Today’s post is by Nathanial Patch, Reference Archivist and Subject Matter Expert for Navy Records at the National Archives in College Park, MD. January 1943, while on her fourth war patrol, the USS Growler (SS 215) from Brisbane, Australia, had been patrolling the sea lanes to Rabaul on the western end of New Ireland, she … Continue reading Prepare for Collision! The Ramming of the USS Growler and a Japanese Gunboat
Today’s post is written by Dr. Greg Bradsher, Senior Archivist at the National Archives at College Park, MD. Background The discovery of the mineral wealth of Alaska led immediately to a large development of the coastwise trade along the northwestern seaboard of the United States, and particularly in Puget Sound. Navigators were then, as now, … Continue reading Assignment: Neah Bay, Washington, 1909; The United States Revenue-Cutter Service and the USRC Snohomish
Today’s post is written by Dr. Greg Bradsher, Senior Archivist at the National Archives at College Park, MD. This is the second of two blog posts about John Barry Ryan, Capt. Washington I. Chambers, USN, Eugene B. Ely, and the USS Birmingham, November 14, 1910. While arrangements were being made for the flight off the … Continue reading The First Aeroplane Take Off from a Ship, November 14, 1910, Part II
Today’s post is written by Dr. Greg Bradsher, Senior Archivist at the National Archives at College Park, MD. This is the first of two blog posts about John Barry Ryan, Capt. Washington I. Chambers, USN, Eugene B. Ely, and the USS Birmingham, November 14, 1910. At the beginning of 1909 the number of airplanes in … Continue reading The First Aeroplane Take Off from a Ship, November 14, 1910, Part I
Today’s post is by Joseph P. Keefe, Archives Specialist at the National Archives at Boston. The USS Braine was a twenty-one-ton Fletcher class destroyer which had been built and launched at the Bath Iron Works in Bath, Maine in March of 1943. Following her participation in General Douglas MacArthur’s campaign to retake the Philippines, the … Continue reading The Kamikaze Attack on the USS Braine, May 27, 1945
Today’s post is by Joseph P. Keefe, Archives Specialist at the National Archives at Boston. When the American Civil War broke out on April 12, 1861, the newly formed Confederate States of America had no ships to speak of in its navy. In the months leading up to the war, the Confederate government sought the … Continue reading The United States vs the Ship Bat: A Civil War Prize Case
By Andrew Begley, Archives Specialist at the National Archives at Boston When the First Congress passed “An Act for the establishment and support of Lighthouses, Beacons, Buoys, and Public Piers” on August 7, 1789, there were only twelve lighthouses illuminating the shores of the newly formed nation. By 1842, that number had grown to 250. … Continue reading Winslow Lewis and the Expansion of Early Federal Lighthouses
Today's post was written by Gina Perry, Archives Specialist at the National Archives in Washington, DC It was 70 degrees early in the morning on April 24, 1862, according to that day’s entry in the logbook of the U.S.S. Hartford, as the ship sailed its way up the mouth of the Mississippi River: “From 4 … Continue reading Over 650 Newly Digitized Navy Logbooks in the National Archives Catalog
Today's post is written by Alicia Henneberry, Archives Specialist at the National Archives at College Park, MD. Commissioning ceremony in which Phyllis Dailey, second from right, became the first black nurse in the Navy Nursing Corps. March 8, 1945. NAID 520618. In October 1908, twenty nurses reported for duty at the Naval Medical School Hospital … Continue reading The Closed Door of Justice: African American Nurses and the Fight for Naval Service
Today's post was written by me, M. Marie Maxwell, an Archives Specialist at the National Archives in Washington, DC. Although normally I work in Textual Processing, I am engaged in a short detail with the Archives' Innovation Hub in the same Washington, DC location. It's April. Spring is springing. Birds are singing. Poetry is in … Continue reading April is National Poetry Month! Let’s enjoy some USCG poems
