By R. Kurt Osenlund, Correspondent

Not every war veteran has fond memories of time served. In this very column, dozens of men and women have shared painful recollections of harsh conditions, lost friends, and near-death experiences. Levittown resident Walter Hicinbothem, a former quartermaster (QM) with the US Navy who fought in WWII, has plenty of those same mental and emotional scars, but what the 83-year-old recalls most about his stint in the armed forces are the good times.

A junior, Hicinbothem was born to father, Walter, and mother, Florence, in Bronx, NY in 1925. He soon saw the arrival of two younger sisters, Gertrude and Alice. When Hicinbothem was still a child, the family hopped the state border and relocated to Linden, NJ, a Union County city that borders Staten Island. It was there that Hicinbothem graduated from Linden High School and, in 1943, at age 18, he enlisted in the Navy.

Like most former soldiers, Hicinbothem's first military memories are those of boot camp. Straight out of the gate, he takes a decidedly positive look back. "That was a great, great time for me," he says of his undoubtedly strenuous six-week initiation, which took place in Newport, R.I. "The military teaches you to take care of yourself."

Hicinbothem remained in Newport for more teaching, attending QM school through the fall of '43 and into the winter of '44. The highlight of that period? Bowling.

"We didn't have much time to get off the base," Hicinbothem says of himself and his peers, "but whenever we did, we went to Boston to bowl. We'd play the duck pins and the candle pins [two variations on the traditional, ten-pin game in which the pins are shorter and thinner, respectively] - they were tough to knock down."

That January, Hicinbothem headed to New London, Conn. to further his education, completing submarine school by the following June. While he says the new institution's tight training schedule left little time for hitting the lanes, the jokester quips that the region taught him how to "play 'cahds' while driving a 'cah.'"

But that's not all it taught him. By August of 1944, Hicinbothem was at sea, making good on the skills he'd picked up throughout the previous year. Among them were overseeing the battle station helmsmen, maintaining the vessel's log and the captain's log, assisting in the torpedo rooms and navigation department, and calculating courses via chromometers - "charting the stars to secure locations."

Hicinbothem saw five war patrols during his time of service, most of them taking him through the Pacific Ocean and the South China Sea, on board the USS Black Fin submarine. On his initial run, he and his crew took out their first "victim," a 4,000-ton Japanese ship, off the coast of the Philippine islands of Luzon. The outfit then went south and landed in Perth, Australia for some "R&R," where they engaged in hunting of a different sort.

Armed with rifles and led by a group of Aussie orphans with whom they lodged, the sailors hit the outback, on the prowl for kangaroo. Though Hicinbothem claims to have dined on rabbit and lamb on his trip Down Under, 'roo meat never ended up on the menu.

"Those doggone kangaroos jumped faster than any of us could shoot," he says. "They jumped right over our heads! Nobody hit anything."

It certainly wasn't always fun and games for Hicinbothem. By the time he was formally discharged in March of 1946, he'd evaded numerous aerial attacks, duked it out in a torpedo battle with a Japanese Shigure destroyer, and faced underwater terror as his sub sustained depth-charge damages. But he healthily holds tightest to the more pleasant experiences, which managed to follow him through his post-military life.

In 1949, he married his wife, Virginia, and the two moved to Linden's neighboring town of Elizabeth. He went to work as an operator in a chemical plant in 1951, during which time he earned his certificate in engineering from Rutgers University. The couple moved to New Brunswick and then to Levittown in 1963, where they've remained to this day. After yet more schooling in radio electronics, Hicinbothem scored "the best job (he) ever had" with RCA, which employed him until his retirement in 1982.

With Virginia, Hicinbothem fathered six children: Eileen, Peggy, Tom, Pat, Carol, and David. He's also a grandfather of 13 and a great-grandfather of five, with one more on the way. He and Virginia have spent much of their lives traveling, around the country and around the world. In the US, the two have gone as far north as Nova Scotia and as far south as Key West.

They've been to Japan and visited Hawaii eight times (once for seven straight weeks). Thanks to his long-standing membership with the US Submarine Veterans of WWII, they've attended annual conventions in "all parts of the country." Not a bad way to rack up more great memories.

"The Navy was good for me - I sowed my wild oats. I had a good time in the service. I learned a lot and, overall, had a great experience." He says it with a smile.