I didn't have the heart to tell the Chief how much D'Angelo was making on his weekend taxi runs into town.
Contributed by John J. Lesjack
Photo: The author and the 1941 Ford near the LST 1134 (courtesy of
author).
Pearl Harbor was still a viable naval base in 1955 while I was stationed
aboard the USS Stark County (LST 1134). Pearl Harbor was also quite a ways from
Honolulu, the major city on the island, so Sailors aboard our ship often
bought cars for transportation to and from town.
One car, a 1941 Ford,was sold to a Sailor from Kentucky for $25 during the
spring of 1955. That sailor, due for discharge in June, needed to sell the car
quickly but had no takers, so he offered to raffle off the car for a dollar a ticket. The drawing was to be held Friday afternoon, just prior to when liberty went down.
Gino D'Angelo, a seaman from Honolulu, Hawaii won the car and kept it on
the dock. He quickly turned his winnings into a money-making operation.
By filling his car with Sailors who paid him one dollar for a ride to Hotel
Street in downtown Honolulu, D'Angelo took ten men into town (no seat belt
laws, back then) every night. He then brought back another ten. He had turned
an immediate profit on his one-dollar "investment."
Late one afternoon, the LST was approaching the dock where the car was parked.
I was on the forecastle with Boatswain Mate Chief George Martella, New Jersey.
I threw the monkey fist and heaving line onto the dock and mentioned that
I almost hit D'Angelo's car.
Martella looked down as the ship got closer and said, "D'Angelo's car? I
bought that car used ten years ago and sold it to someone aboard a destroyer.
I didn't know it was still running. I'll bet if they changed the oil, the
car would fall apart."
I didn't have the heart to tell the Chief how much D'Angelo was making on
his weekend taxi runs into town. If I did, the Chief might have fallen apart.
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