USNA Class of ’78

The only space-related story from my youth came from my folks. We lived in Caracas, Venezuela, when I was 4 years old (Pop was a chemical engineer for Humble/Esso/Exxon and had many overseas assignments).  Whenever we were near the airport, I’d point at the jets and scream.

Two-two. Two-two.

(Not really sure where THAT came from.)

Fast forward to the spring of 1975, my Plebe Year at the U.S. Naval Academy (class of ’78), my company officer, Captain Robert Hodory, promised to get me set up for a year at the U.S. Air Force Academy as a Youngster.  I was 21st in my class at the time.

Later that spring, he canceled the trip after I got a Class A offense for going with my roommate and his parents to a restaurant outside the 7-mile limit during Parents’ Weekend without permission. (Like, who was driving? How the F could we know we were past 7 miles?  Sir.)

I resigned the next summer. Got seasick on a ship; airsick in a fighter jet; motion sickness and claustrophobia in a submarine; and after what Captain Hodory did to us, I sure the hell wasn’t going to join the Marines.  (A few years later, down and out of luck, I enlisted in the Army and managed to get sent to White Sands Missile Range.)

I had a meeting with the Superintendent before leaving.  He offered to send me to Cape Kennedy in Florida for the rest of the summer.  My father had just had a heart attack, though, and I was anxious to get home, so I beat feet. I had to call my US Congressman, John Rarick, to get out of there.  (The Super just wanted to keep me there until classes started in the fall; if I left then, I’d have to serve out my time enlisted.)

I only mention Annapolis because of my academic transcript.  Observe that after just 2 years at the Academy (plus one year before that at LSU in Baton Rouge, my hometown), I had 124 credit hours.

My graduate advisor and the President of the University of Texas, when I was expelled from grad school in 2001, both said I was a PhD student and had started grad school with a Master’s Degree.  Never bothered to see that those 124 hours at Annapolis – typically more than enough for a Bachelor’s Degree – were just, well, 124 credit hours. No degree.