Back in the 70s I worked with a gentleman that was a former submariner in WW2. he related a story to me that I want to share. He was a former radio operator on a Balao class if I recall correctly. One day he found himself at the Post Office as usual it was a long line. As he was waiting he got jittery and subconsciously began typing out code on the counter. after only a few moment he said he began to hear a reply in code. As it turned out there was a German counterpart in line behind him a few people back. Needless to say the became good friends.
Great story!
Closest I could come: in 1971 my highschool-aged older brother had a math teacher who was a former Luftwaffe Stuka pilot. Supposedly when things got slow, Herr Schmidt – who had a wooden leg as a ‘souvenir’ from his time in service – would occasionally reenact missions over the Eastern Front sitting atop his desk, using a yardstick as the control column, narrating in a German-English polyglot.
He’d probably be up on charges in today’s PC environment…but in those days, his students merely found it eccentric if not amusing. (Of course, if he was narrating missions over London or the D-Day beaches, I’m sure it wouldn’t have been quite so amusing…[:$])
Yeah But!
I bet every one of his students then had better grades ! They could relate the stories to where he was describing! My Drafting and Design instructor was a former student of the Famous " Frank LLoyd Wright". and he showed it. His building art and plans were exquisite! So he made sure by telling us stories that we could be able to mentally picture the math and engineering and build something like that someday! Yeah, Yer right, wouldn’t fly in the P.C. world we live in now!
On one of my first jobs we were making a ship CIC simulator for the West German Navy. We were based in the DC area. The lead officer on site had been in U Boats in the Kreigsmarine. He was excited when we were not going to be working over the weekend. He had made plans to drive down to Norfolk and take a tour of the Navy yard. “It will be my first time seeing it from the land side!”