Gearing (DD 710) - Naval Cruise Book

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COMMUNICATIONS DEPARTMENT One of the toughest jobs in the Navy is keep- ing the ship in contact with other commands. This job falls to the Communications De- partment. In June of 1959, COMDESLANT established the Communications Officer as a Head of Department making him directly responsible to the Captain. The Department is divided into four divis- ions: The Signal Gang, as the name implies, takes care of all communications of a visual nature. Although flaghoist, semaphore, and flashing light are familiar terms to everyone on the ship, there are few who are able to under- stand these languages with any proficiency. During periods of radio silence, the load placed on the signalmen is extremely heavy. The men in the signal gang have to be on their toes to do their jobs effectively. They seem to enjoy the strain and always come through when the chips are down. The Radio Gang has the job of maintaining contact with other commands beyond visual range. To remain in communication with other tactical units requires constant practice in order to turn out satisfactory results. Practice makes perfect and our radio gang comes about as close to being perfect as a ship can get. To the Quartermasters fall the task of check- ing the ship ' s position, maintaining weather logs, keeping the ship ' s charts up to date, caring for the chronometers and compasses, and checking the gyro compass error. In the Quartermaster ' s Notebook the events which occur during the day are faithful recorded, forming a peraianent record of the ship ' s histoiy. During ship ' s evolution which re- quire precise control of the ship, it is the Quartermaster who takes the helm. To the men of the Ship ' s Office falls the tre- mendous task of preparing, answering and routing all correspondence; keeping all pub- lications up to date; assisting in legal mat- ters; maintaining ship ' s files; preparing shipboard instructions and notices and main- taining the service records of the personnel aboard. Despite this heavy load the men are always willing to pause for a few minutes and cheerfully answer all questions brought to them by their shipmates.

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COMMUNICATIONS OFFICER LTJG John R. Eggleston OCS 58 Jacksonville, Florida ASST. COMMUNICATIONS OFFICER I. SHIP ' S SECRETARY LEADING SIGNALMAN ENS William W. Kehl Harvard 59 Kittery Point, Maine Charles F. Reed, YNC Charleston, South Carolina Fred E. Schneider, SMC Eddie Biloxi, Mississippi v Roy J. Fluker, QMl Selma, Alabama W. Norman Jones, RMl Jonesey Milwaukee, Wisconsin Charles R. Janulis, RM2 Charleston, South Carolina