Funny. My house was right next to the Seabees barracks in Yokosuka, Japan, and there were always things to get into there. I recall they used to have these giant, cylindrical cages with a hatch in the side, and there was a big handle on the side to turn the cage like a spit...we were small enough to get inside the cage and grab on, shut and latch the hatch, and kids on each end would begin to spin it as fast as they could until the centrifugal force pinned you, then you ended up screaming for them to stop.
Sometimes they wouldn't stop and I recall screaming helplessly "Auuuugggghhhhhhhhh!!!!!!" as they grinned, then when you got out, you would stagger around.
I have no idea what those things were, but I think they might have been things from WWII they put soldiers or sailors wet laundry in to spin them dry before they hung them up to dry in the sun.
That was my guess, at least!
That was where I began my lifelong admiration of the Seabees. They had a giant statue that looked like this on the base at a base motel where we stayed for two weeks when we first got there, waiting for quarters to open up. We had six kids in our family, so we were all crammed into one motel room, while my parents had another room. Sleeping on cots, living out of those old, blue fiberboard suitcases.
We would go out on the dirty beach and play (we didn't care if it was dirty) and I recall there were long stretches of BIG anchor chain segments out there laid out parallel to each other hundreds of feet long, completely and totally rusted out. From large naval vessels. I remember seeing the gray navy ships out near the horizon, coming and going, slowly disappearing going "hull down" until all you saw was the tip of them mast.
Anyway, right in front of the motel there was a large statue that looked like this:
I was about ten at the time, and I thought that was the most awesome thing. It looked gigantic to me. (This isn't the same one, but you get the idea!)
In my professional life, I decided to adopt the Seabee Motto, because I so admired that outlook:
"Can Do!"
It has served me well. I take my hat off to them.
My apologies for getting off topic, but it brought back memories!