FBYC History....

Jere Dennison

Nautical Memoirs

As Historian for several years, I have often heard riveting stories of members’ past sailing and sea-going experiences. In spite of encouraging, cajoling, pleading, begging, and even threatening, I have been unable to solicit written submissions for this history column from these very same members. Such stories can enrich our FBYC experience and deserve an opportunity to be shared with the membership at large. (And a word of warning - if never recorded, these memories will almost certainly be lost to posterity.)

So recently I was pleasantly surprised to receive the nautical memoirs of FBYC Life Member, Club Chaplain, and nonagenarian Bill Egelhoff. It is obvious from his flawless prose that Bill’s rhetorical skills have been honed over many years composing inspired sermons. His story follows for all of us to enjoy. And by the way, for those of you still searching for the elusive fountain of youth, Bill celebrated his 90th birthday last February, 2007 on the slopes of Massanutten!

A word of counsel to all you would-be yarn spinners out there: there is no need to wait until you become a nonagenarian to share your maritime memories. I welcome material now, from young and old, and stand ready to assist in anyway possible to translate your literary dreams into reality! (Be advised that, if necessary, names may be changed to protect the innocent.)

I’'m Pisces

By
Reverend Bill Egelhoff

Sometimes I wonder if in my former life I was a fish. So much of my life over the past 90 years seems to have revolved around water. Maybe it began with my baptism, though I don’t remember that.

What I do remember as a nine year-old was learning to swim at Kamp Kaaterskill in Vermont. It was on Barber’s Pond where blood suckers patrolled the shore. The sooner we learned to swim, the sooner we could swim away from the blood suckers. We all learned quickly so we could navigate the deeper water.

My ability to swim prompted Dad to teach my brother and me to sail. So in 1930 we had our first sail boat, a Ricelake sailing canoe which we learned to sail on Lake Erie outside Buffalo. If nothing else we learned how to capsize a canoe.

Other than ferry boat rides each summer from Buffalo over to Crystal Beach, a wonderful amusement park across Lake Erie in Canada, my next sail occurred in 1927 on my parents’ 15th wedding anniversary. To celebrate they took brother Bob and me for a repeat of their honeymoon. From Buffalo we took a sleeper to Milwaukee to visit Dad’s extended family there, then on to New Orleans, staying in the elegant Maison Blanc hotel. After a few days’ exploration we boarded a ship bound for New York City. It was January and the Gulf of Mexico was not calm. So this was my first and only taste of sea sickness. But it was worth it – I couldn’t believe how big the Atlantic Ocean was, particularly for an 8 year-old.

The summer of 1936 I really ‘went to sea’ with a job as third steward on the Juanita, a passenger ship plying the Great Lakes from Buffalo to Duluth and return. It was an 8 day cruise, stopping along the way at such places as Sault Sainte Marie, the Sault Locks, connecting Lakes Superior and Huron, as well as a stop at scenic Mackinaw Island, where no cars were allowed. As third steward I proudly wore a uniform and officer’s cap. My job was to assign dining room seats for the passengers and serve as the magician’s assistant. As such I had my head chopped off in the guillotine. It was great fun and I was paid $50 a month, a lot of money back then!

Three years later after our junior year at Williams College another friend and I boarded the British freighter, Cairnmona in Montreal for a summer of biking through England and Europe on the eve of World War II. Other than dodging icebergs in the North Atlantic the crossing was routine and uneventful, as was the food in the officers’ mess. There was no question, biking through Germany, that the Nazi Wehrmacht was prepared. It seemed that we were always just one step ahead of their troops. One day, we biked along a prison wall in Dachau, only to learn later that we’d passed the notorious concentration camp.

September 2nd we boarded another British freighter, Cairnross, in Leith, outside Edinburgh, heading home. The next day the ship’s wireless operator called us twelve passengers to meet with the officers to hear Prime Minister Chamberlain declare war on Germany. With the British National anthem ended, the Captain informed us we were at war and under his command. His first order was for us all to join him with a drink. It was about the last thing I wanted at that point.

The wireless operator further informed us that a German U-boat had torpedoed the British passenger liner Athenia 80 miles to the south. As if that wasn’t enough, the Captain added that if the U-boat headed due north it would cross our bow at midnight. Naturally we stayed up most of that night! From that point on we zigzagged across the North Atlantic all the way to Montreal without an incident. Three months later both of those freighters were resting on the bottom of the ocean.

WWII found me in the Navy at NAS Quonset Point, R.I., where I sailed Lightnings over at the Naval Base in Newport. My big-time sailing, however, was as air ordinance officer aboard the newly commissioned aircraft carrier Midway in the North Atlantic near the end of the war.

 Peacetime brought sailing Penguins in Hampton Roads at the Norfolk Yacht Club with Joe Kelly, one of FBYC’s earliest members. With the early ‘80s, Dot and I proudly joined Fishing Bay Yacht Club and soon I was serving as Club Chaplain. Our first daysailor as members was a beautiful Hampton One, #138, one of Mr. Serio’s originals. Before long we were proud owners of C’est La Vie, an Aquarius 23, allowing us easy beaching up and down the Piankatank. From the Aquarius we soon moved on to our O’Day 28, Liebchen, for many memorable cruises on Chesapeake Bay. Highlights were sailing over to Onancock where my Episcopal ministry began at Holy Trinity Church.

The late ‘70s opened up another “sailing chaplaincy,” serving as chaplain on cruise ships. In the past 30 years Dot and I have enjoyed over 35 cruises, ranging from a week to over several months. We’ve sailed the Caribbean, the Pacific, to Alaska, the Pacific, the Atlantic, the Mediterranean, the Black Sea, the Baltic, the Artic, Round the Horn, and to French Polynesia, and too many ports to mention. Needless to say, we never get tired of being on the water. It’s good I’m a Pisces and that Dot loves the water too.