The USS ORLECK (DD 886) arrived in Jacksonville in the spring of 2022 to become the centerpiece of the Jacksonville Naval Historical Museum. You can learn about the ship’s long and storied history at www.jaxnavalmuseum.org.

The ship was freshly painted on the exterior and looked very nice from the pier. Inside however, years of neglect had left quite a mess and volunteers quickly set about cleaning, painting, etc. in order to get the ship presentable for public visitation.

In the summer of 2022 Lee & Lenore decided to sponsor the ship’s barber shop. In addition to a significant financial commitment restoring the barber shop to what it would have looked like in the late 1960s required a lot of elbow grease. The overhead and upper parts of the bulkheads
needed to be scraped, sanded and prepared for spray painting. Lee did most of this work but had a welcome assist from his older daughter, Michelle, one weekend when her family was visiting. The spray painting was done by hand with numerous cans of spray paint.

After some research it was decided not to replace the deck tile but instead to paint it as is. This was done by Taylor Shaw, the ship’s girl Friday”.

Lee obtained some Vietnam era USO posters for decoration and donated used clippers, shears, combs, etc. One of the other volunteers dropped off a box of vintage shaving supplies, talc, pomade to add to the authenticity of the space. Thanks to a lot of effort the barber shop was essentially
restored in time for the opening of the ship to the general public in the fall of 2022.