Page 8 * The ST. JOHNS REVIEW * #3 Feb. 12, 2016 * Email: reviewnewspaper@gmail.com * Mail: PO Box 83068, Port. OR 97283 * Web: www.stjohnsreview.com * Phone: 503-283-5086
Thank you to John Wandres for submitting his story and experience with a long-time St. Johns business, Ace Typewriter.
A Mill for “Elsie Item”
----------------------------------------
J. Wandres is a retired U.S. Navy
Chief Journalist. He serves as
public affairs offi cer for the non-
profi t Amphibious Forces Memo-
rial Museum. AFMM owns the
LCI-713.
By J. Wandres
The other day I dropped in to see
Matt McCormack at Ace Type-
writer in St. Johns. I wanted to
get a quote to clean and restore
my antique 1912 Model 5 Oliver
Portable Typewriter. Wait! In this
nimble digit mobile mania we live
in, did someone say “typewriter?”
Yes! Ace Typewriter Equipment
Repair on North Lombard at Bu-
chanan. It is one of the last place
in Portland, (maybe even Oregon,)
to repair electro-mechanical devic-
es such as IBM Selectrics as well
as old fashioned typewriters, elec-
tric and hand-crank calculators.
Matt and I had met a year before
when he responded to my email:
“LOOKING FOR WORLD WAR
II U.S. NAVY RADIO OPERA-
TOR ‘MILL’ TYPEWRITER.”
As a volunteer crewmember of
a World War II Landing Craft In-
fantry LCI-713, (also known as an
“Elsie Item,”) I was in charge of
locating such a ‘mill’ for the LCI’s
radio room. I knew what a ‘mill’
was; as a Navy radioman in the
1950s I learned to type out mes-
sages that came through my head-
phones as Morse Code. Today, the
navy’s communications specialists
no longer use Morse code; in fact,
the Radioman rating no longer ex-
ists.
My email had gone out to type-
writer museums and repair shops
all over the country. The responses
came back – no surprise – “Sorry,
not here.” “Nope.” “Nothing like
it, but good luck.” Oh Well, I said
to myself. Then came the email
from Ace: “We have two mills.”
When I stepped into the shop
that day a year ago I was warmly
met by Matt and his father, Den-
nis. The senior McCormack had
been a Navy radioman during
World War II. As we chatted we
became like two kids speaking the
secret “dah-dit-dah” language of
Morse code. Dennis felt that the
old Mill should be back on board
a Navy vessel instead of sitting on
a shelf. The nonprofi t Amphibious
Forces Memorial Museum, which
owns the LCI, agreed to have the
mill cleaned and restored. Short-
ly after we installed the mill in the
LCI’s radio room, we got word
from Matt McCormack that his fa-
ther had died.
For about a year the Infantry
Landing Craft was tied up by the
St. John’s Bridge. We have since
moved to the lagoon at Swan Is-
land, to Port of Portland Berth
308, next to PT-658. Restoration
continues every weekend.
Recently we hosted a division
of Sea Cadets. As I was explaining
the radio room, one boy leaned in
close, aimed his iPhone at the mill,
and pushed the button. The device
made a shutter-clicking sound.
Then, with thumbs tapping across
the iPhone’s keypad the boy texted
the image to a friend. “Cool,” he
said to no one. “This is way super
cool!”
LCI-713 is open for visiting, by
appointment, on Saturdays from
10am to 4pm. Visits and tours are
free; donations are always wel-
come. For information, visit the
LCI’s website: www.amphibious-
forces.org, or fi nd us on Facebook.
com/lci713.
The Amphibious Forces Memorial
Museum (AFMM) is an Oregon
based 501c3 charitable non-profi t
organization dedicated to the res-
toration and preservation of the
USS LCI 713. Their Mission is
to preserve the history of the Am-
phibious Forces in WWII, Korea,
and Vietnam, to educate the public
on the rich naval maritime heri-
tage that the Amphibious Forces
have played in our nation’s history,
and the importance of preserving
historic naval ships for future gen-
erations. The USS LCI (L) 713 is
a World War II era Landing Craft
Infantry. Its mission was to place
up to 200 soldiers onto almost any
beach in the world. The LCI was
a joint British-American design
of a new type of ship that would
be capable of landing soldiers on
hostile enemy shores. Within a
2 ½ year period, 951 LCIs were
constructed in ten small shipyards
in the United States. Two of those
shipyards, Albina Engine and Ma-
chine and Commercial Iron Works
were in Portland, Oregon. The LCI
713 is on the National Parks Ser-
vice National Register as a historic
vessel. At the end of World War
II the Navy had over 5,500 com-
missioned ships in service. Of that
total, over half of those ships were
amphibious warfare vessels. To-
day, out of the many WWII Navy
ships listed in the National Regis-
ter, the LCI 713 is the sole repre-
sentative of that half of the fl eet.
They have a dedicated volunteer
crew that spends each and every
Saturday working on the resto-
ration effort.
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