It has been over a year since Bill Byers asked that fateful question, "Are you the Brad Williamson that served on the William H. Bates?" On December 6th last year, I sent him an email that said that there was a little website up where we could coordinate the reunion. This is that little website, one year later.
A little over a year since this was just an idea!
Since then, we have had a reunion in San Diego attended by 38 former crewmembers. We have identified 1222 former shipmates as having been assigned to the Bates and Mark Gray continues to flesh out our Master Sailing List. 281 of those shipmates are registered on this site. Another 33 fellow submariners, including a former Soviet CO, friends, family, and enthusiasts, including one who was a friend of our namesake's, the Honorable William H. Bates' family, brings us to a total of 314 registered users on the site.
Collectively, we have added 52 sea stories, most of them real gems. We have posted 1725 messages in the Scuttlebutt forum, under 323 topics. In addition to any photographs I have included in the site, you have uploaded just under a 1000 photos in 74 categories revealing life as it was on the USS William H. Bates.
This is turning into a real treasure of Cold War history.
All that doesn't begin to touch on the real value of this website, and that is the treasured reconnections made between old friends.
Who would have guessed it would work out this way.
Now it is a year later, and the real question emerges.
Not "what have we done so far", but "where are we going from here?"
I'll leave you thinking on that one...
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