Friday, December 28, 2012

Coming Up in 2013

Happy New Year! 2013 will be a very busy year at the Hampton Roads Naval Museum. We have a lot of great events planned, and this blog post will give you a little taste for our plans. All of our events this year are free of charge!

One event we hope you've heard about already is scheduled for Saturday, February 2, when HRNM will host "Brick by Brick: LEGO Shipbuilding." This is our second year for this Lego Shipbuilding program, and we promise this event will be better than ever. It's for both kids and adults, and we're asking people to bring their own ships to enter in our contest (ages 4+). More details can be found in this blog post.

Other events for 2013 include a military family day at HRNM and Nauticus, where admission to the battleship and Nauticus will be free for military families with ID! This event is scheduled for Saturday, April 13. In addition to the free admission, we'll also be doing a lot of fun crafts and activities for families at HRNM.

In mid-June, we'll be hosting "You Sank My Battleship!", a family fun evening about Navy board games and video games. Come to HRNM to play some of the old-standbys, including Battleship, and also get the chance to participate in Navy-related video games. You and your kids could win lots of great prizes during this free event on June 19, which will run from 6-8pm.

Finally, one of our biggest events of 2013 will be Civil War Navy Day at HRNM, scheduled for Tuesday, September 17. The Virginia Civil War Sesquicentennial Commission's HistoryMobile will be here at HRNM for visitors to see, HRNM staff will be running fun activities, tours, and interactive programs about the Civil War Navy all day, and at 6pm, Dr. James McPherson will speak about his new book, War on the Waters: The Union and Confederate Navies, 1861-1865. McPherson, a Pulitzer Prize-winning author and emeritus professor of history at Princeton University, will also be available for a book-signing after his talk. This event is also free, and is co-sponsored by the Hampton Roads Chapter of the Navy League.

As you can see, we have a lot going on in 2013. This blog post just gives the basic information, so save these dates and keep an eye out for more information as we get closer to each of these events. Visit our Facebook page or contact us at laura.l.orr@navy.mil for additional information about any of our upcoming events. Hope to see you at HRNM in 2013!

Friday, December 21, 2012

The Holidays During a Time of War

With the holiday season upon us, we present a few items from the museum's collection pertaining to the local U.S. Navy during this time of the year. 

Christmas Day 1941 issue of Naval Station Norfolk's official newspaper.
Produced eighteen days after the air raid on Pearl Harbor, it reminds servicemen
that all leave has been cancelled.
Christmas Day 1942 issue of Naval Station Norfolk's official newspaper.
1944 cartoon by Airman Bill O'Keefe that appeared in the Norfolk Seabag about the holiday
shopping rush at the Ship's Service Stores (precursor to the Navy Exchange).
While off the coast of North Korea in 1952, the deck gang of USS Wisconsin (BB-64) builds a snowman.
The Badger, the official newspaper of USS Wisconsin, "...Firing Best Wishes at You"
while in the war zone of the Pacific Ocean.

Thursday, December 13, 2012

CSS Virginia Ship Model and Armor Plate


Shown here is the Naval Museum's model of the ironclad CSS Virginia, along with a piece of Virginia's iron plate.  Ship model builder John Ratclaff constructed the 1/4" to a 1'-scale model for the museum in 1984, and this model is the one of the centerpieces of the museum's Civil War gallery.  Additionally, this particular piece of iron plate is one of the better examples of Virginia's armor on display in any museum.

The armor plate itself is converted railroad rolling stock iron.  Early in the war, a raid conducted by General "Stonewall" Jackson procured rails from the Baltimore & Ohio railroad line in northern Virginia.  While usable rail went to support the South's rail infrastructure, the Tredegar Iron Works in Richmond received the damaged pieces.  After receiving the rails, Tredegar's workers melted them down and hammered them into pieces.  Each one- or two-inch-thick piece was fifty-nine inches long and eight inches wide. 

As you can see in the photograph above, the armor has been pierced in three places.  In these spots, workers hammered in bolts to connect the armor to either the ship's second layer of armor or to the planks of wood that backed up the armor.  However, in Ironclad Down: USS Merrimack-CSS Virginia, From Construction to Destruction, Carl Park noted that it is unclear what pattern Virginia's designers had in mind for these holes. Other examples of Virginia's armor remain at Norfolk Navy Yard's Trophy Park, the Portsmouth Naval Shipyard Museum, and the Museum of Confederacy, and all have their own unique pattern of bolt holes. While there are not many pieces of Virginia's armor remaining, Park remarked that there is enough written evidence from Tredegar's management and the ship's designers to suggest that there may have been no pattern at all.  Thus, most drawings of Virginia (such as the one shown above) are most likely incorrect because they show a straight, uniform pattern of bolts on the ship.

Friday, December 7, 2012

Pearl Harbor Battleships, Part II



Today, on the 71st anniversary of the attack on Pearl Harbor, we present USS California (BB-44), Oklahoma (BB-37), and Arizona (BB-39), three more battleships stationed in Pearl Harbor that also had a direct tie to the Hampton Roads area.  

USS California (BB-44)
USS California in Hampton Roads making preparations
to leave for the West Coast, 1939
Because Mare Island Navy Yard built California and the ship conducted most of her operations on the West Coast, Battleship Number 44's time in Hampton Roads was considerably shorter than the rest.  In 1939, the Navy concentrated the fleet in the Atlantic both for a showing at the World's Fair in New York and for a major fleet exercise ("Fleet Problem XX") in the Caribbean.  California left San Diego to be a part of this fleet concentration. 

After conducting their exercises, the fleet anchored in Hampton Roads.  It was on April 20, 1939, that the Navy unexpectedly ordered the ships to depart the region post haste and return to the West Coast.  In September 1939, the fleet conducted another major exercise off the coast of Southern California. 

The A.P. Wire photo caption reads: "Sailors of the U.S.S.
California, neat and trim for prospective review, lined up on the deck after order for a surprise journey, an immediate return to the Pacific Coast."
USS Oklahoma (BB-37)
USS Oklahoma was built in New York as part of the "Second to None" fleet expansion program.  Upon completion, the Navy assigned her to Hampton Roads for the duration of World War I.  In Hampton Roads, she escorted convoys across the Atlantic to Europe. 

After the war, she remained in the region for several fleet exercises and naval reviews before being sent to Philadelphia for modernizations allowed under the Washington Naval Treaty.  After completing this program, she returned to Naval Operating Base Norfolk.  In 1939, the Navy redeployed her to Hawaii.

USS Oklahoma during the 1927 Naval Review in Hampton Roads
USS Oklahoma in the Elizabeth River, downtown Norfolk, 1939.
USS Arizona (BB-39)
The third ship to present today is USS Arizona.  Battleship number 39 spent much of her post-World War I career in Hampton Roads before being deployed for the first time to the Pacific in the mid-1920s.  Like many of the older battleships, the Navy selected her to be modernized (as opposed to outright scrapping) and sent her back to Hampton Roads.
Between 1929 and 1931, workers at Norfolk Naval Shipyard upgraded  several of Arizona's systems.   The upgrades were similar to ones Yard workers gave to Nevada.  This included two-inches of armor on the deck; anti-torpedo bulges along the side of the ship; a new fire control system; the removal of the old-fashioned cage observation towers; a new steam-launched catapult for the ship's aircraft; and brand new turbines and boilers that had been originally slated for the battleship Washington (BB-47).  Fortunately for historians, a Navy photographer took some very good pictures of the ship during this overhaul. 




Thursday, December 6, 2012

Pearl Harbor Battleships, Part I


New York Times announces
contract awards to Newport News
for West Virgina and Maryland.
Despite its physical distance from Pearl Harbor, the Hampton Roads area has long been known for its strong ties to many ships stationed in the Pacific.  When Japan launched its surprise attack against the U.S. Naval base at Pearl Harbor on December 7, 1941, the enemy targeted the eight battleships moored near one another.  Many of those battleships were either stationed, built, or overhauled in Hampton Roads before being sent out to the Pacific Fleet in the late 1930s.  Today and tommorow, we will be featuring photographs of those ships in remembrance of their sacrifice.

First are USS Maryland (BB-46) and West Virginia (BB-48).  Newport News Shipbuilding constructed and launched the 33,000-ton Maryland on March 20, 1920, and West Virginia on November 19, 1921. Observers considered them technological wonders of the age.  Not only did they come equipped with the most powerful guns in the Navy's inventory (Mk 6 16-inch/45), but they also came equipped with an all-electric drive that more efficiently linked the ships' fire rooms and boilers with the shaft and propellers.  This resulted in a savings in space and additional control over the speed of the ship. 

Maryland on Newport News'
building ways.
However, like all state-of-the-art technology, the ships were expensive.  Each vessel cost the American taxpayers about $40,000,000 (the Navy's total budget between 1920 and 1922 averaged about $700,000,000 a year, with major reductions on the horizon).  Because of the naval arms limitations talks taking place in Washington, many people feared that both ships would never actually make it to the fleet.  One reporter wrote, "West Virginia (BB-48), the newest addition to Uncle Sam's navy and the seventh of the electric battleships, launched at Newport News last Saturday and destined to grace the scrap pile within a few months under the naval reduction program. If the American plan is agreed to, the new $40,000,000 dreadnought, now 60 percent complete, will never be finished."

But the Navy spared both ships from the Washington Naval Treaty axe and commissioned them into the fleet.  After spending the 1920s in Hampton Roads, the Navy redeployed both vessels to the Pacific Fleet in the 1930s. 

West Virginia (at left) at Newport News Shipbuilding, 1923.  The larger ship at right is
 the giant 54,000-ton SS Leviathan

USS Nevada in Hampton Roads, 1927, during a Naval Review
The third ship to mention is USS Nevada (BB-36).  Built in 1914, Nevada was based in Hampton Roads for much of World War I. Under the terms of the Washington Naval Treaty, the U.S. Navy needed to decide whether to build new battleships and scrap the old ones, or upgrade the old ones and scrap battleships under construction.  It chose the second option.

Nevada arrived at Norfolk Naval Shipyard (NNSY) in 1929 and received a major technological upgrade.  Workers added two inches of deck armor; ten new five-inch guns for anti-aircraft (this was found to be seriously inadequate in the days after Pearl Harbor); retrofitted 14-inch guns to allow them to increase their elevation to 30 degrees; and received new geared turbines that had been originally slated for North Dakota (BB-29).  NNSY workers completed the job by the spring of 1930 and the ship immediately headed for the Pacific.

USS Nevada (far side of picture) at Norfolk Naval Shipyard, 1930.  
The ship on the near side is USS Arizona (BB-39). 

Monday, December 3, 2012

Baby Incubator Exhibit (With Living Infants!) at the 1907 Jamestown Exposition

This is the Baby Incubator building at the 1907 Jamestown Exposition. Located on the "Warpath" section of the Exposition, the building invited visitors to the exhibit with the words "BABY INCUBATORS WITH LIVING INFANTS."  While the exhibitors were conducting serious work on the very serious problem of premature babies, the fact that the building was located in the part of the Exposition with carnival-like rides, wild animal shows, flumes, and train rides tended to make one think that P.T. Barnum himself set up the exhibit.  

P.T. Barnum did at least inspire the exhibit.   Mary Daney Smith, R.N., a senior nurse for the Society for the Lying-In Hospital in New York, stated that Barnum  and his new partner James Bailey produced an incubator display during for their 1898 show in London.  The two showmen even charged people to see it and made a handsome profit.

Horrified at the fact that these most vulnerable members of society were being exploited for profit, Smith and her fellow maternity nurses organized the exhibit as a way of securing long-term public funding for premature babies.  Incubators designed for human use were new technology, making them very expensive.  Smith (who did charge Exposition patrons to see the exhibit) estimated that it cost $15 a day to take care of one baby.  She also used the exhibit to demonstrate proper care of premature babies of which mothers everywhere should be aware.  The official history of the Exposition recorded that Exposition patrons frequently made multiple visits to this exhibit to check on the progress of the babies. 

Nurse Smith was particularly proud of her staff's care of a child simply known as Baby Margaret.  She "was born in Norfolk, Va., at the end of 24 weeks of gestation. She weighed at birth 1 lb. 1 oz., she was taken to the Baby Incubator Institution, where she was kept in the incubator at a temperature beginning at 90° Fahr., and gradually coming down to 78° Fahr. for a period of five months, after which time she stayed in the nursery for six weeks and was sent home when she was 7 months old, weighing 2 pounds and as normal as any baby could be. For the first three months in her life she was fed with a medicine dropper, after that a tiny nipple was made for her by puncturing the rubber bulb of a medicine dropper. She is now over three years old, can walk and talk as any baby her age, and is in every way a prize incubator baby."