Dear George,
I'll refresh your memory about how you helped change my life, but it will take a little background. When I was on the staff of the Officers Communications School at Harvard, a Captain Hindmarsh came through at one point recruiting likely officers for language training in Russian and Japanese at his training center at Boulder, Colorado. I had always been fascinated with Russia for some reason, and I told Hindmarsh that I wanted to have sea duty next but asked him if he would consider my application after I had completed a tour at sea. He said he would be glad to have me.
I went to sea but the war was over before I could think of submitting an application for Russian training. We turned my AK over to the Japanese and I returned to the states and was discharged at Great Lakes. After a week with my wife and son who had been born while I was away, I set out on a crazy trip with three possible objectives: persuade the Navy to let me come back on active duty and send me to Russian language school (!!); when that idea fell flat, as I was sure it would, go on to Philadelphia and try to get into the Woodrow Wilson school for graduate work in political science; and, if that failed, go on to Harvard and seek admission to the business administration school.
Now I don’t remember how in the world I knew you were in Washington but I got in touch with you on Admiral Connolly's staff and I think you told me that the Russian center was now at Anacostia and arranged an appointment for me with Hindmarsh. Hindmarsh explained that everything had changed with the end of the war, that he was no longer recruiting, that he was however training officers sent to him by other Navy headquarters, and that I might talk to the Naval Communications Station on Nebraska Avenue. You made the arrangements for me to see the head of the station, a Captain Harper. He received me with the graciousness that might be expected for someone whose appointment had been requested by the CNO, but nevertheless set about explaining to me the reasons why my idea was a bit impractical. I was on the point of getting up to leave, when he unexpectedly asked me if I could come back the next day to see a Captain Dyer. I said sure, expecting that Dyer would simply interview me. When I came back the next day, Dyer immediately commenced the paperwork required to return me to active duty.
So I jubilantly went back to Ohio and waited for the orders to arrive, which they did a week later, instructing me to proceed to San Diego for duty as Communications Officer on board the cruiser Miami! I immediately called Harper, who said he would see what could be done, and I eventually got new orders to come to Washington.
I was returned to active duty on condition that I apply for retention in the regular Navy. When I had completed about seven months of the Russian course, Hindmarsh called me in to tell me that I had been turned down for regular Navy inasmuch as the Navy by that time had brought in as many reserve officers as it needed. He said that since I was doing so well in my course he would try to persuade Bupers to let me finish the remaining four or five months. He was successful in this and I did complete my training. A couple of months before it was over, I applied for positions with State, the brand new CIA, and the Navy as a civilian at the Naval Communications Station. All three jobs came through in the same week: the Navy job in Washington, the CIA job in Shanghai, and the State job at our Embassy in Moscow. Guess which one I took! And that -- at greater length than you may have appreciated -- is how one of my roommates in Midshipman School changed my life and helped me reach a career in the Foreign Service, where I couldn't have been happier.
I'll wait to hear more from you as you pursue your project. Am I remembering right that your cruiser was the Tuscaloosa? I do remember very well the business about Bomb Disposal School; do you remember that I also applied (with my total lack of any mechanical aptitude, I couldn't have been a worse prospect and I think I was just trying to be heroic or something) but was, fortunately, turned down. You obviously stole my place. George, I thought two of our roommates were killed during the war, but I can't remember who the other was supposed to be.
Kitty remembers you well and sends you her best.
Warm regards,