The Art of Bill Root

Bill Root is a self taught artist who started painting in the late 1960's. Most of his work at that time depicted domestic life, in the tradition of Rembrandt and Vermeer. Many of his other recognized paintings were scenes documenting the hippie movement of the '60's. BRoot added the "ip" to his signature to include his then wife, Tippy Dalrymple.

       Brootip could be a very loose Dutch translation meaning "crust of the bread" and is well suited for the genre style of painting and consistent with the artist's love of the old Dutch Masters.

 Here is a picture of Bill with his family as a boy .

 Very little painting was completed between the 1970's and the new millennium. In April of 2000, Brootip found new inspiration and restored his love for the Rembrandt style. His most recent paintings reflect a polished and more preciseness, continuing in the tradition of the Dutch Masters. His new signature adds to the original an additional "B", for the source of his inspiration, a young Dutch woman, Betty. 

USS Pine Island (AV 12)
Commissioned: 26 Apr 1945
Decommissioned: 16 Jun 1967
Stricken 1 Feb 1971 

 The USS PINE ISLAND (AV-12), a Currituck-class seaplane tender, was commissioned on 26 APR 1945. Built at Todd Pacific Shipyard in San Pedro, California, USS PINE ISLAND sailed to Okinawa and then served in occupation duty before returning to the US East Coast in 1946. In December 1946, PINE ISLAND sailed for the Antarctic in support of Operation Highjump and returned to California. A China deployment followed in 1947-48. The Korean and Vietnamese Wars called PINE ISLAND westward. She routinely deployed the "West Pac" through the remaining twenty years of her service career. USS PINE ISLAND served her country for 22 years, 1 month and 21 days, until decommissioned on 16 JUN 1967. USS PINE ISLAND was sold to Zidell Co. in 1972 for scrapping. 

Bill Root in the 1950's

I joined the US Navy in May 1954 and served until May 1958. Boot camp was pretty hard for me and I went "over the hill" twice. I spent 30 days hard labor with confinement in a Marine Corps brig and they adjusted my attitude allowing me to achieve a higher than average rank before the end of my service. After boot camp, I was assigned to the USS Pine Island (AV-12) which was a Sea Plane Tender.

USS Pine Island (AV 12)
Commissioned: 26 Apr 1945
Decommissioned: 16 Jun 1967
Stricken 1 Feb 1971

In those days, one of the defenses against submarine attack was low flying sea planes and our job was the maintenance and repair of the planes as well carrying fuel for them. The ship was equipped with two large cranes and a sea plane deck to facilitate bringing planes aboard for repair. The ships duty station was the Far East, in particular Formosa. (Now Taiwan) We were called the "Formosa Patrol Force". We rotated with our sister ships, 9 months there and 3 months in US.

I was in the Navigation/Signal division. For leaving/entering port, battle stations and refueling at sea, I was the helmsman which afforded some pretty tense times.

 I met two brothers on the ship, Larry and Bud Jennings who were into country music. They both played guitar and Bud was singer. They did a little pro stuff before joining the Navy. We began playing at the enlisted mens club at Buckner Bay Okinawa on the weekends. My favorite guitar player at that time was Les Paul and western music wasn't where I wanted to be but never having had a chance to play with a band, I was more than a little enthusiastic Besides....Momma loved hillbilly stuff. We had a stand-up bass (no electrics in those days) 3 electric acoustic guitars (Before Fenders came out) and drums when the drummer could get the same days off as the rest of us. It usually required one of your buddies to sign a "stand by" chit which committed him to stand your watches. 

I was in the Navigation/Signal division. For leaving/entering port, battle stations and refueling at sea, I was the helmsman which afforded some pretty tense times.

I met two brothers on the ship, Larry and Bud Jennings who were into country music. They both played guitar and Bud was singer. They did a little pro stuff before joining the Navy. We began playing at the enlisted men's club at Buckner Bay Okinawa on the weekends. My favorite guitar player at that time was Les Paul and western music wasn't where I wanted to be but never having had a chance to play with a band, I was more than a little enthusiastic Besides....Momma loved hillbilly stuff. We had a stand-up bass (no electrics in those days) 3 electric acoustic guitars (Before Fenders came out) and drums when the drummer could get the same days off as the rest of us. It usually required one of your buddies to sign a "stand by" chit which committed him to stand your watches.

 My "Man Overboard" duty station was Signalman in the motor whale boat. The boat was about 10 or 12 feet long and was lowered over the side to rescue a man in the water. While the ship is underweight, man overboard watches are posted at strategic places all over the ship. A man overboard drill was affected by one of the officers sneaking out and throwing a dummy over the side to activate the rescue sequence. One day with a pretty moderate to high sea running, I was spending the morning on the signal bridge which is on the highest part of the ship, watching with awe, a school of hammer head sharks a couple of feet beneath the surface. Some appeared to 15 -20 feet long and UGLY! Then the blast from the squawk box...Man overboard! Man overboard! I geared up and jumped into the motor whale boat with the five other guys assigned there and held on while the deck crew began lowering us down the 80 some feet to the water. The boat is held in place fore and aft by two large "pelican" hooks with a large circular "fall" just above the hooks to maintain stability. The falls are quite heavy and I guess weigh about 80 or 90 pounds. As the whale boat touched the water and began bouncing on the waves alongside the ship, which was also rising and falling like crazy, the Boatswain holding one of the Pelican hooks fell and gashed his head open. We all yelled for the deck crew to haul us back up. The Boatswain got up and secured the hook and signaled to haul away. We got about 40 feet up when his wound got the better of him and he passed out and dropped the hook. The whale boat, now, held only by one end, became vertical and dropped us all into the water. We are trained that the most vital life saving thing to do in this situation is to beat feet as fast as you can away from the ship to avoid being eaten by the giant ships screw (propeller). Life jackets in those days were the "May West" type, so called for obvious reasons. Great bulky things in the front meant to keep ones head and face upwards. Totally impossible to swim in so I said goodbye to Mom and got ready. At the moment, I wasn't bright enough to remember that the screw was to be stopped at the onset of the drill. 

 The huge ship side passed by and began to proceed on its way. It got smaller, and smaller and even smaller and the thought crossed my mind that they didn't see us. When it appeared to be about two inches in size, we could see them turning. It would take about an hour and a half to get back to us. At first, I was glad to be alive and then I was struck numb to see the Boatswain gushing blood into the ocean. The very same ocean that was hearth and home to the giant ball gnashers I had minutes before been watching with the detachment of someone who is snuggie in his own home. 

  Suddenly, I saw several white somethings fluttering about 15 feet beneath my feet. Once again, I said my farewells to Momma and if anyone EVER really could walk on water, I would have then! It took only a few seconds to realize that the rest of the crew were dropping their white trousers to lessen their bait profile as well as lighten the load. The ship finally got close enough to send another small boat to get us and brought us to the side of the ship where we had to climb a "Jacobs Ladder" up the side of the ship. A Jacobs ladder is two vertical ropes with wooden planks tied between. I made it after being twisted this way and that and slammed around for what seemed an eternity. No small feat for someone like me who had just aged 30 years in a couple hours. ANYWAY.....Where was I?..... Ships command put us all in sick bay for a couple of days and there I met a tenor sax player from Chicago...Bob something.....Maybe White. The ladder that led down to sick bay ended in a small compartment maybe 6'X6' and Bob would play jazz there. You can imagine the reverb in a 6X6 metal box. Sounded great!