1954–55 Some Notes on Our Stay in the Belgian Congo, 1954–1955 The following notes are written for our children Tom and Liz, and we hope that they may also be of interest to our grandchildren. Both of our kids were old enough to remember the events of our stay in the Congo, but we suspect that they may not remember dates or time-sequences. We hope that they will remember Bukavu and Kivu Province with the same fond memories that we have. Once Zaïre became an independent nation, almost all of the place names in French were changed to names in … Continue reading BUKAVU

I got out of the Navy in June 1946 and went to Jeanne’s home (the “Steffins House”) in Carmel while job-hunting. A 2-week trip to LA, visiting oil companies produced nothing at all but I did get a job with California’s Dep’t of Highways (now “Cal-Trans”) as a junior engineer working on a remodeling of Fremont Ave. in Seaside and Monterey. It paid rather well and I took (and passed) a state examination that gave me the title of “Junior Highway Engineer” and I came in no. 33 out of some 300 taking the exam. I was not then an … Continue reading AFTER THE WAR — MONTEREY-LINDSAY-FRESNO

Operation Olympic More on the Typhoon of Jan. 1946 We should not have been caught in it at all. Something went wrong with the Navy’s weather forecasting system, and we had a couple of days of great misery. Six LSTs in 2 columns of 3; madly pitching, rolling and yawing; almost impossible to maintain station. To avoid damage, gyrocompasses were turned off and secure — only one ship at a time kept its gyro operational and the other LSTs tried to keep station on it. On the LST-569, our steel mast was whipping around so powerfully that we feared it … Continue reading U.S. NAVY — SUPPLEMENTARY MATERIALS

Note to the reader: It appeared to me that my grandfather, John Logan, wrote part of this as a diary followed by a narrative. To highlight his narrative, I have put it in block quotes. If the readers have any comments please share. Now on to the story! Sean Logan On 29 May 1944, I was sworn in as Apprentice Seaman #8884894 in San Francisco, along with a couple of hundred other guys. We were put on a train for an overnight trip to the U.S. Naval Training Center in San Diego where we were about to begin the operation … Continue reading THE NAVAL CAREER OF LIEUTENANT JOHN A. LOGAN, 1944–1959

After getting out of Cal, I could not find work as a geologist and took a lousy job as a surveyor’s assistant with the Southern Pacific Railroad, making $135 a month. Jeanne and I moved into a cruddy apartment in the extreme south of Berkeley on Grove St. next to the city limit of Oakland. Being quite dissatisfied with that job and after a few months with S’n Pacific, I was able to get another job at Richmond Shipyard no. 1, an enterprise of Henry Kaiser, that was building “Liberty cargo ships” for Great Britain, the latter country being at … Continue reading BERKELEY, RICHMOND AND ON TO THE NAVY

The items listed below may be important to our Village’s history, but I am not aware that they have been researched or properly described. 1. Sculptor/painter/illustrator/writer Jo Mora was one of Carmel’s artistic assets. When the Carmel Dairy opened in what is now the Mediterranean Market at Mission and Ocean, Mora had painted a mural around the inside of the soda-fountain-cum-restaurant. I suspect that it may still be there, covered by more recent paint. If so, a treasure would be exposed during the mural’s restoration. 2. All old-time Carmelites remember Louis Slevin and know that he was a noted photographer. … Continue reading A TEEN-AGER IN CARMEL IN THE 1930s: Recommendations for Historical Research, Carmel-by-the-Sea

Memories written a half-century or more later John Logan What follows is a draft. The first 20 pages were written during the period 1991–1995 and this reprint was made in 2002. Many revisions (and even some deletions) are needed, and I may do that job someday. It should be evident that a number of people named in this draft are no longer with us and many of the identified stores or buildings have been replaced. I do not plan to make revisions or deletions for those listings. For openers I am making these notes in early 1991 and apologize for … Continue reading A TEEN-AGER IN CARMEL IN THE 1930s