This transcript has been edited for clarity and readability. The original is available upon request. —Ed.
Tim: A little bit of your thoughts as to why you came into the Navy and your life story.
Jim Murray: WWII was raging when I graduated from high school in 1944. All my classmates wanted to go into military service upon graduating and most of us did. Graduating from high school in June 1944, by July, I was in the Navy’s V-12 program at Wesleyan. I had wanted to go to the Naval Academy but had not scored high enough to qualify. My father was a graduate of the Academy which made me eligible for a Presidential appointment.
I tried for a Presidential appointment again while at Wesleyan [Wesleyan University ion the Connecticut River in Connecticut]. I made the list and entered the Academy in August 1945, graduating in 1949. Upon graduation I went to a destroyer named USS Mansfield on the West Coast. On the Mansfield, my skipper had formerly been a submarine CO. I decided I wanted to apply for submarines. My CO gave me a strong recommendation and I submitted an application. I was a Bualified OOD as you had to be back in those days to apply for SUBSCOL. I was accepted for submarine school, but the Mansfield was sailing for WESTPAC at the time. I left the ship two months before the convening of SUBSCOL It was probably lucky I did, because I probably would have ended up living in the bow of the destroyer, which was blown off by a mine shortly after arriving off Korea. I never heard whether anyone was hurt.
Tim: Wow.
Jim Murray: I went to submarine school in July 1950. Because I arrived two months prior to start, I served two months in training on Sablefish. After SUBSCOL I went to Threadfin for six months then Irex all in New London. From Irex in 1945 I went to post graduate school in Monterey. I graduated from the post graduate school after three years, in 1948, with a master’s degree in Engineering Electronics with a specialty in acoustics having majored in Physics and Acoustics, although the degree did not reflect the acoustics study. From PG School I went to SUBPAC’s staff as electronics officer. Finally, in 1959, back to sea on Wahoo. On Wahoo, I was the 3rd officer, XO and then CO. And from there, I went into nuclear power training. I graduated from there and did my last six months of nuclear training in Admiral Rickover’s office in the old Navy World War I buildings on Constitution Avenue.
Tim: They were still there when I interviewed with the Admiral.
Jim Murray: Prior to the Admiral’s office I did six months at the nuclear school in Mare Island. After six months in Washington I spent six months at the Polaris missile training facility in Dam Neck, training in the Polaris system. From there on to command the USS Robert E. Lee. I spent a little over four years on the Robert E. Lee as the CO of both the Blue Crew and Gold Crew and took Lee through overhaul as it was converted from Polaris A1 to Polaris A3 missile system. – I mean from let’s see. What was the first missile at this time?
Tim: Polaris?
Jim Murray: Polaris. Polaris A1 to Polaris A3, those two systems had been on the Lee. Speaking of the Robert E Lee I saw in the paper a few days ago the obituary of Joe Williams the first Gold skipper of Lee. He had been a good friend of mine. I had relieved him as Gold CO of the Robert E. Lee in June 1964.
Tim: Admiral Joe Williams?
Jim Murray: Yes, Joe passed away. As I said, I relieved him as the second Gold skipper on the Robert E. Lee in Holy Loch. At the time
I relieved Joe we took a famous picture with all four skippers of the Lee, present, Joe Williams and me (Gold), Chuck Griffith and Ralph Carnahan (Blue). In that picture, you had Chuck Griffiths who had just come off patrol, about to be relieved by Joe Williams then relieved by me and Ralph Carnahan about to relieve Chuck when the Blue crew returned to the states. Ralph was in Holy Loch to become oriented on Lee and after relieving Chuck, be my counterpart on the Blue Lee crew. There’s a picture of the four of us on Lee’s deck moored next to Proteus, which was the tender in Holy Loch at that time. It is seldom that you would have four COs two in command and two relieving at an SSBN at the same time. So, I go back quite a way in the Polaris program.
And from the Robert E Lee, I came to Washington and SP. I was head of SP’s Training System Branch. That branch developed and installed all the SSBN missile training systems. At that time, we were developing Training systems for Poseidon. We moved on from Polaris into Poseidon. After SP, I went to command of the SSBN tender Simon Lake. After command of the Simon Lake, I went to the CNO’s staff as the deputy of the Strategic Submarine Division OP21. I was Joe William’s deputy in OP21. I was his deputy for a short period of time until he was relieved by Jack Nicholson. I had known all these submariners throughout my career since the submarine force was pretty small in those times.
I was selected for flag while OP21B and ordered as Commandant of the 13th Naval District in Seattle because of my knowledge of the Trident System. I was there for about a year-a-half when Chuck Griffiths called me back to his staff in OPNAV. I came back here as the Director of the Strategic Submarine Division (OP21) (We should note that all these numbers have now changed.)
OP21 was the Strategic Submarine Division. OP22 was the attack division. I spent about a year as 21. Don Hall was PM2 (which was the Trident Program Manager), a program manager in the Navy Material Command. They wanted him to go to – I don’t remember where he went
– he went to Norfolk, whatever the flag is down there, or Charleston. I don’t remember where he went. but they wanted me to relieve him and I ended up as PM2 and that’s where I retired. Let’s get into what you’re really interested in – which is how did I became involved with the Submarine League?
Tim: Absolutely.
Jim Murray: I retired in 1981. Al Kelln retired about that time also. He was working for ASC, as I remember. Al called me up one day and said he had a project he wanted to talk to me about. I went to his office at ASC, and we kicked around forming the Submarine League for a large part of an afternoon. Al presented his ideas about getting together with all the flags and creating a new group called the Submarine League. Members of the League would be retired submarine officers and other submarine- oriented people interested in the future of the submarine force. I thought it was a great idea as has anyone who has ever heard about it. Al was the impetus for the League and can give you all the startup history.
At the time, he talked Al Whittle into becoming the chairman of the board. Al called me up one day and said, “Hey, Jim, I got a project I want you to take care of for me. I would like you to be the publisher of the Submarine Review.” I said, “Okay. I don’t know anything about publishing a magazine or a review.” “But you’ll work with Bill Ruhe and go out and set up the magazine.” Bill and I worked closely to set up all aspects of the Review. At the time, I looked around at many printers in the area. And of course, we also worried about cost in those days, as we always do. I went around the neighborhoods, to various printers in the shopping centers, to find a printer. I found a printer in the Pan Am Shopping Center, which is on Lee Highway. It was called “We Print”. I discussed the format of the magazine, the number of copies, the quarterly time frame and the cost with the printer. He seemed fully capable of printing the magazine to our specifications and I chose him as our initial printer.
Bill Ruhe and I had a long discussion about what the format of the Submarine Review should be. We decided it should be a small magazine about the size of the Reader’s Digest. As a result, we formatted the magazine with a format similar to Reader’s Digest with a comparable type cover and a similar workup of colors and format – well, not colors but typing. I tried to price this out with the various printers; although most of the layout work was being done by Pat Lewis. She did the work in the office at the time and out of her house. It was after her husband Dick had passes away. Pat was invaluable in the assistance she provided us.
We worked very closely with Pat in putting together the first magazine. We considered having advertisers, but decided it was an unnecessary complication. We did not initially take advertisements. A few years later, we decided that a good way to make money was to add advertisements to the magazine. So, we initiated suitable advertisements.
All articles were funneled through Bill Ruhe who was a very prolific writer and editor on submarine matters. I don’t know what you found out about Bill. But Bill, I think, was working for General Dynamics. He had written many articles on the submarine force and submarines. As I said he was a very good and prolific editor. I worked very closely with Bill as he set up the articles and put the magazine together. I don’t remember where the typesetting was done. I think it was done by Pat, but I’m not sure.
Tim: Sure, sure.
Jim Murray: I remained as a publisher of the Review until I’m not sure of the year. I think it was about 1988. It was about five years of time that I was with it. I think this summarizes about everything I remember, but my memory is poor. It is just not very good anymore, Tim.
Tim: I’m impressed.
Jim Murray: It used to be a lot better.
Tim: Well, you said several things that really sparked interest. I’ll just share with you that we are trying to digitize all the Submarine Reviews much like the Naval Institute has done with the Proceedings in their history of the magazine. We’ve been talking with them for ideas and guidance. But we think it’s a real treasure trove of history and a researcher would love to have all that.
Jim Murray: Probably, I have every copy that was written except there was one time where something happened with my membership. Either they didn’t renew my membership, or something happened to it, but I lost a few months or a year. I’m missing a few magazines. But I have practically the entire Submarine Review.
Tim: Well, I had a member who said, “My wife says if I don’t get rid of this, I’m going out with them. So, can you guys take a full set?” And of course, we’ve said absolutely – because we wanted to have that.
Jim Murray: Yeah. Well, as I say, I have just about every copy. I probably have extra copies of the first edition back when we were putting it together making corrections.
Tim: You worked at SP?
Jim Murray: When I worked in SP-15, the training division, Levering Smith had retired, and Bob Wertheim was the Director of SP. Bus Cobean was back there at that time as Deputy Director. And who relieved Bus? I don’t remember who relieved Bus. I guess Bus was still there, as the deputy director, and as the senior submarine guy. I don’t know how it’s run now, but that’s how it was run when I as in SP. Usually, a very senior submariner was the deputy.
Tim: It’s an amazing history. The American public just can’t imagine what a technological achievement that was.
Jim Murray: Well, that’s right.
Tim: So, tell me about your early days of submarines.
Jim Murray: Well before I went to submarine school, I went to Sablefish in training. Julian Burke, a former war prisoner, was skipper of Sablefish. Chuck Griffiths was on Sablefish as the 5th officer at that time, and I was in training. One day, they were training me on becoming a diving officer. I suddenly ordered too large an up angle on the bow planes creating a large up angle on the boat putting the Captain’s lunch in his lap, since the CO sat at the rear end of the wardroom table.
Tim: Great. Great.
Jim Murray: For a little while after that, I was not very popular. But I had a good learning experience on Sablefish before going to submarine school. Submarine school was still six months at that time. We did all our training in Long Island Sound, as did all the boats that were in New London. Those were the school boats used for training.
Tim: Sure. So, your induction into the nuclear power training program, what was that process?
Jim Murray: Well. I was the CO of the Wahoo when Rickover selected me after putting me through the study program – I think he put me on the study program because we were having so many delays in new construction ships. – I shouldn’t guess why, but anyway. And so, I took the study course. I went back and passed the test on the study program a year later. I was then ordered to nuclear school at Mare Island. I started that in January of 1963. I spent six months in the school. After that I went back to NR for six months – where I was to qualify on a prototype with three of those months at a prototype and three of those months at NR qualifying by taking the engineer’s exam. You’ve never heard of this or maybe you have.
Tim: No. I mean when I went through it, it was six months in prototype just for the initial training. Now, the three months at NR stayed pretty consistent before going to command.
Jim Murray: Okay. Well, I was six months at NR as the base, but I had a three month period to qualify on the prototype. As they say, I was heads up and tail down to qualify.
Tim: So which prototype was this?
Jim Murray: I went to the West Milton prototype. I would go to classes and lectures in the school house during the day. Then at night qualify on systems and stand watch in hull. We split our time by being in hull at night and go into the school house during the day. And so, each day I was working about 16 hours to qualify and did.
Tim: Sure, sure.
Jim Murray: Now, most of the COs that came into the nuclear program as I did, were trained similarly, and went to new construction. I was different. I went to an operating ship. I went to the Robert E. Lee. And I did my first two patrols on the Robert E. Lee before taking it into overhaul.
Tim: So what kind of training in missiles did you have enroute to the
Robert E. Lee?
Jim Murray: We were sent down to Dam Neck. I went through Polaris navigation and missile training including the fire control system, it was training set up for the initial Polaris SSBN submarines and I’ve forgotten how long we were there. But there were submariners more senior than I was going to new construction SSBNs. We lived together in a house on the ocean in Virginia Beach and went to the school during the day. We drove up here to Washington where our families were on weekends. The other two COs that trained with me were Don Miller and Ernie Barrett.
Tim: Well, you spent so much time at sea in that period.
Jim Murray: Oh, I did, yes.
Tim: Yes. It really was such a demanding time for submariners to man up the submarines and be underway.
Jim Murray: Yes.
Tim: Did you get to see the documentary that was recently done? They have Rickover starting the program.
Jim Murray: Yes. On PBS, I did see that. I saw most of it. I don’t think I saw the whole thing.
Tim: I think for people to realize we built 41 ships – and those are just the SSBNS – in what, seven years?
Jim Murray: Well, that is what caused a manning problem for the submarine force and the Navy. Of course, finding people to man those 41 submarines with two crews – and particularly senior people. That’s why I had the Robert E. Lee for so long. Who has a ship for four years? There, but for the grace of God go I, as you know.
Tim: Right, right. And the overhaul is no piece of cake.
Jim Murray: Yeah. Well, what else can I tell you? Is there anything?
Tim: I think we’re good for today and I so appreciate you being willing to sit down.
Jim Murray: Very happy to.
