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Jack Bailey
© 2003-2011 by Author
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Col./Chaplain Wm. Devanney took our chapel quartet to Sinop one week-end. We sang at protestant chapel service; then, did an hour show that afternoon. When we got ready to fly back to Ankara in the Otter on Monday, we were grounded for a week due to an attempted military coup (I think it was the Army vs the Air Force, as I remember).
So, we had to stay in Sinop and take pictures, play tourist and sail around the edge of the Black Sea in a battered sail boat - and the Turkish coast-guard had to come rescue us landlubbers at sundown, as we were headed out to sea! We didn't know a damn thing about sailing that rented or borrowed boat. A storm was blowing up, it was getting dark, and we were bailing water out of that lug of a boat with our SHOES! We just kept getting further and further away from land. What a hair-raising experience that was. The Turks came out to get us, threw us a line, and towed us back to port. Three of us. We were wet, tired, hungry, and scared! Our appreciation for Turks skyrocketed that day.
Our many Turkish adventures changed our lives forever.
(The following is from an email from Jack on 14 Aug 2013, in which he asked to have his email address updated. Thought his comments in that email should be added here.)
I left Manzaralı with my Army discharge in my pocket [age 25 in 1963]. ..visited Athens; Beiruit; Amman, Jordan; Israel; Cypress; ...then back to Ankara; then off to Europe. Spent several months traveling before the trip back to USA on a troop ship, [as a civilian], the USS General Walker. Arrived NYC with the total sum of $15 in my pocket and hitch-hiked from NYC to Lawton, OK, where my parents lived.
Teaching conversational English at Turk-American Association, Ankara, was one of the highlights of my 2 years at Manzaralı Station. The post commander put me on permanent midnight trick so I could accept the teaching job.
Just turned 76. Still kicking!
All the best to all you ASA vets!
Afton D. Jack Bailey, Paris, TX
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