Re: [tlug] Re: [CoLoCo] RESPECT MICROSOFT

[CL <az.4tlug@example.com>]

burlingk@example.com wrote:

> Yes, I know that I am avoiding large chunks of the
> entire story.  Josh was as well.  :P  However, if you
> think that people get agitated when I talk about Microsoft...
>
> It is just better for a southern boy to hold his tongue
> on certain topics, in certain forums, because there is no
> way they are going to say things in the right order to keep
> from pissing off at least half of those present. *grins*

Even more completely off topic, but something that fits here is a 
project I have been involved in for a number of years which has finally 
found a home up the road from Ken.  In about 1994, I stumbled across the 
grave of a number of crew members of the USS Oneida which was cut in 
half by an all-steel British vessel that failed to give the right of way 
and sank just off Futtsu-misaki (present day Futtsu-shi, Chiba-ken) on 
the night of 24 January 1870 (Meiji 2).  Only 54 sailors, under the 
command of the ship's surgeon survived by rowing the ship's one 
remaining rowboat all the way back to Yokohama.  The officers are buried 
at Gaijin-bochi but the crew's remains were scattered around several 
temples.  The grave site I found is in the forecourt of Ikegami Honmonji.

The USS Oneida was an all wood, screw-powered vessel (definitely made by 
the lowest bidder), completed in 1862.  It became famous in the 
Mississippi and Gulf campaigns for being an ironclad killer and the ship 
that captured the ironclad CSS Tennessee at the Battle of Mobile Bay 
("Damn the torpedoes, full speed ahead!").  Her captain was second in 
command to David Farragut during this time.  Oneida sailors and marines 
won more Congressional Medals of Honor in battle than any other ship in 
the history of the US Navy.  Recommissioned in 1868, the Oneida, along 
with the USS Cumberland were the first two ships of the Asiatic 
Squadron, which eventually became the Seventh Fleet.

I've been trying for a number of years to get the grave site recognized 
as a military grave and to have it tended regularly.  The crew of the 
missile frigate USS Mobile Bay decided to undertake care of the grave 
only to be called to the Persian Gulf the week after they started. 
Finally, I convinced a couple of USN Reserve Officers who work at 
Yokosuka and lived in my neighborhood to come and see the site.  They 
got me on base (the kind of place I swore I'd never set foot again after 
I punched out) and in to see the Chaplains at Chapel of Hope.  It turned 
out that Fleet Chaplain Freiberg was another graduate of a high school 
in the Lake Conference of Minneapolis, like me.  Then we found that the 
Fleet CPO was as well.

With that as a basis, I was able to hand off the memorial project to the 
Fleet, where it was endorsed by the Commander and is not an official 
base project.  Over US$50,000 has been raised for the construction of a 
memorial to the Oneida and permission has been received for the 
interment of the ashes of the ship's crew from the other graves around 
Kanto.  A dedication ceremony should be held next spring.

Google for additional information, including information on where you 
can send your tax deductible contribution.

--
CL