Stop in for a cup of coffee

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I knew 2 WWII submariners that were friends of my grandfather. They were both little guys like him and crazier than batshit. One of them had taken a bullet in the leg from a Jap Zero that strafed them when he was on deck. He also was on the boat that sat on the bottom of Tokyo bay for 14 hours taking 137 depth charges before they surfaced and torpedoed a bunch of enemy ships before getting the hell out of there.

We used to call him “Pappy”.
 
They stories those guys used to tell would make your hair stand on end. Then they would tell ones that would make you laugh your *** off! I miss those guys.

Pappy would call me up and ask “Is Mr. Weiser home?” I would always answer “Yep, Bud is here with a bunch of his friends.” Then he would hang up and about 20 minutes later he’d be at my shop waiting for me to toss him a cold beer.
 
dartnabout said:
Doin well...doin well. And you?
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Pretty well. I feel upbeat today for no particular reason. Maybe it’s because it is reasonably warm today and going up to 63* on Thursday. Also, perhaps because we have just about closed out all we need to do to wrap up the details of my BIL Ben’s life.

Only 26 days to daylight savings time and 35 days to the first day of Spring. I feel like the darkness of this difficult Winter season is finally lifting.
 
Ddaddy said:
Pretty well. I feel upbeat today for no particular reason. Maybe it’s because it is reasonably warm today and going up to 63* on Thursday. Also, perhaps because we have just about closed out all we need to do to wrap up the details of my BIL Ben’s life.

Only 26 days to daylight savings time and 35 days to the first day of Spring. I feel like the darkness of this difficult Winter season is finally lifting.
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I am looking forward to Spring this year myself
 
Great picture and thanks for sharing Dave.
Interesting your dad was working direct for the Navy. My dad worked for Bethlehem Steel - welding ships - last year I was trying to figure out which yards he must have been referring to; either Staten Island or Bayonne area. He mentioned his preference for working on the superstructure of a carrier. I've found a couple references to ships converted to carriers in those yards.
 
Mattax said:
Great picture and thanks for sharing Dave.
Interesting your dad was working direct for the Navy. My dad worked for Bethlehem Steel - welding ships - last year I was trying to figure out which yards he must have been referring to; either Staten Island or Bayonne area. He mentioned his preference for working on the superstructure of a carrier. I've found a couple references to ships converted to carriers in those yards.
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It was my grandfather actually. USN employment of civilian workers was quite a bit different during WWII than later.
 
Work Badge.
Couldn't find much about it on the web. Might be for regular employees - which in turn meant priority at shape up. ??

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Oops, my bad - you did write grandfather and his age at the time. But yes I'm referring to beginning of WWII. I'm not exactly sure of when my dad got that job - obviously a lot younger than your Grandfather. He would have been 22 in 1940.
 
Ddaddy said:
Yes, that is a regular employee ID badge. Those were issued to all regular employees and their worker ID number is displayed on the badge so that they can be positively identified.
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Any idea what "BEB" represents?
 
Mattax said:
Oops, my bad - you did write grandfather and his age at the time. But yes I'm referring to beginning of WWII. I'm not exactly sure of when my dad got that job - obviously a lot younger than your Grandfather. He would have been 22 in 1940.
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My grandfather was working at a US Naval ship yard so his circumstance was a bit different than your father who was working as an employee of a private company providing service to the US Navy.

Your fathers credentials would have all been handled by Bethlehem Steel, not the USN.
 
I think that BEB represents “Bethlehem Engineering Beaumont”. Bethlehem Ship building Company was headquartered in Beaumont Texas at that time.
 
Ddaddy said:
My grandfather was working at a US Naval ship yard so his circumstance was a bit different than your father who was working as an employee of a private company providing service to the US Navy.

Your fathers credentials would have all been handled by Bethlehem Steel, not the USN.
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I yes I realize that. Employment experience very different too. My impression was that even skilled labor started by getting hired on a daily basis, showing up at shape up in the morning.
 
Ddaddy said:
I think that BEB represents “Bethlehem Engineering Beaumont”. Bethlehem Ship building Company was headquartered in Beaumont Texas at that time.
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That's better than I came up with!
 
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Another part to the pay; for welding there was an amount marked out or assigned. Then, if that was done by 2 PM, extra would be marked out and that would get paid by the length welded.
 
Yep, welders got paid by the foot in most cases. Base length plus overage on a shift clock basis. Overage was only paid according to specified terms. My grandfather was paid by length of wire run and connections made on a similar basis.
 
Ddaddy said:
Yep, welders got paid by the foot in most cases. Base length plus overage on a shift clock basis. Overage was only paid according to specified terms. My grandfather was paid by length of wire run and connections made on a similar basis.
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Honestly, that sounds like a pretty good thing to do these days...
 
Piecework. Many decent livings were made on piecework.
 
Tooljunkie said:
Piecework. Many decent livings were made on piecework.
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I used to run my Auto Upholstery business that way. It incentivizes the workers to do more work and earn more pay but still keeps quality high. They do more, make more and so do I.

My guys got base plus. Base work plus whatever they finished beyond that in a day. If they got part way finished but did not complete, they got the work done as a credit on the next day’s base. If they stayed late and completed it, they got full payment for the overage on that day.

Sometimes I would leave the shop for the day and they were still going. I would reconcile the work done the next morning. Some of my guys would double their pay in busy weeks. If we were slow, they were always guaranteed to get base even if the work wasn’t there. I ate it, not them.
 
My dad said the pay was good. Some weeks he could make more than his older brother who worked as a non-degreed engineer or designer. Getting a view from the superstructure of a big ship was a great perk (if you're OK with heights). On the other side was working in a tin can in the heat and the cold, dragging the heavy cables for arc welding through to whatever place you had to crawl. Shipyard could be pretty rough too.

One of the carrier conversions out of Beth Steel Staten Island was commissioned as the Royal Navy's Avenger, April 1942. Worked as escort and cover for North Africa landings and looks like she was sunk by torpoedo off of Gibralter late that year. Tough times.

Another one was USN excort carrier conversion USS Chenango ACV-28. This one started as a civilian tanker built in Chester Pa. It made it through the war and wasn't scrapped until '61 !
Escort Carrier Photo Index: USS CHENANGO (ACV-28)
 
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