An Old-Time Submariner Speaks Out

[Intel Source: The Sub Report] A Florida newspaper has a profile out on an old submariner that's a fairly interesting read (even if it's clear a few of his memories have been "enhanced" a little by age); these older guys don't worry too much about being PC, it seems:

Among the interesting things he discovered while serving in the No. 2 capacity at sub school was: "People whose names end in vowels didn't usually finish qualifying for submarines. We had a very high dropout rate.
"When we investigated the dropout problem a bit more we discovered that along the East Coast of the United Sates, much of the population were Italians, Polish and Portuguese. Many of their names end in vowels. They'd come to our school in New London and proceed to drop out or flunk out. Either way they thought they would be reassigned to a base along the East Coast close to home.
"Another thing we learned: Sailors from the Midwest and California were more likely to graduate in the upper percentage of submarine school," Bauer said. "They qualified quicker on submarines than any other segment of the country. What we discovered is that the Midwest is basically an agricultural area with lots of pumps and motors, and sailors who grew up there were likely to know more about pumps and motors than the rest of the country. The kids in California were into cars. These two groups were very mechanically inclined which is a big requirement aboard a submarine."

Personally, I never noted that much of a regional difference between submariners, and I knew a lot of good guys whose names ended in vowels.