(Photo above shows Lt. Bob Burnside, circa 1950's at Zuma HQ. Courtesy of Bob Burnside.)
Just in from 60's era LACo Zuma Recurrent, Larry "Duck" Loganbill, now retired on the island of Kauai and who is absolutely hilarious. The following is a note Duck wrote to his Zuma lifeguard buddy from the '60's, Dave "Baby Dave" Rochlen earlier today:
"Dave,
Do you remember Burnside's "Keep the Kitchen Clean" speech...circa 1962. He called a mandatory 8am Sunday meeting for all lifeguards on schedule... dormies or not and you were required to attend even if Sunday was your day off.
Burnside went on for hours...blah, blah, blah about how the Zuma HQ/Dorms was also a place of work and that the public came through on their way upstairs to the former veranda switchboard area and office. I think he might have also covered kitchen hygiene because we know how obsessive-compulsive all permanent lifeguard staff have always been. After his hour-long rant about keeping the kitchen and downstairs clean......he asked if there were any questions. Tom Landis raised his hand...Bob said, "Yes Tom"...Tom said..."Don't you have to allow for some HUMAN ERROR." Burnside almost blew a chamber... his dark skin turned dark red.
I think it would have been a more meaningful speech if Burnside had incorporated athletic heroes like Sandy Koufax, Don Drysdale, Johnny Unitas and Norm VanBrocklin etc. and told us they were people who kept their kitchens clean. We all felt we had "Chinks In Our Armor" by not keeping the kitchen clean.
(File under:) "Keep the Kitchen Kleen/Human Error Speech"
Cheers,
Duck
NOTE: Over 20 lifeguards ages 18-24 lived in the Zuma HQ/Dorms... sharing kitchen, dining, toilet, shower and bunk areas in the two-story house on the beach.*** Wait a minute... there was one guy named Manny Weiss who worked Coral Beach...he was much older than the rest of us. As legend goes... Manny had taken every undergraduate course that LA State College offered and had begun taking all the graduate courses. He was the first vegetarian we had ever met. He wore canvas shoes and belt and ate vegetarian franks out of the can... Loma Linda brand. I never saw Manny at a recheck swim nor ever saw him in the ocean ever. He may have thought that the ocean water would upset the pH balance of his skin...like another organic vegetarian South Bay lifeguard.
Oh yeah I almost forgot...because Lt. Burnside attended Black Fox Military Academy... he taught us all how to make our beds (bunks)... so that a quarter would bounce off the sheets. I always just slept with my own blanket covering me on top of the LACo issue wool blanket and sheets... so they always passed muster... I just straightened the bed up a little before going downstairs in the morning for breakfast and to read the L.A. Times for the others. I never learned how to make my bed the Burnside military way.
I barely knew how to wash my lifeguard tower windows... my now former brother-in-law Wally Millican taught how to properly wash lifeguard tower windows. Wally also suffers from obsessive-compulsive disorder... OCD.
If you ever got to work Coral Beach or even if you didn't... across the highway was an all the pancakes you can eat diner. Eventually they called-off the deal...too many guys were eating up all their batter... mainly Dave Rochlen. I think they had dollar bills on their walls and ceiling in place of wallpaper.
I'm still pissed that Dave Rochlen (a Malibu local) never told me about Zucky's Deli in Santa Monica. That would have been a treat on a Friday or Saturday night. Plus I've always been attracted to Jewish girls. I think there was a lot about Santa Monica that Rochlen didn't want the rest of us lifeguards to know about. I know for a fact you could pick up chicks off the sidewalk in Westwood. He never told us that... I found out later...and we were too dumb to know there was a college located in Westwood.
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Many Thanks to Larry for the many laughs! Hopefully, Larry will send us more stories and rest of you guys and gals will send us stories too to publish to keep our group entertained.
10-4
Until next time.....
"County Recurrent" News
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2 comments:
Larry, remember the time we got into Ken Benifield's food locker and remove all the labels on the cans of food he so neatly stack in some order only he understood. For the next week every night was a surprise dinner.
Loganbill's Burnside story brings back a lot of good memories from those 60s Zuma days. Bob gave a similar speech pretty much every year after that.
I remember laying on my bunk pretty late at night, listening to Kemp Aaberg play beautiful classic guitar as i fell asleep. A really good guy.
I remember looking for a pair of fins one day, and the only pair that would fit my large feet were Bob Hughes' Duckfeet. As a waterpolo player, i was well aware of the Hughes' legends, and the very thought of pissing him off immediately made me think against using them.
When i came back in '67 for a week during my Navy summer, i stayed in the dorm for a few days.
Great times, greater people, and Zuma surf.
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