Opening paragraphs......................

The sarcophagus of John Paul Jones at the Naval Academy

      When I walked into the United States Naval Academy on a hot summer's day in the early 1970s, the first thing that happened to me was that I got a quick and brutal haircut.  It was not only a sudden induction into military life but a way for the Navy to emphasize that my own power to decide anything, including the length of my hair, was emphatically terminated.  Alongside twelve hundred classmates from  every state in the Union and a smattering of foreign countries, we were then lined up in a very rough formation, broken into small groups—squads of about a dozen—and marched around the Academy grounds.  The highlight of those first hours was an introduction to Captain John Paul Jones, or, more accurately, to his crypt in the heart of the massive Naval Academy Chapel—the de facto high church of the US Navy.

-Admiral James Stavridis, To Risk It All: Nine Conflicts and the Crucible of Decision