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January 1922 Proceedings—When Louie Feipel wrote this month that “A comprehensive history of the United States Navy still remains to be written, ” few dared contradict this honored historian, whose work includes one six-part Proceedings series on filibustering in the 1850s and another on the U.S. Navy in Mexico. He boldly stops time in its flight and proclaims that the U.S. Navy that sailed up to and through the Civil War—“the Old Navy,” he calls it—ought to be remembered as existing in a Golden Age.
But this month’s candid paper suggests that golden ages are hard to mine, for even the most conscientious digger. Feipel has been able to find only “about 300” pieces of historical literature describing this period. And that’s not much to memorialize an era in which our naval architecture astonished the world and our captains circumnavigated the globe in cruises of three-to-five years’ duration—to protect American rights, lives, and property; to punish pirates and tinhorn tyrants; and to shape and reshape both geographic and scientific boundaries. Either Feipel was right in saying that we knew too little about this Golden Age in 1922, or it can be said of the Old Navy as the salty Marine said of his Old Corps; “It ain’t what it used to be—and it never was.”
January 1942 Proceedings—Rear Admiral David Potter has vivid memories of his six-month ordeal in the ram Katahdin during the war with Spain. The Katahdin was a 2,155-ton manhole cover whose upper deck, rising only 56 inches above the waterline, caused her to be dubbed “Old Half-Seas Under.” Like those of his 107 shipmates, Potter’s fears were focused on death by roasting in the 110-125° heat below decks, or—entangled with her impaled prey—the Katahdin and all hands being dragged down to a watery grave.
Later, at sea, the ship's navigator opened a wardroom port, only to be drenched by sea water. By nightfall, his condition had become alarming; by daybreak, he was dead. Still, all requests for ventilation equipment went unanswered until, during an inspection by the commander of the Katahdin's squadron, the admiral and his inspecting party were trapped in a tomb-like passageway, when a fire drill caused the watertight doors at both ends to be slammed shut. Escorting the inspecting party, Potter recalls how their nerves frayed and then broke, with fingernails clawing and feet kicking the unyielding steel in the suffocating blackness. Within a fortnight, the Katahdin got her ventilation gear. By then, however, the end was in sight—for both that “Splendid Little War” and for “Satan’s flagship.”
January 1962 Proceedings—At 26, four years out of the NavaI Academy, the lieutenant (junior grade) stands at a crossroads, but he knows which way he is going to go. An instructor in the Navy’s Nuclear Power Training Unit, he has a bright future. But he knows, too, that five of his most brilliant contemporaries, who climbed on board the Nuke Spook bandwagon when he did, will soon leave to pursue law at Yale, business at Harvard, economics at Duke, math at M.I.T., or a civilian career in electronics.
What do they know that he doesn’t? They know, as he does, that watches, drills, and paperwork make shipboard duty dull and unchallenging; that the discomfort of duty in ships with demanding operating schedules, long separations from loved ones, and high civilian salaries combine to make civilian life seem more and more attractive over time.
What does he know that they may not? He knows who he is and what kind of a man—and what kind of a naval officer—he wants to be 30 years in the future. What makes this a great article and so delightful to read is that today, 30 years after he wrote it, the jay gee—Jonathan Turnbull Howe—has become one of the highest-ranking admirals in the Navy. Admiral Howe recently became the Deputy Assistant for National Security.
Clay Barrow
- Letters notifying the three award winners will be mailed on or about 1 June 1992.
- All essays should be typewritten, double-spaced, on 8 1/2” x 11” paper and accompanied by a floppy diskette when possible. Please include address, phone number, biographical sketch, and social security number with entries.
- The winning essays will be published in Proceedings. Some entries not awarded prizes may also be selected for publication. The authors of these pieces will be compensated at regular rates.
- The Naval Institute Editorial Board will judge the competition.
Air Coast Guard
All aircraft used by the U.S. Coast Guard since the inception of its air arm 76 years ago are featured in a new book by Arthur Pearcy, titled U.S. Coast Guard Aircraft Since 1916. Similar in format to books in our popular Putnam Aviation series, it is the only complete guide on the subject ever published.
Coast Guard historian Dr. Robert Scheina welcomes it as a useful primary reference to the seventh-largest naval air arm in the world. The U.S. Coast Guard operates more than 200 fixed- and rotary-wing aircraft from nearly 30 air stations in the United States—including Alaska and Hawaii—and Puerto Rico.
Many Naval Institute members will remember Pearcy’s previous book, A History of U.S. Coast Guard Aviation, which established a foundation for this new volume. More than 70 aircraft, from the HH-65A Dolphin to the Waco J2W-1, are profiled in the volume, which includes a wealth of technical data, design histories, operations, and serial information. In addition to these listings, the book offers chapters on insignia and markings, the rotary-wing period, acquisitions, and more.
This book and many others are highlights of our Spring 1992 Book Supplement catalog, mailed to you with this issue of Proceedings. Be sure to look it over and take advantage of the Naval Institute's members-only prepublication discounts offered on several titles.
The War in ’42
The Naval Institute, the Admiral Nimitz Museum, the Texas Parks and Wildlife Department, and Pennzoil present a retrospective symposium entitled, "1942 . . . Issue In Doubt," 26-28 March
Proceedings/January l*W2