Flying Skirts and Battleships

During our visit to the 1965 World’s Fair in New York City, daughter Linda and Emmy had each bought an Italian sausage sandwich for their dinner. They had their hands full of food as they walked around the corner of a building, and the unexpected strong wind blew their full circular dresses, high over their heads.

They “plastered” themselves up against the building, trying to keep the dresses from flying even more. Here they were, helpless, hands full of messy Italian sausage sandwiches, with a crowd of laughing people surrounding them. It’s only a coincidence that Linda later married a man whose parents were both born in Italy.

Several years later we were on the Bremerton ferry, sailing from Seattle to Bremerton, Washington, to visit friends. As I remember, Emmy was again wearing a full skirt, made of rather light weight material. As she stepped outside on the deck of the ferry, with hands full of purse and package, again the wind blew her skirt sky-high. Someone who rides the ferry daily would have expected that, but since this was Emmy’s first ride on this ferry, it was a surprise.

I said I would have helped hold down her skirt, but I was too busy leading the applause. Marilyn Monroe received fame and fortune for a similar scene, but Emmy did it best.

Emmy’s sister was on vacation, staying at the home of a friend and her husband, then Mayor of Port Orchard. The mayor also had a full-time job with the Navy, and the next day he took me to visit the battleship, USS Missouri.

The USS Missouri was launched on January 29, 1944 at the New York Naval Shipyard, and was laid up at the Inactive Ship Maintenance Facility, Bremerton, Washington, when I visited. It was commissioned the second time in 1986, then in June 1998 the USS Missouri loomed over the USS Arizona Memorial as it was towed into Battleship Row at Ford Island, Pearl Harbor, Hawaii. She is docked about 300 feet from the USS Arizona Memorial.

USS Missouri is best known as the site where General of the Army Douglas MacArthur, on 2 September 1945, officially accepted the surrender of Japan, ending World War II.