Navy Yarns

Early in the 1950s, Commander Worth Scanland was taking a submarine division west across the Marianas Trench and thought it would be a great idea if all hands had a swim in the deepest spot of the oceans. After hoisting signals to stop and for swimming call, he led the way by stripping off shirt and shorts and doing a graceful swan dive off the bridge of his flagship, the USS Florikan (ASR-9). Worth said later that skinny dipping in over 35,000 feet of water with no land in sight was a truly spooky, but enjoyable, experience. Noting the USS Catfish (SS-339) only a few hundred yards off, he swam leisurely toward her. Suddenly there was a scurrying on her deck, and swimming ceased in the immediate vicinity. As he reached the sub’s side, a line was thrown to him and he scrambled aboard—as naked as the day he was born. He was greeted by four side- boys at the salute, the chief of the boat piping the side, and the skipper extending a “welcome aboard, commodore”—every one of them as naked as he.