Excalibur

T.S.M.Y Excalibur
The Excalibur docked in San Diego, February 1973
Length	184' 6"
Beam	33' 1"
Displacement	850 tons
Draft	9' 5"
Top Speed	15.7 knots

The Excalibur was an ex U.S. Navy ship that was refurbished for use as a Sea Org training ship, based out of San Pedro, California. For history of it's war time service click here.

In June of 1971, Scientology bought the former U.S. Navy ship, the USS Rexburg, just before it was scheduled to be made into scrap metal and shipped off to the Far East. The ship functioned as a training vessel for the Sea Org with units of the DPF and the RPF working and studying seven days a week.

Events of the Excalibur[edit | edit source]

May of 1972 the Excalibur ported in San Francisco for several weeks.
February 9, 1973 the Excalibur ported in San Diego for the grand opening of the Church of Scientology of San Diego.
May of 1974 the Excalibur ported in San Francisco for a couple of weeks.
February 17, 1975. The crew of the Excalibur receive news that the ship will be sold off.
The Excalibur was sold shortly after February of 1975.

Personnel of the ship[edit | edit source]

Excalibur's Crew[edit | edit source]

Captain's of the Excalibur[edit | edit source]

Bob Young

Alan Long

Dave Murphy

Amos Jessup. Amos Jessup was born in 1945, the son of a senior editor at Life magazine. In 1966, while a philosophy major studying in England, he had gone to Saint Hill to try and get his brother out of Scientology. He instead became involved in the subject himself. In June, 1967, Amos arrived in Las Palmas as part of the Sea Project. In October, 1967, he signed on as one of the original members of the newly created Sea Org. During the early days of the Sea Org, Amos and Yvonne Gillham did two survey missions together, one to Corsica and one in Marseilles. Amos was promoted "by merit" to Lt. Commander (RA) by LRH Flag Order 2342 on the 24th Jan 1970. He was one of the students on the original Expanded Dianetics Course. In the spring of 1973 he became captain of the Excalibur, a position he held until the fall of 1973. He was part of the Excalibur’s RPF during 1974 and early 1975, after which he became the Commanding Officer of the Toronto Org, and later, a research auditor for the New Vitality project and a C/S at the Clearwater base. He returned to civilian life in 1979, and became an engineer and a writer.

Quote from Captain Jessup;

When I ran the Excal in San Pedro, from April 73 on, we would routinely take a boatload of staff, SO prospects and Scientologists from LA out on an evening cruise around LA Harbor, past the Queen Mary (if I recall correctly) which was a dockside restaurant, and then back to dock. Sometimes we'd have a music group perform on the fantail. It was a sort of floating party for a couple of hours, with the purpose of promoting SO recruitment. Before me, I believe Alan Long and Bob Young did similar excursions. We had been constrained not to leave San Pedro/Long Beach harbor by the Coast Guard, who thought we were under spec for carrying all those passengers safely. But it is a big harbor so we tootled around in it giving people a taste of the floating life.

Scott Mayer. Scott Mayer was born July 25, 1943, in Chicago, Illinois. He served in the U.S Navy during the Vietnam war. In the late 60's he joined Scientology and rose to the brevet rank of Captain in the Sea Org. During 1973 and 1974 he was Fleet Captain over the three Sea Org ships that made up the U.S. Pacific flotilla. He left Scientology in 1976 and passed away October 6, 2005.

Quotes from Captain Mayer;

When I was a Scientology fleet captain in 1973 and 1974, we had only two ships and another small boat in the U.S. Pacific Flotilla, but we were getting ready to have additional ships in Mexico and San Francisco and part of my assignment was to put a fleet together and to coordinate activities in training programs, staff analysis and establishment of the flotilla^[1].

I just put together a credit collection team and then started hitting the movie studios and others connected with the record companies to rent out use of the U.S. ships. At this time I was captain of the Excalibur which was an old navy ship. I had it rented out to a few movie studios and had money coming in. Indeed, we were making so much money that Scientology could not prove the ship was not financially viable because we were getting all this collection money^[1].

Compared to my Flagship, the Excalibur, it was a veritable garbage scow when I arrived at Flag to assist then Director of Maritime Operations, Commander Robert F. Young, in getting the Apollo cleaned up, ship-shape (and unknown to me, ready for sale on arrival in the U.S.)^[2].

Riggs Eckelberry

Picture Gallery - Captain's of the Excalibur[edit | edit source]

Amos Jessup, Corfu, 1969
Scott Mayer (center) aboard the Excalibur

Crew member's of the Excalibur[edit | edit source]

Maryanne Andrews^[3]	Vince Barbarick^[3]	Mark Britovich^[3]	Ed Charles^[3]	Don Crom	Jim Douglass^[3]
Carol Anne Eckleberry^[3]	Ken Framstead^[3]	Kenda Framstead^[3]	Norma (Randall) Murphy^[3]	Skye Rondestvedt^[3]	Bill Ruddock^[3]
Daphne Rudduck^[3]	Doug Sadwick^[3]	Janice Saxton^[3]	Laurie Temple^[3]	Bob Wakefield^[3]	Bill Yaude^[3]
Paul Katz

Excalibur crew anecdotes about the ship[edit | edit source]

Quotes from Paul Katz;

"HA! Thanks for the promotion Brian., but no, I wasn't Captain. The ship went from Bob Young to Alan Long to Dave Murphy to Jessup to Scotty to Riggs. I sailed with all six. Per Riggs the old girl was sold and as the last SO Master he delivered her to the East Coast. The ship and crew fared best under Alan Long and we had great times. Paul and Kenda Ingraham, Bob and Tina Rosenstein, Bruce Lowdermilk, Pat Hunter, Yvonne Gillingham Press and Husband Gary, Ken and Karen Ostrov, Urban Roman, and, and, and. We all really liked one another. Things started going downhill fast when offloaded Apollo crew started showing up at the top of the Excalibur org board." -pk^[4]

The Excalibur in San Francisco, May 1972.

"The ship will be in port for around 3 weeks for small repairs". Oh, the missing facts! The altered importance! What the SFO org mag editor chose to delete from the story is this: The pushboat that came up against Excalibur's starboard side (side facing away from the photographer) screamed in just a wee bit fast and caved in the side plating and broke a weld below the waterline. The call came over the onboard pa system "Damage Control party to the engine room!" That meant me and I took off running. When I arrived Gordo (Sexton? engineer from Oz or NZ) was holding a rag against the bulkhead. He looked at me and kind of smiled, removed the rag and a stream of water about as thick as your wrist squirted onto the deckplates. One second later the rest of my damage control team arrived and we slowed the leak to a trickle using Gordo's rag and some wood for bracing. The engineers shifted fuel and water to careen the hole above the water line and welded a plate over it from the outside. Fun."^[5]
"OK, An Allen Long story...Excalibur visited the Channel islands weekends early 70's. Don't remember which uninhabited isle it was, but 3 or 4 crew rowed ashore in the dinghy and left it beached while hiking inland. A couple of hours passed and we heard the ship's whistle. We were wanted back aboard. Reached the beach maybe 45 min to an hour later. the dinghy was gone and Excalibur was under way, slowly steaming past. The ship's motor boat was laying to, close to the beach. It was made clear we were to swim out to it. We were hauled aboard like halibut, then back to the ship, boat brought aboard, ship under way back to LA. I don't recall if Capt. Long said anything about this to me, but he didn't have to. Old OT VII EP: Ability to Project Intention (if I disremember correctly)." -pk^[6]

Excalibur's Deck Project Force (DPF)[edit | edit source]

Excalibur's Rehabilitation Project Force (RPF)[edit | edit source]

The Rehabilitation Project Force (RPF) was created by Flag Order #3434, January 7, 1974. Ken Urquhart thought up the concept of the original RPF. This was in response to an order from L. Ron Hubbard to do something about the people on the Apollo who were manifesting case on post.

The Excalibur hosted an RPF of its own, from February 1974 to the sale of the ship. The first Excalibur RPF Bosun was Nathan Hayes. In March of 1974 the RPF produced its very own Newsletter. In May of 1974 the RPF was used in the engine room of the Excalibur. In August, 1974, the Excalibur's RPF was used to renovate the basement of the newly acquired Chateau Elysee. The RPF members were commended in FLWUS ED#320, dated August 15, 1974. In January, 1975 the RPF did a deep cleaning of the galley of the Excalibur. In February, 1975 the RPF produced another newsletter. (see the documents below in the picture gallery).

Quote from Captain Mayer;

I personally observed the RPF when I was captain of the Excalibur. At times, I would have "up to" 34 RPF'ers on board. From time to time 'Flag' would send missions into various Scientology organizations in the Los Angeles area and then call me up and ask if I could use various gangs of RPF'ers to do certain projects. In fact, they used my RPF to move into the Chateau Elyses on Franklin Avenue. Moreover, when other organizations had too many RPF members they would just send the extras down to the ship. There, we could use them for painting, clearing the bilges and scrapping rust, etc. I never did any "over boarding", but I heard about the practice when I first came to the Sea Org^[1].

RPF members were used during the campaign of gubernatorial candidate Bob Moretti. Here is the testimony of Scott Mayer during the Clearwater hearings on Scientology May 8, 1982 - "I personally brought sixty people up to the governor's campaign in, I think it was, 1974. I was asked by the Guardian's Office to provide Rehabilitation Project Force personnel to back one of the gubernatorial candidates in California. He lost, by the way, but, nonetheless, I had them up there, and I got a commendation for it - I still have it, by the way - for my actions in bringing Scientology into more good favor in the State of California."

Quote from Don Crom;

RPF WEST COAST USA 1974/75 WAS ACTUALLY and factually a Rehabilitation Project Force. What it was on the Apollo, or FOLOEUS, couldn't tell you, wasn't there. I for one, as a crew member of the Excalibur was actually a bit jealous of the RPF, 5 hours per day study and/or auditing??? Fuck me running!! To the best of my knowledge the auditing was "by the book" repair actions, list correction, serious word clearing. (help me here Howard if I've missed anything) and a general clean-up of any previous not quite right action. HELL even the MEST work produced an EP, its called "being in present time". To the best of my knowledge, a soapy cloth in ones' hand, touching a solid surface was very effective CCH processing. Now, when where why and HOW it morphed into the Recrimination Prosecutorial Farce I don't know, I simply thank my lucky stars I never experienced it. But yes boys & girls, in the beginning the RPF actually produced real products, not the broken terriorised "things" we have today. So yeah, "wins" on the RPF, not as much of an out-reality as it might seem. C-Ya DC^[7]