In
between voyages, the Bartlett usually
moored in the basin of Port Everglades in Fort Lauderdale, Florida. During these layovers, oceanographic survey
equipment was installed and changed out,
technicians reported aboard and were discharged, fuel and provisions were
loaded, and repairs to machinery were made.
All routine operations.
Occasionally visitors came aboard, mostly in connection with the survey
equipment and mechanical repairs. On Thursday,
October 18, 1984, however, the Commodore of the Fleet came to visit the ship.
Nowadays
a Commodore is an unusual personage. In
the Navy, there were Commodores ranking above Captains and below Rear Admirals
until the late 1890s, when the position was abolished. In the Merchant Marine, a Commodore was the
senior Captain in the company. Mostly an
honorific, the rank and title of Commodore recognized the long years of
experience and extensive knowledge of ships and the sea held by the line’s
longest-serving Master. In some cases,
merchant Commodores had some administrative duties ashore; more typically,
however, this administrative work came under the jurisdiction of the Port
Captain. Most Commodores continued to go
to sea. When they retired and came
ashore, they often wrote their memoirs.
The
Commodores who reigned over our line in the 1980s were different. They were commissioned naval officers holding
the rank of Captain, not Commodore.
Also, they were not the senior shipmasters in the fleet; in fact, none
of them even held Merchant Marine licenses of any level, let alone as Masters. Simply put, they were administrators. They were not real seamen but office
personnel who sailed desks in the company offices in Bayonne, New Jersey. And these offices, contained in a windowless
building situated on the waterfront of New York Harbor, did not permit the
Commodores to even peek outside and see the shipping.
In
my eight years with the company, I think we had four or five Commodores in
succession. They never stayed long, but
arrived and departed with express train regularity. Until this one day aboard the Bartlett in Port Everglades, I never saw
any of these Commodores, although aboard all the ships we routinely received
communications from them. They remained
distant and ethereal figures who sent commendatory memos for work well done and
felicitous greetings at Christmastime.
Most
of the seamen preferred it this way, and for good reason. The Commodores and many other high-ranking
personnel were regarded not with reverence and respect but with suspicion and
disdain. Too many times aboard too many
ships big shots of various descriptions
came on board in various ports for very dubious purposes. They demanded lavish attention from busy
crews, and their presence on board interfered with the ships’ routines and
wasted much of the company’s time and money.
In short, they got in everyone’s way.
They had no useful work to do and they made nuisances of themselves. Consequently, the seamen came to regard
visiting big shots as nothing but trouble.
The more inquisitive-minded of the seamen wondered about the psychology
that drove these big shots to behave the way they did.
Impromptu
discussions in the chow hall or at the gangway sometimes focused on the
abnormal psychosis of the big shot.
There were many questions but few answers. Why does this guy act like this? What’s he trying to prove? Is he compensating for an overwhelming
inferiority complex? Is he an unwanted
second son trying to outshine his older brother? Is he an
ignorant person trying to sound more sophisticated than he really is? Is his demonstrated contempt for the crew an
act to conceal his own lack of self-esteem?
Whatever his problem is, we don’t need it here. He should go home and get counseling!
One
big shot and retiring Commodore especially rankled the crews of every ship in
the fleet with a farewell message which he sent on his departure. In this missive he discussed his upcoming
retirement, and went so far as to brag that he had taken the exams for and had
been given an original Master’s license
by the Coast Guard!! This meant that on
the basis of going to sea in the Navy, the Coast Guard had permitted him to
take the exams not for third mate or second mate or even chief mate, but to
jump right to the top. Whatever his
military credentials may or may not have been, he had not built a career of
sailing aboard civilian cargo ships.
This lack of experience in seaborne commerce, of which the Master’s
license stood as the crowning achievement, struck the Masters and mates in the
fleet as outrageous beyond belief, a slap in the face to all merchant seamen
everywhere! If this fellow could get a
Master’s license without ever having been a merchant seaman, let alone working
his way up through the licensing levels, then the Master’s license itself would
become nothing but a meaningless piece of paper, a mere decoration. But then, big shots always seemed to somehow
get everything they wanted.
It
was with the cynicism generated by negative experiences involving big shots
that the crew of the Bartlett
anticipated the arrival of the company’s first lady Commodore one bright and
sunny October morning.
About
9:00am Commodore Elizabeth Wylie drove onto the pier in a nondescript rental
car. She parked the vehicle in a legal
parking space, got out, and walked over to the ship and up the gangway. She arrived alone, without an entourage. She wore plain Navy khakis with only her rank
insignia on the collar. She did not wear
battle stars, campaign ribbons, or gold braid. The gangway watchman and I met her when she
stepped aboard. She greeted both of us cordially
and introduced herself simply as Elizabeth Wylie without adding any titles. She cheerfully showed me her company
identification when I asked for it. In
fact, she remarked that of the five ships that she had visited thus far, the Bartlett was the only one to require
identification, and she was happy to see this done. I next notified Captain Giaccardo that the
Commodore had arrived, He came along a
minute or so later, and the introductions continued. The discussion that followed took place in
normal conversational tones. There was no
shouting nor barking of orders nor unreasonable demands for lavish hospitality. Neither were there any displays of
self-importance, military pomposity, or personal aggrandizement. On the contrary, the occasion was noteworthy
for its simple civility. After previous
experiences aboard other ships, it seemed astonishingly benign.
After
a few minutes of light conversation at the head of the gangway, Captain Giaccardo and Commodore Wylie set out on a tour of the Bartlett. I returned to my own duties thinking that the
day would not be so bad after all.
And
it wasn’t. The Commodore spent the next
few hours touring the ship, meeting and talking with the crew, having lunch,
and discussing business with the Captain and Chief Engineer. I saw her again a few times, too. She impressed me as being very interested in
the ship and the oceanographic survey work that it did, and also as an
exceptionally pleasant person. After
spending most of the day on board, she wished us all well and returned ashore
as quietly as she had come aboard. After
her departure, a broadly smiling and very happy Captain Giaccardo told me more
about her visit.
He,
too, had not been looking forward to this state occasion. A young man in his early thirties, Captain
Giaccardo was serving his first stint as Master on the Bartlett, and quite naturally he did not want any trouble with big
shots visiting from the Bayonne headquarters.
Well, he didn’t get any. Captain
Giaccardo described Commodore Wylie in glowing terms. She was friendly and courteous and very
gracious. Obviously intelligent and well
educated, she asked many good questions about the ship and its survey voyages,
and then she listened attentively to the answers without interrupting or otherwise
demonstrating impatience. Somewhat
surprisingly, she admitted to never having gone to sea—this was before the Navy
became fully co-ed—and also to being new on the job as Commodore, having
started only two and a half weeks ago, at the beginning of the month. For these reasons, she stated her intention
of visiting as much of the fleet as she could and learning as much as possible
about all the ships and their operations.
She expressed a sincere admiration for the crews she had met thus far
and for the work they did. In this way,
she made an outstanding first impression as a gracious guest and industrious
administrator.
Everyone
on the ship who had met Commodore Wylie liked her and appreciated her polite
and professional demeanor, her interest in the ship and its crew, and her
demonstrated willingness to listen and learn.
While this behavior sounds like simple common courtesy, previous
experiences had unfortunately shown it to be more the exception than the rule
with visiting big shots. But this one
was different. In Shakespearean terms,
Commodore Wylie displayed neither “the insolence of office”[1]
nor “the proud man’s contumely.”[2] In shipboard terms, she did not act at all
like a big shot!
The
Bartlett remained in Port Everglades
for another week and then sailed on Thursday, October 25. She went on a three-weeks-long survey voyage
in the southwest Atlantic, just outside the Caribbean basin. I never saw Commodore Wylie again, but I did
hope that she would do well in her new position as Commodore of the Fleet. In retrospect, I see Commodore Wylie as
following the scriptural admonition, “Humble yourselves in the sight of the
Lord, and he will lift you up” (James 4:10).
She boarded the Bartlett
humbly and without fanfare as a new employee striving to learn the ropes, and
she returned ashore commanding the respect and admiration of the entire crew.
