From the Frontlines: Freedom Fest

This past weekend (see, I’m almost caught up!) was Naval Station Everett’s annual ‘Freedom Fest’; their public day. One of the things they do is have community groups come in and give out information and demos. One such group, naturally, being the SCA.

It is more than a little odd to do a demo of 16th century swordfighting next to an HMMWV with a ring-mounted M240 machine gun. OTOH, the picture of me, in garb, in the turret is nifty.

One of our big draws at demos is that we give children ~2 foot long ‘swords’ (glorified pool noddles), and let them do battle with similarly armed veteran SCA fighters (such as myself). The children have superior numbers, energy, and generally a complete disregard for possible injuries to themselves and/or others. We have superior skill. Impressively enough when we employ that skill, the fighting tends to be pretty even despite 2:1 or 3:1 odds. Naturally we hold back a little if for no other reason than we ARE aware that you can actually inflict an injury with a glorified pool noodle, plus we actually acknowledge the hits we take, so the kids generally win. Great fun is had by all (often including the parents), and it makes a good crowd draw, plus where else can you say you spent hours beating up little children and get away with it?

I also got to do some actual fencing with Vladimir; it seems that while I am rusty I have retained my core skills much better than I had feared.

The Navy was doing ship tours – including a pair of Oliver H. Perry class FFGs. I visited the USS Ingraham (FFG61), the last of the Perrys built. We saw the main deck, upper deck (including the bridge), hanger, and fo’c’sle. I was interested to note a hard-bound copy of Janes Fighting Ships 2011-2012 (right next to Janes Merchant Ships). They also had a plaque up commemorating the prior USS Ingraham (DD694), an Allen M. Sumner class destroyer commissioned in 1944, herself named after USS Ingraham (DD444) a Gleaves class destroyer commissioned in mid 1941 and sunk in late 1942. She, in turn, was preceded by USS Ingraham (DD111) a Wickes class destroyer commissioned in 1919 and sunk as a target in 1937. The US Navy does like reusing names. I’ve always liked the Perrys, due in no small part to their ‘balanced’ initial weapons fit which made them very useful in wargames.

It is also rather pleasant to deal with REAL security. Granted, there weren’t many Marines around (actually, I didn’t spot any for sure), but the Navy realizes that real security checkpoints have rifles, concrete barriers, and people using their brains rather than detuned metal detectors, 2oz containers of liquids, and officially sanctioned sexual assaults. I was a little surprised, noting one MA with an M4, that the Navy hasn’t made ACOGs general issue (the Marines have one on every rifle these days). I suppose on shipboard the ACOGs advantages are rather reduced, and the price tag is notable (on the same order as the rifle it is mounted on). The petty officer giving the tour was an electronics tech, so we were treated to a brief description of every antenna on the ship (OK, he probably skipped a few). I also observed that either they are making very young ensigns these days, or I am getting old.

“Old” of course coming from the man touring a missile frigate wearing clothing that last saw shipboard use when muzzle-loading cannon were the hot new concept for shipboard weapons.