Highflying Dispute

In the 18 years the Pacific Corinthian Yacht Club has been anchored on the edge of the marina, thousands of active and retired military officers have passed it en route to Port Hueneme and Point Mugu.

In all that time, club officials say, no one has complained about the club’s flag display--that is, until retired Chief Master Sgt. R.F. “Mike” WySocki moved into the neighborhood.

Now, with his repeated demands that the display be changed, WySocki has sparked a congressman’s interest and sent yacht club members--many retired military men themselves--scurrying to the history books to settle a question over honor and centuries-old tradition.

At this yacht club, as in hundreds of others throughout California and the nation, the U.S. flag flies on a gaff, a secondary shaft, that juts out at an angle toward the top of the pole. The club’s burgee, a small triangular pennant in orange, yellow and red, flaps from a higher point, atop the pole.

WySocki, who served in the Navy and Air Force from 1954 until 1995 and did two tours in Vietnam, noticed the yacht club’s flag arrangement shortly after moving into the nearby Mandalay Bay community in May. He was appalled.

Throughout his military career, he was taught no flag flies above the U.S. flag--it’s a matter of patriotism and respect--and certainly that must apply to yacht clubs.

“This is a blatant disrespect of our country’s flag,” he said in a recent interview.

WySocki complained to the club, but to no avail. Both the club manager and the port captain explained to him their flag setup was in keeping with protocol. The matter was put before the club’s board of directors, but the directors would not budge.

Instead, they cited Chapman Piloting, considered by many the blue book of seamanship, as well as the Southern California Yachting Assn.’s guidelines. Both sources consider the display respectful. The gaff is considered a position of honor.

But why? WySocki could get no explanation, and the whole thing didn’t ring true to him. So he called the office of U.S. Rep. Elton Gallegly (R-Simi Valley) to find out what federal law requires of U.S. flag displays. Gallegly spokesman Tom Pfeifer did some research and found Public Law 94-344 signed by President Gerald Ford in July 1976.

“As the law stands now, you should not fly any flag or anything above the American flag,” Pfeifer said. But Pfeifer could find no penalty for violating the provision, which appears to be more of a recommendation than a mandate.

Gallegly said he is looking into the matter. While he is convinced the yacht club means no disrespect, he, too, questions how tradition would dictate something that could be seen as unpatriotic.

The Times consulted approximately a dozen experts, at the Pentagon, the Navy Historical Center, the Smithsonian, the Ventura County Maritime Museum, and yacht club organizations on the east and west coasts. None of the historians, researchers or yachtsmen contacted could say when or why the practice of flying an organizational flag over the national flag began.

Meanwhile, members of Pacific Corinthian, many of them retired Navy officers, can’t understand why WySocki is questioning their patriotism.

Gene Whitt, a retired Navy officer and a staff commodore at the yacht club, went home, dug through his books, and found an explanation he hopes will satisfy WySocki: The burgee really is not on top of the U.S. flag, it’s on another pole, the gaff, that juts out of the main pole.

“The guy’s complaint is you’re flying something above the ensign, but it turns out in flag etiquette terms, you’re not,” Whitt concluded. “It’s on a separate hoist.”

In fact, Whitt said, when he served in Vietnam, his river division was permitted to fly their division burgees from a level higher than the U.S. flag atop their boats, so long as it wasn’t on the same pole.

WySocki said he doesn’t care what the club members say, what the books say, or even what the federal law says; the current display is wrong. If there needs to be a new law, he said, so be it. He is hoping Gallegly will be the one to sponsor such a measure. Gallegly has not made any commitment, but is sending his chief of staff to the club for further inspection.

Meanwhile, Elbert S. Maloney, a retired Marine colonel who has been editing the Chapman guide since 1965, said WySocki is not the first to complain about the practice, although traditionally complaints come not from military men but from “little old ladies with their hair up in curlers.”

Maloney said yacht clubs’ flag displays represent ships’ masts. Since the 1500s, he said, the major powers have displayed their kingdoms’ and countries’ flags from the gaff of the aftermost mast of sailing ships. Often pennants would be flown higher on a ship, but never higher on the same pole. That, he said, is the distinction.

As to why the aftermost gaff was considered the position of honor, Maloney said he can only theorize. The concern may have been aesthetic, he said; a rectangular flag would fly more freely from the end of a gaff than from a position perpendicular to the deck.

His second theory, which he believes is more likely the case: Enemies would be less likely to aim their fire at the aftermost gaff of a ship than toward the center. Thus, the gaff position makes a country’s flag “less likely to be shot away in battle,” said Maloney.

And as WySocki would surely concede, a true patriot would always try to keep the flag out of the line of fire.

Editorial librarian Jacquelyn Cenacveira contributed to this story.