Gerald Ott Sr:  

I lived in Ambler and the Wissahickon School District until 1959. I transferred to the Upper Dublin School District in 1959, the fifth grade, when we moved to Fort Washington. After graduation, I enlisted in the Navy. I saw many parts of the country and the world, places that I wouldn't have otherwise seen. I sailed on three different ships and my home ports included San Fransisco, Long Beach (LA), and San Diego. San Diego is about 12-15 miles north of the Mexican border. Needless to say, I went to Tiajuana many times. We pulled into the ports of Pearl Harbor, Hawaii. One such time, they were filming the movie Tora, Tora, Tora. It was eerie to watch the Jap Zeroes fly around the very port that they caused so much damage to, some 75 years earlier. Other ports of call included Guam, Wake Island, Philippines (many times), Taiwan, Hong Kong, Okinawa & Japan. My first two ships were LSTs (Landing Ship Tank). It has the ability to pull right on the beach, when needed. Largely we sailed from DaNang to Chu Lai and DaNang to Qua Viet, all up around the DMZ. On the way back to San Diego, we met up with another, much older LST, in Guam, and one of the rare times, that ships actually swapped their entire crews. They took our ship and went back to the war zone. We took their ship and went back to San Diego. Later we went to Panama and then through the Panama Canal. Actually there are two locks, one for the Pacific and one for the gulf. Between them is a very large lake.We sailed up to the Sabine river that separates TX and LA, to Orange, Texas. There we decommissioned our ship and two others. I was later transferred to a Destroyer and went back to Nam two more times. We would cruise up and down the coast, mostly between DaNang and the Tonkin Gulf. We would supply artillery support for the Marines and Army. We had sailed with severa...Expand for more