[Rhodes22-list] A BUCKET OF SHRIMP GREAT STORY AND TRUE

Sat Mar 28 10:42:41 EDT 2009

Great story, Rummy.  Thanks.
Claude
----- Original Message ----- 
From: <R22RumRunner at aol.com>
To: <rhodes22-list at rhodes22.org>
Sent: Saturday, March 28, 2009 9:22 AM
Subject: [Rhodes22-list] A BUCKET OF SHRIMP GREAT STORY AND TRUE


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> This came to me today from A friends father, now a retired Naval  chaplain 
> in
> Pensacola, FL..
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> Rummy
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> Many sailors know this story. I once told it in a sermon  on CURRITUCK 
> AV7.
> I'm not certain I ever told it again.  A number of  years earlier, during 
> the
> Korean War, Eastern Air Lines returned a number  of what the Navy called 
> R5Ds,
> to the US Navy to reclaim them for cargo  planes to support the war 
> effort. As
> a young AT2(Aviation Electronics  Technition second class) I did not know 
> why
> this was so, but was told  that Eastern had leased them from the Navy and
> were now returning  them to be used in the war effort. I suspect the truth 
> may
> have been a bit  different from that, but it was a good story; it broke my 
> heart
> to take  those wonderful radios out of those beautiful passenger planes 
> and
> install  some haze grey boxes to take their places. I was in flight test 
> at O &
> R at NAS Corpus Christi Texas and flew in most of those planes during
> flight test after retrograding them. Sometimes when my inspection was done 
> I would
> sit there in the radioman's chair and imagine Eddie Rickenbacker telling 
> me
> that story  over and over about those days in the raft starving to death 
> when
> the  seagull saved their lives. I have always had a soft spot in my heart 
> for
> seagulls. I am grateful for Nate and Sandra Dishman sharing it with me. It
> brings back lots of good memories of flight test, R5Ds, and the greatest
> seaplane tender ever. Now I have shared it again with a number of good 
> friends.
> Wayne
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> A  BUCKET OF SHRIMP GREAT STORY AND  TRUE
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> It  happened every Friday evening, almost without  fail, when the sun
> resembled a giant orange and  was starting to dip into the blue  ocean.
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> Old Ed came strolling  along the beach to his favorite pier.  Clutched in 
> his
> bony hand was a bucket of  shrimp.  Ed walks out to the end of the  pier,
> where it seems he almost has the world to  himself.  The glow of the sun 
> is a
> golden  bronze now.
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> Everybody's  gone, except for a few joggers on the  beach.  Standing out 
> on
> the end of the  pier, Ed is alone with his thoughts...and his  bucket of
> shrimp.
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> Before  long, however, he is no longer alone.  Up  in the sky a thousand
> white dots come screeching  and squawking, winging their way toward that 
> lanky
> frame standing there on the end of the  pier..
>
> Before long, dozens of  seagulls have enveloped him, their wings 
> fluttering
> and flapping wildly.  Ed stands  there tossing shrimp to the hungry birds. 
> As
> he does, if you listen closely, you can  hear him say with a smile, 'Thank
> you.  Thank you.'
>
> In a few  short minutes the bucket is empty.  But Ed  doesn't leave.
>
> He stands there lost  in thought, as though transported to another  time 
> and
> place.  Invariably, one of the  gulls lands on his sea-bleached,
> weather-beaten  hat - an old military hat he's been wearing for  years.
>
> When he finally turns  around and begins to walk back toward the beach,  a
> few of the birds hop along the pier with him  until he gets to the stairs, 
> and
> then they, too,  fly away.  And old Ed quietly makes his way  down to the 
> end
> of the beach and on  home.
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> If you were sitting there on  the pier with your fishing line in the 
> water,
> Ed  might seem like 'a funny old duck,' as my dad  used to say.  Or, 'a 
> guy
> that's a sandwich  shy of a picnic,' as my kids might say.    To 
> onlookers, he's
> just another old codger, lost  in his own weird world, feeding the 
> seagulls
> with a bucket full of  shrimp.
>
> To the onlooker,  rituals can look either very strange or very  empty. 
> They
> can seem altogether  unimportant .....maybe even a lot of  nonsense.
>
> Old folks often do  strange things, at least in the eyes of Boomers  and
> Busters.
>
> Most of them would  probably write Old Ed off, down there in   Florida .
> That's too bad. They'd do well to know him  better.
>
> His full name:  Eddie  Rickenbacker.  He was a famous hero back in  World 
> War
> II.  On one of his flying  missions across the Pacific, he and his
> seven-member crew went down.  Miraculously,  all of the men survived, 
> crawled out of
> their  plane, and climbed into a life  raft.
>
> Captain Rickenbacker and his  crew floated for days on the rough waters of
> the  Pacific.  They fought the sun.  They  fought sharks.  Most of all, 
> they
> fought  hunger.  By the eighth day their rations  ran out. No food.  No 
> water.
> They  were hundreds of miles from land and no one knew  where they were.
>
> They needed  a miracle.  That afternoon they had a  simple devotional 
> service
> and prayed for a  miracle.  They tried to nap.  Eddie  leaned back and 
> pulled
> his military cap over his  nose.  Time dragged.  All he could  hear was 
> the
> slap of the waves against the  raft.
>
> Suddenly, Eddie felt  something land on the top of his cap.  It  was a
> seagull!
>
> Old Ed would  later describe how he sat perfectly still,  planning his 
> next
> move.  With a flash of  his hand and a squawk from the gull, he managed 
> to
> grab it and wring its neck.  He tore the  feathers off, and he and his 
> starving
> crew made  a meal - a very slight meal for eight men - of  it.  Then they 
> used
> the intestines for  bait.  With it, they caught fish, which  gave them 
> food
> and more bait......and the cycle  continued.  With that simple survival
> technique, they were able to endure the rigor of  the sea until they were 
> found and
> rescued (after  24 days at sea...).
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> Eddie  Rickenbacker lived many years beyond that  ordeal, but he never 
> forgot
> the sacrifice of  that first lifesaving seagull.  And he  never stopped
> saying, 'Thank you.'  That's  why almost every Friday night he would walk 
> to  the
> end of the pier with a bucket full of shrimp  and a heart full of 
> gratitude.
>
> Reference: (Max  Lucado, In The Eye of the Storm, pp.221,  225-226)
>
> PS:  Eddie was  also an Ace in WW I and started Eastern  Airlines.
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