Fifties Frogs Magazine

Vol  3
Pg 5 Biography (click on thumbnail photos to enlarge)
 

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QM1 Harold Mingus, USN, Class 1 COR 11/50

Hal Mingus QM1/C (in foreground-right) working as a cartographer on chart (using data collected on slates by UDT-3 Frogmen)

 


In his own words:

1943—After graduation from high school in Glendale, California I enlisted in the Navy at age 17. After completing boot camp and Quartermaster School at the Naval Training Center on Point Loma, San Diego, I reported aboard the Aircraft Carrier USS Takanis Bay CVE 89 and served in the Asiatic Pacific Theatre for duration of WWII.

1950—After graduating from college and as a member of the Naval Reserve, I was called back for active duty soon after the Korean War started. I reported in at the Naval Amphibious Base in Coronado and immediately volunteered at the Underwater Demolition Training Unit located in Quonsets Huts on the Strand south of Del Coronado Hotel. Upon completion of UDT Training, we were deployed to Camp Troy McGill located in Takeyama, Japan and blended in with the experienced veterans of UDT 3 whose previous actions had been well chronicled and documented. It was with pride that I was able to serve with a great group of men while on assignments in Korean and Japanese waters aboard the USS Begor APD 127, and the USS Weiss APD 135 under LCDR J. F. Chace. The recons to various bays and harbors in rubber and LCPR's permitted me to utilize my skills in communications, navigation, chart maintenance and cartography.

Chuck Austin EN1/C & Hal Mingus QM1/C at awards ceremony at Camp McGill in Japan (both men are from Glendale, CA.)

 

 


UDT-3 Frogmen getting ready for
recon Hal Mingus in foreground

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Hal Mingus & Frank Florian
(from Eagle Rock, CA) on APA off of Korea

 

 

Hal Mingus topside waiting for the "Smoking Lamp" to be lit.


 

My [civilian] work career spanned 36 years in the Aerospace Industry. My first job after discharge in 1952 was for Firestone working on liquid propellants. The next job was with the US Army corporal Missile System as Field Engineer and assigned to El Paso, TX at Fort Bliss and the White Sands Missile Range in New Mexico. Then it was to Fort Hood at Killeen, TX  with the 2nd US Army Missile Command (nuclear), later I moved to Fort Carson in Colorado Springs CO. Then I worked for the Sperry Utah Engineering Laboratory in Salt Lake City UT on the new generation solid propellant for the US Army Sergeant Missile System.

Once again, we moved, to Sunnyvale, CA IN 1962, to LMSC and the US Navy Polaris, Poseidon, and Trident Programs (A1, A2, A3, C3, C4, and D5) missiles, all submarine based and assigned to the Newport News Shipyard and Dry Dock Co. in Virginia for four years. In 1966, I accepted a promotional assignment back to Southern California as the Resident Manager of LMSC Field Offices located at the Northrop Corps in Anaheim and the Hugh's Company in Fullerton, CA until retirement.
 
My wife, Joanne, and I are enjoying our retirement. We have been married 45 years. We have traveled rather extensively in the USA and abroad. Hobbies include exercising and swimming, fishing, golfing, gardening, and traveling. We have four daughters: Kathy, Karen, Janet, and Jo Dee, and five grandchildren Andrea, Daniel, Becky, Jamie, and Jolene.  We live at 2514 So. Rita Way, Santa Anna, CA. Zip 92704.

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