A Very Honorable Man: Today's Thankful Thursday Post

From the time we are born, we, as human beings, are learning -- Often by trial and error. This is the way we learn to walk. We get up, take a step, fall down. Then we get back up and do it again. What happens when we fall a long way and get hurt in the process? It takes either a certain level of character or a certain level of stupidity to keep on trying when you painfully fail at something, especially when all the "experts" are telling you it can't be done. Character, Commitment, Honor and Strength... not just of muscle, but of mind, heart and soul. These are the things that bring us tales of the impossible. The stories that inspire us.

Everybody needs inspiration from time to time. Some of us need it on a daily basis. Sometimes in my life, I have had trouble coming to grips with such things. I've always tried to be self-sufficient, usually to my own detriment. Sometimes we have to look outside ourselves and find those men and women who inspire us. And when we find someone whose struggles and accomplishments have really inspired us, then we should share their stories for others who may be needing that inspiration in a tough spot. When the pain of running gets too tough, I am thankful for the inspiration of this next hero and Man of Honor.

　
Today, my Thankful Thursday post is about:

Master Chief Carl Brashear, USN 1931-2006

So much has been written about Carl Brashear that it is so easy to consider just copying and pasting the information in here. But people of his stature deserve so much more. Carl Brashear was the first African-American to attend and graduate from the US Navy's Diving and Salvage School and become the first African-American US Navy Diver. If that was all, he'd be a hero to a lot of people. But he went on to become the first African-American US Navy Master Diver, as well. But that was only after Navy Diver Carl Brashear became the first amputee diver to be re-certified by the US Navy as a diver.

Brashear joined the Navy at a time when racism was still heavily ensconced in the US Military. Despite the grand accomplishments of such groups as the Tuskegee Airmen and individuals like Navy Cross Awardee Dorie Miller, the US Navy had to be ordered to desegregate in 1948. But racism and prejudice continued to be prevalent for more than a decade after.

When he submitted his first request to attend diving school, the Navy that they did not have any "colored" divers. Brashears reply, "The Navy's about ready to have one!" After several repeat requests, Brashears reported to the US Navy Diving & Salvage School in Bayonne, NJ in 1954. Because of being born to a sharecropper in rural Kentucky, Brashears dropped out of school to help on the farm and only had a 7th grade education. The school showed Brashear that there was more than just the physical difficulties of diving, but there was also a heavy burden of science to working in the deep that he would have to master.

Many applicants washed out of the program without any extraordinary difficulties, but Brashear also had to fight the racial bigotry and hatred of not only the staff and instructors, but of many of his fellow students. Threats were almost a constant for him. But there was also support. It was enough to keep Brashear going and he graduated from the school and became a Navy Diver.

Things went well for Brashear for the next 10 years. In 1966, he was set to make the next big leap in his career when a B52 carrying live nuclear weapons collided with it's refueling aircraft off the coast of Spain, dropping its payload of 4 nuclear bombs out of the sky. Three of the devices landed in a farm field. The fourth was dropped into the ocean and required a deep sea salvage diver to locate. At that time, Brashear was serving aboard the USS Hoist and that ship was called in to locate and recover the final bomb.

During the recovery, a tow line snapped taking a piece of pipe with it. As the pipe whipped across the deck, it hit Brashear in the left leg just below the knee with such force that it nearly severed it. After being stabilized aboard ship, he was moved to a naval hospital where his leg was restored. However, there was a lot of damage and facing a long and painful recovery with no guarantee of regaining full function of his leg and a significant danger of gangrene, Brashear convinced doctors to amputate.

Brashear had done more than many men could hope to do and achieved more than most could hope to achieve, but he had not attained his goal of being a Master Diver. Refusing to go to a hearing that would have declared his physical state to be such that he would be medically retired, Carl Brashear worked hard to prove that he was medically fit to remain in service. It was an uphill battle the entire way, having to appeal to Navy brass in Washington in order to get a hearing that wasn't predisposed to putting him out of service and would actually give himself a change to prove he could do it.

Finally with a chance to prove himself once again, Brashear pushed himself. "Sometimes I would come back from a run, and my artificial leg would have a puddle of blood from my stump," Brashear said in 2002 when he was inducted into the Gallery of Great Black Kentuckians. "I wouldn’t go to sick bay because they would have taken me out of the program." In April of 1968, Carl Brashear was finally recertified, becoming the first amputee to be certified as a diver by the US Navy. By 1970, he had achieved his dream of becoming the first African-American US Navy Master Diver. Retiring from the Navy in 1979 as a Master Chief Petty Officer and Master diver, Brashear went on to work for the Navy as a civilian, finally retiring from all government work in 1993.

Carl Brashear was the subject of and the technical advisor for the movie made about his life, Men of Honor, starring Cuba Gooding Jr. as Brashear, Gooding would later say that Brashear was "the strongest man I have ever met." His story was selected for the US Naval Institute Oral History Program in 1989. Carl Maxie Brashear died of respiratory and hear failure on 25 July 2006.

　
"It's not a sin to be knocked down. It's a sin to stay down." ~ Carl M. Brashear
My thanks goes out to this Man of Honor. Carl Brashear, thank you for inspiring me!