• St. Michael's College; Colchester, VT

A very special note of gratitude to Professors Peter Harrigan, Catherine Hurst, and John Devlin (Technical Director) of St. Michael's College Theatre Department for availing their beautiful McCarthy Theatre, and opening up their exceptionally large hearts to us and the USS PUEBLO crew during this historic occasion. Without their extraordinary kindness, this "Tribute" performance could not have been made possible.

and

• THE CREW OF THE USS PUEBLO   

We don't even know where to begin thanking the wonderful and heroic crew of the U.S.S. PUEBLO for offering their unwavering show of support for us and in this mission. They are extraordinary gentlemen, each and every one of them. We voice not only our gratitude for their service, but also our continued outrage over their ordeal, and our unswerving pride in them for what is representational of the very best this country has offered to the free world, and to that part of the globe which may never know the meaning of the word "free."    

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HOW YOU CAN HELP HONOR AND PAY TRIBUTE:

If you would like to help honor the men of The USS PUEBLO in this special 40th Anniversary Tribute, you may mail your tax-deductible contributions in any amount you wish (we are a non-profit company) to:

The Heritage Theatre Company

P.O. Box 844

Rockville, Maryland  20848

ATTN:  PUEBLO "Tribute"

ALL DONORS & SPONSORS (SMALL & LARGE)

• All contributors' names will be displayed on this website (along with our thanks), in addition to being included in our very special PUEBLO "Tribute" program / playbill for the USS PUEBLO crew which all donors / contributors will receive as a keepsake souvenir of this historic occasion.

SPONSORS:  $1,000 OR MORE

• For sponsorships of $1,000 or more, we will include your special message to the crew in our PUEBLO "Tribute" Program for the PUEBLO crew (space limitations require we limit your message to 100 words).

SPONSORS:  $5,000 OR MORE

• For individual, corporate, or organizational sponsorships of $5,000 or more, we will award up to 2 (two) free passes to the special PUEBLO "Tribute" performance in Vermont on September 12, 2008 as "guests" of The Heritage Theatre Company.

SPECIAL NOTICE

• PLEASE NOTE: Tickets will not be sold or otherwise made available to the general public for this private performance for the crew.

Our sincere gratitude for your every assistance

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THE NAVY TIMES

August 27, 2007

(published August 20, 2007)

Command performance for 'Pueblo'

Group hopes to stage play at crew's 40-year reunion
By Philip Ewing

Posted : August 27, 2007

Harry Iredale was a 24-year-old civilian oceanographer with the National
Oceanographic and Atmospheric Administration when he reported aboard the
Navy surveillance ship Pueblo in 1968. He was barely prepared for his
job, he said - "They picked me because I could spell 'oceanographic.'
They were desperate for young bachelors to go to sea" - and certainly
not ready to face an ordeal like the one he and his shipmates would
endure.

Karey Faulkner was 12 when North Korea seized the Pueblo and imprisoned
its crew for 11 months. She said she vividly remembers following the
story on TV, and it has stayed with her all her life.

"Sometimes there's just a magnetic pull about something, and you don't
know why," she said.

That magnetism has pulled Faulkner, who directs a theater company in
suburban Washington, D.C., to begin one of the biggest projects she has
done: Not only stage a version of Stanley R. Greenberg's play, "Pueblo,"
at her home theater, but also put on a private performance for the
Pueblo's crew at their 40th anniversary reunion next year.

"This is not a play; this is a tribute," Faulkner said. "It will be the
biggest honor of my life."

She has a script, written by Greenberg for television in 1973. She's
assembling a cast and already has her "Cmdr. Lloyd 'Pete' Bucher," the
Pueblo's skipper, in actor Tom Pentecost.

And she has an eyewitness in Iredale. But to take "Pueblo" to the
reunion, Faulkner and her Heritage Theatre Company need money.

She said the company has to find a way to transport a cast of about 20 or
30, as well as its crew members and sets, from their home theater in
Silver Spring, Md., to St. Michael's College, outside Burlington, Vt.,
for their performance of "Pueblo" on Sept. 12, 2008.

Faulkner is asking for donations of any size so she'll be able to put on
her tribute. The theater company is nonprofit, she said.

Frightening flashbacks

"Pueblo" takes place at a Navy court of inquiry after the ship's crew
has returned from North Korea. American admirals question whether the
men should've let themselves be captured, and scenes flash back to their
times on the ship and in captivity.

Iredale said he saw productions of "Pueblo" when it first appeared in
the early 1970s, on stage in Washington and on TV, starring Hal Holbrook
as Bucher.

As an oceanographer, Iredale wasn't involved in the surveillance and
intelligence-gathering that North Korean leaders used to justify their
capturing the Pueblo, but having scientists aboard gave the ship a cover
story. When North Korean attack boats appeared, Iredale and the ship's
other NOAA man, Dick Tuck, asked Bucher what they should do.

"'Do your oceanographic thing,'" Iredale remembered the captain telling
them.

As they lowered their scientific gear into the water, the Pueblo's intel
crewmen were destroying their equipment and codebooks. Iredale laughed
as he recalled a navigator feverishly erasing charts that showed where
the ship had been. Later, the North Koreans opened fire - Iredale
remembered their 57mm shells popping straight through the Pueblo's hull.

Bucher ordered all stop, and the North Koreans came aboard; Iredale and
his crewmates were bound and blindfolded, he said, then he and Tuck were
locked up in a military barracks. Their cells were always lighted,
making sleep difficult; the North Korean interrogators screamed at them;
and they were paraded in "press conferences" for Communist "reporters."

The press conferences are what many Americans remember about the Pueblo
crew, when the sailors displayed the "Hawaiian good luck sign" - what
Americans knew to be a famous obscene gesture - as a symbol of defiance.
The famous photo of the sailors paying their respects with their middle
fingers was taken in Iredale's cell, he said. The North Koreans
eventually caught on to what it meant and made the Americans pay for the
disrespect.

The "room daddies" - North Korean interrogators who had been shouting
and pressuring the sailors to denounce the U.S. and sign confessions -
changed their tack.

"When my room daddy smashed me across the face, I knew we were in
trouble," Iredale said. "They had never touched our faces before."

Some soldiers "worked me over pretty good" with their fists, Iredale
said, and then gave him a bucket of water to clean his own blood off the
walls of his cell. The beating left him in bad shape.

"It took me 30 years before I could smile straight across again," he
said.

Memories like those have made actors starring in "Pueblo" apprehensive
as they think about their special show at the crew's reunion.

"It's intimidating," actor Sean Coe said of his character, a North Korean
interrogator. "I don't understand - I hope I never understand - a man doing
such monstrous things, a human being doing this to another human being.
I'm anxious not to make the audience relive that experience."

Iredale admitted he'd probably have nightmares after seeing the play,
but he insisted that it will be valuable not only for him, but for
general audiences who see it at the cast's home theater in Maryland. He
and members of "Pueblo's" cast said they wanted the play to be relevant
to modern audiences for a number of reasons. Pentecost said it would be
useful to try to help audiences better understand the North Korean
perspective - "They were trained to hate us from when they were young,"
he said. "We were the devil incarnate to those people" - and Faulkner
said she hoped it would put viewers inside a situation where on-the-spot
decisions can conflict with higher values.

Faulkner recalled that some Americans scoffed when a team of British
sailors and marines were captured in the Persian Gulf in April. Like the
crew of the Pueblo, critics said, the British troops should've resisted,
but she hopes audiences come away from her play with a more nuanced
view.

"When you see this you'll be able to imagine what it's like to make a
decision like that," she said. "When those British boats were captured,
I didn't hear one person compare it to the Pueblo. Why is this not being
raised?"

Notwithstanding its references to current events, Faulkner and her
actors said the main objective is to remember and tell the story of the
crew of the Pueblo.

"This is about us honoring them," she said. "This most important thing
is that this not be forgotten. We've got to perpetuate this."

How to help

The Heritage Theatre Company is a 501c(3) nonprofit organization;
contributions are tax-deductible.

Contributions for "Pueblo" can be mailed to:

The Heritage Theatre Company

P.O. Box 844

Rockville, MD 20848

On the Web:

http://www.theheritagetheatre.org