History of Oregon Scientology
From PDX Anon
January 9, 2008
August 2007
(The Post Chronicle, 8/29/07), (13Abc.com)
Tom Cruise has sent his children to Scientology summer camp. Isabella, 14, and 12-year-old son Connor - his adopted children with ex-wife Nicole Kidman - have spent their summer at a camp near Portland, Oregon, run by the Church of Scientology.
A source told America's Star magazine: "The summer camp is part of the Scientology's 'get them while they're young' campaign.
...
Isabella and Connor have been sent to the summer camp while Tom is in Berlin filming new World War II drama, 'Valkyrie'. He has been joined by wife Katie Holmes and 16-month-old daughter Suri.
September 11, 2006
(Oregon Secretary of State Business Info)
Created by Doug Jonsson and Maggie Condon in Beaverton as a Field Auditing Center
September 21, 2005
(Oregon Secretary of State Business Info)
Now taken over by Gwen Barnard and Steven Crandell
May 11, 2005
(Oregon Secretary of State Business Info)
WISE business created by Mark Walsh.
January 31, 2005
(Oregon Secretary of State Business Info)
Now owned by Delphi Schools, Inc. which owns the Delphian School
September 28, 2001
(Oregon Secretary of State Business Info)
Business is now controlled by Delphi Schools, Inc (Greg Ott and John Nosko)
April 24, 2001
(Oregon Secretary of State Business Info)
WISE company created by Phil LaClaire and Farrell LaClaire
December 28, 1999
(Oregon Secretary of State Business Info)
WISE business created by William Lee, Therese Lee and John Mickelson
September 9, 1999 (9/9/99)
(Oregon Secretary of State Business Info)
Registered by Mark Antony Historic Property, LLC (Doug Neuman)
March 23, 1998
(Oregon Secretary of State Business Info)
Registered by Richard Dixon and Kathy Dixon of the Portland Mission
March 13, 1998
(Wikipedia Article with References)
Gale was raised from birth to age fourteen in Scientology, a fourth generation Scientologist. He had a sister, Elizabeth Gale, and was the son of Scientologists David Gale, a software programmer who died from a heart attack in 1995, and Marie Gale, director of the Citizen's Commission on Human Rights (CCHR) in the Carolinas and chief national spokeswoman for CCHR. Gale was still coming to terms with his father's death at the time of his suicide. In 1986, his family moved to the church's international spiritual headquarters in Clearwater, Florida, but around the same time he was sent to attend a Scientology school in Oregon.
Gale was educated at the private Delphian School in Sheridan, Oregon, which was founded by L. Ron Hubbard's followers and dedicated to the sect's philosophies. Gale graduated from the Delphian School at age 14. Marie Gale brought her children into the public light in 1991, when a series of critical articles were published in the St. Petersburg Times which stated that Scientology children are "emotionally and physically neglected".
...
Gale was admitted to MIT at the age of fifteen. At MIT, he joined the Phi Sigma Kappa fraternity as a freshman in the fall of 1994, and he had just begun a music degree at the time of his suicide.In part, Gale's suicide note explained his motives: "Presumably I have jumped from a tall building... I am not crazy, albeit driven to suicide. It is not about any single event, or person. It is about stubborn sadness, and a detached view of the world. I see my life -- so much dreary, mundane, wasted time wishing upon unattainable goals -- and I feel little attachment to the future.But it is not so bad, relatively. I exaggerate. In the end, it is that I am unwilling (sick of living) to live in mediocrity. And this is what I have chosen to do about it... take care world, Philip." Gale closed his handwritten suicide note, found at his apartment, with a smiley face and the words "And stay happy!"
October 20, 1997
(Minute Order dated July 16, 1997)
Godeka, describing his life in America, recounts that he returned to Portland in 1995 when [h]e then digresses, stating that he and his wife began to argue. He saw his other friends graduating from college and obtaining stable employment. Marital issues escalated, and he admits to occasional physical altercation. Feeling despondent, he noted that John Travolta, a well-recognized individual, was coming to Portland. He therefore went to the Scientology Celebrity Center [on Salmon street] and was given a personality test. It was then recommended that he complete at [sic] $40.00 Communication course taught by an individual named Murray. This is described as a confrontation in which he and the teacher would stare at one another until one blinked, and this was to teach him how to confront today's society. He states that this was the beginning of his problems.
In retrospect, he believes that they "hypnotized me." he later learned that they were doing "mind research," and that he became a subject of "telepathy." These individuals could "stay in my mind and be part of me," and that "my mind and body became an apartment for Scientology roommates." After returning from Alaska [where he worked in a cannery], he went once again to the Celebrity Center, stated that he had been in Alaska, but could tell by the Scientologists' response that they knew of his whereabouts, thoughts and behavior. He was offered booklets which he refused, and at this point his problems continued to escalate.
While some of the details he relates are obviously symptoms of schizophrenia, many resound with clarity of truth, both in this passage - & elsewhere in this document - & suggest he is not as mentally disoriented as he has been portrayed in other reports: from his comments when he returned to the offices in Portland, I wonder if the registratrars there engage in ``cold reading"; he describes the Sea Org with a certain amount of accuracy (``The Sea Organization were doing mind research. This he believes was done in the ocean from a large ship.").
June 9, 1997
(Oregon Secretary of State Business Info)
WISE company created by Robin Asher
September 25, 1996
(By Bryan Smith and David R. Anderson The Oregonian, 9/26/96) (hosted by Holy Smoke)
Godeka apparently was motivated by a grudge against the church. He blames the organization for ruining him financially and thinks it has kept him from bringing his sister here from Kenya to study, according to police reports.
In San Francisco, where Godeka lived recently, he sent a remote-controlled toy tank in front of the Church of Scientology branch, with the message: "Next time, it will be real."In February, he called the Portland offices, repeatedly demanding money for the ruin of what he described to police as a San Francisco company that sold lighting equipment.The receptionist, Helen M. Burke, apparently was the primary target of Godeka's threats because she was the one who answered the phone.
…
At one point, Godeka told Burke that his anger stemmed from something that had happened at the San Francisco branch, but that the Church of Scientology is all "the same thing."
…
After Godeka was introduced to Scientology, "they imprisoned my mind to do what they wanted me to do," he told police in February. He also complained to police that the church got him deported to Kenya in 1986 and that Burke was controlling his mind.
February 2, 1996
(Oregon Secretary of State Business Info)
WISE business created by Mark Stanley
August 1995
(By Doc Wainwright, X Mag 1997)
A week later, Willamette Week, a local newspaper, reported:
The August [1995] issue of Exotic Magazine was disappearing fast – a little too fast...In fact, somebody was walking into clubs and adult bookstores that carry the magazine and walking out with stacks of 50 to 100 copies...clerks at a half-dozen stores say thieves posing as distributors told them they were 'recalling' the magazine because an article in it was going to be the subject of a lawsuit. The men told the clerks they would replace the magazines with corrected copies, but they never returned...About 1,500 issues were taken... When the August issue containing the Scientology story first appeared... a distributor said that he saw someone walk out of the church, deposit 50 cents in the newsrack and then carry the rack's entire stack of magazines back inside. Representatives for the CoS categorically deny any knowledge of the Exotic Magazine thefts. However, church spokeswoman Vicki Scherer says the Wainwright article is full of 'false information' about Scientology...
October 28, 1994
(Oregon Secretary of State Business Info)
Notice given on September 13, 1994
October 12, 1994
(Oregon Secretary of State Business Info)
WISE Business
August 31, 1993
(Oregon Secretary of State Business Info)
Registered Agent is John Callaghan
July 23, 1993
(Oregon Secretary of State Business Info)
Now registered to Alan Larson and Heather Kertchem
October 26, 1991
OSA is rumored to have destroyed records in 3 counties.
(By Lucy Morgan, St Petersburg Times, 2/8/98)
Several lawsuits have been filed against Scientology by families who blame its "purification" programs for their relatives' deaths. In Portland, Ore., the parents of Christopher Arbuckle, 25, filed suit after he took a Purification Rundown course that requires running several hours each day in a sauna and a diet rich in vitamins, including megadoses of niacin.
Arbuckle died after his liver failed. Arbuckle's parents settled out of court for an undisclosed amount and agreed not to discuss the case.
Scientology officials say Arbuckle died because he had previously taken steroids and had pre-existing kidney problems that he did not disclose. Thousands of people around the world have successfully completed the purification program and benefited from it, (Mike) Rinder said.
Why did the church settle the Arbuckle lawsuit?
"The civil justice system has no guarantees," Rinder said. "You can spend millions of dollars defending when people have absolutely no case. Look at Bill Clinton. There is no guarantee you'll get justice. There is a guarantee you'll spend money, and if you are the Church of Scientology, there is a guarantee you'll get a lot of negative publicity."Rinder and other Scientology officials bristle at questions about the deaths of members, saying they are statistically insignificant and are not connected to any church doctrine or practice. Similar patterns would be found in the deaths among Baptists or Catholics, Rinder said, or even among staffers at the St. Petersburg Times. In fact, some of those members who died might still be alive if they had stayed in Scientology, Rinder said.
"I don't like being accused by innuendo or directly of doing things to harm people because it is absolutely directly opposite to what I do," Rinder said. He called questions raised by the Times "dishonest and reprehensible."
(By Geoff Dougherty, St Petersburg Times, 3/28/99)
When an organization (Narconon) linked to Scientology sought approval from Oklahoma regulators to offer a drug-treatment program that relied heavily on purification rundown, Geary wrote to state officials. "As a health care practitioner that has participated in their so-called purification rundown... I would say it is bunk," Geary wrote. "I consider their treatment unscientific and dangerous." In 1991, the Oklahoma Board of Mental Health and Substance Abuse Services refused to approve the treatment program, calling it "unsafe and ineffective," according to a report in the Tulsa Tribune.
Several lawsuits have been filed against Scientology by families who blame purification programs for the death of a relative. In Portland, Ore., the parents of Christopher Arbuckle, 25, filed suit after he took a purification rundown course. Arbuckle died after his liver failed. His parents settled out of court for an undisclosed amount and agreed not to discuss the case.
August 13, 1990
(Oregon Secretary of State Business Info)
WISE business created by Dave Kranick and Marci Murray
July 14, 1989
(Oregon Secretary of State Business Info)
Created by Clarke Balcom, Gaabriel Becket, and Victoria Ewing
June 18, 1987
(Oregon Secretary of State Business Info)
Gwen Barnard becomes leader June 6, 1999
September 1, 1987
(Oregon Secretary of State Business Info)
(Oregon Secretary of State Business Info)
June 19, 1986
July 17, 1985
June 26, 1985
(Oregon Secretary of State Business Info)
Notice given May 16, 1985
June 25, 1985
(Oregon Secretary of State Business Info)
Created by Fred King and Larry Silver
May 20, 1985
(By AP, New York Times, 5/20/85)
Hundreds of members of the Church of Scientology converged in Portland on Sunday to protest a $39 million fraud judgment against the church.
A jury Friday awarded the judgment to a woman who had been a member of the church for nine months in 1975 and 1976. She testified that church teachings held that Scientology could improve her weak eyesight and raise her intelligence quotient.
About 500 members rallied outside the Multnomah County Circuit Court, where the case was decided.
May 17, 1985
(by AP, New York Times, May 18 1985)
A jury today awarded $39 million to a woman who says the Church of Scientology defrauded her with claims it would improve her eyesight and make her more intelligent. The Multnomah Circuit Court jury, after a 10-week trial and two and a half days of deliberations, found that the church defrauded the woman, Julie Christofferson Titchbourne, who had been a church member for nine months.
Willamette Week Series, May 1986: Page 1 Page 2 Page 3 Page 4 Page 5 Page 6 Page 7
Church of Scientology Handling Eval for Julie Christofferson (hosted by Gerry Armstrong)
Oregonian Series (May 26 - May 30) (hosted by Arnie Lerma)
May 1, 1985
(Oregon Secretary of State Business Info)
Created by E. Ray Phelps and Christine Perpelitt, becomes Phocis, Inc
May 24, 1983
(Oregon Secretary of State Business Info)
Portland School that uses Hubbard Study Tech, created by Claire Syck and Kathleen Anderson
June 11, 1982
(Oregon Secretary of State Business Info)
WISE company listed with Peter Scherer
September 18, 1981
(Oregon Secretary of State Business Info)
Created by notorious members Timothy Bowles, Alice Cecena, David Strutt and Jane Lionni
July 1979
(by John Painter Jr., The Oregonian, 7/25/79)
Scientology courses are designed to make students dependent on their instructors so it is "easier to brainwash them," a disaffected Church of Scientology communications supervisor testified Tuesday in Multnomah County Circuit Court.
One particular "drill" called "bull baiting" involved verbal and physical abuse and sometimes overt sexual contact, Diana Morgan testified.
...
Ms. Morgan testified she joined the church in 1975 after she had separated from her husband, who already was a church member. She said she joined after being told a Scientology communications course would help her get along with her husband.
After starting the communications course, she said, she was contacted by Ed Petty, a Scientology registrar, and was talked into signing up for additional courses after a conversation that lasted "many, many hours."
She said Petty sent her to Bend to borrow $10,000 from her parents to pay for the courses. After she was refused, she said, she and her husband borrowed $1,500 from friends and used that as collateral to borrow another $1,500 from a Scientology credit union. The money was used to pay for courses.
She said she signed on as a staff member of the Mission of Davis, one of the defendants in the lawsuit, first as a receptionist and later as a communications course supervisor.
Ms. Morgan, a Portland resident, described the various classes and what was required of students in them. Describing "bull baiting," she said: "You sit in a chair and your coach sits across from you. He can do anything or say anything, and you're not supposed to react."
She said the session was designed to find a person's "buttons" - weak points - and to punch them over and over again until there was no reaction.
In her case, she said, her coach would "hit me on the nose all the time and say 'You have a big nose.'" If she reacted - she was "flunked" and the "bull baiting" started over.
Foul language was common, she said, and "they really got into sex."
'In one such session, she said, she saw the 8-year-old son of a registrar repeatedly put his hands down the front of a woman student's dress until she failed to react. The woman left and did not return.
In another case, a female coach repeatedly unzipped a male student's pants, exposing his genitals, until he too, stopped reacting.
Asked the purpose of such exercises by Garry McMurry, lead attorney for Mrs. Titchbourne, Ms. Morgan said, "The more you find out about the student, the easier it is to keep him in Scientology."
She added: "The more you learn about your student, the easier it was to brainwash them."
She testified that how fast a student progressed through the course depended on the amount of money the student had. Students with cash in hand progressed faster than students still trying to gather the course rate.
In trying to recruit new followers on the street, she testified, she was instructed to deny Scientology was a religion if the potential recruit seemed concerned or apprehensive about that aspect. She said that in soliciting new students, she was told not to "say too much and to stay away from religion."
Ms. Morgan will continue her testimony Wednesday.
October 4, 1976
(Oregon Secretary of State Business Records)
Created by Greg Ott and John Nosko
December 31, 1973
(Oregon Secretary of State Business Records)
May 1, 1973
(Oregon Secretary of State Business Records)
WISE Business created by Patricia Huff
July 1944
(by Russel Miller, The Bare-Faced Messiah, 10/26/87) and the Deck log of USS Algol, US National Archives
The USS Algol was commissioned in July and immediately put to sea for trials. Through August and most of September she was exercizing at sea; as Navigating Officer, Ron signed the ship's deck log every day, but there was little to report except 'under way, as before'. He seemed to have had second thoughts about wanting to see action, for on 9 September he applied for an appointment to the School of Military Government, citing among his qualifications his education as a civil engineer, membership in the Explorers Club, wide travel in the Far East and experience of handling natives. The Algol's Commanding Officer approved Ron's application, noting on his fitness report that while Lieutenant Hubbard was a capable and energetic officer, he was 'very temperamental and often has his feelings hurt'.
On 22 September, the Algol was at last ordered to Oakland, California, to start taking on supplies in preparation for sailing to war. The excited rumour among the crew was that the ship was to take part in a major new offensive in the Pacific aimed at the final defeat of the Japanese.
At 1630 on the afternoon of 27 September- the day before Ron was due to leave for Princeton - the ship's deck log recorded an unusual incident: 'The Navigating Officer reported to the OOD [Officer On Duty] that an attempt at sabatage [sic] had been made sometime between 1530-1600. A coke bottle filled with gasoline with a cloth wick inserted had been concealed among cargo which was to be hoisted aboard and stored in No 1 hold. It was discovered before being taken on board. ONI, FBI and NSD authorities reported on the scene and investigations were started.'
No further mention was made of the incident. There was no explanation of why Lieutenant Hubbard, the Navigating Officer, was poking around in cargo being loaded on to the ship or of how he had managed to find the 'petrol bomb'. Neither was the result of the investigations recorded. Shortly after ten o'clock that evening a brief signal was received 'Lt Lafayette Ron Hubbard, D-v (S), USNR 113392, is this date detached from duty'. On 4 October, the USS Algol sailed for Eniwetok Atoll in the Marshall Islands, from where she would take part in the invasion of Luzon in the Philippines and the landings on Okinawa, earning two battle stars. Her erstwhile Navigating Officer, meanwhile, was on a four-month course in 'Military Government' at the Naval Training School, Princeton, prompting him to claim ever after that he finished his education at the venerable Ivy League university of the same name.
December 1943
(by Russel Miller, The Bare-Faced Messiah, 10/26/87) and LRH interviews with Rocky Mountain News, 2/20/83
This good deed done, in October 1943 Ron was sent on a six-week course at the Naval Small Craft Training Center on Terminal Island, San Pedro, California. In December he learned he was to be given another opportunity to go to sea - as the Navigating Officer of the USS Algol, an amphibious attack cargo ship under construction at Portland, Oregon.
To judge from an entry in his private journal, he was not particularly thrilled about going back to sea, nor indeed, about being in the Navy at all. 'My salvation is to let this roll over me,' he noted gloomily on 6 January 1944, 'to write, write and write some more. To hammer keys until I am finger worn to the second joint and then to hammer keys some more. To pile up copy, stack up stories, roll the wordage and generally conduct my life along the one line of success I have ever had.
The only thing that ever affected me as a writer,' he recalled years later in a newspaper interview, 'was the US Navy when their security regulations prohibited writing. I was quiet for about two years before I couldn't take it any more and went and took it out on a typewriter and, wearing a stetson hat in the middle of a battle theater, wrote a costume historical novel of 60,000 words which has never seen the light of day.
'For the first six months of 1944, Ron remained in Portland during the fitting out of the Algol. News of the war in the Pacific was of bitter fighting and heavy casualties. US Marines were working their way from island to island towards Japan, but at shocking cost. In the attack on Tarawa Atoll, more than a thousand Americans were killed and two thousand wounded: news pictures of the beaches littered with dead Marines shocked the nation and brought home the terrible reality of war. On 15 June, two divisions of US Marines began an assault on Saipan in the southern Marianas, and in the battle that followed 16,500 Americans were killed or wounded.
June 8, 1943
(by Russel Miller, The Bare-Faced Messiah, 10/26/87) and Memorandum from Commander NW Sea Frontier, 6/8/43
Despite the scepticism, the US Navy mounted an immediate investigation of the incident. Ever since Pearl Harbor, Americans had been jittery about the possibility of an attack on the mainland by Japanese submarines. In February 1942, a lone enemy submarine had surfaced about a mile offshore north of Santa Barbara, California, and lobbed twenty-five shells at an oil refinery. If it happened once, it could presumably happen again and the Navy certainly needed to know if the USS PC-815 had indeed stumbled across enemy submarines close to the coast of Oregon.The Commanding Officer and Executive Officer of PC-815 were ordered to report immediately to Admiral Frank Jack Fletcher, Commander Northwest Sea Frontier, in Seattle. Fletcher studied Ron's eighteen-page Battle Report and interviewed the Commanding Officers of the four other ships and two blimps involved. The tape from the PC-815's attack recorder, which recorded the strength and characteristics of the sonar signals, was evaluated by experts. When all the reports were in, Fletcher swiftly came to the conclusion that the hundred depth charges dropped during the 'battle' had probably killed a few fish but no Japanese.
In a secret memorandum to the Commander-in-Chief, Pacific Fleet, dated 8 June 1943, Fletcher stated: "An analysis of all reports convinces me that there was no submarine in the area. Lieutenant Commander Sullivan [Commander of the blimps] states that he was unable to obtain any evidence of a submarine except one bubble of air which is unexplained except by turbulence of water due to a depth charge explosion. The Commanding Officers of all ships except the PC-815 state they had no evidence of a submarine and do not think a submarine was in the area."
Fletcher added that there was a 'known magnetic deposit' in the area in which the depth charges were dropped. The implication was clear: Lieutenant Hubbard, Commanding Officer of USS PC-815, had fought a two-day battle with a magnetic deposit.
Neither Ron nor Moulton would accept this verdict. They believed that denying the existence of the submarines was a political decision taken to avoid spreading alarm among the civilian population. Moulton pointed out that the Reader's Digest had recently published a story about the attack on the oil refinery near Santa Barbara and it had caused something approaching panic among people living along the coast of California. It was hardly surprising, they concluded, that the top brass wanted to hush up the fact that US Navy ships had been fighting enemy submarines only about ten miles off the coast of Oregon.
The disconsolate crew of the USS PC-815, who had no doubt expected to return home as conquering heroes, had to be satisfied with this explanation and forego public recognition of their battle. It was a bitter pill for them to swallow. The only reward their Commanding Officer could arrange was a rare treat recorded in the ship's log on the day they returned to Astoria: 'Ice cream brought on board.'
As Commanding Officer, Lieutenant Hubbard's record was unquestionably blighted by the Admiral's damning report, although there was no suggestion that he should be relieved of his command. There was plenty of good-natured joshing in the service about the man who had attacked a magnetic field, but it would probably have been forgotten eventually and need not have affected Ron's career, except that the luckless USS PC-815 was soon in even worse trouble.
Towards the end of May, the PC-815 was detailed to escort a new aircraft carrier from Portland to San Diego. Thankfully this voyage was completed without incident. On arrival in San Diego Ron said goodbye to his friend Tom Moulton, who had been transferred to HQ Thirteenth Naval District in Seattle for further assignment.
May 18, 1943
(by Russel Miller, The Bare-Faced Messiah, 10/26/87) and USS PC-815 Action Report, 10/24/43
On the evening of 18 May, the USS PC-815 sailed from Astoria, Oregon, on her shakedown cruise. Her destination was San Diego, but she had only been at sea for five hours when, at 0230 hours off Cape Lookout on the coast of Oregon, she encountered at least one, perhaps two, enemy submarines in the middle of a busy shipping lane!
Ron provided a graphic account of the engagement that followed in a secret Battle Report to the Commander-in-Chief, Pacific Fleet:
'Proceeding southward just inside the steamer track an echo-ranging contact was made by the soundman then on duty . . . The Commanding Officer had the conn and immediately slowed all engines to ahead one third to better echo-ranging conditions, and placed the contact dead ahead, 500 yards away.
'The first contact was very good. The target was moving left and away. The bearing was clear. The night was moonlit and the sea was flat calm . . . The USS PC-815 closed in to 360 yards, meanwhile sounding general quarters . . . Contact was regained at 800 yards and was held on the starboard beam while further investigation was made. Screws were present and distinct as before. The bearing was still clear. Smoke signal identification was watched for closely and when none appeared it was concluded the target must not be a friendly submarine. All engines were brought up to speed 15 knots and the target was brought dead ahead . . .'
On its first attack run, the USS PC-815 dropped a barrage of three depth charges. When it had re-established contact, a second attack was made at 0350 hours, this time laying down a pattern of four depth charges.Ron lapsed into rather unmilitary lyricism to describe the ensuing events:
'The ship, sleepy and sceptical, had come to their guns swiftly and without error. No one, including the Commanding Officer, could readily credit the existence of an enemy submarine here on the steamer track and all soundmen, now on the bridge, were attempting to argue the echo-ranging equipment and chemical recorder out of such a fantastic idea.'
At 0450, with dawn breaking over a glassy sea, a lookout sighted a dark object about 700 yards from the ship on the starboard beam. When inspected the object seemed to be moving . . . Although very probably this object was a floating log no chances were taken and the target was used to test the guns which had not been heretofore fired structurally. The gunners, most of whom were men of experience, displayed an astonishing accuracy, bursts and shells converging on the target.
'The target disappeared for several minutes and then, to test the guns not brought to bear on the first burst, the ship was turned in case the object reappeared. The object appeared again closer to the ship. Once more fire was opened and the target vanished.'
Ron stressed that he considered it likely this target was no more than driftwood, but he thought it was good for the morale of the gunners to ensure the newly-installed guns worked. The USS PC-815 mounted four further attacks on the elusive submarine in the hope of forcing it to the surface, without success. At the end of the sixth attack the ship's supply of depth charges was exhausted. Urgent signals requesting more ammunition at first met with no response.
At nine o'clock in the morning, two US Navy blimps, K-39 and K-33, appeared on the scene to help with the search. By noon, Ron believed that the submarine was disabled in some way, or at least unable to launch its torpedoes, since the PC-815, lying to in a smooth sea, presented an easy target and had not been attacked. In the early afternoon a second, smaller, sub-chaser, the USS SC-536 arrived, but was unable to make contact with the target.
On the bridge of PC-815, Ron offered to lead the other ship on an attack run, blowing a whistle to signal when to drop its depth charges. 'With the bullnose of the SC nearly against our flagstaff,' Ron wrote, 'we came to attack course . . .' Five depth charges were dropped on the first run and two on the second.
"The observation blimps began to sight oil and air bubbles in the vicinity of the last attack and finally a periscope. This ship also sighted air bubbles . . . At 1606 oil was reported again and this ship saw oil. Great air boils were seen and the sound of blowing tanks was reported by the soundman . . . All guns were now manned with great attention as it was supposed that the sub was trying to surface. Everyone was very calm, gunners joking about who would get in the first shot.'
But the submarine did not surface. Far from being discouraged, it seemed that Ron was by then convinced that there was not just one but two submarines lurking somewhere beneath them. His sonar operator had reported making a second, separate, contact a few hours earlier.
Shortly before five o'clock, a Coast Guard patrol boat brought in further supplies of ammunition. Manoeuvring alongside, twenty-seven depth charges were transferred on to the USS PC-815 and made ready for firing. Not long afterwards, a second Coast Guard patrol boat, the Bonham arrived, followed by another sub-chaser, the USS SC-537. There was now a total of five ships and two observations blimps involved in the search for the enemy submarines off the coast of Oregon.
All through the next day, sweep and search operations continued, although not all the Commanding Officers were as keen or convinced as Ron. 'Neither the SC-537 nor the Bonham', he noted 'showed any understanding whatever and refused by their actions to cooperate.' The SC-537, he added with barely concealed disgust, failed to drop a single depth charge. As if in compensation, the USS PC-815 made one attack run after another, forging back and forth at high speed, dropping barrage after barrage.
Still no wreckage, no bodies, floated to the surface. Ron was not in the least deterred. 'Because we had three times found two sub targets on the previous day, we considered from her failure to surface that one sub was gone down in 90 fathoms. The other still had batteries well up for it made good speed in subsequent attacks.
'All during the following night, the USS PC-815 kept the area swept as well as it could. The moonlight showed up an oil slick which we investigated, though the slick was too thin for samples . . . A report that the sub had surfaced off Sand Lake caused all vessels except the Bonham to go flying north to that position. But before flank speed was attained the reported "sub" was reported as a fishing vessel'At 0700, May 21, 1943, being near the area of the attacks the night before this ship stopped to search . . . Suddenly a boil of orange colored oil, very thick, came to the surface immediately on our port bow . . . The Commanding Officer came forward on the double and saw a second boil of orange oil rising on the other side of the first. The soundman was loudly reporting that he heard tanks being blown on the port bow.
'Every man on the bridge and flying bridge then saw the periscope, moving from right to left, rising up through the first oil boil to a height of about two feet. The barrel and lens of the instrument were unmistakable . . . On the appearance of the periscope, both gunners fired straight into the periscope, range about 50 yards. The periscope vanished in an explosion of 20mm bullets.'
The USS PC-815 made one further attack run and dropped its last two depth charges. At midnight, after being in action for some sixty-eight hours, Ron received orders to return to Astoria.
He noted in his report, rather sourly, that they were greeted with 'considerable scepticism' on their return. Nevertheless, his conclusion was unequivocal: 'It is specifically claimed that one submarine, presumably Japanese, possibly a mine-layer, was damaged beyond ability to leave the scene and that one submarine, presumably Japanese, possibly a mine-layer, was damaged beyond ability to return to its base.
'This vessel wishes no credit for itself. It was built to hunt submarines. Its people were trained to hunt submarines. Although exceeding its orders originally by attacking the first contact, this vessel feels only that it has done the job for which it was intended and stands ready to do that job again.'
April 20, 1943
(by Russel Miller, The Bare-Faced Messiah, 10/26/87)
While the PC-815 was being built, the two officers found time to enjoy life a little in the pleasant city of Portland. Moulton's wife came over from the East Coast and Polly was able to visit from Bremerton, which was only 150 miles to the north. As a foursome they enjoyed each other's company and frequently had dinner together, despite rationing, in one of the restaurants overlooking the green valley of the Willamette river and the distant snow-capped peak of Mount Hood. On one well-remembered occasion, the prospective Commanding Officer of PC-815 and his Executive Officer drove up to Seattle for a dance at the tennis club. Ron was wearing his mysterious dark glasses, as usual, and was being gently teased by one of the women in their group. When he explained why they were necessary, the woman raised her eyebrows as if she did not believe him. Moulton was quite shocked. However, to prove what he was saying, Ron took off his glasses and within five or ten minutes his eyes began watering and were clearly sore. His friend was deeply gratified.
At ten o'clock on Tuesday 20 April 1943, the USS PC-815 was commissioned. Ron noted the event in a pencilled entry on the first page of the ship's log book, signing his name with a proud flourish. Two days later, the Oregon Journal published a photograph of Ron and Moulton in uniform with an article about the commissioning of the new ship. Ron wore his dark glasses and an intrepid expression, his coat collar was turned up and he gripped a pipe in his right hand: he looked just like a man ready to go to war.
In the story, Ron was described as a 'veteran sub-hunter of the battles of the Pacific and Atlantic . . . an old band at knocking tails off enemy subs'. To add a little local interest, it seems he told the reporter that he had grown up in Portland and came from a long line of naval men. He said his grandfather, 'Captain' Lafayette Waterbury, and his great-grandfather, 'Captain' I.C. DeWolfe, had both helped make American naval history, although naturally he did not elaborate on their contribution. (His great-grandfather's name was Abram; 'I.C.' were his grandmother's initials.)
His membership of the Explorers Club received a prominent mention, of course, along with the fact that he had commanded three 'internationally important' expeditions. He was also persuaded to reveal that during the Caribbean Motion Picture Expedition he had become the first man ever to use a bathysphere for underwater filming.
When the reporter asked Ron for a comment about his new ship, he obliged with a picturesque quote that began by sounding like Humphrey Bogart and ended like the President: 'Those little sweethearts are tough. They could lick the pants off anything Nelson or Farragut ever sailed. They put up a sizzling fight and are the only answer to the submarine menace. I state emphatically that the future of America rests with just such escort vessels.'
