be accepted into Navy Vets. Had a roundabout way of getting into the communications field. San Diego boot camp, then up to Frisco (Yurba Buena Island, under the Oakland Bay Bridge. Went aboard the USS President Jackson bound for the Orient. Pearl Harbor was the first stop. We docked at the Submarine Docks for a couple of days. Got liberty for an afternoon and evening. Now I hate to say it but I spent the whole time on Hotel Street. From there we made Guam where I got liberty for a day (went swimming), Manila, Subic Bay, Philippines, Shanghai, Tsingtao China, and then Yokosuka Japan. When we debarked we were lined up on the dock and an officer says that everyone with a last name starting with "A" on down through "C" to step forward. Next thing I knew I was on a truck bound for the railroad station. Our group detrained in Tokyo and were bussed down to the APL46 (USS Mark Hopkins). There we were assigned berthing and also put on a work schedule in communications downtown in the Tokyo Bank Building. I had seen a typewriter but that's about it at this point. We were put on as monitors for the TTY machines, tearing off messages, sorting, saving chad and chadless tape and runing messages around to the various offices. After a while I learned to type on my own fairly good and was allowed to use the keyboard to send and receive various "low-key" messages as needed. In my spare time I brushed up on the Morse code (I had learned about that while in the Boy Scouts several years earlier). When things were quiet I got to practice copying Fox when I wanted to. I think I got pretty good at that. My desire was to learn to use a speed key. One of the guys in the Comm Center had one and when we were working the mid watch he sometimes would get it out and use it to send his stuff. It really sounded great. However, I never was able to switch over to radio. I became a Teleman striker and stayed that way through the Tokyo experience and through Fleet Activities Yokosuka. In Yokosuka, I sometimes got to handle the yard voice circuit which I enjoyed very much. But, things being what they were, my time was growing relatively short and I vegetated until I was put aboard the USS Randall (an AKA) for the trip home. Got to Frisco and Treasure Island and for a couple of weeks transient duty. I got a month's leave to go home. When I returned I was sent down to San Diego and took a water taxi out to the USS Doyle, flagship for Mine Squadron 1. I spent the rest of my time in the Second Division chipping paint and doing odd jobs. Finally with a week to go on my enlistment I moved over to the Destroyer Base where I was separated. A friend and I bought passage on a motor trip East with a officer's wife who was headed for New England to set up for when her husband was transferred. We all shared the driving and other costs of the trip. At home I landed a job after a few months with the Associated Press doing Teletype sending and receiving. Great job. I spent the next four years in the Navy Inactive Reserves. Started to sign up for the Active Reserves but I just felt I didn't have the time to put toward it so I just dropped out altogether. I did take a couple of mail-order Navy courses in teletype use and repair. Enjoyed that. Later when Teletype developed into caps and lower case (six rows of holes instead of five in the tape) for use in the newspaper field, I went along with it, and finally after many years being involved with Teletype and newspapering I retired to my current home in Liverpool, PA., alongside the Susquehanna River. It has been a very exciting and rewarding experience. After all these years I am still a Navy man. We even have a member of the Pennsylvania Navy in our neighborhood, the Millersburg Ferry which plies the Susquahanna River about nine months of the year. LGC

Comments

Ronald C. Brabbin April 3, 2012 at 12:31pm

Hi Lou, When I got to Tokyo RTO then the bus to the APL46, there were several of us and no one knew what it was. One guy said it is a communications ship, another guy said it is a fairy boat, we finally found out it as going to be home for a while, eventual was able to move in with the army in the finance building and that was great quarters. Ron Brabbin
Louis G. Cranford March 22, 2012 at 6:27pm

Glad to be accepted into Navy Vets. Had a roundabout way of getting into the communications field. San Diego boot camp, then up to Frisco (Yurba Buena Island, under the Oakland Bay Bridge. Went aboard the USS President Jackson bound for the Orient. Pearl Harbor was the first stop. We docked at the Submarine Docks for a couple of days. Got liberty for an afternoon and evening. Now I hate to say it but I spent the whole time on Hotel Street. From there we made Guam where I got liberty for a day (went swimming), Manila, Subic Bay, Philippines, Shanghai, Tsingtao China, and then Yokosuka Japan. When we debarked we were lined up on the dock and an officer says that everyone with a last name starting with "A" on down through "C" to step forward. Next thing I knew I was on a truck bound for the railroad station. Our group detrained in Tokyo and were bussed down to the APL46 (USS Mark Hopkins). There we were assigned berthing and also put on a work schedule in communications downtown in the Tokyo Bank Building. I had seen a typewriter but that's about it at this point. We were put on as monitors for the TTY machines, tearing off messages, sorting, saving chad and chadless tape and runing messages around to the various offices. After a while I learned to type on my own fairly good and was allowed to use the keyboard to send and receive various "low-key" messages as needed. In my spare time I brushed up on the Morse code (I had learned about that while in the Boy Scouts several years earlier). When things were quiet I got to practice copying Fox when I wanted to. I think I got pretty good at that. My desire was to learn to use a speed key. One of the guys in the Comm Center had one and when we were working the mid watch he sometimes would get it out and use it to send his stuff. It really sounded great. However, I never was able to switch over to radio. I became a Teleman striker and stayed that way through the Tokyo experience and through Fleet Activities Yokosuka. In Yokosuka, I sometimes got to handle the yard voice circuit which I enjoyed very much. But, things being what they were, my time was growing relatively short and I vegetated until I was put aboard the USS Randall (an AKA) for the trip home. Got to Frisco and Treasure Island and for a couple of weeks transient duty. I got a month's leave to go home. When I returned I was sent down to San Diego and took a water taxi out to the USS Doyle, flagship for Mine Squadron 1. I spent the rest of my time in the Second Division chipping paint and doing odd jobs. Finally with a week to go on my enlistment I moved over to the Destroyer Base where I was separated. A friend and I bought passage on a motor trip East with a officer's wife who was headed for New England to set up for when her husband was transferred. We all shared the driving and other costs of the trip. At home I landed a job after a few months with the Associated Press doing Teletype sending and receiving. Great job. I spent the next four years in the Navy Inactive Reserves. Started to sign up for the Active Reserves but I just felt I didn't have the time to put toward it so I just dropped out altogether. I did take a couple of mail-order Navy courses in teletype use and repair. Enjoyed that. Later when Teletype developed into caps and lower case (six rows of holes instead of five in the tape) for use in the newspaper field, I went along with it, and finally after many years being involved with Teletype and newspapering I retired to my current home in Liverpool, PA., alongside the Susquehanna River. It has been a very exciting and rewarding experience. After all these years I am still a Navy man. We even have a member of the Pennsylvania Navy in our neighborhood, the Millersburg Ferry which plies the Susquahanna River about nine months of the year. LGC

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