Mister Rogers' (and Snoopy's) Neighborhood

 In 1968-1971 I was assigned to the USS ROGERS (DD876) as Operations Officer and Senior Watch Officer. Our home port was San Diego, and we were seldom at home. We made 2 deployments to Viet Nam during the height of the war, and when we were back at San Diego we were usually at sea training for more war. Our youngest daughter Kassi was born in 1970 and her birth was very hard on Donna. Shortly after Kassi’s birth I was at sea again, heading for the Tonkin Gulf and leaving Donna with our 3 girls. Keri, our oldest, could have been a help with Kassi except that she had a broken arm from a playground accident. 

This must have been the hardest part of our marriage.The ROGERS was a WWII destroyer, named for the three Rogers brothers who were killed in action on the USS NEW ORLEANS at the battle of Tassafaronga north of Guadalcanal in 1942. ROGERS was commissioned in 1945 and in the early 1960s was upgraded with more modern electronics and support for helicopter operations. Along with 5 inch guns, 40mm anti-aircraft guns, and torpedoes she was equipped with DASH, which meant Drone Antisubmarine Helicopter. The DASH helicopter was flown just like the toy drones that are around today; it was strictly line-of-sight, so the sailor at the controls was on a platform on the mast. The idea was for the helicopter to drop a torpedo close to a submarine who was several miles away. It seemed like a good idea but our sonars weren’t good enough to find submarines at any great distance, so the DASH mission fizzled out.So a new mission in Viet Nam was found for DASH. We gave our helicopter the name Snoopy, and equipped it with TV infra-red detectors. The idea was to fly Snoopy over land to find the enemy, usually by detecting fires or heavy equipment operating. Several destroyers had Snoopys but I don’t think any of them had much success. The ROGERS had the last operational Snoopy. The very last mission we flew was at night and when Snoopy landed on board we found a bullet hole in one rotor blade. We gave Snoopy a purple heart and left her in Pearl Harbor on her way home.

Young men at war develop a sense of humor which would not seem funny to civilians, but which helps sailors and soldiers to keep their sanity. War is crazy, nasty, and boring, so a dark sense of humor is a defense.We had two ways to play on the Rogers’ name. Although it was entirely against all rules, we had a black flag with a skull and crossed bones which we flew whenever we had a chance. Of course this is the Jolly Rogers which has been flown by pirates from BlueBeard to the PIrates of the Caribbean. The other misuse of Mister Rogers’ name was when we were firing our 5 inch/38 caliber guns. These guns were small compared to those on a battleship, but each projectile weighed about 55 pounds and could hit a target more than 10 miles away. We often provided firepower for troops ashore. We typically stayed about 3 miles from shore and then could hit targets up to about 7 miles inland. We almost never saw what we shot at, and depended on the spotters ashore. Our communications technicians would play on all ROGERS’ loudspeakers “It’s a beautiful day in the neighborhood…won’t you be my target?” BOOM! I hope the real Mister Rogers never knew what we did to his theme song.

   In January 1969 ROGERS was all over the news, and that’s another story.

P.S. All caps ROGERS refers to the ship; Rogers refers to the Rogers boys or to Mr Rogers. [11 Feb 2023]