Salute to Nixon’s First Command : Celebration: Library and birthplace of former President will feature children’s skit recalling his WWII Navy service during 81st birthday observance.

Richard Nixon the Navy commander?

While most people remember the former President for ending the Vietnam War, opening relations with China and resigning amid the Watergate scandal, few are aware of his service in World War II. His stint as a naval officer in the South Pacific will be recalled today at the Nixon Library & Birthplace as part of the celebration of Nixon’s 81st birthday.

The library will feature a children’s skit recounting Nixon’s wartime service as a lieutenant commander, including a scene at “Nick’s Snack Shack,” where the future President handed out free hamburgers and Australian beer to flight crews, library spokesman Kevin Cartwright said.

Yorba Linda, Nixon’s hometown, will also celebrate his birthday for the sixth consecutive year by closing city offices Monday.

“It’s an honor we give him,” Yorba Linda Mayor Barbara Kiley said.

Beyond the birthday celebration, Nixon’s supporters are making plans for a new policy center in his honor: the Richard Nixon Center for Peace and Freedom. With branches to be located in Yorba Linda and Washington, the center will be “dedicated to the pursuit of enlightened national interest,” and “pragmatic idealism,” Cartwright said.

Plans for the center will be formally announced Jan. 20--on the 25th anniversary of Nixon’s inauguration--and organizers are closely guarding the details until then.

Nixon, along with luminaries from his Administration, including his successor in the White House, Gerald R. Ford, and former Cabinet members Henry A. Kissinger, George P. Shultz, and Caspar W. Weinberger, are scheduled to be present at the library for the Jan. 20 celebration. Ford became President in 1974 after Nixon’s resignation, and Kissinger served as secretary of state under both Nixon and Ford. Shultz served as treasury secretary for Nixon and later as secretary of state for President Ronald Reagan. Weinberger served as secretary of health, education and welfare under Nixon and went on to become defense secretary under Reagan.

Although Nixon and his friends will appear at the library in two weeks, Cartwright said this Sunday the former President will celebrate his birthday at his Park Ridge, N.J., home in the company of his daughters, sons-in-law and other family. It is his first birthday since the death of his wife, Pat, who died of lung cancer in June, 1993.

As in past years, the Nixon Library & Birthplace will waive the usual $4.95 admission fee on Sunday and Monday for all visitors. The library will be open from 11 a.m. to 5 p.m.

Those who stay for the half-hour World War II skit will see vignettes of Nixon’s 1942-45 years on Bougainville and Green Islands in the Solomon Island chain. The skits will be performed at 2 p.m. by two local chapters of the Children of the American Revolution.

Nixon’s job was to supervise the loading and unloading of C-47 cargo planes that brought in supplies and carried out the wounded, Cartwright said.

While Nixon never saw combat, he was known as a “first-rate scrounger,” Cartwright said, quoting from Stephen Ambrose’s 1987 biography, “Nixon: The Education of a Politician.”

When Nixon arrived at Bougainville Island in January, 1944, he scrounged enough ham to give the nine soldiers in his command a ham dinner, Cartwright said. Nixon learned just how happy his men were about the food when he censored their letters--part of his job as their commander--and noted that all of them had mentioned the meal, Cartwright said.

Also at the library is an exhibit honoring the 200th anniversary of the White House, “200 Years of Presidential China,” displaying rare china and glassware from 23 presidential households.