Harold Bakke said he had been a NAAV member for a long time. Harold was 20 years old at Bikini, born in 1926. He was a sailmaker on the USS Dixie.
"I went to the NAAV San Francisco convention back in '96. They ask that we bring pictures and things like that." He laughed about that and said, "If you got caught with a camera on ship you'd get a General Court-Martial." Harold said he had a copy of the program (Radio Bikini) that was played on the Discovery channel.
"I was on the USS Dixie for Bikini."
I asked, "When you were at Bikini, did you see both of the shots?"
"Yeah, the one on top and the one below."
What was the Dixie doing there?
"My particular job was sailmaker, and I made all those canvas boots that people wore. Five thousand pair of 'em. Me and the crew in the sail locker and the bosen's mate and then, when we were through, we made stack covers for the target fleet. We were there for a year."
What did you do on the day of the first shot?
"Well we lined up and watched that B-29 come over, and we covered our eyes and then watched the cloud go up." Harold said, "You could see right through your arm.
"On the second one, (Shot Baker) we saw the tidal wave, it was about a hundred feet high."
Thinking of the base surge that is seen with the Baker shot, I asked Harold, "Did any of the spray get on your ship?"
"Oh yeah. We were on one side of Bikini and the bomb went off on the other. We got the spray. Yeah, we got wet. We thought it was pretty nice. Nobody ever heard about radioactivity before."
Did they check you with Geiger counters and make you take your clothes off?
" No. On the Able Shot, we had some ship parked in the middle there that had a hot side and a cold side. You went aboard the hot side and took a shower and they gave you clothes and you went off on the cold side. You never wore the same clothes twice."
Did you ever go fishing in the lagoon after the shots?
"No, but we went swimming though. Whenever we got too hot we went swimming."
"We were parked close to the Mt. McKinley most of the time and we watched the Saratoga go down. The scuttlebutt on the ship said we were five miles from the blast."
Did the explosion seem pretty big to you?
"Oh yeah. It shook that ship like a bowl of jelly, that was on the one on top. (The air burst, Able Shot.)
I asked if he had sent off for his military records.
"When I signed up for disability, I put down Dixie and Bikini, and you know anything with the government takes 120 days. Well, according to the government, there is no ship Dixie, so that took 120 days. Well, I said there were 1200 people on that thing. So, I had another 120 days and they couldn't find my records. They said you were never in the Navy. Fortunatly, I kept my mail and all that, for souveniers, ya know. I dug all that out from my mother's basement and it took damn near a year to prove I was in the Navy. I never did get my disability, of course."
Harold does have medical problems. He said, "I put in for a walker, at the VA. They said, 'Oh, we can't do that. You have to buy that yourself.'"
I ask him if he wore a film badge.
"No, I never had one of those. We didn't have goggles or film badges. I remember them coming aboard with their Geiger counters, checking your sea-bags and all that. I remember mine just about broke the machine. I still had it till about a year ago. Somebody broke into my mother's basement and stole it. "
I ask him a little bit more about his health problems.
"I can't get around very good. I got one of those electric scooters. That thing is wore out now. It stopped on me right in the middle of Burnside Street. (Large major street in Portland, Ore.) Fortunately there was a man and two women who pushed me across the street."
We both were laughing at the predicament and I said, "There you were, an Atomic Veteran, stranded out in the middle of Burnside,"
Then, he added, "Yeah and I had my sweatshirt on too, Atomic Veteran. I'm trying to get a new electric scooter. The Rotary Club is trying to get me one."
" About ten years ago the VA gave me a 'Cat-Scan' and some muscle tests. They didn't tell me anything though. I asked the doctor how I was doing and all I got was a grunt. Every time I go up there I wear my atomic bomb sweatshirt, I got it at the convention. Only time I wear it is when I go to the VA."
Harold ask me if I had seen the book Operation Crossroads and I said "Yes." He said that was stolen too. He said he wants to have the Crossroads video, and he has a copy of Radio Bikini.
I promised that the Crossroads vets would be having a meeting real soon and that I would let him know when.
He said, "Yeah them guys would want to know who made them booties."
Keith Whittle
September 26, 1997