Happy Veterans Day!

Happy Veterans Day to my mom 

and all our other Veterans 

on 11/11/11!
Thank you and God bless you all!

Songs for a Navy WAVE

While doing more sorting today, I came across a little booklet of songs my mother received when she served as a Navy WAVE in the 1940s. I thought I'd share some of them with you just for fun. Sing along with me if you'd like!

(Warning: What follows may not be entirely politically correct!)

WAVES Go Marching On

(Tune: "Battle Hymn of the Republic")

(Okay, I can't figure out how this first verse fits the song, but the last verses do)

We're WAVES in the Navy.

We are sailors dressed in skirts.

Our lives are run on schedule

[I THINK THERE'S A LINE MISSING HERE!]

And we spend our nightly quiet hour

Washing out our shirts,

The WAVES go marching on.

They teach us how to make a bunk

And how to wear our hats

And shine our shoes and clean our rooms

In almost nothing flat.

They put us all in girdles

If we're thin or if we're fat

The WAVES go marching on.

Well fun is fun but now we're done, 

We're kidding on the square,

We didn't join the Navy

For the uniforms we wear;

We joined to help our loved ones

Who are fighting over there.

The WAVES go marching on.

CHORUS:

GLORY, GLORY TO THE NAVY

GLORY, GLORY TO THE NAVY

GLORY, GLORY TO THE NAVY

THE WAVES GO MARCHING ON.

Navy Boots 

(Tune: "The Caissons Go Rolling Along")

Navy Boots, new recruits

Don your hats and don your boots

Join the sailors a-swinging along.

Column right, left oblique, square your corners, do it right

As the Navy goes singing along.

For it's one, two, three,

Guide right there Company

Call out the cadence loud and strong.

Make them proud of you,

Girl in Navy Blue.

Join the sailors and fight right along.

Join the sailors and fight right along.

Boots of the Navy

(Tune: "Hinky Dinky Parley Voo")

We are the girls they call recruits--

Parley Voo

We are the girls they call recruits--

Parley Voo

We are the girls they call recruits

All we have are our hats and boots,

Hinky Dinky Parley Voo.

They gave us our hats, they gave us our boots--

Parley Voo

They gave us our hats, they gave us our boots--

Parley Voo

They gave us our hats, they gave us our boots

But when are we going to get our suits?

Hinky Dinky Parley Voo.

We are the girls of 612--

Parley Voo

We are the girls of 612--

Parley Voo

We are the girls of 612

We never know just what to do,

Hinky Dinky Parley Voo.

Navy Spirit

(Tune: "You've Got to Be a Football Hero")

We're proud to be a part of Navy.

And stand to colors with the red, white and blue.

We'll back our men in all that they're fighting for

We'll do our share to shorten this war.

You know we're going to miss you, Hunter,

But we're off to help them win.

We may not go to see

But we'll try to be

A credit to the USN. [US Navy]

[Hunter referred to the training center for Navy WAVES located at Hunter College in New York]

WAVES in Navy Blue

(Tune: George M. Cohan's "Yankee Doodle Dandy")

We are WAVES of dear old Navy,

Navy hearts beat in us too.

One for all and all for Uncle Sam

And for the red, white and blue.

We've a lot of work before us

And we're going to see it through.

Navy WAVES all march together,

To defend the nation;

We are the WAVES in Navy Blue.

There are many more songs in this booklet, but they're all to songs I've never heard of, such as: "Bell Bottom Skirts", sung to the tune of "Bell Bottom Trousers"; "Salute to the WACS", sung to the tune of "Skinna-Ma-Rink"; "Don't Make My Girl a Sailor", sung to the tune "Don't Send My Boy to Harvard", and "Ginny, the Ninny of the First Platoon", sung to the tune of "The Strip Polka". (Yes, I know, amazing that songs with such titles ever went out of fashion!)

And of course, no book of Navy songs would be complete without the following:

Anchors aweigh, my boys, Anchors aweigh.

Farewell to college joys we sail at break of day-day-day-day!

Through our last night ashore,

Drink to the foam,

Until we meet once more here's wishing you a happy voyage home.

The preface to this little booklet reads:

"The spontaneous singing of WAVES as they march is the best indication of their spirit. Original songs submitted at Song Fests, supplemented by other Navy songs in this book, set a precedent for you who follow. Carry the book with you, sing and add your own songs; for a singing crew is a happy crew and a happy crew is a good one." W.F. Amsden, Captain, USN

And here's the Dedication:

Singing as they march and work, thousands of American women have upheld the morale at the United States Navy Training School. To them, for their fine spirit, this book is dedicated. In the following words that spirit is expressed.

We are singing WAVES of the USA,

We sing as we march along;

We sing, we sing, we sing,

Our hearts are filled with song;

For we are singing seamen

Of the land of the brave and the free,

We are singing WAVES for Uncle Sam

And we sing for victory.

We are working WAVES of the USA,

We work from dawn 'til night;

We do a job to free a gob

So he can join the fight.

And when the war is over

And our men are home to stay

We can proudly shout we did our part

For the good old USA.

(May be sung to the tune: "Georgia Tech")

To all our service men and women, now and then, WE SALUTE YOU!

Hymns for Memorial Day

During the televised memorial services for those who died in the bombing of the Navy destroyer USS Cole in 2000, the Navy band played a tune that struck me as particularly beautiful. When I mentioned it to my mother, she immediately sprang up and pulled out her old “Song and Service Book for Ship and Field” from her days in the Navy WAVES. She flipped to a page in the book and handed it to me. As soon as the memorial services were over, I went over to our piano and played and sang the song that the Navy band had performed. The words brought me to tears. They are as follows:

1. Eternal Father, strong to save,
Whose arm doth bind the restless wave,
Who bidd’st the mighty ocean deep,
Its own appointed limits keep;
O hear us when we cry to Thee
For those in peril on the sea.

2. O Saviour whose almighty word
The winds and waves submissive heard,
Who walked’st on the foaming deep,
And calm amidst its rage didst sleep;
O hear us when we cry to Thee
For those in peril on the sea.

3. O Sacred Spirit, who didst brood
Upon the chaos dark and rude,
Who bad’st its angry tumult cease,
And gavest light and life and peace;
O hear us, when we cry to Thee
For those in peril on the sea.

4. O Trinity of love and power,
Our brethren shield in danger’s hour;
From rock and tempest, fire and foe,
Protect them wheresoe’er they go,
Thus ever let there rise to Thee
Glad hymns of praise from land and sea.

This song, “Eternal Father, Strong to Save” is also known as the “Navy Hymn”. I decided to do an internet search on this hymn this Memorial Day weekend, and discovered that additional verses have been added to this hymn since my mother served in the Navy in the 1940s. Some of these verses recognize other branches of the U.S. Armed Services…and more! I thought you might enjoy reading the words to a few of them on this Memorial Day.

Eternal Father, grant, we pray

To all Marines, both night and day,

The courage, honor, strength, and skill

Their land to serve, thy law fulfill;

Be thou the shield forevermore

From every peril to the Corps.

--J.E. Seim, 1966

Lord God, our power evermore,

Whose arm doth reach the ocean floor,

Dive with our men beneath the sea;

Traverse the depths protectively.

O hear us when we pray, and keep
them safe from peril in the deep.

--David B. Miller, 1965

O God, protect the women who,

in service, faith in thee renew;

O guide devoted hands of skill

And bless their work within thy will;

Inspire their lives that they may be

Examples fair on land and sea.

-- Lines 1-4, Merle E. Strickland, 1972,
and adapted by James D. Shannon, 1973.

Lines 5-6, Beatrice M. Truitt, 1948

Eternal Father, Lord of hosts,

Watch o'er the men who guard our coasts.

Protect them from the raging seas

And give them light and life and peace.

Grant them from thy great throne above

The shield and shelter of thy love.
--Author and date unknown

Eternal Father, King of birth,

Who didst create the heaven and earth,

And bid the planets and the sun

Their own appointed orbits run;

O hear us when we seek thy grace 

For those who soar through outer space.

-- J.E. Volonte, 1961

God, who dost still the restless foam,

Protect the ones we love at home.

Provide that they should always be 

By thine own grace both safe and free.

O Father, hear us when we pray 

For those we love so far away.

-- Hugh Taylor, date unknown

Lord, guard and guide the men who fly

And those who on the ocean ply;

Be with our troops upon the land,

And all who for their country stand:

Be with these guardians day and night 

And may their trust be in thy might.

--author unknown, about 1955

And when at length her course is run,

Her work for home and country done,

Of all the souls that in her sailed

Let not one life in thee have failed;

But hear from heaven our sailor's cry,

And grant eternal life on high!

--Author and date unknown

“Eternal Father was the favorite hymn of President Franklin D. Roosevelt and was sung at his funeral at Hyde Park, New York in April 1945. Roosevelt had served as Secretary of the Navy. This hymn was also played as President John F. Kennedy's body was carried up the steps of the capitol to lie in state.” (Source: Naval History and Heritage Command website: http://www.history.navy.mil/faqs/faq53-1.htm)

May we each take time to remember on this day those far away on land and sea, past and present, the guardians of our precious freedoms!

(Click here to send a postcard to our troops!)

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