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I spent 14 months typing sensitive documents from scribbles handwritten on legal sized yellow lined paper while serving Uncle Sam’s Navy at NATO Headquarters in Norfolk, Virginia under the watchful eye of Admiral Gerald Wright, Supreme Allied Commander of the Atlantic Fleet.  Enlisted men, especially those devoid of personal transportation,  had only one area to go for entertainment while on liberty–East Main Street.  Years ago that was probably the seediest stretch of city thoroughfare known to man–a 20-block long line of beer joints, tattoo parlors, penny arcades and pool halls all designed to separate sailors from their meager pay.  Most of the female employees were multi-taskers, if you get my drift.

Naval officers learned how to behave like gentlemen at the Academy.  Enlisted men, on the other hand, learned how to tie knots, swab decks and paint bulkheads at boot camp (present company excepted).  As a result sailors tend to be a bit rowdy, especially for the first three days after payday.  That’s why they are pretty much restricted to the East Main boundary.  Stray into the nicer areas of the city and they’ll find signs in restaurant and store windows the read NO DOGS OR SAILORS ALLOWED.  Wearing civilian clothes didn’t help.  I believe a blind man in a kiosk would have refused to sell me  a magazine.  Locals could tell a sailor.  Maybe we smelled salty.  Perhaps we cussed too much.  The Navy wanted to ease strained relations and one payday it paid all its seamen (and they were legion in Norfolk) with two-dollar bills to show business people the economic impact sailors had on the city.  I don’t know how that played out.  It didn’t matter.  Most sailors found the sleaze of East Main much to their liking.

The only civilians who dared wander the sidewalks of East Main Street were business owners, their employees and the gentlemen who walked in pairs, wearing business suits, hats and little skinny dark ties–the vice squad.  They may as well worn uniforms and badges they were so easily identified.  They, and the ever-visible shore patrol, were watching for signs of prostitution (many), public drunkedness (lots) and fighting (sailors fight, especially with marines).  There were no discernable signs of illegal drug activity.  The ’60s had not yet dawned.