Around the World Submerged: The Voyage of the Triton

2125 William Roy Welch, Machinist’s Mate First Class, is re-enlisted in the service of the United States Navy for a period of six years. Since the Manual of the Bureau of Naval Personnel specifically prohibits re-enlistments at sea, to re-enlist Welch it was necessary to obtain permission in advance from the Assistant Secretary of the Navy for Personnel and Reserve Affairs. Welch’s re-enlistment is a milestone of sorts, inasmuch as it is done at deep depths, at high speed and at the culmination of history’s first submerged circumnavigation of the world. All these things we carefully record in Welch’s service record and in the ship’s Log.

2145 We are not yet home, but we may be considered to have taken a long lead off third base. So tonight, to celebrate completion of the first submerged circumnavigation and our looked-for homecoming, we hold a “third base party” for the crew and officers. There are even several acts of pretty good entertainment. The first is by Fireman Raymond Kuhn, who has been practicing on a homemade French horn. To everyone’s amazement it works, and he plays us several fairly recognizable bugle calls on it. Kuhn will never win any Nobel prizes for music, but the fact that he can play that thing at all is astonishing. He gets cheers of appreciation from his shipmates, many of whom throng around asking to try it themselves, and we may use him on the bridge for rendering passing honors to other naval vessels.

Another act is a barbershop quartet consisting of Herb Zeller, EM1; Chief Steward William “Joe” Green; Richard Brown, EM1; and Wilmot Adair (Mrs. Neptune) Jones, TM2. The quartet are taken aback by their audience’s wild insistence upon an encore, for it turns out they know only one song. They needn’t have worried; it gets as many cheers the second time.

The hit of the evening, from my point of view, is a skit put on by Jim Flaherty, RM1, and Jones. Flaherty plays a TV announcer and Jones acts the part of “Mother Fletcher,” the cooking instructor, who continually samples her sherri-herri [sic] while baking a cake, and slowly drinks herself into a stupor in front of the anguished announcer. Mother Fletcher’s delighted audience was particularly convulsed because someone had doctored up the “sherri-herri” bottle with chili sauce; Jones’ agonized expression throughout the skit was very real indeed.

We also held a “beard contest,” with myself as chief judge. I had already decided who was going to win: he was our ship’s barber, Pete Kollar, whose luxurious facial foliage could have competed with any Hollywood actor’s, but he fell asleep and no one remembered to call him for the contest. Forced, therefore, to judge honestly from among the other candidates, I finally awarded the prize for the “most glorious beard” to James Bennett, RM1.

0230 Finally wrote finis to the World’s First Submerged Circumnavigation Celebration. All hands turned in with the feeling of satisfaction that comes from having finished a big job.

A special Well Done should go to LCDR Bob Fisher, our supply officer, whose cooks kept the party-goers well supplied with a steady flow of pizza, popcorn and punch. Bob also serves as the officer representative on the ship’s recreation council, whose members did the planning for the party.

Thursday and Friday, 28-29 April 1960 With a comfortable speed of advance and our circumnavigation complete, these two days were devoted to engineering drills. Like all nuclear ships, we have rigid qualification requirements for officers and men before they may stand certain main propulsion plant watches.

Saturday, 30 April 1960 This is Will Adams’ birthday. He has announced everybody else’s birthday in his daily “Plan of the Day,” but had hoped to avoid mentioning his own. I out-foxed him, however, and wrote it in just before the Plan of the Day went to press.

As an added birthday present, this morning a message arrived with notification that Will Adams is a Commander, US Navy, with a date of rank from 1 February [that is, he will be as soon as he finishes some correspondence courses which are still dogging him]. The same message states that Don Fears is a Lieutenant Commander, also with a 1 February date. We knew both promotions were due, and it is certainly fine to get the news at last; Will and Don have been congratulated all day long.