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Text Box: Another Navy Coat Story
By John Worman
I enjoyed Alfred Berg’s Peacoat story in the last issue.  Again, it reminds me of another story. Do you remember the foul weather coats?  They were a light tan coat with a fleece lining that was pretty heavy and WARM!  
I wanted one of those coats, but I didn’t get much enthusiasm when I asked about getting myself one.  “The boiler room seldom gets below 90º so why would you want one” I was asked.
I couldn’t be real truthful as I wanted to steal one because I had a motorcycle on the beach.  What a good riding coat it could be.
Finally I got one.  I think Charlie Walkinshaw must have found it while cleaning the bilges he described in the last issue. Nobody wanted that thing (except me).  I did get it off the ship and I wore it for the rest of my enlistment when I rode the bike.  
I took it home to New Mexico and wore it every winter.  I had a job at White Sands Missile Range as a computer operator, and the coat went there too.  Most of the people I worked with thought it had so many layers of scum that it was alive and swore they saw it move on occasion.  Finally I suppose some misguided soul mistook it for rubbish and I never saw it again.  Sigh, what a good coat those things were.
 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 


 




 

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