America in WWII - (Page 22) A pass it through the Panama Canal? There was one problem: the canal locks are 110 feet wide; the dry dock was 124 feet wide. Enter A.E. “Jack” Graham, a brilliant civilian engineer whose work of salvage at Pearl Harbor had earned him the Medal for Merit, presented personally by President Franklin Roosevelt. Graham’s solution: WAR STORIES Getting the dry dock onto its side was an engineering feat. Here, the tilting begins. tilt the dock on its side, tow it through the canal, and in the Pacific, put it back as it had been. After welding on stabilization pontoons, the massive structure was tilted and declared ready. Two large tugs were assigned to make the passage. One was the ATA-183, skippered by my father, Lieutenant Richard S. Lowry, Sr., USNR. The story of this tug goes back to the steaming marshes of the Sabine River at Orange, Texas. Lieutenant Lowry had just successfully passed the anti-submarine warfare course at Miami, Florida. His new order: take command of a large oceangoing salvage tug under construction at Orange. The complex work of pulling ships off reefs and towing ships whose dead engines rendered them helpless in the huge waves of a hurricane was quite a different specialty from tracking German submarines. My father suggested that perhaps the navy had made a mistake. No mistake—be on your way to Texas. My father had been promised an experienced crew, but on the first trip down the Sabine River, a sailor asked about the objects going north in the river. The objects were navigator markers, and their wakes were generated by the river’s flow—something any seaman should have known. After intensive work-ups in the waters off 22 AMERICA IN WWII OCTOBER 2007 Galveston, and with the help of a bosun who actually knew something about towing, ATA-183 was pronounced fit for duty. Her initial assignments were completed successfully. Then came the dry dock order. Lowry suggested to his superiors that accidentally jamming this huge object in the only convenient link between the Atlantic and the Pacific would not only impair the war effort, but would be a disaster for him personally. He was assured of their complete confidence in him and his crew. Fortunately, there was no disaster. The dry dock sailed through the Gatun locks, Gatun Lake, and the Miraflores locks, emerged into the Pacific and was on its way. No medal. The two tugs and their crews had done their duty and returned to less dramatic work. Fifty years later, I leaned on the rail of a cruise ship taking the same route and smiled with quiet filial pride. Thomas P. Lowry, Woodbridge, Virginia but I suppose amongst these fighters were P38s, Corsairs, and perhaps Thunderbolts. The busy St. Clair River did have its youthful priorities that first summer: swimming, rafting, and boating. But also of interest was the seemingly never-ending parade of vessels. Every once in a while, a newly built warship would be in the mix, COURTESY OF TOM LOWRY A BOY’S VIEW OF THE WAR FROM CANADA UMMER OF ’42 was a 1971 movie about adolescent love after the USA entered the Second World War. For me, the summer of 1942 was the beginning of a love affair of another type: the first year of cottage living near the St. Clair River in Canada, opposite Michigan. The busy waterway joins Lakes Huron and St. Clair near Port Lambton, Ontario, where our cabin was located, about 40 miles northeast of Detroit (as the crow flies). As an impressionable six-year-old, I was entranced by the many sights and sounds of war. Selfridge Air Base near Mt. Clemens, Michigan, provided much of the entertainment. On a daily basis that summer, overhead were staged what we kids called “dog fights.” US fighter pilots training for the real thing would dip and dive, chase and be chased, honing their skills for the time their gunsights would be lining up Zeros or Messerschmitts. The sounds were enthralling. I wasn’t into airplane identification at the time, S The coal-fired side-wheeler Seeandbee (above) sailed between Cleveland and Buffalo (brochure, left inset). In 1942, she became the carrier USS Wolverine, seen here (right inset) with a British Martlett trainer on deck. heading downriver and on to the war front. These gray-hulled ships, complete with deck guns, drew special interest amongst the younger set. Late that August of 1942, word circulated that a special warship was due to pass MANN HISTO RICAL FILES
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