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At random: The first diesel engines built by Electric Boat for submarines were installed (1913) in the USS NAUTILUS and SEAWOLF, namesakes of the first nuclear powered submarines, also built by Electric Boat.
What the hell happened to belt loop halyard clips?
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dex armstrong
Posted 2007-08-06 3:16 PM (#6205)


COMSUBBBS

Posts: 3202

Location: Alexandria, Virginia
Subject: What the hell happened to belt loop halyard clips?

Way the hell before before Velcro, magnetic hooks....poopie suits...and heavy metal music (if you can call that stuff music) the United States Navy issued things called dungarees that were held up by web belts that passed through things called belt loops. The belt loop directly over the back pocket was reserved for the placement of a contraption, found in every flag locker on everything that floated and had scews and a rudder in the USN. Halyard clips provided a spring loaded thumb operated clip and a brass loop at the other. Every "salty" sailor (translated... Dolphin aspiring clueless rookie.) placed every key, John Wayne P-38 can opener, electricians knife....and bent dogtag on a split ring and attached it to his pilferred halyard clip. A halyard clip suspended from your belt loop imparted an aura of saltiness. It was the twentieth century equivalent of hanging around the Admiral Ben Bow Inn singing "Yo-Ho-Ho and a bottle of rum....Fifteen men on a dead man's chest." Strictly deep water stuff. Of course any non-rated man who had the IQ of a New Jersey sea slug, recognized the danger involved in clearing the bridge with a giant load of stuff that would hang up on any projection on the way from the shears to the Conning Tower hatch....leaving Mr. Salty to gargle small fish and suck salt water until the boat could surface....such keys, in the amount required to provide visual testimonial to the wearers deep water sailordom, could also attract lightning and play hell with the earth's magnetic field. I always wondered how a lad in the USN on an initial enlistment, accumulated close to fifty keys. Nobody knew what half of those keys went to, including the dumb bastard wearing them...They were, in the eyes of practicing nuns "Vain....cosmetic adornment." I've seen E-3 Orion postal clerks wearing fifty pounds of assorted useless keys....enough that if he fell off a cliff on Cape Horn would head straight for the ocean's bottom. Halyard keys...the first step on the long road to being accepted as a mature, deep water sailor.....No, they were a stupid affectation and instant recognition checkpoint for kids who were once barn roof aviators....and beach pirates. Anybody remember belt loop halyard clips? DEX
steamboat
Posted 2007-08-06 4:10 PM (#6208 - in reply to #6205)
Master and Commander

Posts: 1812

Location: Boydton, Virginia
Subject: RE: What the hell happened to belt loop halyard clips?

Remember? remember? Whats to remember? I still use mine! About 10 years ago when I worked as a Wildlife Biologist my slug of keys got caught on something on tractor and I plowed the entire set 8" underground. We had to change all locks where I worked, even though I emphatically assured them that they won't be found until the next archeological search 1000 years from now.
Steamboat sends
Park Dallis
Posted 2007-08-06 5:09 PM (#6213 - in reply to #6205)


Old Salt

Posts: 419

Location: Anchorage, Alaska
Subject: RE: What the hell happened to belt loop halyard clips?

Keys?  Who put keys on 'em?

Mine had a TL-29, a 4" crescent hammer, and a dog tag attached.  I was one salty sumbitch!

At sea they stayed in my bunk bag but in port they were hooked to my seafarer dungarees.


John J. Patterson
Posted 2007-08-06 5:10 PM (#6214 - in reply to #6205)


Crew

Posts: 69

Location: Irwin, PA
Subject: RE: What the hell happened to belt loop halyard clips?

Yep, I had them in sub school, trying to look salty. The swivel finally wore out and the key ring seperated. I still have the key ring and use the halyard clip to keep my tool box securely shut. Waste not want not.
JrKrup, Skimmer
Posted 2007-08-06 11:41 PM (#6225 - in reply to #6214)


Master and Commander

Posts: 1319

Location: Oxnard, CA
Subject: Fifteen Men on a Dead Man's Chest

DEX! Since you mentioned it, ...

1. Fifteen men on a dead man's chest
Yo ho ho and a bottle of rum
Drink and the devil had done for the rest
Yo ho ho and a bottle of rum.
The mate was fixed by the bosun's pike
The bosun brained with a marlinspike
And cookey's throat was marked belike
It had been gripped by fingers ten;
And there they lay, all good dead men
Like break o'day in a boozing ken
Yo ho ho and a bottle of rum.

2. Fifteen men of the whole ship's list
Yo ho ho and a bottle of rum!
Dead and be damned and the rest gone whist!
Yo ho ho and a bottle of rum!
The skipper lay with his nob in gore
Where the scullion's axe his cheek had shore
And the scullion he was stabbed times four
And there they lay, and the soggy skies
Dripped down in up-staring eyes
In murk sunset and foul sunrise
Yo ho ho and a bottle of rum.

3. Fifteen men of 'em stiff and stark
Yo ho ho and a bottle of rum!
Ten of the crew had the murder mark!
Yo ho ho and a bottle of rum!
Twas a cutlass swipe or an ounce of lead
Or a yawing hole in a battered head
And the scuppers' glut with a rotting red
And there they lay, aye, damn my eyes
Looking up at paradise
All souls bound just contrawise
Yo ho ho and a bottle of rum.

4. Fifteen men of 'em good and true
Yo ho ho and a bottle of rum!
Ev'ry man jack could ha' sailed with Old Pew,
Yo ho ho and a bottle of rum!
There was chest on chest of Spanish gold
With a ton of plate in the middle hold
And the cabins riot of stuff untold,
And they lay there that took the plum
With sightless glare and their lips struck dumb
While we shared all by the rule of thumb,
Yo ho ho and a bottle of rum!

5. More was seen through a sternlight screen
Yo ho ho and a bottle of rum
Chartings undoubt where a woman had been
Yo ho ho and a bottle of rum.
'Twas a flimsy shift on a bunker cot
With a dirk slit sheer through the bosom spot
And the lace stiff dry in a purplish blot
Oh was she wench or some shudderin' maid
That dared the knife and took the blade
By God! she had stuff for a plucky jade
Yo ho ho and a bottle of rum.

6. Fifteen men on a dead man's chest
Yo ho ho and a bottle of rum
Drink and the devil had done for the rest
Yo ho ho and a bottle of rum.
We wrapped 'em all in a mains'l tight
With twice ten turns of a hawser's bight
And we heaved 'em over and out of sight,
With a Yo-Heave-Ho! and a fare-you-well
And a sudden plunge in the sullen swell
Ten fathoms deep on the road to hell,
Yo ho ho and a bottle of rum!

Boy Throttleman
Posted 2007-08-07 7:09 AM (#6228 - in reply to #6205)


Old Salt

Posts: 431

Subject: RE: What the hell happened to belt loop halyard clips?

I still use one only they are plastic these days
JrKrup, Skimmer
Posted 2007-08-07 11:48 AM (#6242 - in reply to #6228)


Master and Commander

Posts: 1319

Location: Oxnard, CA
Subject: RE: What the hell happened to belt loop halyard clips?

Any boat store or chandlery has them in various sizes and configurations, in brass, bronze, and chrome plated.
Bear
Posted 2007-08-07 12:20 PM (#6243 - in reply to #6205)


Great Sage of the Sea

Posts: 781

Location: Port Orchard WA
Subject: RE: What the hell happened to belt loop halyard clips?

now the rage is carabiners and I have lots and lots of them and was even thinking of making some for us (and prob still will) that have a little bullet (I remember when we all had one of them as well) like pill case for those of us who occassionally carry those very tiny white pills (with or without being part of the zipper club, (I am without)). But it is still the thought behind the item, I have a key to everything I own even my mini magnum (my little Kubota diesel mower, can you say more power, 2 acres of lawn mowed in under an hour)
Bear
Posted 2007-08-07 12:23 PM (#6244 - in reply to #6205)


Great Sage of the Sea

Posts: 781

Location: Port Orchard WA
Subject: RE: What the hell happened to belt loop halyard clips?

BTW  Just back from trinket show in Long Beach and saw both types of these key rings and brought back a dozen or so samples of the Carabiner types They have started to make them in shapes thinking about doing them eith3er in dolphins or boat outline and am working on the quotes for them.

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