Ron and I have been friends since 1971. We met while serving in the United States Air Force at Pope Air Force Base, N.C. Ron was back after a Vietnam tour flying as a loadmaster, where he earned three air medals. I was a C-130 loadmaster and back from my first Vietnam tour.
Ron and I flew many missions together, and a very strong friendship developed. But I was transferred into a special operations squadron, and Ron’s Air Force commitment soon ended. Over the many years, we kept in touch through the mail and with an occasional phone call. Eventually computers came into our lives, and email became routine.
Approximately 7 years ago, I got an idea and “Email Battleship” came to life. Ron took the pirate name Captain Crusty. I have had several pirate names over the years — currently it’s Captain Chunk. We played several games and soon found that when the grandkids came over and played with the pegs, things got messed up quickly. The major problem I had was Ron letting his grandkids shoot, and they most always sank my ships.
The game evolved over the years with many ideas, some good and some very bad. Ron now has his game set up on the computer, and I have stayed with pen and paper. We have added mines. Two ships have ammo cans, and if you hit the ammo can, that ship is sunk. Round One is a torpedo round, where if you hit a ship, the ship is automatically sunk.
