Born in 1919, at the end of World War I, Don Holmes boarded the USS Fletcher DD-445 as a young sailor in 1942, as World War II raged.

The destroyer was brand new, and Holmes, then 23, was assigned to the engine room."I first was on the throttle, then I was in charge of the engine room. Everybody worked together, and we enjoyed everybody's company," Holmes, now 91, said. He served on the ship through 1945.He spoke while taking a break from the jocular bustle of the 40th reunion of those who served on the USS Fletcher. The gathering, held Sunday through Wednesday at Split Rock Resort in Lake Harmony, drew about 70 Navy veterans, ranging in age from "kids" their 50s to seniors in their 90s, and their loved ones. The sailors traveled from near and far, including Texas, Arkansas, Alabama, Louisiana, Connecticut, Colorado, New York, Maryland and Vermont.Holmes, of Montgomery, Minnesota, wouldn't have missed it for the world."This is my 36th straight reunion. The first one was in Charleston, in 1975, and I really enjoy them," he said.What's important for him about the reunions?"The friendship! The friendship!" he exclaimed.The plan to hold annual USS Fletcher reunions was launched in 1970 when Dr. Ray V. Allen, a former engineering yeoman and a Fletcher plank owner (a plank owner is a man who was on the first crew of a ship) attended a League of Naval Destroyers Reunion in Boston.There, Allen met other Fletcher veterans and held the first, loosely-organized reunion. The next year, 1971, the veterans held the first official reunion, in the Poconos. Allen died in 1993, but his wife, Lill, continues to serve as the USS Fletcher Reunion group's matriarch and corresponding secretary.This week's reunion was organized by Joanne Cebulewski-Kobus of Columbia, New Jersey, in memory of her parents, Stanley "Ski" Cebulewski of Summit Hill, who served on the USS Fletcher from 1942-1944, and the former Mary Janis of Lansford, who attended almost every reunion, beginning in 1971. "They traveled all over the country" to attend the reunions, she said.Her father died two years ago; Kobus organized this reunion as a labor of love, and respect for those who served.Although the veterans felt the tug of an undercurrent of sadness for those who have passed, the reunion bustled with the exuberance of shore leave.Holmes caught up with buddies John Rust, 79, of Loveland, Colorado, who served on the Fletcher from 1951-1954, during the Korean War era, and Bob Foss, 71, of Prince George County, Virginia, who served from 1958-1960, during the Vietnam era.The lessons he learned on his tour of duty will last a lifetime, Rust said.Being aboard the USS Fletcher taught him the "significance of serving, mainly for your country and learning, somewhat, what the world was about," he said.It also taught him a lot about working as a team."The camaraderie, working together with all of the others on the ship. When they send you out to sea and you're out there for 30, 40, 50, 60 days at a time, without going back into port, you've got to get along on the ship," he said. "And that's what we're doing yet today - we're still getting along, still family."What did he do on the Fletcher?"Well, if you talk to some of my buddies, they'll tell you I didn't do anything," he said, tongue in cheek. What Rust did do was to tend the boiler that generated the steam that powered the ship. "After awhile, I became what they called 'oil king'. I was in charge of all of the oil and all of the water, both for crew use and the boilers. You had to test that to see if it had the right salinity," he said.Rust had a lot of freedom to roam the ship. "The fellows down in the engine rooms and the boiler rooms couldn't see up topside, so they'd send me up topside to see what we were shooting at," he said. "I'd come back down and report to them - sometimes good news and sometimes bad news."All in all, "It was a wonderful experience. Good times, good friendships. That's why I still cherish the days I can still spend with my buddies today," he said.Foss came aboard as a teenager."It was my first ship. I was 18 years old, just out of high school," he recalls. "They had just come back from a western Pacific cruise - we used to called them 'West-Pac'."Foss told a visitor a little about the destroyer's history. "The Fletcher had two nicknames: In World War II, she was known as Lucky 13. That had to do with the formation she was in the battle of Guadalcanal, she was the 13th ship in line," he said. "Later on, when I went aboard, her nickname was 'The Fighting Fletcher, First in Class', because she was the first in class, commissioned in 1942, and there was no other ship in the U.S. Navy that had more ships after her - there were 150 Fletcher class destroyers built during World War II and thereafter."Foss was a quartermaster. "A quartermaster deals with navigation and visual communications - signaling. I really enjoyed it," he said. "In fact, I made a career out of it - I had 26 years in the Navy."For him, the reunions are chances to keep strong the ties born of shared service."These people here are more than just people. They are family. That's what we really are. We look forward to seeing each other year after year," he said. "My first one was in Baton Rouge, Louisiana, in 1991. I haven't made all of them since then, but we look forward to it."Foss' voice drops a bit as he talks about losing those Fletcher veterans who served during World War II, now in their 80s and 90s."We really mourn when our friends pass away. We have a lot of World War II vets who are no longer with us," he said.The reunion included "stations" where attendees could sign cards to send to the families of those veterans who have passed; learn to navigate the Internet; help make "pocket flags" to send to soldiers overseas; a "veteran's center."The reunion also included a presentation by the Lackawanna Historical Society, trips to Jim Thorpe and a banquet.