ALEX HALEY WAS A COOK AND SHOESHINE BOY IN THE COAST GUARD.

Alex Haley was a shoe-shine boy in the U. S. Coast Guard until it was discovered that he could write. Haley was born 11 August 1921 in Ithaca, New York, but he grew up in Tennessee. He always spoke proudly of his father and the incredible obstacles of racism he had overcome. On May 24, 1939 Haley began his 20-year service with the Coast Guard. He enlisted as a Seaman and then became a third class Petty Officer in the rate of Mess Attendant, one of the few enlisted designators open to African Americans and Philipinos at that time. It was during his service in the Pacific theater of operations that Haley taught himself the craft of writing stories. He talked of how the greatest enemy he and his crew faced during their long sea voyages wasn't the Japanese but boredom. He collected many rejection slips over an eight-year period before his first story was bought.

After World War II, Haley was able to petition the Coast Guard to allow him to transfer into the field of journalism, and by 1949 he had become a First Class Petty Officer in the rate of Journalist. He later advanced to the rank of Chief Petty Officer and held this grade until his retirement from the Coast Guard in 1959 when he became a Senior Editor for Reader's Digest. He is best known for The Autobiography of Malcolm X, which he ghostwrote, and his book Roots: The Saga of an American Family. He died 10 February 1992.

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The Most Unforgettable Character I’ve Met

(The Most Unforgettable Character I’ve Met by Alex Haley was originally published in the March 1961 issue of Reader’s Digest.)

The Most Unforgettable Character I’ve Met (March 1961) Alex Haley is widely known as the author of Roots: The Saga of an American Family, the 1976 Pulitzer Prize-winning novel that traced his family’s roots back to his African ancestors. Before this novel and its television miniseries made him famous, Haley was best known for The Autobiography of Malcolm X, which had originated with an interview Haley conducted while he was writing for Playboy. Prior to that, Haley had been a writer for Reader’s Digest. This was Haley’s second career, however. In 1959 he had retired as a chief petty officer after twenty years of service in the U.S. Coast Guard. Haley had enlisted in 1939, after a couple of years of college. He went through World War II on Coast Guard cutters and other ships as a steward’s mate. But Haley also attempted to write for publication in slack hours. After years of effort, he began to have some success. One day, while stationed in the Third Coast Guard District in New York long after the war, Haley was serving coffee to Admiral, "Iceberg" Smith, an officer exceedingly proud of his literary taste. Smith pointed out an article lying open before him as a captivating piece, one that had been written by "some colored fellow." Haley hesitated, then replied, "Yes, sir, I wrote it." At a conference of admirals in Washington a few months later, the Coast Guard established a rating of journalist, and Haley became a journalist first class. In this 1961 article, Haley recounts the origin of his writing career—his penning love letters for his shipmates while serving on the USS Murzim, a Navy ship manned by Coast Guard personnel. Haley pays special tribute in this piece to an illiterate first class steward’s mate under whom he had served, a man who always attempted to do his best for his fellow black servicemen (including Haley) in whatever way he could.

Haley’s recollection not only vividly portrays the "Unforgettable Character" who is its main subject, but it also glances at the unfortunate situation of black sailors of the era. On the other hand, one notices here the informal power that a leading petty officer often wielded—especially a leading petty officer like this one, who had the ear of the ship’s captain.

The Most Unforgettable Character I’ve Met By Alex Haley

In our quarters on the USS Murzim, I glimpsed on the steward’s bunk an incomplete letter to his wife, and saw my name: “Haley he the steward second-class, suposed to be my asistant. Ben to colege and can tiperite but schur is stoopid. Can’t boil water.”

This was World War II, and the Murzim was a Coast Guard cargo-ammunition ship newly arrived in the South Pacific. Scotty, with twenty-five years’ service, had been a hostile old sea dog from the day I entered his galley. A huge, jowled Negro, his sail-like apron bulging over his washtub belly, he would glare down at me sourly: “Us bein’ the same race ain’t gon’ get you by. Damn civilians done ruint the service!”

Scotty was the darling of the captain, who loved old-timers. He lumbered about the ship, poking into everyone’s business, and the young boots trailed in his wake with open-mouthed awe and admiration. The Seafarer, the ship’s mimeographed newspaper, ran such Scotty quotes as, “I wrung more seawater out of my socks than you ever sailed over.”

My ambition was to be a writer. Nights, off duty, I typed stories in the officers’ wardroom pantry. Scotty, after haranguing me all day, was irresistibly lured to watch me “tiperite.” I’d make the portable rattle, certain it angered him that a subordinate had a skill he hadn’t. I didn’t know Scotty.

One night his deep voice interrupted me. “Looker here, boy, you ever seen the Cap’n talk letters to his yeoman?” I replied that the yeoman took shorthand. “Don’t need all that chicken-scratchin’!” Scotty exclaimed. “Fast as you run that thing, you might make a yeoman. I’ll help you practice, I’ll talk you some letters.” The idea of this ungrammatical clown hijacking my off-time to dictate to me was hilarious, and I laughed in his face. “You real wise, ain’t you?” he rasped. “Opportunity ain’t every night!”

The next morning a messboy shook me awake. “Man, Scotty wants you on the double!” I hurried to the galley. “I meant on the double!” Scotty roared. “This ain’t no cruise ship!” He lobbed a big steel pot into midair. “Scour that!” He flung a sweat-popping succession of more pots and abusive orders. I shined steam kettles, scrubbed garbage cans and bulkheads. Finally I realized that I could revolt—and land in the brig—or I could type Scotty’s letters. “You got the message?” he asked. Choked with rage, I could only nod. “You a smart boy.” Derisive laughter was in his eyes. “Take off—see you tonight!”

After 8 p.m. muster, Scotty, scowling around a new cigar, followed me to the pantry. Angrily I zipped paper into the typewriter as he overflowed an armchair he had swiped from the wardroom.

“This here letter’s to Pop Robinson. He’s a first-class cook on the Pamlico.” I smacked out the heading, and Scotty smiled approvingly. “Hello—it is a long time since we was in touch. . . .” I typed that. I typed one garbled, ungrammatical cliché after another for half a page. Abruptly Scotty ended: “Forever always your ex-shipmate.” I added, in caps, “PERCIVAL L. SCOTT, STEWARD FIRST-CLASS, USCG,” and thrust the page and my fountain pen at Scotty. He signed as though it were the Emancipation Proclamation.

In the galley next morning, Scotty assembled the five messboys. “You better wish you had some brains! Don’t never forget, Haley give orders, it’s the same as me!” All morning he excluded me from any real work. After dinner he growled, “Chow’s in the stove. See you tonight.” Again, I got the message. That night I typed half-pages to three former shipmates of his.

After a week of fifteen stilted letters, Scotty began to relax. Fat elbows on aproned knees, jowled chin in hands, he paced his sentences to the moving typewriter at about thirty words a minute, and his letters lengthened with “good old days” reminiscings: “Never will forget the time I hired that civilian to come busting in that woman’s place and scared you half to death.” “Remember when I raffled champagne and let you win and we drunk it?” The stories portrayed a hard-drinking, hard-loving Scotty, always exploiting the gullible.

As the Murzim shuttled between islands, Scotty happily showed me replies to his letters. The laborious scrawlings expressed joy at hearing from him and incredulity that he had learned to type. Meanwhile, U.S. magazine editors rejected my love stories. “You help me with my mail,” Scotty gruffed, “maybe I can help you with them stories.”

The stories obviously impressed him. Nightly, after dictating, Scotty would leaf through my dictionary. Soon new words cropped up in his talk. “Can’t tribulate no ninety-day ensigns,” I heard him tell a chief. “They ain’t got no significance.”

Scotty demonstrated my significance by letting me spend whole afternoons with the friendly signalmen on the bridge, who were teaching me to read flags and blinker lights. “Signalin’ takes brains,” Scotty approved. When I could read blinker, Scotty, while dictating, kept alert to hear any clicking of the bridge signal light. I would dash on deck, read the message, and then Scotty would go forward and “predict” news sometimes hours before it was broadcast on the public address system. His fo’c’sle followers soon whispered that Scotty had second sight.

Every night, after dictating and studying new words, Scotty left me to write stories while he made his circuit of the ship. One night he returned towing a big, rawboned youngster from Ohio, who was red-eyed and upset. “Go ‘head, show him!” Scotty barked. Nervously, the seaman handed me a pink envelope. The first few lines revealed a “Dear John” letter. Appalled at Scotty’s indelicacy, I handed it back.

“I’m gon’ set her straight!” Scotty exploded.

“Scotty, you can’t do that!”

But wild horses couldn’t have stopped him. Scowling over the letter, he dictated: “It’s a cryin’ shame you think bein’ out here is some good time. Here I set on a ship full of five-hundred-pound bombs in a ocean full of subs and sharks. You don’t even wait to see if I get back. I bet you grabbed some disanimated 4-F. It ought to be him out here doin’ your fightin’ and dyin’. . . .” While the shaken seaman signed, Scotty raked me with a black look.

When the Murzim put into Brisbane, mail call was held. Scotty and I were shelling peas when his “Dean John” client burst into the galley. We read an astounding reply from the boy’s girl, begging forgiveness. “See, dammit, you wouldn’t of wrote!” Scotty trumpeted.

This triumph made Scotty a strutting Cupid among the admiring kids in the fo’c’sle. Back at sea, he confronted me: “Looker here, few kids want me to cor’spond to some Brisbane gals they just met.” His face struggled with delight, but his voice conveyed menace if I balked.

Each night now, Scotty brought two to four young clients into the pantry. “I’ll dictate later—dictatin’ oughter be private,” he instructed me. “I’ll just ask stuff I need—you keep notes.”

Seating a youngster in his appropriated officer’s chair, he would ask, “Anything special you want to say?” “What’s her hair and eyes like?” “How’d she act?” When a client was reticent, Scotty blazed, “You ain’t got nothin’ to write about!”

To my astonishment, he had marked lyric passages from my rejected love stories. “Ready-made stuff! Take right here—‘the enchantin’ moon studdin’ the night ocean with diamon’s as he think about her . . .’ ” We began to produce love letters. Scotty gave me a ream of the captain’s bond and a box of carbon paper which the captain’s yeoman had traded for a surreptitious steak. “Make a copy of every letter,” he directed. “No reason we can’t use the same ones over.”

Soon mail calls brought gushing responses from Brisbane girls and Scotty’s young clients exulted. But I began to grow concerned: clearly the girls would now expect Scotty’s distinctive letters. “Scotty,” I said, “what happens when some of these kids get transferred? What will they do without your letters?”

All morning he worried. In the afternoon he asked, “Them copies you been makin’—how many you got now?”

“About three hundred.”

“Tell you what. Bind up different copies in folders. Them kids can pick stuff they like and write in they own hands.”

It worked fine. Nightly, clients clustered about mess-hall tables, shuffling through twelve binders. Selecting passages they liked, they wrote furiously. Scotty steamed around inspecting them as he once had my typing. “Han’ writin’s more better!” he sang out, encouraging independence. “Stick in some of your own words—twis’ stuff around!”

Finally orders came for our second stop in Brisbane. In the wee hours of the first night, one after another of Scotty’s clients wobbled back, describing fabulous romantic triumphs. Scotty, painfully incapacitated with varicose veins, presided in the fo’c’sle. Three cheers for the old sea dog rang out regularly. Scotty was fit to split with bliss.

The next afternoon, a messboy telephoned me on the bridge where I spent all my spare time with the signalmen. “Scotty wants you in the pantry—on the double!” It was my first “On the double!” in a year. I rushed below, wondering. Scotty and the messboys stood around a white-frosted cake. On it, chocolate-chip Morse code spelled “HALEY.” Scotty, shuffling his feet, spoke gruffly. “I tol’ the Cap’n you could stand watch as signalman. He say go ‘head.” Suddenly glowering, he whirled on the messboys. “Looker here, don’t it rate a hand when one of our race can better hisself?”

They clapped as my tears blurred them all. And it was in that humbling instant that the massive old sailor spun into brilliant focus. I saw with crystal clarity the enormous soul and heart seasoned through a quarter-century of fo’c’sles into barnacled wisdom. He cultivated being rough to mask even from himself his benevolent, patriarchal affection for shipmates. I had resented his vicarious attachment to the education I had been luckier than he to have—and now he had helped me to leave him behind.

Scotty often visited me on the signal bridge. Once he came when we had anchored off an island and “Mail Call!” was being piped. Naming two men, he said, “Watch ‘em down there and see what you see.”

We looked down on the forward main deck as yeomen barked names and passed thousands of letters from a dozen bulging mail sacks to the jubilant sailors. But the two men we were watching got nothing. “Poor guys don’t never get no mail,” Scotty said. “Looker here-fix up this thing.” He gave me a Pen Pal Club ad, torn from a magazine. I filled in the two men’s names, and in time the two astounded men received their first letters.

The poignant “Mail-Call” scene kept bothering me. One night in the pantry, I wrote it as I felt it, and it was printed in The Seafarer, which many men enclosed in letters home. Someone’s home-town newspaper reprinted my story. A press wire service picked it up; [my article] “Mail Call” was printed widely over the United States. From across America, letters came addressed: “Lonely Sailors, c/o The Seafarer, U.S.S. Murzim.” Before long, a message was relayed to me, too—from U.S. Coast Guard Headquarters. Ordered back to the States, I wound up assigned in Third (New York) District public relations. There, in 1950, I was named the U.S. Coast Guard’s first chief journalist, and my stories, too, began to click.

But my letters to Scotty went unanswered. Then, in 1954, some reader mail resulting from a Reader’s Digest article included an envelope addressed in a wavering, unruly script that I joyously recognized. Scotty told me that he had made chief steward on the Murzim. But in 1945 his varicose veins forced him to retire and he had settled in Norfolk, Virginia, where he was a night watchman at the Brook Avenue Navy Men’s Y.M.C.A. “Reeding your name folowed by story a grate thril,” Scotty ended his letter. “Knowed you’d make good was how come I help you out.”

(The Most Unforgettable Character I’ve Met by Alex Haley is presented to our audience under the Creative Commons License. It was
originally published in the March 1961 issue of Reader’s Digest. © 1961 The Reader’s Digest Association, Inc. All Rights Reserved.)

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Doris Miller, known as "Dorie" to shipmates and friends, was born in Waco, Texas, on 12 October 1919. He was commended by the Secretary of the Navy, was advanced to Mess Attendant, Second Class and First Class, and subsequently was promoted to Ship's Cook, Third Class.
When the Japanese attacked Pearl Harbor on 7 December 1941, Miller had arisen at 6 a.m., and was collecting laundry when the alarm for general quarters sounded. He headed for his battle station, the antiaircraft battery magazine amidship, only to discover that torpedo damage had wrecked it, so he went on deck. Because of his physical prowess, he was assigned to carry wounded fellow Sailors to places of greater safety. Then an officer ordered him to the bridge to aid the mortally wounded Captain of the ship. He subsequently manned a 50 caliber Browning anti-aircraft machine gun until he ran out of ammunition and was ordered to abandon ship.

Miller described firing the machine gun during the battle, a weapon which he had not been trained to operate: "It wasn't hard. I just pulled the trigger and she worked fine. I had watched the others with these guns. I guess I fired her for about fifteen minutes. I think I got one of those Jap planes. They were diving pretty close to us."
Miller was commended by the Secretary of the Navy Frank Knox on 1 April 1942, and on 27 May 1942 he received the Navy Cross, which Fleet Admiral (then Admiral) Chester W. Nimitz, the Commander in Chief, Pacific Fleet personally presented to Miller on board aircraft carrier USS Enterprise (CV-6) for his extraordinary courage in battle. Speaking of Miller, Nimitz remarked:

This marks the first time in this conflict that such high tribute has been made in the Pacific Fleet to a member of his race and I'm sure that the future will see others similarly honored for brave acts.
In addition to the Navy Cross, Miller was entitled to the Purple Heart Medal; the American Defense Service Medal, Fleet Clasp; the Asiatic-Pacific Campaign Medal; and the World War II Victory Medal.

Commissioned on 30 June 1973, USS Miller (FF-1091), a Knox-class frigate, was named in honor of Doris Miller.

Was Captain Michael Healy really a Black man?

Many of the Coast Guard's Founding Fathers were Black. They were African Americans whether you subscribe to the one-drop rule or not.
Captain Michael A. Healy, the only African American to have a command or commission in any of the Coast Guard’s predecessor services, commanded the cutter Bear from 1887 to 1895. Healy retired as the third highest-ranking officer from the Revenue Cutter Service.
One of ten children born in Macon, Georgia, to an Irish immigrant and a slave of mixed blood, Healy habitually ran away from school. At the urging of his brother, who felt sea life would discipline the youngster, the 15-year-old Healy was hired as a cabin boy abroad the clipper Jumna in 1855. He applied to and was accepted by the Revenue Cutter Service in March of 1865, was promoted to Second Lieutenant in June 1886, and to First Lieutenant in July 1870.
As First Lieutenant, Healy was ordered aboard the cutter Rush, to patrol Alaskan waters for the first time. He became known as a brilliant seaman and was considered by many the best sailor in the North. A feature article in the January 28, 1884 New York Sun stated: "Captain Mike Healy is a good deal more distinguished person in the waters of the far Northwest than any president of the United States or my potentate in Europe has yet become."
Healy distinguished himself when he took command of the cutter Bear, considered by many the greatest polar ship of its time, in 1886. The ship was charged with "seizing any vessel found sealing in the Bering Sea." By 1892, the Bear, Rush and Corwin had made so many seizures that tension developed between the United States and British merchants. Healy was also tasked with bringing medical and other aid to the Alaska Natives, making weather and ice reports, preparing navigation charts, rescuing distressed vessels, transporting special passengers and supplies, and fighting violators of federal laws. He served as deputy U.S. Marshal and represented federal law in Alaska for many years.
On one of Bear’s annual visits to King Island, Healy found a native population reduced to 100 people and begging for food. After ordering food and clothing, Healy worked with Dr. Sheldon Jackson of the Bureau of Education to import reindeer from the Siberian Chukchi, another Eskimo population. During the next ten years, Revenue cutters brought some 1,100 reindeer to Alaska. The Bureau of Education took charge of landing and distributing the deer, and missionary schools taught the natives to raise and care for the animals. By 1940, Alaska’s domesticated reindeer herds had risen to 500,000.
The Coast Guard named an icebreaker for Michael Healy, in acknowledgment of his inspiring commitment to the Service, including his invaluable assistance to Alaska Natives.
The first Secretary of the Treasury, Alexander Hamilton, proposed the Federal government accept public responsibility for safety at sea. On August 7, 1789, President George Washington approved the enabling Ninth Act of Congress. To counter the smuggling and other illegal activities rampant at this time, Hamilton proposed a seagoing military force to support national economic policy. Mere legal-paper status was not enough to combat criminal activity: on August 4, 1790, the Revenue Cutter Service’s predecessor, the Revenue Marine, was born.
Years after their deaths, the Healy family is being claimed as "Black" because of their achievements, according to A. D. Powell writing in the Interracial Voice.
If they can't claim you when you're alive and fighting, the hyenas try to "kidnap" your memory after you're dead. James and Francis Healy have been betrayed by the Catholic Church they served so faithfully because insecure "black Catholics" want to claim "trophy" clergymen of high rank despite the fact that discrimination and lack of educational opportunities prevented real "blacks" from creating an impressive "resume" in the 19th century. James Healy is now being described as the first "black" American to be ordained a priest and the first "black" bishop. Georgetown University now claims that Francis Patrick Healy was the first "African American" president of a predominately "white" university and the first "black" to obtain a PhD.. Some gratitude the Catholic Church has shown! It has insulted the memory of James and Francis Healy by effectively stating that they were not good enough for their Irish-American heritage but only fit to "improve" the "black race" with their "white blood." The Healys must be turning over in their graves!
Captain Michael Morris Healy's memory was recently tarnished by the United States Coast Guard, which named an Icebreaker, the U.S.C.G.C. HEALY (launched in 1997) after him. Normally, it is a great honor to have a ship named after you. It is an insult, however, when the ship is named after you so the U.S. Coast Guard can honor a "black" hero who was really Irish-American, at least 3/4 white, and identified as both white and Irish. In this case, someone told a group of black schoolkids at Virgil Grissom Junior High School in Queens, New York that they had a "black" hero in Captain Healy. The black kids initiated a letter-writing campaign to get the Coast Guard to name a ship after Michael Healy. Now, these kids may be flattered by the idea that a person of obvious Caucasian phenotype shares their "race," but it is in fact a racial insult they are incapable of recognizing.
A prime example of the "liberal racism" that condemns the Healys as "black" on the basis of the "one drop" myth while pretending to be anti-racist and sympathetic, is "Racial Identity and the Case of Captain Michael Healy, USRCS," by James M. O'Toole, director of the archives program at University of Massachusetts, Boston.. (Quarterly of the National Archives & Records Administration, Fall 1997, vol. 29, No. 3)
O'Toole begins with a confrontation between Captain Healy and two sailors he was disciplining. He notes that they called him a "God damned Irishman." O'Toole is very upset that the sailors didn't call Captain Healy a "nigger." This seems to him the only natural thing to call Captain Healy. O'Toole throughout the article, projects his own racism and devotion to the "one drop" myth on 19th century Americans who obviously didn't share his devotion to white racial "purity."

O'Toole's racist devotion to the "one drop" myth blinds him to racial reality in the 19th century. He assumes that the "one drop" myth was law and universally accepted by "whites." It wasn't. Any research into racial classification laws in the 19th century would have shown him that various degrees of "negro blood" were accepted into the "white race," even in the Deep South. Also, the combination of a person's looks and the reputation he had established were all taken into consideration in determining whether one was "white" or not. It is obvious that Captain Healy and his siblings succeeded in establishing themselves as second-generation Irish Americans. O'Toole cannot bear this and insists that the Healy siblings were really "African Americans." He also calls their mother, Eliza, an "African American" even though her ancestry was at least half European.
O'Toole also claims that all "whites" believed in "mulatto inferiority" or the doctrine that mixed-race people are biologically inferior to BOTH or ALL "pure" parental groups. He is too ignorant to understand that this doctrine was created as a defense of slavery by pro-slavery intellectuals who wanted to counter the Northern anti-slavery argument that, if slavery is justified on the basis of "race," then "white" slaves should be automatically free because the negro racial "taint" had been effectively bred out of the line. Lawrence Tenzer explains the origins of this doctrine very well in his book The Forgotten Cause of the Civil War: A New Look at the Slavery Issue. O'Toole would do well to sit at Tenzer's feet and learn something. O'Toole follows the usual liberal excuse of claiming that "society" defined the Healy family as "black," but expresses wonderment at the fact that "whites" who knew about Captain Healy's mixed ancestry still treated him as "white." O'Toole is amazed that establishing a "white" identity was so easy for the Healys:

The apparent ease with which they made the transition from black to white is striking. Hell, any white-identified multiracial could have told him that! First, they didn't start out as "black." All things would be made clear if he would stop listening to and promoting "black" propaganda. O'Toole is racist because he accepts the myth that the Healys' real identity was "black" and that they were only "passing" for white and Irish American. Even though, like so many liberals, O'Toole acknowledges that "Group boundaries are more fluid than we often suppose," he clearly accepts and endorses the "one drop" myth, passing it off as biological and social reality:

Where the Healys are remembered today, it is as African Americans; several of them are now celebrated as the "first black" achievers in their fields. They themselves, however, recoiled from such an identification. Wherever possible, they sought a white identity...

This may seem surprising or even disappointing to us...

Why should it be "surprising" or "disappointing" to anyone? The Healys embraced the identity that they believed best defined them. The Irish American identity certainly described the Healys well - far better than any false "black" identity. Does O'Toole really believe that the "white race" is "pure" or totally free from the "taint" of the "race" in whose equality he professes to believe? O'Toole also accepts the "liberal" nonsense that a "white" identity is merely an attempt to escape from "racism" and that the Healys would have cheerfully accepted a "black" identity if there had been no anti-black discrimination. Tell me, in a world free of anti-Semitism, would Jews voluntary call themselves "non-Aryans" or "kikes" or any other term invented to degrade them? Of course not; the question would be considered ridiculous. Why, therefore, do liberal and "black" elites insist that, in a prejudice-free world, people would cheerfully accept a racially degraded identity for themselves. Such idiocy constitutes a total rejection of logic.
Imagine that! O'Toole can't understand how a boy with a white-identified Irish quadroon father and a "pure" Irish mother could presume to call himself "white" instead of some "black" nonsense. O'Toole appears to be really concerned about those polluting "black drops" contaminating his "whiteness." He apparently doesn't want to share his Irish American identity with people contaminated by the blood of the "race" he claims to champion.

O'Toole acknowledges that Captain Healy experienced prejudice for being Irish and Catholic, but he seems to be so disappointed that the "nigger" insult never pops up to put the uppity quadroon in his place. Indeed, O'Toole's liberal racist contention that the Healy family's Irish Catholic identity was mere social climbing to escape discrimination is even more ridiculous when you realize that, in the 19th century, both Irish and Catholics faced massive discrimination. If the Healys wanted to social climb, they could have become white Protestants.

The "racial kidnaping" of the Healy family is an important example of why the "liberal racist" assumption that a publicly-identified European heritage is somehow "too good" for those non-Hispanics "tainted" by "black blood" must be openly and defiantly challenged. We must end this racial "rape." If the Healy family can be violated in death, it can happen to anyone.

Francis Patrick Healy First Rector/President of Georgetown University.(1873-1881)

Alexander Hamilton was African American.

Alexander Hamilton (January 11, 1755 or 1757 – July 12, 1804) was an American politician, leading statesman, financier, intellectual, military officer, and founder of the Federalist Party. One of America's foremost constitutional lawyers, he was an influential delegate to the U.S. Constitutional Convention in 1787 and was the leading author of the Federalist Papers (1788), which has been the single most important interpretation of the Constitution ever since.
He was the first and most influential Secretary of the Treasury and had much influence over the rest of the Government and the formation of policy, including foreign policy. With a vision of using federal power to modernize the nation, he convinced Congress to use an elastic interpretation of the Constitution to pass far-reaching laws. They included the creation of a national debt, federal assumption of the state debts, creation of a national bank, and a system of taxes through a tariff on imports and a tax on whiskey that would pay for it all. In foreign affairs he favored the British; he was the major force behind the Jay Treaty of 1794 which averted war with Britain and brought ten years of peace and trade
Alexander Hamilton was born in the West Indies island of Nevis to James Hamilton, the fourth son of a Scottish laird, and Rachel Fawcett of the island of St. Croix, where she gave birth to a son which she left with the father when she moved to Nevis
Hamilton was always sensitive about his illegitimate birth. Hamilton's childhood was Dickensian. His father abandoned his two sons—with severe emotional consequences, even for the times—in the course of breaking with Hamilton's mother. His mother kept a small store on Nevis, and had, it is said, the largest library on the island - some thirty-odd books. Business misfortunes having caused his father to leave when Hamilton was seven, and his mother having died suddenly of a fever in 1768, young Hamilton was effectively orphaned. A short time afterwards, the son from the first marriage appeared in Nevis, and (legally) confiscated the few valuables Hamilton's mother had owned, including several valuable silver spoons. Hamilton never saw him again, but years later received his death notice and a small amount of money.
President George Washington appointed Hamilton as the first Secretary of the Treasury. Hamilton served in the Treasury Department from September 11, 1789, until January 31, 1795. It is for his tenure as Treasury secretary, as well as his contributions to the Federalist Papers, that Hamilton is considered one of America's greatest early statesmen. He was in many ways Washington's most trusted advisor, handling critical domestic and foreign policies, and writing drafts of important messages such as Washington's Farewell Address in 1796. In 1794 he designed a "bold initiative", the Jay Treaty that "ushered in a new era of prosperity for Anglo-American trade," and resolved left-over issues from the Revolution. He fought Jefferson and Madison in the matter--they favored France--thus setting up foreign policy as a major dispute between the parties.

Clan STEVERSON dates from 10th CENTURY.

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The family name STEVERSON is believed to be descended from the Boernicians, an ancient founding race of the English/Scottish border dating from about the year 400 A. D.. The border was also home to Clans, such as, the Sturdy Armstrongs, the Gallant Grahams, the Saucy Scotts, the Angry Kerrs, the Bells, the Nixons, the Famous Dicksons, the Bold Rutherfords, and the Pudding Somervilles.
Through diligent research among some of the most ancient manuscripts, such as, the Exchequer Rolls of Scotland, the Inquisitio, the Ragman Rolls, the Domesday Book, baptismals, parish records, tax records and cartularies researchers have found the first record of the name STEVERSON, in Northumberland where they were seated from very ancient times, some say before the Norman Conquest in 1066 of William the Conqueror.
When the Crown of England and Scotland were united under James VI of Scotland in 1603 the Border Clans were dispersed to England, northern Scotland and to Ireland. Some were banished directly to the (American) Colonies.
In Ireland they were granted lands previously held the Catholic Irish. They signed as "Undertaking" to remain Protestant and faith to the Crown. In Ireland the name assumed the variance of Steenson and Stinson, and they settled in County Limerick, and were prominent patrons of Gaelic literature.
The New World beckoned settlers from Ireland (who would come to be known as the Scotch/Irish), as well as from the Old Country. The sailed aboard the armada of sailing ships known as the "White Sails" which plied the stormy Atlantic. Some called them, less romantically, the "coffin ships". Among the early settlers bearing the STEVERSON surname who came to North America were: Joseph Stephenson, who settled in Argentia, Newfoundland, in 1730; William and Mathew Stevenson, who settled in Harbour Grace, Newfoundland, in 1760; Andrew Stevenson, who settled in Charlestown, Mass., in 1630; Richard Stevenson, who settled in the Barbados in 1654; Robert Stevenson, who settled in Boston, Mass., in 1763; Christian and Anne Stephenson, who settled in Virginia, in 1637; Thomas Stephenson, who settled in Maryland , in 1774; John Steenson, who settled in Charles Town, S.C. in 1767; David, Hugh, James, John, Robert, Thomas, and William Stinson , who all arrived in Pennsylvania from 1844 to 1857.
In America these pioneers became the nucleus of the first settlements from Maine to the Cumberland Gap, and from Nova Scotia to the Prairies.
In more recent times, many of the family named STEVERSON have achieved prominence: among them were; Congressman Thaddeus Stevens, abolitionist and drafter of the 14th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution; Sir Francis Stephenson; Edgar Stephenson, Archdeacon; Professor Gordon Stephenson, Architect; Colonel Sir Henry Stephenson; Jim Stephenson, Recorder; Sir Percy Stephenson; Sir William Stephenson, Canadian Author; Dr. Alan Stevenson, Researcher; Sir Aubrey Stevenson; Dr. Derek Stevenson; Dame Hilda Stevenson; Air Marshall Leigh Stevenson; Sir Matthew Stevenson; Sir Ralph Stevenson; Todd Anthony Steverson, professional baseball player for Detroit and San Diego; and Adlai E. Stevenson, U.S. Presidential candidate; London Livingston Steverson; Justin Adlai Steverson, actor and athlete; Verolga Leilani Steverson, genetic researcher; Diana Marie Steverson, fashion model; Marianne LaPara Steverson; Sarah Diana Stevenson, Taekwon-do champion (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sarah_Stevenson); Sarah Mahalia Steverson, linguist; Simone Magdalena Steverson; and Rosalind Steverson Stevenson, actress and Hollywood publicist.

WHERE HAVE ALL THE SAILORS GONE?

Sexual favors can move mountains. Women today are using what they have to get what they want. They are being aided and abetted by politically correct and chivalrous news articles portraying them simultaneously as liberated women and defenseless little creatures. Helen Gurley Brown claimed that women could have it all, ‘love, sex, and money’. Due to her advocacy, the liberated single woman was often referred to generically as the ‘Cosmo Girl’. Her work played a part in what is often called the sexual revolution. Brown said that good girls go to Heaven, but bad girls go everywhere. Brown exhorted ambition and assertiveness over men, on dates or on the job. She repeatedly linked careers to single-woman prowess, and both monetary and emotional stability: A single woman is known by what she does rather than whom she belongs to, she writes in Sex and the Single Girl. Strategies to get ahead include flirting with the management and tips on how to ‘mouseburger’ your way to the top. Tactics range from impressing the boss to marrying him. So who's in power -- the exec who seduces, or the men who deliver? Why do women work -- to meet men or outfox them? A man likes to sleep with a brainy girl, she said.



Sadly, today women are finding that they cannot have it all, nor can they have it both ways. They have to be equal and pull their own weight or they have to be ladies in the traditional sense and conform to the Emily Post’s rules of etiquette. They cannot be ladies by day and sluts by night. For many years girls have measured themselves by the standards of debutants. But as the sexual revolution begot working rights for women, the measurements changed. Sexual rites of passage changed, too. Today there are a sizeable percentage of teenage mothers at the high school proms. It is not uncommon today to meet 30 year old grandmothers. That is not a laughing matter, as we've learned to our sorrow and to society's financial pain. Teenage pregnancy is a financial drain on society. Poor women, particularly single mothers, suffer most when such society’s mores change.

Once it was said that the stock market rises and falls with a woman’s hem line. Today women proudly exhibit their navels and lower backs. Fashion reflects the times, and modesty and femininity are anachronisms in a world in which slut is no longer a slur. The New York Times reports that it has become a term of endearment between women friends, a fun word for ladies who lunch. These are the young women who read The Vagina Monologues to each other, reveling in the celebration of their body parts. Helen Gurley Brown calls them flirts. The flirt reacts. She laughs at the jokes, clucks at the sad parts, applauds bravery. I really think it gets easier to flirt as you get older because you learn to listen to any man, employing the same charm and rapt attention you once reserved for seven-year-olds.

Teenage flirts lie a lot about sex. Their bodies, subject to swift hormonal changes, are further manipulated by pop cultural expectations not always of their own making. As society pushes young women to grow up faster, teenagers become more and more sexually active.

Sex has become a useful weapon of choice. Flirts use sex as a weapon. Teenagers trying to enlist in the military use sex as a weapon. Wives use sex as a weapon. Girlfriends, dates, college students, aspiring actresses use sex as a weapon. Radical feminists use sex as a weapon. Waitresses use sex as a weapon. Gays and homosexuals use sex as a weapon. Sorority pledges use sex as a weapon. College co-eds use sex as a weapon. Female graduate school students use sex as a weapon. Cub-reporters looking for a scoop use sex as a weapon. Female private detectives use sex as a weapon. High school girls trying to enlist in the military use sex as a weapon. Underclass cadets use sex as a weapon. Female recruits in boot camp use sex as a weapon.



Military recruiters have increasingly resorted to overly aggressive tactics and even criminal activity to attract young men and women to the battlefield. Grueling combat conditions in Iraq, a decent commercial job market and tough monthly recruiting goals have made recruiters' jobs more difficult. This has probably prompted more recruiters to resort to questionable tactics. There are some 22,000 personnel working for the military's recruiting program, which cost more than $1.5 billion this year. A staff of some 14,000 frontline recruiters must enlist two applicants per month. Given the large numbers of service members Department Of Defense must recruit every year, there is ample opportunity for recruiter irregularities to occur.




More than 100 young women who expressed interest in joining the military in the past year were preyed upon sexually by their recruiters. Women were raped on recruiting office couches, assaulted in government cars and groped en route to entrance exams.
A six-month Associated Press investigation found that more than 80 military recruiters were disciplined last year for sexual misconduct with potential enlistees. The cases occurred across all branches of the military and in all regions of the country.
At least 35 Army recruiters, 18 Marine Corps recruiters, 18 Navy recruiters and 12 Air Force recruiters were disciplined for sexual misconduct or other inappropriate behavior with potential enlistees in 2005, according to records obtained by the AP under dozens of Freedom of Information Act requests.
The AP also found:
-The Army, which accounts for almost half of the military, has had 722 recruiters accused of rape and sexual misconduct since 1996.
-Across all services, one out of 200 frontline recruiters - the ones who deal directly with young people - was disciplined for sexual misconduct last year.
-Some cases of improper behavior involved romantic relationships, and sometimes those relationships were initiated by the women.
-Most recruiters found guilty of sexual misconduct are disciplined administratively, facing a reduction in rank or forfeiture of pay; military and civilian prosecutions are rare.
The Pentagon has committed more than $1.5 billion to recruiting efforts this year. Defense Department spokeswoman Lt. Col. Ellen Krenke insisted that each of the services takes the issue of sexual misconduct by recruiters "very seriously and has processes in place to identify and deal with those members who act inappropriately."
The Associated Press generally does not name victims in sexual assault cases. For this story, the AP interviewed victims in their homes and perpetrators in jail, read police and court accounts of assaults and in one case portions of a victim's journal.
A pattern emerged. The sexual misconduct almost always takes place in recruiting stations, recruiter’s apartments or government vehicles. The victims are typically between 16 and 18 years old, and they usually are thinking about enlisting. They usually meet the recruiters at their high schools, but sometimes at malls or recruiting offices.
"We had been drinking, yes. And we went to the recruiting station at about midnight," begins one girl's story.
Tall and slim, her long hair sweeping down her back, this 18-year-old from Ukiah, Calif., hides her face in her hands as she describes the night when Marine Corps recruiter Sgt. Brian Fukushima climbed into her sleeping bag on the floor of the station and took off her pants. Two other recruiters were having sex with two of her friends in the same room.
"I don't like to talk about it. I don't like to think about it," she says, her voice muffled and breaking. "He got into my sleeping bag, unbuttoned my pants, and he started, well ..."
Her voice trails off, and she is quiet for a moment. "I had a freak-out session and just passed out. When I woke up I was sick and ashamed. My clothes were all over the floor."
Fukushima was convicted of misconduct in a military court after other young women reported similar assaults. He left the service with a less than honorable discharge last fall.
His military attorney, Capt. James Weirick, said Fukushima is "sorry that he let his family down and the Marine Corps down. It was a lapse in judgment."
Shedrick Hamilton uses the same phrase to describe his own actions that landed him in Oneida Correctional Facility in upstate New York for 15 months for having sex with a 16-year-old high school student he met while working as a Marine Corps recruiter.
Hamilton said the victim had dropped her pants in his office as a prank a few weeks earlier, and that on this day she reached over and caressed his groin while he was driving her to a recruiting event.
"I pulled over and asked her to climb into the back seat," he said. "I should have pushed her away. I was the adult in the situation. I should have put my foot down, called her parents."
As a result, he was convicted of third-degree rape, and left the service with an other-than-honorable discharge. He wipes the collar of his prison jumpsuit across his cheek, smearing tears that won't stop.
"I literally kick myself ... every day. It hurts. It hurts a lot. As much as I pray, as much as I work on it in counseling, I still can't repair the pain that I caused a girl, her family, my family, my kids. It's very hard to deal with," he says, dropping his head. "It's very, very hard to deal with."
In Gainesville, Fla., a 20-year-old woman told this story: Walking into an Army recruiting station last summer, she was greeted by Sgt. George Kirkman, a 6-foot-4, 220-pound Soldier. Kirkman is 41.
He was friendly and encouraging, but told her she might be a bit too heavy. He asked if she wanted to go to the gym with him. She agreed, and he drove her to his apartment complex.
There, he walked her to his apartment, pulled out a laptop, and suggested she take a basic recruiting aptitude test. Afterward, Kirkman said he needed to measure her. Twice. He said she had to take her pants off. And he attacked her.
Kirkman, who did not respond to repeated requests for an interview, pleaded no contest to sexual battery in January and is on probation and a registered sexual offender. He's still in the military, working now as a clerk in the Jacksonville, Fla., Army recruiting office.



Not all of the victims are young women. Former Navy recruiter Joseph Sampy, 27, of Jeanerette, La., is serving a 12-year sentence for molesting three male recruits.
"He did something wrong, something terrible to people who were the most vulnerable," State District Judge Lori Landry said before handing down the sentence in July, 2005. "He took advantage of his authority."
One of Sampy's victims is suing him and the Navy for $1.25 million. The trial is scheduled for next spring.
---
Sometimes these incidents are indisputable, forcible rapes.
"He did whatever he pleased," said one victim who was 17 at the time. "... People in uniform used to make me feel safe. Now they make me feel nervous."
Other sexual misconduct is more nuanced. Recruiters insist the victims were interested in them, and sometimes the victims agree. Sometimes they even dated.
"I was persuaded into doing something that I didn't necessarily want to do, but I did it willingly," said Kelly Chase, now a Marine Corps combat photographer, whose testimony helped convict a recruiter of sexual misconduct last year.
Former Navy recruiter Paul Sistrunk, a plant supervisor in Conehatta, Miss., who had an affair with a potential recruit in 1995, says their relationship was entirely consensual.
She was 18, an adult; he was 26 and married.
"Things happen, you know?" says Sistrunk, who opted for an other-than-honorable discharge rather than face court-martial. "Morally, what I did was wrong, but legally, I don't think so."
A nine-year veteran of the Navy, Sistrunk lost his pension and health benefits. His victim, who discovered during a medical exam at boot camp that she had contracted herpes, unsuccessfully tried to sue the federal government.
"In my case," said Sistrunk, "I was flirted with, and flirting, well, that's something I hadn't seen a lot of until I became a recruiter. I had no power over her. I really didn't."
Kimberly Lonsway, an expert in sexual assault and workplace discrimination in San Luis Obispo, Calif., said "even if there isn't overt violence, the reality is that these recruiters really do hold the keys to the future for these women, and a 17-year-old girl often has a very different understanding of the situation than a 23-year-old recruiter."
"There's a power dynamic here that's obviously very sensitive," agreed Elaine Donnelly, president of the Center for Military Readiness, a group that studies military policy.
"Let's face it, these guys are handsome in their uniform, they're mature, they give a lot of attention to these girls, and as recruiters they do a lot of the same things that guys do when they want to appeal to girls. There's a very fine line there, and it can be very hard to maintain a professional approach."
Weirick, the Marine Corps defense attorney who has represented several recruiters on rape and sexual misconduct charges, said it's a problem that will probably never entirely go away.
"It's difficult because of the nature of nature," he said. "It's hard to put it in another way, you know? It's usually a consensual relationship or dating type of thing."
When asked if victims feel this way, he said, "It's really a victimless crime other than the institution of the Marine Corps. Its institutional integrity we're protecting, by not allowing this to happen."
Anita Sanchez, director of communications at the Miles Foundation, a national advocacy group for victims of violence in the military, bristles at the idea that the enlistees, even if they flirt or ask to date recruiters, are willingly having sex with them.
"You have a recruiter who can enable you to join the service or not join the service. That has life-changing implications for you as a high school student or college student," she said. "If she does not do this her life will be seriously impacted. Instead of getting training and an education, she might end up a dishwasher."
Ethan Walker, who spent eight years in the Marine Corps including a stint as a recruiter from 1998 to 2000, said he was warned.
"They told us at recruiter school that girls, 15, 16, are going to come up to you, they're going to flirt with you, they're going to do everything in their power to get you in bed. But if you do it you're breaking the law," he said.
Even so, he said he was initially taken aback when he set up a table at a high school and had girls telling him he looked sexy and handing him their telephone numbers.
"All that is, you have to remind yourself, is that there's jail bait, a quick way to get in trouble, a quick way to dishonor the service," he said.
All of the recruiters the AP spoke with, including Walker, said they were routinely alone in their offices and cars with girls. Walker said he heard about sleepovers at other recruiting stations, and there was no rule against it. There didn't need to be a rule, he said. The lines were clear: Recruiters do not sleep with enlistees.
"Any recruiter that would try to claim that, 'Oh, it's consensual,' they are lying, they are lying through their teeth," he said. "The recruiter has all the power in these situations."
---
Although the Uniform Code of Military Justice bars recruiters from having sex with potential recruits, it also states that age 16 is the legal age of consent. This means that if a recruiter is caught having sex with a 16-year-old, and he can prove it was consensual, he will likely only face an administrative reprimand.
But not under new rules set by the Indiana Army National Guard.
There, a much stricter policy, apparently the first of its kind in the country, was instituted last year after seven victims came forward to charge National Guard recruiter Sgt. Eric Vetesy with rape and assault.
"We didn't just sit on our hands and say, 'Well, these things happen, they're wrong, and we'll try to prevent it.' That's a bunch of bull," said Lt. Col. Ivan Denton, commander of the Indiana Guard's recruiting battalion.
Now, the 164 Army National Guard recruiters in Indiana follow a "No One Alone" policy. Male recruiters cannot be alone in offices, cars, or anywhere else with a female enlistee. If they are, they risk immediate disciplinary action. Recruiters also face discipline if they hear of another recruiter's misconduct and don't report it.
At their first meeting, National Guard applicants, their parents and school officials are given wallet-sized "Guard Cards" advising them of the rules. It includes a telephone number to call if they experience anything unsafe or improper.
Denton said the policy does more than protect enlistees.
"It's protecting our recruiters as well," he said.

DEATH OF THE MAIDEN DURING A ROUTINE DIVE.

The torch has been passed to a new gender at the Coast Guard Academy. What does this mean for the Coast Guard and the armed forces in general? How will this affect our military readiness? Since the Coast Guard is the lead agency in the Department of Homeland Security, how will this affect the War on Terror?

Are Americans ready to have their daughters brought home in body bags? How many female casualties will it take before America says enough is enough?

Two Coast Guard divers assigned to the Seattle-based Coast Guard Cutter Healy died Thursday August 17 during a routine dive operation in the Arctic Ocean approximately 500 miles north of Barrow, Alaska.
Deceased are Lt. Jessica Hill, 30, of St. Augustine, Fla., and Petty Officer 2nd Class Steven Duque, 26, of Miami.
CGC Healy was engaged in a science mission when the accident occurred. The dive was intended to be a cold-water familiarization dive near the bow of the ship, a routine activity when the ship is operating in Arctic ice. During this type of dive, the ship sits idle and hazardous pumps and propellers are disengaged.
The cause of this dive accident is under investigation. The Coast Guard will conduct an investigation to determine the cause of this accident. A formal Board of Inquiry will be convened, but the Coast Guard will be investigating itself.
How could two people die during a routine dive? Since a male and a female died, it is highly unlikely that gender played any role in the tragedy. That would leave possibly equipment failure, operator error, or negligence on the part of support personnel handling the logistics and support services. Who serviced their equipment? When was it last used before the accident? Who authorized the operation? Who was controlling the ship at the time of the incident? Who was on watch on the bridge and in the engine room? Who was assigned to monitor the progress of the diving operation on the forecastle? A young man and a young woman do not just die in a routine diving operation.
What was CGC Healy doing 500 miles north of Point Barrow, Alaska? Was she breaking ice, or taking water samples, or collecting marine mammal specimens? CGC Healy would in all likelihood be inside or at the edge of the multi-year Arctic pack ice. That ice is sky blue, super cold, and almost as hard as a diamond. This water is so cold that a person would only be capable of surviving for about two minutes in the water without a proper wet suit. It is so hard that it is capable of penetrating the steel hull of an icebreaker. Small pieces of pack ice, called bergie bits, can damage a rudder fluke or shaft, and damage a ship's rudder. Also the wire cable used to take Nansen water samples or deep core samples from the ocean floor can become wrapped around the rudder or propeller shaft. If either of these occurs it would be necessary to put a diver in the water to inspect the damages.
In order to ensure the stability of the ship, usually it is advisable to park the ship in the pack ice. That would ensure that the ship does not move while the divers are in the water.
The skipper of the CGC Healy is Captain Douglas G. Russell. The captain has total responsibility for the ship and the lives of all hands onboard. The American people and the parents and relatives of the crew place great confidence in his judgment and professional qualifications. Only the best qualified and the most experienced officers are given command of an icebreaker. His judgment, orders and actions prior to the deaths of the divers will be thoroughly scrutinized. If he should be relieved of command during the investigation, it would be a sure indication that preliminary indications are that he was derelict in some manner and that dereliction lead to the deaths of the divers. The Coast Guard will be quick to insulate itself from any direct liability for the wrongful deaths of two young divers.
If Captain Douglas Russell is relieved of command and he is assigned a detailed Coast Guard attorney, it would mean that he is facing a court-martial or dismissal. He would be wise to hire an experienced civilian attorney. His career and retirement pay would be in jeopardy. If relieved of command, he could consider himself a party to the investigation. That is not good news.
It would be interesting to know if Captain Russell was personally selected to command the Coast Guard's largest and newest icebreaker. Was he an Academy graduate? His medical record and his fitness report file would be of interest. Whether he was a drinking men, used artificial stimulants or prescription medications would have to be verified. Also, the psychological profile of Captain Russell would be crucial to see if he was stable enough to endure the rigors and the stress of long deployments to isolated environments. How attentive was he to details? Could he manage many things at once? Was he surrounded by capable officers to whom he could delegate important tasks? And what was his personal working relationship with the civilians from the National Science Foundation deployed on the ship?
The only known predators in the Arctic waters near the North Pole are polar bears. At the South Pole there are no polar bears, only killer whales and leopard seals.
Early news reports did not mention any of these reasons for the divers being in the water. The Coast Guard late Friday had conflicting information about what the
two divers were doing when they were killed. In the late afternoon, Coast
Guard officials said the two died during a "familiarization dive" for cold
water at the bow of the ship.
Earlier in the day, Coast Guard officials had said the two died during a
routine shallow-water dive to inspect the ship's rudder.
Had these two divers been in the water before, or was this their first time making an Artic dive? The Polar environment is very unforgiving. It allows no mistakes, not even one. Your first mistake can very well be your last.
Lt. Jessica Hill grew up in St. Augustine, Fla., and had a master's degree in
marine science from the University of South Alabama. She joined the
Coast Guard after college. Presumably she is a graduate of the Coast Guard Officer Candidate School at Yorktown, Virginia, unless she was given a direct commission.
Coast Guard divers train with U.S. Navy divers at the Navy diving school popularized in the 2000 film MEN OF HONOR located in Panama City, Fla. Any able-bodied person who is physically fit, whether an officer or enlisted person, can apply. Only a few openings are available each year. Selection is determined by factors including command approval, physical fitness,
swimming abilities and other capabilities. Beauty plays no part in the selection. A strong sense of duty and a desire to serve your country is all this is required.

WHO PLAYED THE RACE CARD IN THE WEBSTER SMITH CASE?

Who played the race card in the Webster Smith case? Was it Commandant of Cadets Doug Wisniewski and CWO2 David French? Or was it Webster Smith’s defense team? Could it have been the news media? Someone certainly did, because the race of the accused was reported before the trial began.
Excerpts from The Day newspaper said as follows:
Defense lawyers say race is a factor in the case.

(TEMPORARILY REMOVED FOR REVIEW by the author.)

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SMITH CASE COULD GO TO SUPREME COURT!

It is possible the Webster Smith case could make it all the way to the Supreme Court. This dispute is a case of first impression.


The Court of Appeals of the Armed Forces will have to review the Webster Smith case. It has no choice. The United States Court of Military Review, under Article 66 of the UCMJ, shall review all cases of trial by court-martial in which the sentence as approved by the Convening Authority extends to dismissal of a cadet from the Coast Guard, and/or a dishonorable or bad conduct discharge, unless the accused waives appellate review.

Decision of the Coast Guard Court of Criminal Appeals may be appealed to the Court of Appeals of the Armed Forces.

The Coast Guard Court of of Criminal Appeals is made up of Coast Guard Officers. It has the power to decide matter of both fact and law. The Court of Appeals of the Armed Forces is made up of five civilian judges, appointed to 15 year terms. It decides only issues of law. All of its decisions are reported in the Military Justice Reporter and create precedent. Its decisions may be appealed to the U. S. Supreme Court. It is the highest court in the land.

Chief Justice John Roberts does not want this kind of case coming to the Supreme Court. ´Too many people think whenever there's any kind of dispute in our society, well let's take it to the Supreme Court and they'll decide," Chief Justice Roberts said. "In a democratic republic that shouldn't be someone's first reaction. ..”

This and other little-known facts of Chief Justice Roberts appear in a new kid-friendly biography, "John G. Roberts, Jr.: Chief Justice," by Lisa Tucker McElroy. It has just gone on sale at the Supreme Court gift shop. Pitched at about a sixth-grade reading level, the 48-page hardcover book filled with family photos is part of a Lerner Publishing Group series that also includes the life stories of Illinois Sen. Barack Obama (D), and Mother Teresa.
The emphasis throughout, though, is on the humanizing anecdote.



Webster Smith has apologized for his behavior. Confession is good for the soul. It is the first step toward true rehabilitation.
http://www.time.com/time/quotes/0,26174,1209244,00.html

No one else involved in the entire episode has shown such strength of character. The Academy is a character building institution. Is it fulfilling its mission.

The system of recognizing and assigning responsibility to cadets must be carefully examined, for the “best and the brightest” appear to be among those demonstrating risky behavior. Cadets exhibiting and recognized for the highest academic and military proficiency were part of this tale of drunkenness and debauchery.

Lcdr Patrick Knowles said that seemingly intelligent, motivated and ambitious women (upwards of seven) all 'hooked-up' with a single man, and all within an eight month time period. Given the small, close-knit nature of the Academy, these liaisons must have been widely known.

It is not enough to declare revulsion with sexual assault. The systemic problem is not one of incomplete, inefficient, or unclear reporting procedures or processes. Those are management issues that Captain Judy Keene will have to address. The problem is about a system that appears unsuccessful in aligning cadet values to the point that they demonstrate conduct becoming a gentleman – or a lady. These are leadership issues.

Patrick H. Knowles Jr. is a 1983 CGA graduate. He completed a 20-year career, retiring as a lieutenant commander. He spent the last nine years of his career as an Academy engineering professor, and assisting in the summer leadership training of Academy cadets. Among his duties he was an overnight watch-stander in the Cadet Barracks.

Judge London Steverson
London Eugene Livingston Steverson (born March 13, 1947) was one of the first two African Americans to graduate from the United States Coast Guard Academy in 1968. Later, as chief of the newly formed Minority Recruiting Section of the United States Coast Guard (USCG), he was charged with desegregating the Coast Guard Academy by recruiting minority candidates. He retired from the Coast Guard in 1988 and in 1990 was appointed to the bench as a Federal Administrative Law Judge with the Office of Hearings and Appeals, Social Security Administration.

Early Life and Education
Steverson was born and raised in Millington, Tennessee, the oldest of three children of Jerome and Ruby Steverson. At the age of 5 he was enrolled in the E. A. Harrold elementary school in a segregated school system. He later attended the all black Woodstock High School in Memphis, Tennessee, graduating valedictorian.
A Presidential Executive Order issued by President Truman had desegregated the armed forces in 1948,[1] but the service academies were lagging in officer recruiting. President Kennedy specifically challenged the United States Coast Guard Academy to tender appointments to Black high school students. London Steverson was one of the Black student to be offered such an appointment, and when he accepted the opportunity to be part of the class of 1968, he became the second African American to enter the previously all-white military academy. On June 4, 1968 Steverson graduated from the Coast Guard Academy with a BS degree in Engineering and a commission as an ensign in the U.S. Coast Guard.
In 1974, while still a member of the Coast Guard, Steverson entered The National Law Center of The George Washington University and graduated in 1977 with a Juris Doctor of Laws Degree.

USCG Assignments.
Steverson's first duty assignment out of the Academy was in Antarctic research logistical support. In July 1968 he reported aboard the Coast Guard Cutter (CGC) Glacier [2] (WAGB-4), an icebreaker operating under the control of the U.S. Navy, and served as a deck watch officer and head of the Marine Science Department. He traveled to Antarctica during two patrols from July 1968 to August 1969, supporting the research operations of the National Science Foundation's Antarctic Research Project in and around McMurdo Station. During the 1969 patrol the CGC Glacier responded to an international distress call from the Argentine icebreaker General SanMartin, which they freed.
He received another military assignment from 1970 to 1972 in Juneau, Alaska as a Search and Rescue Officer. Before being certified as an Operations Duty Officer, it was necessary to become thoroughly familiar with the geography and topography of the Alaskan remote sites. Along with his office mate, Ltjg Herbert Claiborne "Bertie" Pell, the son of Rhode Island Senator Claiborne Pell, Steverson was sent on a familiarization tour of Coast Guard, Navy and Air Force bases. The bases visited were Base Kodiak, Base Adak Island, and Attu Island, in the Aleutian Islands.[3]
Steverson was the Duty Officer on September 4, 1971 when an emergency call was received that an Alaska Airlines Boeing 727 airline passenger plane was overdue at Juneau airport. This was a Saturday and the weather was foggy with drizzling rain. Visibility was less than one-quarter mile. The 727 was en route to Seattle, Washington from Anchorage, Alaska with a scheduled stop in Juneau. There were 109 people on board and there were no survivors. Steverson received the initial alert message and began the coordination of the search and rescue effort. In a matter of hours the wreckage from the plane, with no survivors, was located on the side of a mountain about five miles from the airport. For several weeks the body parts were collected and reassembled in a staging area in the National Guard Armory only a few blocks from the Search and Rescue Center where Steverson first received the distress broadcast.[4]. Later a full investigation with the National Transportation Safety Board determined that the cause of the accident was equipment failure.[5]
Another noteworthy item is Steverson's involvement as an Operations Officer during the seizure of two Russian fishing vessels, the Kolevan and the Lamut for violating an international agreement prohibiting foreign vessels from fishing in United States territorial waters. The initial attempts at seizing the Russian vessels almost precipitated an international incident when the Russian vessels refused to proceed to a U. S. port, and instead sailed toward the Kamchatka Peninsula. Russian MIG fighter planes were scrambled, as well as American fighter planes from Elmendorf Air Force Base before the Russian vessels changed course and steamed back

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DO THE RIGHT THING for THE RIGHT REASON.

The torch has been passed to a new "gender" and a new generation at the Coast Guard Academy. Members of the United States Coast Guard Academy class of 2008, 23 percent of whom are female, were formally accepted into the Corps of Cadets during a ceremony Wed. Aug. 18, 2004 on the academy's Parade Grounds.

Reverend Doctor Martin Luther King would be proud. Spike Lee should feel proud. America has learned from them. Doctor King's non-violent civil rights movement became the preferred model for others fighting for their rights in America. The Homosexual Rights movement fighting for a right to same sex marriage has patterned their movement on the Civil Rights Movement. The Women's Rights Movement borrowed their tactics from Doctor King. Even the children of illegal aliens have declared a right to equal "entitlements" asserting their intention to engage in mass protests and non-violent direct action. All have adopted the methods used by Doctor King, a great American social engineer. Fortunately none of them will have to face police dogs, high pressure fire hoses, or angry white mobs. They will not have to fill the jail cells with Black children looking for their rightful place in American society. All they have to do is adopt the catchy slogans of director Spike Lee in his groundbreaking movie entitled "Do The Right Thing".



Captain Judy Keene, the Academy's first female Commandant of Cadets, is moving into her campus office during a pivotal time in the Academy's 130-year history. On the eve of the 30th anniversary of women cadets first lining up for drills and attending classes with men, the academy is taking stock after the turmoil left by the first general court-martial of a cadet. Webster M. Smith, 23, of Houston, was convicted in June of extorting a female classmate for sexual favors.

The Class of 1980 included the first 14 women to graduate from the Academy. The changes they brought to the cadet culture, changes Captain Keene said she took for granted as a student only a year later, were significant for their ordinariness: a beautician in the campus barbershop who knew how to cut women's hair, and uniform trousers made for women.

The Class of 1966 included the first African American to graduate from the Academy. In the Class of 1968 there were two more. They were not able to bring about any changes in the cadet culture. Their cries for a barber who knew how to cut African American hair fell on deaf ears. It would be years before African American skin care products were offered for sale in the cadet store. After 1978 with its large number of Black cadets small changes began to appear. Again the African American struggle for dignity and self-respect was leading the way. The doors they opened were quickly filled by other social classes in America.

Black cadets arrived 14 years before the female cadets, but there has never been an African American Commandant of Cadets. Their arrival has never been commemorated by a symposium.

The arrival of Captain Keene is welcomed. It is progress of some sort. Women are making tremendous progress. One day the system will have to hold them equally responsible for engaging in consensual sex acts, not only for reporting them.

CAPE MAY: (3.17) Capt. Sandra Stosz will assume command of the U.S. Coast Guard Training Center here March 22.
Commanding Officer, Capt. Curtis B. Odom will retire after 30 years of service.
A change of command ceremony, a time-honored, sea-service tradition, will take place as Stosz relieves Odom March 22 at 11 a.m. in the center's gymnasium.
The ceremony will be attended by training center personnel, family and friends of the commanding officer and prospective commanding officer.
In 1978, Stosz entered the Coast Guard Academy. She was a member of its third class to include women, among 12 women in a class of about 300.
In 1990, Stosz became the first woman to command a cutter, Katmai Bay, in the Great Lakes. an ice-breaking tug.
She was featured in People magazine and National Geographic, and made an appearance on the television show "To Tell the Truth."
I n 2002, she became the third woman to command a medium-endurance cutter when she assumed command of Reliance with an 80-person crew. Her duties included the newly-added role of homeland security.
In 2004, Stosz assumed a post at the National War College in Washington, D.C. She earned her master’s degree in National Security Policy.
Stosz has a master of business administration degree and completed an executive fellowship in national security through the Massachusetts Institute of Technology

The Academy under Captain Doug Wisniewski has shown that it is willing to pay any price, bear any burden, meet any hardship, support any friend, oppose any foe, in order to ensure the survival and success of women at the Academy. The word has gone forth. The torch has been passed. A new generation has taken power at the Academy, but remnants of the old are languishing in the U. S. Navy Brig in Goose Creek, South Carolina. The last chapter has yet to be written in the Webster Smith saga.