MICHAEL KENNETH HEMP
mkhemp@thehistorycompany.com



Historic Research * Heritage Marketing * Consulting * Lectures * Special Events

 CANNERY ROW   •   BOMBARDIER'S LOUNGE (Returning Soon)  •   END OF LIES, The Nadjik Pheromone
                                                                                                                   Biochemical Lie Detection (Returning Soon)



(This is a timeline scroll site: newest posts and news appear at top of pages in chronological order of posting.



Updated on 2/24/2025



[PAST EVENT]

WESTERN FLYER NAVIGATIONAL ARTIFACTS
ARE WERE EXHIBITED FEBRUARY 11th, 2025, free to the public
by the City of Monterey in Pacific Biological Laboratories,
Ed Ricketts' Lab, Cannery Row, Monterey.

Followed by


WESTERN FLYER NAVIGATIONAL ARTIFACTS
ARE TO BE AUCTIONED ON FEBRUARY 13th, 2025.




The Auction will be conducted
by Historic Literary Estate Auctioneers
PBA Auctions in Berkeley, California,
starting at 11:00 AM and ending at 4:00 PM Pacific Standard Time
on Thursday, February 13th, 2025.

—Likely the last time these historic Steinbeck literary artifacts
may ever be seen in public again—

Request the special program for the combined Edward Ricketts Jr. Estate
and Dennis Fry Family Collection of Western Flyer Navigational Artifacts.

The special auction program specifically for the Steinbeck, Ricketts & the Western Flyer:
Ed Ricketts Jr. & Dennis Fry Collections

     

Click here for the Auction Program and to sign in to bid.


BE THE WINNER OF THIS EXTRAORDINARY
HISTORIC AND LITERARY COLLECTION






[PAST EVENT]

Western Flyer Artifacts Special Event

On Saturday, January 11, 2025,
THE CITY OF MONTEREY
 hosted:
• Free Public Ed Rickett's Lab Walk-through Tours
of Pacific Biological Laboratories, "Doc's Lab"
from l1:00 to 4:00 PM for an Exhibition of
Fry Collection of Western Flyer Navigational Artifacts
to be auctioned by PBA Auctions in Berkeley, CA
on Thursday, February 13th, 2025, at 11 A.M. Pacific Time
—Likely the last time these historic artifacts
may ever be seen in public again—
Made possible by the City of Monterey, PBA Galleries,
and The History Company.



Cannery Row's star site on the National Record of Historic Places
Pacific Biological Laboratories and Steinbeck's "Doc's Lab" haunt.




The Assembled Nautical Artifacts from the Western Flyer operated by
John Steinbeck, Ed Ricketts, Skipper Tony Berry, Engineer Tex Travis,
and deckhands Sparky Enea and Tiny Colletto on the Sea of Cortez.


The special auction program specifically for the Steinbeck, Ricketts & the Western Flyer:
Ed Ricketts Jr. & Dennis Fry Collections

VIEW THE AUCTION ITEMS

     

[past event]
• Register at the City of Monterey for a free webinar
panel discussion of "Return to the Sea of Cortez"
featuring Dr. Richard Astro, Dr. Katie Rodger,
Donald Kohrs, and Sherry Flumerfeld.

Panel Moderator: Christopher Dunlap
Your host: Michael Kenneth Hemp

This Monterey Peninsula public service is made possible by
• The City of Monterey Museums & Library
• PBA Auctions & Appraisers, Berkeley, CA
• The History Company, Gig Harbor, WA
Western Flyer Foundation, Moss Landing

A few scenes from the Ed Rickett's Lab tour:

  
 MK Hemp photos

Above left: Brian Edwards, Monterey Director of Library and Museums with the flying bridge wheel. Above Right: Devin Armstrong, grandson of Dennis & Vonnie Fry, assists the skipper in assembly of the artifacts exhibit stand. Below left: Michael Hemp and Western Flyer (Gemini) skipper Dennis Fry at the Western Flyer flying bridge brass wheel Below Right: The Western Flyer flying bridge brass wheel,  helm stand and boxed flying bridge compass in Ed Ricketts' Pacific Biological Laboratories Cannery Row 1/5/2025

    
                                                                                                                                                                                                                                MK Hemp
           
SO WHAT'S THE BIG DEAL?

WHAT IT IS ALL ABOUT:










NOTICE * 5th Edition is SOLD OUT
Please do not order...


CANNERY ROW • JOHN STEINBECK
• ED RICKETTS • WESTERN FLYER
• SEA OF CORTEZ
In facts and photos for that
perfect gift for someone you know.





Actual size 11 x 17.75 inches.


    Will return to availability on for Purchase on Square
as early as possible.
 





\


2009 From the Archives



ISBN: 978-954-089-1681-1




Click here for the 2009 link to Vimeo video of a live interview by Michael Hemp at Wave Street Studios (Cannery Row)
Featuring "Queen of Cannery Row" Kalisa Moore, Bulgarian Professors George Dechev, and Professor Alex Gochev,
after a guided tour of their delegation of Ed Ricketts' Pacific Biological Laboratories, Monterey, California.

With active links for more of the story, far below near the bottom of The History Company site scroll:



 
[More details by Dr. Gochev with photos at the active links for this story near the bottom of this site scroll]







The History Company is proud to announce another fine Independent Book Store now selling our
history of  John Steinbeck's Cannery Row and  its connections to the maritime Pacific Northwest:



                                                                        David and Jane Danielson

157 Winslow Way E. • Bainbridge Island • WA 98110
(206) 8423-5332 • jane@eagleharborbooks.com






Photos from the private Moss Landing party November 3,
and arrival of the Western Flyer at Monterey, November 4th, 2023
will be added soon.
(A full album soon, under construction)







FROM THE HISTORY COMPANY CANNERY ROW ARCHIVES

11/6/23
THE CANNERY ROW FOUNDATION
WESTERN FLYER
Newsletter 1994
(Designed, written and published by
1983 CRF Founder/Executive Director, Michael Hemp)

We've waited a long time...










The Western Flyer "Welcome Home" party
is 11 AM to 4 PM on Saturday November 4th, 2023,
on, Monterey, CA.








Finally to Moss Landing, California, after midnight
October 6th, 2023.








Once under way again, weather complicated plans.
The Western Flyer had to lay-over not far south
 at Brookings, Oregon, to await weather to clear.

                                                                                                                                MK Hemp photo



 



Western Flyer moored at Newport, Oregon, September 24, 2023,
by ©2023 Ben King / Out West Photography • Newport

(CLICK HERE for more information)






2023

Wednesday • October 11th, 2023 • From 4:00PM

Plan to attend another FREE Mason County Historical Society and Museum benefit
speaking engagement by MSHS&M lifetime member, author and historian,
Michael Kenneth Hemp returning to his familiar historical research turf on 
Washington State's Hood Canal—on Wednesday, October 11th, 2023.

Admission is free • Donations are appreciated

This return speaking engagement is again co-sponsored
by Union, Washington's renowned
Alderbrook Golf and Yacht Club
Wednesday, October 11th, 2023
From 4:00 PM
330 E. Country Club Drive E.
Union, WA 098592 • (360) 898-2560



In addition to more on-going original historical research results
about the Hood Canal of the 1930s and the emerging record of an intense
research presence of pioneering marine biologist Edward F. Ricketts,
the father of ecology, and his family during many spring and summers 
staying at the Gateway Inn (now Hoodsport's salmon hatchery)
there is more to exciting news connected to Ed Ricketts.

The 1937 Tacoma-built "Western Flyer" was made world-famous by
Ed Ricketts and his more famous friend John Steinbeck for their
1940 voyage of "science and leisure" to Mexico's Sea of Cortez to remove
Steinbeck from death threats by California's Associated Farmers
for his dust bowl exposé of their sins in "Grapes of Wrath".

After over 7 years of restoration at Port Townsend Shipwright's Co-op
and nearly another year at Snow & Company in Ballard (Seattle) for
installation of her hybrid diesel-electric propulsion, controls, electronics,
and ship's gear—on November 4th, Monterey & Cannery Row will
celebrate the return of the "Western Flyer" to Home Port Monterey.

You don't want to miss the most recent chapter in the saga of the
"Western Flyer" presented by (yours truly) the Cannery Row-Monterey
historian who, in 1984, announced the prospect of the return to
Monterey of the "Western Flyer"—the result of research by
colleague Bob Enea, Monterey's sardine fleet and Sicilian heritage.
Not the least of which is that Croatian skipper Tony Berry and
Steinbeck-famous deck-hand "Sparky" Enea were his uncles!

Please join me, the general public, and the members of both the Mason County
Historical Society and the Alderbrook Golf and Yacht Club for this
incredible story at 4Pm on Wednesday, November 11th.
Followed by a "Meet the Author" and book signing.

It's in here: (2022)




Admission to this speaking engagement is free • Donations appreciated.






Countdown to Western Flyer
Departure from Seattle to
home port Monterey...

Sign-up for the Western Flyer Foundation Newsletter
for up to date information and photography of
the last stages of the Western Flyer's eight-year
restoration at Port Townsend Shipwright's Co-op
and now at Snow & Company, Ballard (Seattle) for
hybrid-diesel propulsion and technical outfitting.

If you're around the Seattle area, look out for her on
sea trials begun in-and-around the Lake Washington area.
Be a Western Flyer Finder and e-mail us your photos
we can share on this website (with your photo credits)
for the Western Flyer world that this site has been
championing since the early 1980s!

We also want to share our recognition for a creative
new Western Flyer logo by  graphic designer Zina Oliver:




COME BACK SOON FOR MORE
HISTORY OF THE WESTERN FLYER






July 25, 2023

It's the 25th of July, 2023. It was on this date in 1930,
Ed Ricketts was photographed by his close friend
(and 1939 co-author of "Between Pacific Tides")
Jack Calvin. They had arrived at Port Townsend,
Washington, from British Columbia's Vancouver Island,
to be there specifically on this date—1000 miles from
Cannery Row—for the -3.42 low tide in this photo.
Carl Gray, Hood Canal tidal researcher, determined
this tide would not come again for 30 years!


Ed Ricketts, kneeling in winged kelp at Port Townsend, July 25, 1930.          Jack Calvin photo/Pat Hathaway Collection

Many of you reading this may know that this photo is at
Port Townsend, Washington, where the 1937 Tacoma-built
Western Flyer would spend 8 years in magnificent restoration
 by the Port Townsend Shipwright's Co-op. At this time
she is in Ballard (Seattle) undergoing the installation of
electronics and her hybrid-diesel propulsion!

Be ready for her impending return to Monterey;
to her new Home Port, with a life and detailed history
you should know as much as possible about—from where
the Western Flyer is authoritative history — as you
may see some of it deeper in this website. But the
only way you'll have the most complete history
anywhere of the Western Flyer is this 5th Edition of



Please scroll below slightly to order.




April 23, 2023
Are you ready for the
Return of the Western Flyer?

The restored Western Flyer is heading south soon
from Seattle to home port Monterey!

Cannery Row and Monterey have been
waiting since this Herald headline in 1984:


 Monterey historian Bob Enea was responsible for the search and discovery
of the re-named Western Flyer (to Gemini in 1970). This news story did not
include him in its composition.


GET READY FOR THE WESTERN FLYER DEPARTURE
from the maritime Pacific Northwest to home port Monterey


FROM THIS: The Gemini (Western Flyer) raised after 2nd sinking at Anacortes, Washington  June 24, 2013


                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                Art Kendall photo



TO THIS: Restoration completed at Port Townsend Shipwright's Co-op  June 29, 2022


                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                   MK Hemp photo



  Hybrid diesel-electric propulsion system installation under way at Snow & Company, Seattle  


                                                                                                                                       MK Hemp photo




The organized chaos of nearing completion...for  her maritime Pacific Northwest departure to Monterey





Western Flyer departure from Ballard (Seattle) Washington in a matter of weeks

Be ready: Get the Book!

Click here to purchase



Stand-by for our announcement of the departure and its (Unannounced yet) destinations
If you are not already part of our e-mail program e-mail your address for notification)







(Past Event)


On March 14th, 2023, the Western Flyer Foundation will present another program
to bring you up to date on the saga of the Western Flyer, plans for her future,
and an estimated date of her return to Monterey.

A Bit of Background
       



Happy Steinbeck's Birthday
(February 2, 1902 - December 20, 1968)

John Steinbeck's Birthday gift to you
is the approaching date of the arrival
at Monterey of the Western Flyer upon
return to her new home port of  Monterey.

Steinbeck and Ed Ricketts "Ed Head" fans:
Detailed news of the return of the Western  Flyer to
Monterey can be found at the Western Flyer Foundation
site along with a load of info and photos of the progress
of the restoration of one of the world's most famous boats.

www.westernflyer.org




 

 



The now world-famous Tacoma-built Western Flyer was chartered
in Monterey by John Steinbeck in 1940 for a scientific expedition
to Mexico's "Sea of Cortez" with his closest friend and mentor,
pioneering ecologist marine biologist Edward F. Ricketts.
It was also an escape from the backlash from Steinbeck's expose
of California's agricultural industry in "Grapes of Wrath."
The co-authored book from that journey became a heralded
anthem of ecological consciousness and the new holistic view
that humanity is interconnected to nature and its protection.

None of it could have been accomplished without a stout
Croatian-build Tacoma purse-seine fishing boat which has
emerged from an 8-year restoration at Washington state's
Port Townsend Shipwright's Co-op, and very soon from
the Seattle technical expertise of the Snow & Company
installation of a revolutionary hybrid propulsion system.

If you have not heard about any of this topic or have been
unaware of what a cultural, marine sciences, literary, and
historical accomplishment is about to happen at any time...

You need this authoritative one-of-a-kind book. Now:
 
by a historian-scribe and researcher connected to its identity,
historical, maritime, ecological, literary, and inter-cultural
 legacies since 1983. With credit to invaluable sources and
colleagues like Bob Enea of Salinas, California, on his uncles
 Croatian skipper Tony Berry and deckhand Sparky Enea; and
for his decades of dedication in locating the Western Flyer
...and assuring its survival.

ISBN: 978-0-941425-06-3   (5th Edition since 1986)

See special offer below!

 




The Western Flyer Foundation is preparing to return the
Western Flyer to its home port of Monterey this spring.
Click here to learn more and support the debut of one of
the most famous and certainly most celebrated boats
in the world.


November 9th, 2022 • Hopkins Marine Station •  Western Flyer update Reception and Program

	Western Flyer Foundation's John Gregg & Cannery Row Foundation's Michael Hemp                   photo by Anne-Marie Hemp

 { OFFER EXPIRED }


CLICK  HERE FOR






STEINBECK NOW REVIEW:









Weather Cancellation. To be Rescheduled.

"New Horizons: Steinbeck's Cannery Row in Pacific Northwest History"
An archival images PowerPoint by MICHAEL KENNETH HEMP presented by the
Puget Sound Maritime Historical Society
December 3rd, 2022, at the
Wagner Educational Center • Center for Wooden Boats
1010 Valley Street, Seattle WA 98109

Open Free to the public from 12:15


Information for luncheon prior the event at: www.pugetmaritime.org

or call: (206) 812-5464
 









The Western Flyer Foundation
at Hopkins Marine Station


Wednesday, November 9th, 2022
Stanford University Hopkins Marine Station

• Reception at Miller Library of Hopkins Marine Station
• Presentation of the status and planning for the 2023 Arrival
of the Western Flyer at Home Port of Monterey










Key Peninsula News
The Voice of the Key Peninsula
Vaughn, Washington
9/1/22
  Click here for the

NEWEST PRESS ON HISTORICAL RESEARCH BY MICHAEL KENNETH HEMP
ON ED RICKETTS & THE WESTERN FLYER



   




"New Horizons: Steinbeck's Cannery Row in Pacific Northwest History"
An archival images PowerPoint by MICHAEL KENNETH HEMP at the
68th Annual Pacific Northwest History Conference
September 29th to October1st, 2022, at Kennewick, Washington,
hosted by the Washington State Historical Society
in partnership with the Oregon Historical Society.

Presentation at 2:45 pm, Saturday, October 1, 2022
Columbia Center, Ballroom II/III
Kennewick, Washington

Click here for details.


2022 PACIFIC NORTHWEST HISTORY CONFERENCE SPONSORS



 








August 11, 2022

A Home-Style Monterey Podcast with everyone's Sicilian cousin
"Cousin Johnny Aliotti" about research bringing news
of the shared connections between Monterey
and the maritime Pacific Northwest.

"Buzzin' with Cousin"
Click Here








Re-naming and re-launching of the Western Flyer
(from Gemini back to Western Flyer)
June 29, 2022, Port Townsend, Washington.


                                                                                                                                     - Billy Wolf photo

Click here soon for more photos.
Michael Hemp photos of the re-naming and re-launching of the Western Flyer on
June 26th, 2022, at Port Townsend Shipwright's Co-op, Port Townsend, Washington.









The 5th Edition is here!





The new enlarged deluxe 5th Edition (since 1986) of
"CANNERY ROW, The History of John Steinbeck's
Old Ocean View Avenue and
Its Connections to the pacific Northwest"

This new enlarged edition provides additional original research about

•  Ed Ricketts and his maritime Pacific Northwest
marine biological research for his introduction of Ecology

•  The Pacific Northwest Croatian boat-building industry that enabled
Monterey's Sicilian sardine fleet to make it the Sardine Capital of the World"
•  John Steinbeck and Edward F. Ricketts and the illustrated Saga of the Western Flyer

ISBN: 978-0-941425-06-3    $34.95

• Signed by the author • Shipped free by USPS Media Mail

• Your purchase includes an authentic 1940s Cannery Row sardine label (a $10 value)


(smaller than actual size • label may vary by cannery)




 

A Bombardier's Lounge segment from the past. www.bombardierslounge.com is being reformatted and will soon to be re-posted as a srand-alone site.

The Junior Officers Revolt at SAC headquarters

73 years ago, 34 Junior Officers from the Strategic Air Command's Headquarters
in Omaha, Nebraska, the "best and brightest" Special Intelligence Officers of the
544th Aerospace Reconnaissance Wing, were assigned to the worst places anyone
with their far above Special Intel clearances should ever have ever been allowed
to be stationed: in South East Asia high-threat and wartime combat zones.

Here is the story as told in 2004 by former USAF Captain Michael Hemp
of The History Company on its site www.bombardierslounge.com
— to be back online soon after 2 years Covid absence:

“A DIFFERENT APOLLO 11 MOON LANDING STORY.” The Lunar Landing of Apollo 11 and the Junior Officers Revolt at SAC Headquarters. July 20, 1969… July 19, 1969. Omaha, Nebraska—Strategic Air Force Command Headquarters.  By order of SAC Commander-In-Chief, Gen. Bruce K. Holloway, 38 junior USAF Special Intelligence Officers are ordered to appear at a mandatory “Commander’s Call” in the second floor Command Staff briefing room of SAC HQ, Offutt Air Force Base, Omaha, Nebraska. As I recall it was to be on Sunday, July 20th, 1969. Apollo 11 landed on the moon, but that was not the big story. The orders required all 38 officers to assemble to account for their conduct in an embarrassing public relations bungle by the Air Force. One of the First Lieutenants at SAC’s elite and ultra-top secret 544th Reconnaissance Technical Wing, among the world’s top photo intelligence analysis units, inadvertently set off what became known in SAC command circles as the “Junior Officer’s Revolt.” Not exactly the Cain Mutiny, but it involved one of the very top Generals of the United States military. The state of Nebraska enjoyed a special relationship with SAC and its succession of “Cincs,” or commander-in-chiefs. Between 1968 and 1969, an unusually rapid succession of SAC commanders took place. General Joseph J. Nazzaro was replaced by an interim commander, Gen. Keith Compton, succeeded by Gen. Bruce K. Holloway of “Flying Tigers” fame. Part of this close military/community cooperation involved fundraising for AKSARBEN (Yep, Nebraska spelled backwards), the state’s “United Way or Community Chest.” USAF personnel were expected to support a huge, high-pressure donations campaign. To refuse to donate or virtually “tithe” through USAF payroll deductions, it was threatened, would reflect on your military service record. Officers were threatened with “derogs” (negative notations) on their OERs (Officers Effectiveness Ratings) if they did not participate—something that would effect their career advancement and promotions. A lot of minimally paid enlisted men and struggling career officers caved in and signed up. Some held out, mostly junior (lieutenant and captain) “Reserve Officers,” not generally regarded as career officer material and therefore somewhat indifferent to pressure on their military futures since almost all expected to return to civilian status at the end of their service agreements. July 16th Apollo 11 blasted off from Cape Canaveral on its epic lunar mission. Mission commander, Neil Armstrong, and lunar module pilot “Buzz” Aldrin were preparing to walk on the moon on July 20th. It seems that about the same time they were leaving their lunar footprints, the mandatory SAC commander’s call of 544th Special Reconnaissance Intel Officers to SAC Headquarters commenced. What on earth could cause all this fuss during days this historic? Junior Intel officers were not always cast in, or controlled by, the behavior protocols held dear by echelons of senior Air Force officers. A new breed, we enjoyed a certain intellectual and analytical independence beyond our rank, important to the critical thinking and analysis of everything from drone photography of the harbor at Haiphong, to SR-71 “Blackbird” multi-sensor photo and radar imagery from above 85,000 feet, to counting “Foxbat” aircraft on Soviet airfields and ICBM launch sites from space. Senior staff tolerated our certainties while chafing occasionally at our perceived impudence. But we were very good at what we did.     First Lt. Nicholas King was the culprit. He had the nerve to write a scathing personal letter to the Chairman of AKSARBEN after they gifted the new SAC Commander, Gen. Holloway, with $40,000.00 of donated AKSARBEN funds to be used at the discretion of the SAC Commander-in-Chief. The gift was spent to transform the entrance and upstairs command staff offices from stark Curtis E. LeMay marble and pale green, to alternating panels of ocher wall covering and dark hardwood paneling. Thick ocher carpeting was installed at the SAC HQ Main Entrance and its upstairs command staff offices, including the CINC’s. Lt. King’s letter suggested the next time AKSARBEN had $40,000 to throw away, rather than enable the beautification of the SAC entrance with charitable donation funds, they should consider helping with the Offutt AFB airmen’s barracks, many of them brick structures built before WWI that reached 120 degrees in summer (un-air conditioned, of course). Or, help the struggling facility for handicapped children of base personnel. And on…you get the idea. The letter was circulated though the super-secret subterranean labs of the HQ Intel photo interpreters, analysts, and briefing officers—almost all of whom were junior officers. Thirty seven other officers became signatory to Lt. King’s impudent pique, and off it went. I can’t honestly recall if Neil Armstrong had walked on the moon by the time we assembled for the commanders call. Phone calls between us concluded we were in for a real chewing, some had heard and were terrorized that the Commander-in-Chief, himself, was going to tear into us. What a small handful of us knew—being his Special Intel briefers on a daily basis—was that this heroic WWII air ace was particularly inarticulate with even his half dozen staff generals at our briefings and was highly unlikely to be the one “ripping into us.” General Holloway, as expected, was not present for the meeting. It turns out that chore fell to his DCI (Deputy Chief of Staff for Intelligence) Lt. Gen. Dacey, who took to the podium. Gen. Dacey was a good choice; many of us liked him from our duties of briefing him regularly—finding him dashing, smart, incisive, erudite, and tough. This day he was volcanic. General Dacey’s comments were angry, threatening, and for a while, effectively intimidating to most of the assembled young officers. He degraded us, railing for a while berating us for bringing dishonor on the Air Force by signing and sending the letter, breaking the chain of command, betraying our honor and duty as officers, and for conduct unbecoming an officer. It was at this time a hand shot up near the back of the room and Gen. Dacey paused to permit the question. It was not what he expected. The question asked “Why, when the Commander in Chief of the Strategic Air Command gets caught with his pants down, spending charity money donated by his troops, to decorate his offices and SAC HQ entrance, that WE are the ones guilty of conduct unbecoming an officer?” I swear I heard Dacey choke. A brief pandemonium erupted before order was restored. Several other unsolicited comments of the same nature erupted as nearly the entire group of us pushed back at the hypocrisy of this collective “spanking” for the mindless misdeeds of the Command. The intimidation had produced precisely the opposite effect it intended. Order was quickly restored but as hard as Gen. Dacey tried to continue his offensive, he was met by surreptitious shouts and comments from the assembled officers who would simply not accept his ugly, threatening comments. The assembly was clumsily broken off, with attending senior officers visibly flabbergasted and enraged at our insubordinate conduct. The Commanders Call abruptly ended and all of us were ordered back to duty. I hope this story reaches some of the other junior officers at this historic event. I would like to know their comments on this narrative, their feelings about it, and their personal consequences of having been part of what was thereafter called “The Junior Officers Revolt at SAC Headquarters.” It seems that within a week or so, 37 of the 38 officers that signed the AKSARBEN letter had orders to some of the worst assignments at which an Intel Officer could be stationed. Only my friend, Capt. Lionel Smith, was spared out of all of us. He was simply so absolutely indispensable to the SAC satellite surveillance program he avoided similar punitive reassignment. The effect of this retaliation against the best intelligence community in the Strategic Air Command, their “best and brightest,” was to instantly strip SAC’s intelligence capability to perform daily critical intelligence analysis and procedures. And beyond that simple, blind revenge against its insubordinate junior officers was the location of our punitive assignments. They were considered the worst places they could possibly send us—all in combat zones of Viet Nam or high threat areas of Thailand. The Great SAC sin was that NONE of us, with our security clearances (far above TOP SECRET Special Intel) and working intelligence knowledge of our strategic surveillance programs, plans, platforms, capabilities, and assessments should have ever been assigned out of the continental U.S. Any of us falling into the hands of the enemy could have constituted a catastrophic setback for US military intelligence capabilities. That, however, was not a consideration in SAC’s response to intimidate and punish us. My orders were to Task Force Alpha, Nakhon Phanom Royal Thai Air Force Base, and after weeks of training at Ft. Walton Beach, Florida, I was on my way to the cushiest of our collective punishments, know to all as “Naked Phanny" RTAFB. A 4000’ asphalt strip cut out of the Northeast Thai jungle, it was the home of the 56th Special Operations Wing. Too short for jets, and with a Search and Rescue and Air Commando mission, it was a throwback to Korea and WWII. The prop aircraft inventory consisted of retiring A-26 Intruders (twin engine attack bombers from WWII), C-19 (WWII) Flying Boxcar gunships, three squadrons of A-1 Skyraiders (Korean War), CH-3 Jolly Green helicopters for search and rescue and air commando operations, and 0-2 and OV-10 forward air control aircraft. Only seven miles from the Mekong it was a short hop across Laos to the Ho Chi Minh Trail. I was there as an analyst in the seismic and acoustic sensor network that monitored and targeted troop and truck traffic shuttling war supplies through Laos to South Vietnam on the dirt road network of “the trail.” It was the best of the worst duty and conditions but hard to complain about when grunts were sent from South Viet Nam to NKP for R&R. Capt. Nick King, on the other hand, had been sent to Phan Rang, South Viet Nam—a place called the armpit of Viet Nam and a really awful assignment. Reports reached us at NKP that he responded as we might have expected, with a peace symbol emblazoned on his bunker helmet; Nick also refused to salute the base commander and was reported to have responded, “What are they going to do to me? Send me to Phan Rang?” Years later, long after our military exploits, I heard he’d become an Assistant District Attorney in Louisville, Kentucky. And then a Tennessee Supreme Court Judge. A closing comment on the Junior Officers Revolt. It wasn’t just the Junior Officers that were ultimately upset with the SAC command. A look at any photograph of SAC Headquarters shows a huge building with a central entrance opposite the walkway, easily identified with an ICBM missile motif, from the Officers Club to the main entrance. Well, it seems that when foul weather set in—a certainty in Omaha—the new ochre yellow carpets at the SAC HQ main entrance took to soiling heavily from the wet and slushy foot traffic from the Officers Club and main entrance arrivals. What happened next almost set off the “Senior Officers Revolt at SAC HQ.” Full “bird” Colonels without sufficient rank and clout, plus hordes of Lt. Colonels and      Majors accustomed to using the direct access to the Officer's Club or their offices in the HQ Building were barred from using the main entrance! They were required to walk the considerable distance (in freezing sleet and snow) to the far left or right wing entrances at each far end of SAC HQ. Indignant is not a strong enough reaction, though insubordination on the order of the Junior Officers Revolt at SAC Headquarters was not among their options. Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin left their iconic footprints from Apollo 11 on the surface of the moon on the weekend of July 20th, 1969. And now, as a small footnote to history, is the true (if unknown) story of that same date. The Junior Officers revolt at SAC Headquarters. Michael K. Hemp (Capt. Monkey Hotel, NKP 1969-1970) More detail, photos, and information at www.BombardiersLounge.com Strategic Air Command Headquarters Building from the Offutt AFB Officers Club.

VLADIMIR PUTIN IS A WAR CRIMINAL
Along with those in America who politically support him
 and his enablers in our media and politics.





Donate:

WORLD CENTRAL KITCHEN (Chef Jose Andres)  https://wck.org

and

DOCTORS WITHOUT BORDERS

among many deserving supporters of Ukraine.












From the Archives

A special Black Sea treat on a much lighter note FROM THE HISTORY COMPANY ARCHIVE:
A 2009 video interview at Wave Street Studios, Cannery Row, Monterey, moderated by Michael Hemp,
about a Bulgarian version of Ed Ricketts' Lab ("Eastern Biophysical")
on the shores of the Black Sea in 1970–before the fall of the Iron Curtain.

Full story details near the bottom of the website scroll:


"THE STORIES ARE ALWAYS BETTER"
A Bulgarian Memoir by Dr. Alex Gochev








NEW RESEARCH FROM THE STATE OF WASHINGTON ARCHIVES
Olympia, Washington
Click Here for


by
Cannery Row's historian
MICHAEL KENNETH HEMP

Western Flyer Update:


                                                                                             
                                                                                                                                                     Chris Chase Western/Flyer Foundation photo

The deck house is back on the Western Flyer. Click here to see it
being installed on December 4th, 2021, at the
Port Townsend Shipwright's Co-op.

    A LOOK BACK: