The tour at SLK was fifteen months. After my arrival in 1961, there was a steady parade of new people in, as well as others already there, leaving for new duty stations. I met a lot of guys in the thirty months that I spent there. Many of them became good friends. Among them, Bob “Zebo” Zarbaugh, Maurice “Moose” (Dalton, a gentle giant. Big enough to be a man’s worst nightmare, but not a mean bone in his body); Fred Grafe, nicknamed Ichabod Crane, for his resemblance to the Disney cartoon character; and the Yates brothers, Frank and Paul--fraternal twins that were ready to fight anyone at the drop of a hat. They were good men and we became fast friends. Paul (PJ as he was known) always wore a non-regulation, slouch fatigue cap. I had admired it many times. He also had a pair of foam rubber ear pads that fit over the ear pieces of his headset, a commodity that I also had admired; and an accessory that all operators coveted. When he shipped out, he gave both items to me. Finally, when I was ready to come home for good, I handed them down to someone else since they were still in like-new condition.

 

As time passed, I became more proficient in my job and was moved to work on more complicated networks, requiring a higher degree of copy skills. Mick Hagala, having previously served in Pakistan, was an especially gifted operator and he helped me make the transition. In March, 1962, just before my first tour ended, I decided that I would extend my tour for another fifteen months. The duty was good (I had been a good learner), and in addition to performing more complex duties, I would be able to earn another stripe by extending my stay. I ran into Gary Snarr and Merle Mountain at the Enlisted Men’s Club. Their initial tours were ending also. Gary decided he would volunteer for another overseas tour, transferring to Scotland. He would be given another stripe as well. Merle, on the other hand, opted out of another tour and was transferred out of USAFSS and to an Air Force Base in Great Falls, Montana. Having to ship out on different schedules, we said our goodbyes and headed off in separate directions. As part of my tour extension, I would have to spend two weeks at Goodfellow AFB, in San Angelo, Texas for additional “training.” This brief training period seemed to be a mechanism to get us back to the States for our leave because I can’t remember a single thing I learned from the weeks I was there. I went through the training and left San Angelo headed for Miami and a 30 day leave.  It was on this leave that I met and dated the girl that I would marry three years later.

 

While on leave, I had an attack of acute appendicitis and was admitted to the Homestead AFB Hospital for an emergency appendectomy. My recovery was difficult and three days after my release, I had to be re-admitted for additional treatment. Thus, I was unable to return to Taiwan on schedule. I was 10 days late getting to Travis AFB, and then I was billeted in temporary quarters for a week until a flight back to Taiwan was available. Since I was at Travis, I was now living in the “real” Air Force. I would have preferred to simply check in with the MATS terminal each day and, if no flights were available, go about my business. Rather than allow me this simple leisure, if no flights were available, I was required to report to the First Sergeant for “policing” duty. No, not Police duty but policing duty which is a polite term for picking up trash and cigarette butts around the base. Because of this delay, I was unable to say my farewells to several of the guys at SLK I had come to know and that I loved like brothers. They shipped back to the States while I was still waiting at Travis. I remember, while at the terminal, seeing and speaking to a few of the guys coming in from Taiwan on their way to new duty stations. It seemed that Trick 3 knew what had happened to me but I knew nothing current about SLK. These chance meetings at the Travis terminal were my only connection to the 6987^th and what was happening there during my absence.
 

My second tour was uneventful and filled with the activities similar to my first tour, although I did try the second time around to do more sightseeing and interacting with the citizens of Taipei.  Part of that interaction took place at a Trick 3 beach party. Many of the NCO’s had their own vehicles on station and were free in their off-duty hours to come and go without having to wait on the shuttle bus. For weeks we had planned a beach party and when the time came, we reserved a 6X truck as transportation for those without their own vehicles. The trip to the beach was routine and we enjoyed our cookout and all the beer we could drink. Toward the end of the day, Taiwanese fishermen came to the shore to set their nets offshore and then, later, pull them in. At the appropriate time a large group of us went to their aid and helped them pull in the nets. I’m not sure if they wanted our help or not, but they were gracious in their thanks. On the trip back to SLK at the end of the day, about 15 of us were riding in the open bed of the 6X when a similar truck filled with Taiwanese soldiers came up behind us, the bed of their truck being open as well. When we showed them the “goods” that we had on board and made an offer to share, they pulled out into the oncoming lane and would ride along beside us as the beer was either gently tossed or actually handed to their eager hands. Because of oncoming traffic, it took some time and miles in distance to complete the transfer of a sufficient quantity. They too were gracious in their response and just briefly, we connected with a group of “boys” no different than we, except their country was in a state of war with mainland China.

 

On each mid-shift, when activity was at a minimum, we had time to “publish” a little 4 or 5 page newspaper, typed up on the six-ply paper we used for traffic copy. This little publication kept us busy (and awake), and it contained all manner of humor, art work, and sarcasm aimed at some of our flight-mates. The sarcasm was really no different than the latter day “roasts” that appeared on TV, meaning if you got “cut” in the paper, it was a compliment and nothing more than friendly banter. This little publication also included the AP and UPI news. We would assign one operator who was skilled at copying “plain text” and he would tune in the News frequency (call sign DZM, as I recall) which would transmit the AP or UPI news in Morse Code. Copying Morse Code as plain text was not a particularly easy task without practice, as there was a natural tendency of the operator to read the news while copying it. This sometimes causes a loss of focus on the copy and something could be missed. We always assigned the task to Roger Romanik, another of the quality operators on Trick 3, and another of the continuing reasons Trick 3 was recognized as the best on the hill.. When Roger shipped out, the task of copying the news fell to me. Not because I was any better at copy, Lord knows Trick 3 was loaded, but because my position was generally less active at night and the lack of activity allowed me to copy. I would watch in awe as, on those easy mid shifts, some of the operators that transferred in from Europe would sometimes run across a network they knew in their former venue, settle in and start copying code that seemed to be coming in at 50 to 60 words per minute--too fast for me to even fathom. Romanik, Russ Rigdon, and Ed Maloney did it effortlessly.

 

During my second tour, an unfortunate incident happened, the memory of which has stayed with me for the last four decades. We had a young airman come on station right out of Tech School. He was a sharp kid, very popular among Flight members, had attended USMA at West Point, but had washed out for some reason. He met and fell in love with a local girl--not just any girl, but a member of a prominent family in Taipei. She was deeply in love with him also and they wanted to be married. The Air Force policy at that time was to discourage marriage between military personnel and foreign nationals. Her family also forbade the marriage. The solution they arrived at was similar to the well-known scene in the movie Sayonara. It was tragic and they failed in their suicide pact. A group of us went to see him in the hospital downtown. It was a difficult bedside visit. In spite of his situation, he seemed to be putting his best face forward for us, trying to cope with his situation, and I was probably not mature enough to understand what he was going through. Shortly thereafter he was quietly shipped back to the States. I have thought of him often over the last forty years, and I have made several unsuccessful attempts to locate him. I continue to search for him from time to time.

 

In April or May, 1963, Sgt. Jim Stroud asked me if I was going to re-enlist and, if so, I would be named to the Contingency Team. The Team was a group of men, proficient in their individual specialty, that were to be deployed from time to time to survey and set up additional sites, known as detachments. I told him that my tour was ending soon and that I would not be making a career in the Air Force, that it was my intention to separate at the end of my four year enlistment. He thanked me and told me he would be selecting another Airman to take the open spot on the Team. Although he did not tell me the location of the upcoming deployment, the scuttlebutt was that it was in Thailand. The newspaper Stars and Stripes had been filled for months with news and body counts of the guerilla conflict in Laos. I have wondered at times in what direction my life would have gone had I taken the deployment and made the Air Force a career. For one, I probably would not have married the same girl 43 years ago nor would I have enjoyed the blessings of two wonderful children and the five grandchildren that I do have.

 

In July, 1963, it came my turn to rotate back to the states. Even though I was not a career

Airman, I was considered an old veteran to the kids coming in from Tech School and was called on to train a lot of the operators that came onto Trick 3. I still had a year to go on my four year enlistment and was moved out of USAFSS to SAC at Eglin AFB, Florida. After President Kennedy’s assassination, President Johnson decided to cut the military budget and offered “early outs” for certain enlistees. As a result, I only served at Eglin from August, 1963 to April, 1964, after which I was separated from the Air Force.

 

My final job with the Air Force was as a permanent “CQ” (Charge of Quarters) at the B-52 alert facility at the end of the runway. For the final 8 months of my active enlistment, I worked mid-shifts performing wake-up calls for the bomber crews. I received and routed phone calls to the crewmembers from family members, issued decks of playing cards, volleyballs, ping pong sets, and sold cigarettes, candy, and soft drinks to them. Quite a change of pace after spending two and a half years on a mountain top off the coast of China, working behind the scenes in a very cold war, gathering early intelligence information for our Commander-in-Chief and his advisors.

 

My memories of Shu Linkou and Trick 3 are good ones. On Trick 3 we had gathered some of the best technicians, Morse and Voice Intercept Operators, Analysts, Cryptologists, Mission Supervisors, and Commanders that the USAFSS had to offer. Although some of the men pushed the edges during off-duty time, at work, there was never a question about their dedication to the job at hand. Proof of their quality comes from the work produced then and later, their post-Linkou careers and successes.

 

With the advent of the computer age, I have embarked on a project to locate as many of my former USAFSS friends as possible. I have had a fair degree of success in this endeavor. I have learned, sadly, that after a long and successful USAFSS career, Gary Snarr passed away in 2004. Merle Mountain now lives in Alaska and is retired from government service. Fred Neubauer, one of my early roommates at Keesler, retired after a long Air Force career, and is now living in Wisconsin. The Yates twins have both passed away, as has “Moose” Dalton and many others with whom I served so long ago. Many of my Trick Three brothers are still around, scattered all over the nation and world. You may be interested to know that David Demaree is not so “Daffy” anymore and is now a retired businessman living in California. Bo Atherton retired as an engineer for Boeing, Tex Loftin retired as a Federal law enforcement agent, Reb Kelley retired from the US Army Corps of Engineers, and Dub Jenkins and Mick Hagala, are both living in Washington state, the former a successful Real Estate Broker and the latter now retired. So many others that I knew went on to spend their careers in the USAFSS, gathering intelligence information and continuing the “Mission.” My first contact with all of these men after 40+ years, was as if we had just spoken with each other the previous week. A true testimony to the brotherhood we shared.

 

In searching for these men, it has allowed me to establish new friendships with people that I did not previously know--our former Provost Marshal, Martin Doria, our Flight Commanders Dick Olin and later, Tom Penn. For an Airman to have known Captain Doria on a professional level in those days would not have been a good thing. I am sure he was taxed to the limit in making Solomon-like decisions to keep order and discipline among the ranks. Imagine the stories he could tell.

 

In providing the included image of Captain Penn receiving the “8-ball” Award, Penn hastens to add, “…since the majority of the people under my “command” were in their teens or early twenties, male, and unaccompanied, thus wild-assed youths, our unit statistically accounted for the most automobile accidents, barroom fights, public intoxication, public urination, sexually transmitted diseases and God know what all, behavior typical of males regardless of era or culture…I went on to father five sons, bless their testosterone pickin’ hearts-but man, can they get into some crap. So I forgive y’all for having put me behind the 8-ball.”

 

I have met, via e-mail, men who were at the 6987^th long before I graduated from high school and were long-gone before my arrival there.. In searching for Bob “Zebo” Zarbaugh, I met his brother David via e-mail, and the two of us communicate semi-regularly now. I discovered that not only does David do mission work for his church, but his brother (my buddy “Zebo”) is in full-time Christian service with his church.

 

For thirty months I never had to serve in what the majority would define as the “Real” Air Force. I served my last eight months at Eglin AFB with SAC, performing rather mundane, repetitive duties. It was an assignment where I did not have to stand for inspections, march in formation, or be closely supervised. It was this latter aspect that I believed was a fitting way to end my Air Force enlistment.