RVAH-13

Comment

Comment by Lawrence (Ski) Grumboski on October 5, 2019 at 6:03pm

If anyone has any stories or pictures of CDR Charles L. Putnam please send them to me at sus4ever@gmail.com. I will get them to his granddaughter. The CDR was shot down on 9 March 1967 and she don't have a memory of him. Here is a copy of the message I received from her.

HI! This is random but I came across a video you shared a couple years ago to what appears to be a RVAH Navy page and it seems you served with my Grandfather, Charles Lancaster Putnam!!!

It is always amazing when I find little snippets of him being as I never got the chance to know him or hear too many stories as his own children were young when he was killed and lost their mother less than a year later!

I was very young when his remains were recovered/identified but escorted him from Hawaii to DC for burial with my parents.

Thank you for remembering him and I have been able to forward that link to his children as well, I know the will enjoy seeing the memory just as much!

Comment by Carl (Bub) Wilkins on March 13, 2019 at 6:50am

Ski, I too worked the crash site, picking up pieces of the aircraft where ever we found them.  I remember seeing where an ejection seat had hit the roof of one of the houses.  I had only been in RVAH-13 since November and ultimately stood watch over all the recovered pieces on New Year Eve along with a guy named Todd from Washington state.  I was part of the line crew.

Comment by Ron Saylor on March 11, 2019 at 1:15pm

Mike ! the moving deck of the Indy was always a site to see.

Comment by Lawrence (Ski) Grumboski on March 11, 2019 at 1:13pm

Ron, LtCdr Stokes was a Mustang. He was an enlisted BN before they made the BN an officer position. 

Comment by Ron Saylor on March 11, 2019 at 1:10pm

I remember Stokes talking to some of the "boots" about the difference he had seen from ASB-1 and 7 at Whidby Island to being told "no vidioo games yet with ASB-12.  I was realy in RVAH-3 TAD to 13 at that time with the Bace Carts.  My brother was in the electric shop.   Lt Quean was the Personel Officer and much later he was the CO on my next time with 13.  I spent over 10 years TAD from squadrons to AIMD.

Comment by Michael J. Hampton on March 11, 2019 at 1:06pm

13 was my first of 3 squadrons of RA5Cs that I was in.  I made my first cruise with them in 1975 to the North Atlantic and the Med.  Had some crazy times with learning all about the RA5C and the squadron life.  Good memories mostly.

Comment by Lawrence (Ski) Grumboski on March 11, 2019 at 12:46pm

Ron, I was also in RVAH-13 and remember going out to the crash site and working it. CDR Nolta was also the XO of VAH-13 the year before. The backside you mentioned was LT Paul Stokes. The ASB shop division officer. He later dies as a LtCDR during a Med cruise accident.

Comment by Ron Saylor on March 11, 2019 at 12:35pm

Today RVAH-13 is on my mind as I drove up Shell Road in DeBary, FL.  Our first CO, CDR Nolta, crashed on the east side of that road.  Just before Christmas.  The evening before in Maint. Control the XO, CDR Webster was asked who had the most kids.  They both had six.  The back seater in the crash was saved by a tall tree catching the parachute swinging him safely down.  I lived in Bowmans trailer park south of DeBary.  The first person I seen there was US Sentor Dirkson who wintered in DeBary.

Comment by David Bennett on March 10, 2019 at 11:07pm

I meant '75, of course, or anytime in the 70s. The event I'm thinking of was definitely in 1969.

Comment by David Bennett on March 10, 2019 at 12:11am

Bert,

Not 1972. I was long gone by then. What I'm talking about took place in 1969, between our WESTPAC/Around-the-World cruise in 1968 and our Med cruise on the Forrestal in 1969 - 70. I separated in May of 1970.

DB

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