Channel Islands Navy

In 1971 my father launched the “Channel Islands Navy”. Seeing this in print some may think that this was just a figment of his imagination, others may wonder at the delusions of grandeur. Neither opinion is correct. In the winter of 1971 dad began work on a boat in the living room of our apartment. You may ask why in the living room, the answer is we didn’t have a garage and winters in Oxnard can get quite wet.
By June of 1971 dad had finished my boat, a prototype of a kayak, which could be carried in the backseat or trunk of a full-size sedan. The kayak came apart in three pieces, a seating compartment with a nose and rear which both detached and fit in the compartment for carrying. He had started with huge foam blocks, four feet long, by three feet wide and two feet thick. The idea was to be able to lock, and unlock, the end pieces from the middle making a solid body kayak which was completely portable.
After working for almost six months and trying, and failing, to develop the proper locking device, in June 1971 dad had a working prototype. So, in the middle of the week, just before dark my mom and us kids, Carol, Calvin and I, watched dad load the kayak in the trunk of our 1963 Cadillac Sedan DeVille and then we all piled in the car to go try the maiden voyage of our boat. Dad was relieved to see that the beach was almost deserted as we parked as close to the water as we could. I helped dad take the boat out of the trunk as my mother stood with the Super 8 movie camera and filmed our historic moment.
As usual Calvin couldn’t stand still and was quickly involved in chasing down seagulls. Carol stayed near the car and tried to look uninterested. I on the other hand remained front and center, involved and excited. Because I had helped at each stage of planning and building the kayak my dad had already determined that I should be the first one to take it out in the water. Besides which, if it sank I could probably swim back and if not my dad would be available and ready to pull me, and the kayak, out of the water, a feat I didn’t think I could do for him.
With no fanfare, my dad and I locked the kayak together while my mom filmed our progress. Thank fully it went together without incident. Dad later said it was all he could hope for, the boat locked together without a problem. Now the final test, would it float? Dad slid the front of the kayak into the water and I settled myself in the middle. Dad handed me the paddle, gave the boat a push and I took off.
It took all my concentration to paddle the boat over the small waves. When I looked back at the beach I saw my mom slap my dad on the shoulder, she told me later that he had been holding his breath since I left the beach.
Within a few minutes my dad took the movie camera from my mom and began yelling instructions to me. I must have paddled around for about 20 minutes. Every time I looked at the beach both my parents were watching me in the boat. I don’t think either of them looked at Calvin or Carol during that entire time. Some people would say that we were lucky they were still alive when we headed back to the car and found Carol still standing next to the car waiting for us. Of course it took us almost ten minutes to find Calvin. Nothing unusual about that. He was under the pier digging in the sand.
As we dismantled the boat dad began asking me questions, he needed to know every detail. There wasn’t any water in the bottom of the boat and the detachable pieces had stayed locked together just like he wanted them to. I told him the boat had floated along just like it was on wheels, or glass. It was a success. In just a few minutes we had the boat detached and the ends nested back in the middle and the whole boat stowed back in the trunk. Now we just had to get the film developed and show it to some investors.
This was the beginning of the Channel Islands Navy, our first watercraft.
Over the next six months my dad drug our little home movie projector, and the boat, to at least a dozen offices showing people both the movie and the boat itself. A lot of people found the whole concept quite interesting, the movie really played well. But, despite all the hard work he put into it the kayak, the whole concept, just didn’t sale. Again, like so many other things he had developed and tried to sale over the years he couldn’t get the kayak sold.
Still, dad was determined to do something with the concept of the “Channel Islands Navy”. After all we lived in Oxnard, California where anything that could have the name Channel Islands on it did. In addition to Channel Islands Boulevard, Channel Islands High School, there was also Channel Islands Dry Cleaners, Channel Donuts and at least two dozen other assorted businesses. Today there is even California State University Channel Islands, it is a popular name, so we were almost surprised that we could not find the Channel Islands Navy in existence already. Anyway, despite his limited art abilities dad developed a logo and a working concept.
Over the next six months dad ran ads, as cheaply as possible, in different magazines like Popular Science, etc. The ad copy read, “Are you officer material? Join the Channel Islands Navy and become an officer. Send a check for $10.00 and the form below to ANS, Inc., and receive your certificate of commission as an officer in the Channel Islands Navy.” During that initial six month run dad sold just a few more than 1,000 commissions, certificates that identified the holder as a captain, commodore, commander, even an admiral, whichever the buyer requested. So, he made a little money, after the expense of ads and materials, but the Channel Islands Navy was not the success he was convinced it could be.
Over the next few years whenever dad had, or “found”, some extra money he renewed the ads and tried selling more “commissions” in the Channel Islands Navy. Despite the fact that he tried a dozen different small magazines, he never found the one, or combination of magazines, that were right combination to provide the exposure, and audience, needed to give him a large enough return on investment.
It appeared that my mother took this latest venture in stride. Of course by that time my parents had been married for almost twenty years and she had been through this before. Even though she had been through this before my mother did not simply shrug her shoulders and let my dad go off and try crazy things. When she saw him becoming obsessed, her word, with the Channel Islands Navy, she advised caution. Like with previous ventures she expressed concern that dad remember that they had three children to support. Whenever I overheard a comment like that I asked myself, how could he forget!
Dad continued to pursue the Channel Islands Navy until about 1976 when it all became just too much. After failed businesses, heart attacks, bypass surgery, etc., it seemed like the right time to just let a lot of those things go and focus on staying alive.