I had graduated from the California Maritime Academy a few weeks before and just finished my first job with a large West Coast tug company out of Long Beach, Calif. While waiting for my next work assignment, I was lucky when the parents of Jim, a friend bf mine from school, offered me a spare room at their home in Santa Ana until I got my financial feet on the ground. His dad Tom was a retired first engineer and though he didn't go to sea anymore, he volunteered on the Liberty-class museum ship SS Jeremiah O'Brien. One Friday evening during a family barbecue, Tom told me, "I worked on Liberty ships during and after the war, Kelly. Now when I drive up to San Francisco to be part of the volunteer crew, it's like going back home." Liberty-class ships were the workhorses of the World War II effort, and hundreds were destroyed in convoys. In fact, of the 2,710 that were built, only two in the U.S. are still operational - the museum ships John W. Brown and Jeremiah O'Brien.
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机译：几周前，我从加利福尼亚海事学院毕业，刚刚在加利福尼亚州长滩市的一家西海岸拖船公司完成了我的第一份工作。在等待下一份工作时，我很幸运当吉姆（Jim）的父母去世。我从学校来的朋友，在我位于圣安娜的家中为我提供了一个备用房间，直到我踏入财务困境。他的父亲汤姆（Tom）是一位退休的第一任工程师，尽管他不再出海，但他还是自愿参加了自由级博物馆的SS耶利米亚·奥布赖恩（Jeremiah O'Brien）船。汤姆（Tom）在一个家庭烧烤的一个星期五晚上告诉我：“战争期间和战争结束后，我在自由船上工作，凯利（Kelly）。现在，我开车去旧金山参加志愿者工作，就像回到家一样。”自由级战舰是第二次世界大战努力的主力军，数百艘护卫舰被摧毁。实际上，在建造的2,710座之中，在美国只有两座仍在运行-博物馆的船只是John W. Brown和Jeremiah O'Brien。
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