Jim Boland:  

After High School, I spent a year at NCE before going to the U. S. Naval Academy. I was commissioned with the Class of 1969, became a Surface Warfare Officer (AKA - a ship driver), and was sent to my first ship. A year later, I married Sue Van Varick from WHS 65’. The next couple of decades found us moving 14 times to 10 different locations, some of which we lived in twice. I have literally been around the world and gained perspective that I could not have gained in any other profession as I got to see the good, the bad, and the ugly of the rest of the world. My two most memorable tours of duty were commanding USS Hepburn (FF 1055) where I took the ship on two deployments, first to the Persian Gulf and the second to the Western Pacific. We survived six typhoons in the Pacific and operated with the USS Stark in the weeks before she was hit by an Exocet missile. The most fun, however, was testing surface effect ships and driving the SES-100B to a world spe...Expand for more