| [begin 05222011 Interview with Glen Tarbet.5] |
GT | To start over, I do that, huh? |
JB2 | Yes. That’s right. Very good. |
GT | Let’s see. I was talking about moving the house from right behind Godfreys’ to the west end of our property, and then, the dictation took about a twelve-hour lapse, so I’m restarting now, in the afternoon of the 23rd of May, 2011, at 2:27pm Arkansas time. We resided in the house right behind Godfreys’ until we had it rolled down onto our property, and one major thing that happened while we were still living in the house right behind Godfreys’ was the neighbors two houses away — the Adamsons’ house caught fire and burned down. We had some of the Adamson children come and live in our house with us. That didn’t last for very long. I don’t know why. I think the Adamsons quickly built themselves shelter, but I wrote a story about that that was published in the BYU magazine. I can’t remember the name of the magazine, but that [the publication] happened in 1955. I have a copy of it somewhere of the magazine. It’s pretty interesting, I think.
I went to school right away, to Plymouth Elementary in the sixth grade, I had a very good time for the rest of the sixth grade at Plymouth. I enjoyed the — my fellow students there, and I rode the school bus to school to Plymouth for the rest of my time — for the rest of that year and the next three, through the ninth grade. My most, I think — well, a couple of very happy things happened while I was in Plymouth. In the 9th grade I was elected Chief Justice, and had to hold court for a few kids that misbehaved. I can’t remember exactly what happened, except the advisor, Mr. Broadbent, did most of the judging. [laughter] In fact, I guess he did all of the judging, and just prompted me a little bit. I also was in the glee club and I was chosen to play the bass fiddle by the band leader, Mr. Jepson, who was a victim of polio, I think — at least, he was quite crippled, but a very fine gentleman and taught me as much as he could about playing the bass, not being a player of one himself, but he conducted the band and the orchestra, and they were about altogether at least, oh, well, not more than a fourth the size of one of Victor’s organizations. But, I was also in the glee club, and when I was in the ninth grade, for some reason the music superintendent for Granite District chose me to sing a duet for the Aaronic Priesthood Boys Choir that presented a program on the fifteenth of May, and I was the alto in a duet, and I can’t even remember the name of the song that I sang. I got to keep the songbook for the boys choir, but it disappeared while I was living in the Avenues in — oh, I guess it was 1965. That was while Gay and I were separated, before we were divorced. But, I cherished that songbook, so if any of you know where it is, I’d please like it back, so I could at least have it for the rest of my life. It was an Aaronic Priesthood Boys Songbook. That was a cherished experience for most of my ninth grade, into my first year in high school, and second year. I was in the Aaronic Priesthood Boys Choir, and my good friend, Robert Collier and I went together to the rehearsals on Wednesday nights. And, I also at the same time had the privilege of playing the bass fiddle for the McKin? [00:07:05.0] Junior Symphony Orchestra, rehearsing on the same nights as the boys choir sang. [end]
|
| [begin 05222011 Interview with Glen Tarbet.6] |
GT | Soon after the house was moved down in the field from behind the Godfreys, we finally got our own outdoor toilet facilities, and when it was first built, our privy didn’t have a roof. That was quite a lot of fun. I called it “the observatory” because I could sit there and look at the stars a lot of the time. And, we also had a lot of bricks that we had salvaged from someplace, that I got to lay in and build a walk back to where the privy was, so we wouldn’t have to walk in the mud. For a long time before that, though, we had planks that we walked on. And, we also had a — Dad Tarbet built a shower in our backyard, which had a fifty-gallon drum on its side on the top, and a showerhead on it, and we filled that up with water during the summer, so when I didn’t feel like going down to the Jordan — to dive in the Jordan River, I would shower in that stall or, actually, most of the time I was in junior high school or high school, and did most of my school time bathing in the school showers, or in the swimming pool at Granite High School. Granite High School swimming was a very serious experience for me. It’s what I did for most of my gym periods, and when I was a junior in high school, I was doing my favorite thing, swimming under water, and one of the boys dove off the shore and collided heads with me. Several other boys rescued me, although I was unconscious, and gave me artificial respiration and saved my life. But, I think I have suffered ever since from that, from loss of memory. I was put in the County Hospital for a month because of it, and when I got out, it took me several months before I was totally able to walk. I remember one time we went on a hike up Big Cottonwood Canyon, up at the top, and I remember Gene Cook hiked with me up the mountain, and I could only go about half as fast as he went, because my legs weren’t working right. But, I got all the way to the top and all the way back down in spite of that. Another thing that happened before my accident is, when I first became a Boy Scout I got to be a Second Class, and when I was trying to qualify for first class, we did what was then called a fourteen-mile hike. And, Don Alguyer, Bishop Alguyer’s son, and I went together on our “fourteen-mile” hike — and that has to big quotation marks, because I’ve since calculated that we only walked about a mile up the canyon —well, we got up past Tracy Wigwam, but I know it wasn’t much more than —at most, it could have been two miles. And, we camped overnight and we slung hammocks between a couple of trees for our bunks, and built fires under them, and I about froze to death, but Don kept me warm. I’ll never forget that. But, we never did get to be First Class Scouts because the Boy Scout Troop fell apart and there wasn’t anybody to do the leadership work. So, I had acquired all of the qualifications for First Class, but never got the award. I have regretted that all my life, because I always wanted to be a First Class and so on. In fact, I had several merit badges towards being a Star, and even a Life Scout, but never got by my First Class. So, you can pity me for that. [chuckles] |
AT | You still got funding. |
GT | I still remember the Scout Law and the Scout Oath, the slogan the motto, and they’ve met a lot to me all my life. And, of course, at the same time I was learning those things, I was learning the Articles of Faith and fulfilling my duties as a deacon and a teacher. I became Deacons Quorum President and Teachers [Quorum] President, and Priests [Quorum] Secretary before I joined the Navy. I graduated from Granite High School. I was seventeen when I graduated, in 1949. But, I had all of my college prerequisites, and, as I mentioned I think before, my mother had persuaded Uncle Virgil and Aunt Edna to let me live at their house in Logan for my first year at Utah State. Soon after I started — I think I was in the eighth grade at Plymouth, when Mr. Jepson decided he wanted me to play the bass fiddle for the junior high school orchestra. He should me how to do that, and I did my best on that. And, I also qualified to play the bass drum for the band. I did both things, and my mother quite often since then has confused the two. I kind of surprised her with the bass drum. I hadn’t told her that I was doing that too, and she came to the first program where I was playing, and she was surprised to see me playing the bass drum as well as the bass fiddle. While I was in the ninth grade at Plymouth, my good friend, Vern Mockley, who was head boy and also had his own little band —he was a very skillful trombone player — started a little dance combo and had me borrow Plymouth’s bass fiddle, and I played the bass fiddle for them. Not long after that, Vern Middleton came back from the Navy. This was after the end of World War II. He made very fast friends with my mother, and he leant me the money I needed to buy a bass fiddle. So, I paid a hundred dollars for the bass fiddle that I got and was able to use it to play in the band combos I was in. I’ve played many, many band dances with Vern Mockley’s little band. It was called The Harmony Five. He was on trombone, and we had a girl that played the saxophone, and one that played the piano, and me on the bass fiddle. So, it was The Harmony Five [editor: missing one member/instrument]. And, we played lots of weddings and church dances all over the place. And, we also had several ward traveling assemblies that I was privileged to take part in, and my mother also sang and played the piano for some of the traveling assemblies — I mean, not traveling assemblies, but ward road shows. The traveling assemblies — the reason I got confused with that is I was on the traveling assembly for Granite High School, and we went to several different high schools to play for their assemblies, and of course, they brought their traveling assemblies to Granite. But, I got to play the bass fiddle for them, and played for a skit that was performed, and for a combo. Our combo was on the talent show. It was a different combo than The Harmony Five. It was just The Three G’s. There was Glen, Gene, and Gordon. Gene was on the piano, and Gordon was on the drums, and we played “How High The Moon” for the talent show, and we got huge applause, but we didn’t win because there was somebody that was a violinist — a very fine violinist who was judged the winner by the faculty judges. The high school traveling assembly went to South High School, and East, and West, and Jordan. That was kind of the tradition, I think, for the area. And, that was a lot of fun. I played the bass fiddle for a skit that was performed, and I also got to play the bass fiddle for the high school choir when they sang “Dem Bones”. That wasn’t the traveling assembly, that was just a high school assembly, but it was a lot of fun. But, I guess that’s what I had the most fame for in high school. While in high school, we also had clubs during the noon hour and I was in the electronics club when I was a senior in high school. Of course, I took chemistry and physics in high school too. I was convinced that I wanted to be a physicist. And so, that’s what I aimed at when I went to Utah State. I was registered as a physics major. The way they worked it there is, you didn’t take any physics when you were a freshman, which is all I was at Utah State. But, I took chemistry — three quarters of chemistry, and I finished with a B+ average in chemistry, which I pretty good, I think, for chemistry because it’s a very difficult subject. I think I got all A’s my final quarter in chemistry, which is how I managed to get a B+ average. When I finished my freshman year in college, I decided that my best hope was to join the Navy, which I did. I went and signed up to join the Navy, but they told me I had to lose thirty pounds before I could be accepted. So, I set out to do that. I weighed about 210 lbs then, which was — [chuckles] I wish I could that right now. I’m about 290 lbs — close to 290 lbs now — I think maybe a little less right now. But, I got from 210 lbs to 180 lbs when I joined the Navy — when I finally got to join the Navy. I finally joined the Navy in December of 1950. [end] |
| [begin 05222011 Interview with Glen Tarbet.7] |
GT | During the summer of 1950, my really best friend, Glen Bolden, was called on a mission, and he had his missionary preparation all done and was accepted on a mission, and he got his draft notice. And, he had to report to join the Army. And, that was because that’s just when the Korean War began. It wasn’t long after he got in the Army, that I got on a call to go on a mission, but I decided I didn’t want to happen to me what happened to Glen, so I joined the Navy. I managed to get in the Navy just in time, I think, to avoid getting called in the draft. When I signed up to join the Navy, I was promised that I would be an electronics technician aboard a submarine, and so that’s what I aimed for. I had no idea what an electronics technician did in the Navy, but it sounded pretty exciting to me. So, I said, “Well, okay. That’s what I want to be.” And, of course, they gave me tests to see if I qualified for that . [end] |
| [begin 05222011 Interview with Glen Tarbet.8] |
JT | Okay. We’re all here together for Family Night tonight. It is May 23, 2011. We’re in Sam and Julia Bernards’ home, and present is Isaac. Ethan, Carol and Dora have already gone to bed, but Brad Bernards, Sr., is on the sofa with Josh leaning there on his lap, and James is sitting on the hearth, and Grandpa Glen Frank Tarbet is in the chair, and Grandma Ann Tarbet is next him, and on the sofa is Rachel, and in the middle is Max Bernards leaning on Kiki [Kristen] Bernards who is playing with his hair, and . . . who’s in the kitchen? |
BB | Julia. |
AT | Julia? |
JB | Julia stepped into the kitchen. . . . [distraction] Um . . . We’ve had some tornadoes that last night there was a big tornado in Joplin, which is about an hour’s drive to the north of us, and we sheltered in the stake center here in Bentonville, while James had his seminary graduation. But, we’re here tonight for Family Night, and I have a special question that I would like to ask Grandpa to share with us for Family Night. And, anybody who has questions or interjections or conversations, feel free to ask Grandpa. But, I think tonight I’d really like it, Dad, if you would share with us how you gained your testimony of the Gospel, and some of your experiences that were either early — some in the early part of your life, and later on how you — who taught you and how you learned and how you gained your testimony. |
GT | That covers a lot of ground. I’m sure it began with when I was — when I first became conscious of my surroundings. My grandparents and my aunts and uncles were faithful Mormons, largely, and I adopted their habits to begin with, but from the time I was in the Tarbet home, by which I mean when my mother married Glen E. Tarbet, my first step-father, that it was quite different, because the Tarbets were not faithful members. And so, I was — |
JB | So, that was when you were in the Cornia home, they were faithful members — |
GT | The Cornias were somewhat faithful. Grandpa Tarbet [Cornia] was an employee of Cook Tea and Coffee Company, and sold coffee — the makings of coffee. Cook Tea and Coffee Company made coffee, baked — roasted coffee beans, and sold their products to restaurants. And, Grandpa Cornia was an agent for them and delivered coffee grounds — that is, very high caliber coffee, to restaurants and hotels all over the intermountain area. And, I had the privilege of going with him. But, he was a high priest and he had been in a bishopric as a younger man — not when I was well-acquainted with him. But, he took me —When I was five years old I remember very clearly having him take me to the old Fourteenth Ward, which was on — let’s see —between First and Second West, I believe on First South —if I remember right. It’s hard for me to place it. But, it was right next to Sweet Candy Company, and just down the street from Whitaker Court, which I talked about earlier on this recording. But, I was — I think I must have been five years old when he took me to Sacrament Meeting, and I can remember singing “The Spirit of God Like a Fire Is Burning” with everybody else, as best as a five-year-old could. But I remember how I impressed I was with that. I think that probably was part of the beginning of my religious happiness. Then, I mentioned when we moved to Chesterfield, I was thirteen years old when I decided I wanted to be a Boy Scout, and I found out how to get into that, and it turned out to be that I went to the Boy Scout meetings which were also Aaronic Priesthood meetings. And, by then, I had been baptized —I was baptized when I was eight years old, but between then and when I turned thirteen, I was very sketchily active in the Church. I did go to Primary and to Junior Sunday School a few times, but Grandpa Cornia was the only one of my family who ever took me to church — that is, to the Mormon Church. Peggy Cornia, who I told you walked me to the Washington Elementary School and back whenever I could catch her, took me to the Church of England church [ed: Episcopalian] a couple of times, and actually, I was more impressed with what I experienced there than I was in the Mormon Church because they were very disciplined and it was quiet, which couldn’t be said with where Grandpa took me to the Fourteenth Ward. When I went to the Junior Sunday School, there wasn’t a teacher for the little kids —the four-year-olds, and it was just chaos, and playing around for a bunch of little kids. That didn’t impress me at all. And then I — later on, when I was six and seven years old, I did go to Primary at the Eighth Ward, when we lived in Moffatt Court. Sometimes I did, and I did go to Junior Sunday School occasionally when — I can’t remember exactly how it happened, but it wasn’t steady. And then, I mentioned earlier that my friend in the apartment house on Third East, Ronald Franz, took me to church with him, and he and his mother convinced us to have me baptized when he was baptized, after I’d turned eight years old. But, from then on, I did a little more going to Sunday School. And then when we moved to Chesterfield, I was completely inactive until I turned thirteen and decided to become a Boy Scout. The Boy Scout activities were mingled very much with the Aaronic Priesthood activities then, and I was acquainted with friends who were very active in the Church, including the Pederson family who had seven boys and three girls, and their father had been bishop of the ward —the Redwood Ward —uh, Oliver C. Pederson — while I was — after we first moved there. He was bishop, I think for the two or three years that we lived there before I became active in the Church. And then, he was replaced by Bishop Clarence Alguyer, and I was close friends with Bishop Alguyer’s son, Don Alguyer, a lot of the time. In fact, he and I went together on our “fourteen mile” hike that I mentioned earlier. We were close friends for a lot of the time. But, that was the beginning of my religious experience. When I was fifteen, is when I had my first real epiphany. I went to Temple Square — and, of course, another thing I should have mentioned is that when we lived on North Temple, I spent a lot of time playing on Temple Square. We lived just about three blocks from Temple Square, and I spent a lot of time on my own or with friends running around and visiting the —what they called the museum then —the museum of Church History. . . . Kiki is just telling us that she went out with a young man named Josh Cornia at one time, and I’m sure that he’s related because I doubt if there are any Cornias who aren’t related. It’s a very rare name. In fact, Cornia is really a corruption of Cournoyer, [cour-no-yay] and it just happens that Dr. Robert Cournoyer —or, Cornia is what his name has come to be, only he pronounces it “Corniea” — |
BB | Is he an eye doctor? [laughter] |
GT | He’s not an eye doctor. But, he’s a member of our ward, and he traces his ancestry back to the same man who is my second great-grandfather — |
JB | Peter Cornia. |
GT | No, Peter Cornia’s father. He traces his ancestry back to Peter Cornia’s father, my second — Peter Cornia was my great-grandfather, and his father and Dr. Corniea’s second great grandfather or something like that were the same. |
JB | Are you recording? |
GT | Yes. |
JB | Okay. Good. |
GT | Anyway . . . . Let’s see. Where was I. |
JB | Your bishop was — your best friend was the bishop’s son. |
GT | My best friend, Don Alguyer, Bishop Alguyer’s friend [son] and I were —well, he wasn’t my best friend, but almost. I had several really close friends that we did a lot of things together. And, this had really a great deal of influence on my testimony, and teachers I had in school influenced my testimony. When I went — my first teacher at Plymouth Junior High, in the sixth grade, was Mrs. Frisbee. [laughter] and she was a wonderful lady — |
BB | Throw her out and she’d always come back. |
GT | Who was a very faithful Latter-day Saint and let everybody know that, and spread the Gospel in her class, which she couldn’t possibly do today. |
BB | You can in Arkansas. |
JB3 | You can in Arkansas, actually. |
GT | Really? |
JB3 | The schools are very involved with religion. |
MB | We’re in the Bible belt. |
GT | Can you? Well, good. |
BB | Especially if you have white sheets. |
JB2 | You go to choirs and they are constantly only singing songs about God. It’s really great. |
GT | Well, that’s good. Mrs. Frisbee took a liking to me immediately, and I liked her, and she did a lot to promote the religion. And, I had another teacher there — Mr. Frame was my seventh grade homemade shop teacher — home room, not homemade —home room shop teacher. But, he was very, very obviously active LDS. In fact, later on, he became bishop of the Taylorsville Ward — the Plymouth Elementary and Junior High Schools were in Taylorsville, and he lived just up the street from the school. But, he was a strong influence on me. And, of course, I must acknowledge that probably the strongest influence to my gaining a testimony was from my Uncle Virgil and Aunt Edna, who were very faithful. Uncle Virgil was on the High Council in Logan for a long time, and Stake Sunday School Superintendant, and bishop of the Eighth Ward, I think, when he died, or shortly before he died. And he and Aunt Edna were very influential in teaching me the Gospel and answering my questions about it. And, they lived right across the street, as I mentioned before, from the Logan Temple, and I spent a lot of time playing around the temple. Calvin, their youngest son, began by cutting the lawns of the temple, and he later became the building engineer for the temple. When he retired, he was the longest — he had been an employee of the Church for longer than anyone else. And, he still lives in Logan. I haven’t talked to him for a couple of years, so I don’t know how he is now. But, he’s still there and he was my childhood hero. He’s, I think about six years older than I am, and he used to come with Uncle Virgil and Aunt Edna — When I was a little kid, they used to come when we lived in Alamo Place and stay at Grandma and Grandpa’s, and leave Calvin with me there, while they went dancing at the Coconut Grove or the Rainbow Rendezvous or whatever it was when they were there. And, Calvin and I would do all kinds of fun things together, especially like going down in the basement under the Cornia home —the basement had a trap door access to it in the kitchen of the place, and it had a dirt floor in the basement. It was a very interesting place, and where Grandma Cornia stored her homemade wine and her root beer that she made. |
JB | You were going to tell us about the Gospel — your conversion to the Gospel, and some of your experiences. |
GT | Jami just reminded that I’m supposed to be talking about my conversion to the Gospel, and actually, I think I grew up with the Gospel, as I’ve been describing. I started to —I think I started to mention my first really strong exposure to it was when I was fifteen, I felt like I was the same age as —or very close to it as Joseph Smith. And one time I decided I would take a tour on the Temple grounds —take the Temple Grounds tour that they gave, and I remember feeling very strongly the impression that what I was hearing was the absolute truth. And, I’m trying to think of the name of the guide that took me on his tour with about twenty other people. He later became one of the Presidents of the Seventy. I can’t think of his name right now, but it will come to me later, I think. |
BB | S. Delworth Young. |
GT | No, it wasn’t S. Delworth Young. It was — |
BB | Alvin Dyer |
GT | [chuckles] No. He was a young man who had just returned from his mission when he was a guide on Temple Square. |
BB | Oh. Marion Hanks. |
GT | Marion D. Hanks. That’s the one. |
BB | See? I knew it! |
GT | [chuckles] And uh |
BB | You said ‘young’ and I knew who it was. |
AT | No, that’s Brigham. |
GT | Well, Elder Hanks really created a powerful impression on me at that time. |
BB | He was very enthusiastic. |
GT | What? |
BB | He was very enthusiastic. |
GT | He was very enthusiastic and very intelligent and very convincing. He told the Joseph Smith Story very beautifully and bore testimony to the truth of it, and it really struck me then that I was really close to being the same sort of fellow as Joseph Smith was. And, I’ve always felt that way since then. But, uh — I think — Did Marion D. Hanks die recently? He was one of my heroes for a long time. And then, when I joined the Navy, I did so, as I mentioned earlier, because my very best friend, Glen Boldon, had been called on a mission and then got his draft call because the Korean War started. He had to go into the Army and couldn’t go on his mission. I got called on a mission at the same time, but — or, just a little bit later than that, I guess I should say. But, I didn’t want the same thing to happen to me that happened to Glen. James, what’s your question? |
JB4 | When you were in the Navy, did you ever think about joining the Navy Seals? |
GT | No, I never — I was never that brave a guy. [chuckles] But I — when I first went to be recruited in the Navy, when I visited the recruiting office, they encouraged me to sign up to be an electronics technician, which I was — I had no idea what an electronics technician was, but it really sounded great. |
BB | I don’t think the Seals came into existence until Viet Nam. |
GT | No, I think they were in existence during the Korean War too. |
JB4 | When were you a Navy Seal? |
GT | Oh, I never was a Navy Seal. |
JB4 | When were you in the Navy? |
GT | I joined the Navy in 1950 — in December of 1950, I finally got in the Navy. When I first went to join, they told me I had to lose thirty pounds. I was thirty pounds over the maximum weight. |
BB | They make ships kind of go over to one side. [laughter] |
GT | That took me three months. They promised me that they would make me an electronics technician aboard a submarine. They did make me an electronics technician, but what happened was, while I was in electronics school, they decided that I was an excellent candidate to take a special equipment course on airborne early warning radar, which very few submarines had. I think there were only about two submarines in the Navy that had it. And almost every aircraft carrier had it, so I got put aboard an aircraft carrier. |
AT | You need to tell them — |
| What do I need to tell them, dear? |
AT | I think you need to tell them about having passed with the highest score. And how the people found out. |
GT | Well, I really should have kept that a secret. |
AT | I think your kids need to know that. |
GT | When I was in boot camp, I was a funny looking guy. I had hair about a mile long and — |
JB3 | Really? Awesome! |
GT | [chuckles] it was long hair. |
JB3 | Was it curly? |
GT | By a lot of people’s —it was a little bit longer than James’ hair, is all. But, I was —when I first went to boot camp, I had been to college for a year and — at Utah State, and I’ve talked about that a little already. But, to answer Grandma’s prompting, they gave a test one day —a GCT test they call it: General Classifications Test — and when I — oh, I guess it was a few days after that, after they had evaluated the tests, I was coming out of a class and I made the mistake of scratching my ear in a line coming out, and the drill chief said, [gruffly] “Look at that! Get your hand down, Tarbet! That just goes to show you that just because you get the highest score on the GCT in the company, you’re not capable of keeping your hands where they belong. “ [laughter] |
JB3 | That’s awesome. |
GT | But, you know, I had been kind of scorned by more people before that, but after that I was really admired. [laughter] I felt really good about my status after that. [laughter] |
AT | You need to feel good about that. I wanted your kids to know about it. |
GT | I was treated a lot differently after the chief said that. But, — |
BB | He was a smart man. [laughter] |
GT | But, I uh —that’s really how I got to be in electronics school. I found out that electronics school really meant that they were training me to be a repairman of the shipboard electronics equipment. That’s what happened to me. They put me in the class for shipboard airborne electronics equipment, and so that was — |
AT | That’s what you got to do on the — because of that. |
GT | Well . . . |
AT | When you went over to the destroyer — |
GT | Oh yeah, one time there was a destroyer in the task force over by Korea, that had shipboard AEW electronics and they couldn’t make it work. And they high-lined me over to fix it. |
AT | Tell them what high-lining is. |
BB | Tell us — it’s really beaming up, but . . . horizontally. |
GT | [chuckles]. Yeah. They take a gun and shoot a line from the aircraft carrier over to the destroyer, and pull it over, and rig it so that they can haul over a hanging personnel basket, and I got to ride in that basket between the ships. [exclamations] |
AT | While the ocean was what? |
BB | Heaving and hoeing. |
GT | Well, they’re pretty good at keeping things quite calm while they’re doing that operation. But, the destroyer of course was a much different ship from the great big Boxer, and I got their equipment fixed, just in time to go and throw up over the side, seasick. [chuckles] [laughter] |
AT | From the trip over, right? |
GT | No, it wasn’t from the trip over. It was because the destroyer was pitching and yawing and all that stuff. It was a lot rougher ride than on the aircraft carrier. |
JB | So, how far apart were they when you did the zip line? |
BB | About thirty miles. [laughter] |
GT | I guess about oh, thirty yards apart. [laughter] |
BB | Well, I was close. It had a thirty in it. |
JB | How wide is a football field? |
Everybody | [unintelligible] |
JB | Fifty — |
JB4 | A football field is approximately thirty yards — [descent] |
JB | Wide? |
MB | I thought it was fifty. |
GT | No, it’s more like fifty yards wide. |
JB | And how high above sea level was the zip line. I know those ships — |
GT | It would be about twenty feet above the water. |
JB | Did you have to wear a life vest when you were doing that? |
GT | Oh, yes. [various comments] But, it happened so fast, it only took about five seconds to zip across. |
JB | But, did you step in and release yourself, or did someone else push you. |
GT | No, they — There was a line that pulled me across. After I got in position, the boson blew a whistle, and away I went. |
AT | Tell them about your private office and how you kept people out. |
GT | [chuckles] Well, the AEW equipment was in a little room — oh, about half the size of this room, I guess, and it had a locked door and I got to be in charge of that room with all the equipment in it. And, it was halfway between the hanger deck and the flight deck, and during flight operations, I found out that the plane pushers, when they have a moment off, would come down and get in my room and flake out on the deck. So, I made a sign and put it on the door that said “Danger 30,000 volts” [laughter]. Nobody ever went in there after that. |
BB | Highly radioactive area. |
MB | They probably didn’t know about radioactivity |
GT | It wasn’t radioactive, but 30,000 volts was what they called a getter voltage, and it was in a little box that was really inaccessible in a closed space under a deck. |
JB4 | There’s something about that number. |
GT | Nobody would go in there when they saw that sign on the door. |
MB | You know when you shock somebody when you walk across a carpet? And like, touch somebody and a little spark flies, that’s ten thousand volts. |
KB | Is it really? |
JB | Oh, so that’s just three times a little carpet shock. |
MB | Three times a little shock. [laughter] |
AT | [0:35:06.01] |
GT | That’s right. |
JB4 | The resistance would be different. |
BB | It’s kind of like they use a pendulum at the Eyring Center at BYU so the students — |
GT | [0:35:18.4] |
BB | They were tired of everybody touching it, and everybody disregarded the signs, so somebody wrote 100,000 Ohms on it. [laughter] and noooobody touched it. [laughter] |
MB | That’s funny. |
JB2 | And an Ohm is worth nothing. |
GT | I remember seeing that. |
MB | It’s a measure of resistance. |
JB4 | It blocks electrical field. |
BB | So, now, it’s actually an engraved sign on there. 100,000 Ohms. [laughter] And all the kids who know about it got a laugh out of it. The other ones don’t touch it. |
AT | Tell them what happened when that —with a couple of wrecks you saw on the floor of the ship. |
GT | Well, I did get some crashes. The first one was on the first cruise across, we had a new flight group aboard that were doing their qualification flights in their F9-F jet planes, off Hawaii. |
BB | Are these —were these Phantoms? Phantom jets? |
GT | Yes. F9-F Phantoms |
BB | Boy. How’d I know that? |
GT | They were doing qualification flights and landings. |
BB | Those were new. |
GT | Yeah, they were quite new planes then. I think they were brand new. |
BB | Yeah. One of the longest used fighter jets. |
GT | But, anyway, I went up to my duty station during the flight operations, which was on the eleventh deck, which is six decks up from the flight deck in the island. What’s called the island is, the superstructure in the middle of the aircraft carrier. But, I was watching jets land, and one came in and — came in low and hit the fantail of the ship, about halfway through the plane, and it broke in two. I saw that happen, and the front end of the jet slid off the starboard side of the ship and sunk in the ocean, and they never recovered the pilot. He was killed. |
BB | Ouch. |
AT | He saw his face as he was going — |
GT | That’s right. I could see him in the cockpit. |
BB | He couldn’t even eject? Or he just didn’t do it? |
GT | He might have disabled it or something, or it happened too fast, or maybe he decided it was too dangerous to eject after he hit the plane and . . . [end] |
| [begin 05222011 Interview with Glen Tarbet.9] |
AT | Awesome |
JT | Say something into that . . . . . . there we go. I want you guys to know one of my earliest experiences when I felt the Spirit, and I didn’t think at the time, “Oh. I’m feeling the Spirit.” I just can look back and realize that that’s what it was. And it’s when I gained my testimony of the Church. And that was how I grew up —just knowing that it was true. Because, I remember when I was a little girl, we had a big old double bed — to me it seemed huge, but it was probably just a regular double bed — and my sister Carrie and I would sleep on that bed. This was before I started kindergarten — so, I was probably four or five. And, Grandpa —your grandpa, my dad —would come in and lay across the end of the bed at nighttime to get us to sleep. And, he would lay down on that bed and he would sing to us. And, he would let us choose our favorite song. And, my favorite song to hear him sing was “O, How Lovely Was The Morning”. And, I knew when I heard my dad sing that that he believed that it was true, and that was when I gained my testimony of the Prophet Joseph Smith. And, it’s been with me my whole life. I just have always known it’s true, and it’s because of my dad’s testimony. |
GT | Thank you very much, Jami. [small chuckle] |
JB3 | Thank you, Mom and Grandpa. |
JB | So, I’d kind of like to sing that song for our closing song, if that’s okay? Max? |
| [Plunking guitar strings] . . . [piano] . . . [lovely harmonic singing] |
Everyone | O how lovely was the morning Radiant beamed the sun above. Bees were humming, sweet birds singing. Music ringing through the grove. When, within the shady woodland Joseph saw the God of Love. When within the shady woodland, Joseph saw the God of Love.
Humbly kneeling, sweet appealing, Was the boy’s first uttered prayer. When the powers of sin assailing Filled his soul with deep despair. But, undaunted still he trusted In his Heavenly Father’s care. But undaunted still he trusted In his Heavenly Father’s prayer.
Suddenly a light descended, Brighter far than noonday sun. As the shining, glorious pillar O’er him fell, all around him shone. When appeared two heavenly beings, God the Father and the Son. When appeared two heavenly beings, God the Father and the Son.
“Joseph, this is my Beloved. Hear Him!” Oh how sweet the word. Joseph’s humble prayer was answered And he listened to the Lord. Oh, what rapture filled his bosom, For he saw the living God. O what rapture filled his bosom, For he saw the living God. |
BB | Second verse. [end] |
| [Begin 05222011 Interview with Glen Tarbet] |
GT | [singing] Where could I go and how would I know . . . ‘Scuse me. My voice is shot. |
AT | You’ve been talking a lot today. |
GT | [change of key] Where could I go and how would I know For doubt filled my mind in search of truth. While reading one day, what God had to say, “If anyone lack wisdom, in faith let him pray.” Spring filled the air, sweet was her song That morning. Flowers bloomed fair. They to each tree adorning While all alone, finding a grove and kneeling I spoke to God in prayer. Then, there came a power that would destroy me. God, in that same hour, with Christ appeared in glory. “Joseph,” he said, calling my name, and saying: “This is my beloved Son. Hear him.” O their love serene I felt above me. And, my heart did sing as I beheld their glory. Radiant and bright, clothed in their power before me. A boy who sought God in humble prayer. [applause] [hack/cough] |
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