Clyde W. Aldridge, CTTCS USN Retired, 1956-1975


One of my brothers was a four-year "career" seaman in the navy from 1951-55. 
He spent his time on the USS Iowa (BB-61).  He helped take the battle wagon 
out of mothballs and rode her over to Korea for a year (52-53) and then moved 
into the Atlantic for the last year or so of his enlistment.  He hit all the 
ports and he always mailed back home a package of "goodies" from each port.  
He always sent me the ship's newspaper and usually included a two dollar bill 
in each letter that he wrote to me while I was in high school.
 
He thoroughly enjoyed his time in the navy as a fire controlman, helping aim 
and shoot those nine sixteen inch guns that were on the ship.  He enjoyed telling 
his sixteen/seventeen year old little brother all the sea stories, and all the 
ports that the ship visited, from Yokohama to Copenhagen and all the ports in between.  
He told me that I would enjoy being a fire controlman and that is what I should do. 
He told me that I was a smart and serious kid and that I should/could make 
"slick armed first" like a lot of his buddies did. 
 
After graduating from high school in 1956, I tried carpentering for a little while but 
eventually went down to the navy recruiter a few days before Thanksgiving and took some 
kind of appitude test in his office.  The recruiter told me that I made the highest score 
that had ever been made in the Waycross, Georgia in the three years that he had been there.  
He told me that I could easily become a fire control technician just like my brother had done.  
So I signed up as an EFSR and was guaranteed an electronics school out of boot camp.
 
Early on in boot camp, I realized that my interests did not lie in the electronics field, 
but rather either admin or supply. When classifying time came around in boot camp, the PN1 
who I talked to took a look at my battery of scores and told that I qualified for "everything" 
so I asked about being a SK/DK/PN.  He told me that I had to be ordered to an electronics field 
type of Class "A" School.  We discussed FT School, but he told me that since I had not had 
calculus or trig in high school, that I would spend most of my time in night school trying 
to keep up with my classmates.  He suggested CT "R" school in Imperial Beach, and I am glad 
that I listened to my classifier.
 
I had a pretty good 18 year, 9 month, 24 day career as a CTTCS but I was ready for civilian life 
when I retired. In civilian life, I returned to the business side of life and do not even install 
software on my home computer (I let Barbara do that). 
 
See you all in Portland.
 
Clyde Aldridge