This book covers the events I encountered as an active duty member of the U.S. Coast Guard.

Oral history of Capt. David Oliver, USCG (Ret.) concerning his career with the Coast Guard. Oliver describes how he enters the Coast Guard just before the U.S. enters WWII.; his first sea duty assignment at Norfolk, Va., aboard the U.S. Coast Guard cutter Dione; transatlantic convoy duty aboard the Dione (1941-1942); patroling for German U-boats; pilot training; air-sea rescue duty at San Diego, Calif. (1942-1944); learning to land seaplanes at sea; helicopter training and early work with helicopters (1944-1946); rejoining the Coast Guard as a regular officer and flying rescue seaplanes out of Salem, Mass. (1946-1947); working with Coast Guard Lt. Frank Erickson in rotary wing development and air-sea rescue duty and North Atlantic ice patrol from Elizabeth City, N.C. (1947-1950); commanding officer of the first helicopter detachment based at Floyd Bennett Field, in Brooklyn, N.Y.; Coast Guard duty at Kodiak, Alaska (1954-1956) and at the San Francisco air station (1956-1958); Coast Guard duty in New Orleans, La., learning to fly jets, and test piloting jet fighter planes (1958-1960); Coast Guard duty at Juneau, Alaska; sea duty aboard the Ingham (1962-1964); duty at Coast Guard headquarters in Washington, D.C., relating to small boat safety in the U.S. (1964-1968); final Coast Guard assignment as captain of the port in Chicago (1968-1970); and managing the American Boat and Yacht Council, New York, N.Y. (1970-1973).

Blue Water and Rocky Lights takes you back to a Coast Guard that would hardly be recognizable today with officer candidate school at the Coast Guard Academy, and cutters of World War II or older vintage. Lawrence G. Desmond, a junior officer aboard the cutters Mclane and Avoyel, tells a historic story sprinkled with anecdotes and good humor. It's illustrated with color and B-W photos of shipboard life, crew members, rescues, and photographic documentation of the exceptional seamanship required to supply St. George Reef lighthouse in the often treacherous seas off the coast of northern California.

The US Coast Guard patrols US and international waters. Guardsmen enforce laws and help rescue people who are stranded at sea. Some Guardsmen serve in the United States, while others serve abroad in other countries. Life in the US Coast Guard shares what daily life is like for different members of the US Coast Guard.

Throughout the United States, local residents customarily view their hometown U.S. Coast Guard units as intimate parts of the civilian community. Nowhere is this truer than in the Great Lakes region. Here, for almost 200 years, the lives of the people and Coast Guardsmen have been intermingled in a most special bond.As enterprising Americans pressed westward along the southern shores of these primeval lakes and upon them, aids to navigation in the form of lighthouses and buoys, and armed revenue cutters were promptly provided by the Federal Government to facilitate their progress. Other varied services of the entity destined to become known as the U.S. Coast Guard, whether lifesaving stations, inspections of steam vessels or regulation of navigational waterways, were provided as needs arose, until today, the Service is ubiquitous on the Inland Seas.

While the Coast Guards many battles at sea in the War on Drugs are widely known, its participation in the ground offensive is not. Indeed, the Guard didnt just send its cutters to interdict narcotics-laden vessels attempting to bring their illicit cargo into Uncle Sams territorial waters, it sent ground troops to foreign lands to train their forces and, when necessary, directly engage the enemy. But to create the type of force needed was no small task and would not be without tribulation, both from within and outside the organization. The road traveled to complete the mission was laden with obstacles. This is not a story about the Coast Guard you know, or think you know. Rather, this is a story about the other side, the side that history nearly forgot; not the standard, but the antithesis of standard. It is a story that will undoubtedly make even the most seasoned Coast Guardsmen question their understanding of the organization to which they belong. To be sure, This is not your fathers Coast Guard.