Thanks a Million!

By M.C. Farrington
HRNM Historian

I never thought I would see this day.

Over 270 posts and five years ago, I took over the editorship of the six year-old Hampton Roads Naval Museum blog. Although we experimented with different formats such as long-form stories and book reviews, the most important factors for success were focusing on our artifacts and particular primary sources in our collection, leavened by brevity and timeliness.  From 2014 to 2018 we went from an average of 320 page views per post to over 4,000.

Statistics on page views from the HRNM's blog from its founding until June 2020. 

When Naval Network Warfare Command began blocking Blogger-hosted blogs on government computers and Google shut down their Google+ social media platform at around the same time over a year ago, our numbers plummeted once again.  Despite this, and the fact that the social media platforms that have come into being since the blog's founding have become the predominant platforms for news and information about museums, not to mention everything else, we have persisted and our numbers have even been climbing again as of late.

The top ten posts of the HRNM blog as measured in page views on Blogger, not counting those read on other ersatz aggregation sites (otherwise known as "content farms") around the web hosting HRNM posts without permission.  

Although it may never again hit the heights it did only a couple of years ago, writing for and editing this blog has been a surprisingly demanding yet subtly satisfying experience.

We could not have gotten close to one million page views without the work of current and former museum staffers such as educators Diana Gordon, Matthew Headrick, Jerome Kirkland, Julius J. Lacano, Joseph Miechle, Reece Nortum, A.J. Orlikoff, Alicia Pullen, and Zachary Smyers. HRNM Registrar Katherine Renfrew, former director Elizabeth "Becky" Dove and former curator Joe Judge also contributed pivotal posts during my tenure here.

A screen shot of the first HRNM blog post, published by then-HRNM historian Gordon Calhoun, who founded the blog.   

Helping us have been our contributing writers, made up of local authors and naval enthusiasts, museum interns and docents as well even drillling reservists, who each have contributed their deep and varied experience to the blog, such as Diane L. Cripps, Cmdr. Colette Grail, USNR, Justin Hall, Ira "Dick" Hanna, Matthew Krogh, J. Huntington "Hunt" Lewis, Sarah Linden-Brooks, Steve Milner, Alexander G. "Sandy" Monroe, and Christopher Pieczynski,

The blog's very survival has also sometimes depended upon the efforts of former and sometimes co-editor Laura Orr, the museum's education director, as well as Elijah Palmer, her deputy.  They have also written quite a few posts in their own right, both before and after my arrival.  

As my departure draws nigh, I will look back with pride at our modest attempt to make the collection of this museum and its parent command, the Naval History and Heritage Command, more accessible to naval enthusiasts, journalists, students, scholars, and those who are unable to visit either by circumstance, distance, or the ongoing pandemic prohibitions.

What the future holds, who can say?  As for the last few years, we have hopefully made local naval history more interesting for you along the way.  

When Caroline Kennedy Last Christened a Ship in the Name of Her Father

A page from the USS John F. Kennedy (CVA 67) christening program contained in the Jacqueline Bouvier Kennedy Onassis Personal Papers held by the John F. Kennedy Presidential Library and Museum.

By M.C. Farrington
HRNM Historian

There have been a number of new aircraft carriers that carried on the names of their predecessors: names such as Yorktown (CV 5 & CV 10), Hornet (CV 8 & CV 12), Lexington (CV 2 & CV 16), Wasp (CV 7 & CV 18) and Enterprise (CV 6 & CVN 65).  These were vessels named to commemorate great American victories or storied vessels of the past.  As time has gone on, the names of presidents and other notable figures in naval history have been added to new American flattops joining the fleet.  However, no president's name has been carried forward from an old carrier to a new one.*

On December 7, 2019, at Newport News Shipbuilding, a new American carrier was christened with the name of a president from a previous carrier for the very first time.  And, in what might be another first, the new carrier was christened by the same person who christened the old one at the same shipyard over 52 years ago.
Another detail of the ceremony turned out to be remarkably consistent with that person's first performance on May 27, 1967.

Caroline Kennedy, President John F. Kennedy's daughter, former ambassador to Japan, and sponsor of the Ford-class aircraft carrier USS John F. Kennedy (CVN 79), christens the ship on December 7, 2019. USS John F. Kennedy (CVN 79) was christened at Huntington Ingalls Industries' Newport News Shipbuilding (HII-NNS) division, in Newport News, Virginia. The aircraft carrier is named after John Fitzgerald Kennedy, the 35th president of the United States, who served in office from January 1961 to November 1963. This is the second U.S. aircraft carrier named for President Kennedy, with the former being the last conventionally powered carrier, CV-67, which served from 1968 to 2007. (U.S. Navy photo 191207-N-PG550-1463 by Mass Communication Specialist 3rd Class Samuel Lee Pederson/Released)

You might have read that Caroline Kennedy didn't quite score a clean break on the first try with a bottle of "American sparkling wine" on the bow of the new ship on December 7.  This was a clear-cut case of history repeating.  But why was she selected to christen USS John F. Kennedy (CVA 67) in the first place, when she was just nine years old?  The decision had as much to do with naval custom as it had to do with tragedy.

Lieutenant John F. Kennedy, USNR, (standing, far right) with other crewmen onboard USS PT-109 at a South Pacific Naval Base, 1943. (U.S. Information Agency Photograph 306-ST-649-9, now in the collections of the National Archives)

As a lieutenant junior grade during World War II, her father John Fitzgerald Kennedy fought bravely in the Pacific, sustaining serious injuries after the PT boat under his command was rammed by a Japanese destroyer in 1943.  After his meteoric rise after the war as a congressman and, later, senator from the state of Massachusetts, he edged out Vice President (and fellow former naval officer) Richard Nixon for the presidency in November 1960.  After a tumultuous tenure as president, during which he authorized naval assets to secretly support Cuban exiles attempting to invade and overthrow the Communist government of Cuba and later ordered a naval quarantine of the island when the Soviets secretly put troops and tactical nuclear missiles there in response, Kennedy was assassinated on November 22, 1963 in Dallas, leaving Vice President Lyndon Baines Johnson (yet another former naval officer) as commander-in-chief.

Kennedy was unquestionably not afraid to put the Navy he led into harm's way, but he was also a strong advocate of the service.  After his death, President Johnson led the effort to name a modified Kitty Hawk-class carrier, authorized for construction during his predecessor's administration, for the fallen leader.  The keel for USS John F. Kennedy (CVA 67) was laid on October 22, 1964.  

As a matter of custom, as the carrier was nearing completion a significant member of President Kennedy's family would be invited to christen the vessel.

(Jacqueline Bouvier Kennedy Onassis Personal Papers/ John F. Kennedy Presidential Library and Museum)

In February 1967, Secretary of the Navy Paul Nitze sent Jacqueline Kennedy an invitation to sponsor the new carrier.  "Traditionally, a lady sponsors only one Navy ship; however, there have been exceptions to this custom," wrote Nitze.  "Though you christened the Polaris submarine, USS  LAFAYETTE, I am sure that I express the sentiment of the entire navy in urging you to christen the new carrier.  Should you prefer, your daughter, Caroline, may be designated."

In happier times: White House naval aide Capt. Tazewell T. Shepard and General Dynamics executive Roger Lewis look on as First Lady Jacqueline Kennedy christens USS Lafayette (SSBN 616) May 8, 1962 at Electric Boat, General Dynamics, in Groton, Connecticut. (Library of Congress via Naval History and Heritage Command/Flickr)

Indeed, Jacqueline Kennedy had christened USS Lafayette (SSBN 616) at General Dynamics Electric Boat shipyard in Groton, Connecticut, May 8, 1962. Less than two years later, however, her life, and the course of the nation's history, had been irrevocably changed by the assassination of her husband.  That tragic change impacted the way she felt towards attending another such event.

(Jacqueline Bouvier Kennedy Onassis Personal Papers/ John F. Kennedy Presidential Library and Museum)

In an early draft of the response Mrs. Kennedy sent Secreatry Nitze, she wrote, "That type of thing [the christening], remembering my husband, is very difficult for me."   But she then assured Nitze that someone from President Kennedy's family would attend the christening.

Overcoming her grief, Mrs. Kennedy decided upon having her daughter Caroline sponsor the ship, and on the morning of May 27, 1967, she accompanied the little girl and her son John F. Kennedy Jr. (along with approximately 15 immediate family members and their families) to the Newport News Shipbuilding and Dry Dock company.   

Writing for the Virginian-Pilot newspaper published in Norfolk, Virginia, reporter William K. Stevens observed, "Not since the 1963 funeral [of John F. Kennedy] had so many New Frontiersmen and relatives of John F. Kennedy been in one place at one time." Richard Cardinal Cushing, Archbishop of Boston, the same man who had blessed John F. Kennedy's marriage to Jacqueline L. Bouvier in 1953, given the invocation during his inauguration in 1961, and celebrated his funeral mass in 1963, was there to give the invocation for the christening.   

Secretary of Defense Robert McNamara escorts Jacqueline Kennedy, her son John Kennedy Jr., and her daughter Caroline (behind her brother) after arriving at Newport News Shipbuilding on May 27, 1967 (Newport News Shipbuilding photograph/ Hampton Roads Naval Museum collection)

Caroline Kennedy was hardly the first in her family to christen a ship at the mammoth shipyard on the James River.  Her paternal grandmother Rose Kennedy had sponsored the Cimarron-class fleet oiler SS Esso Richmond at Newport News Shipbuilding in September 1939 (which was commissioned USS Kaskaskia (AO 27) the following year), and her aunt Patricia Kennedy had sponsored the President Jackson-class attack transport President Polk (AP 103) in June 1941. Another aunt, Ethel Kennedy (wife of then-Attorney General Robert F. Kennedy) had sponsored the Ethan Allen-class ballistic missile submarine John Marshall (SSBN 611) in May 1961.

Caroline Kennedy prepares to swing a bottle of champagne into the bow of the aircraft carrier John F. Kennedy (CVA 67) at Newport News Shipbuilding under the guidance of Shipyard President Donald A. Holden on May 27, 1967 (Newport News Shipbuilding photograph/ Hampton Roads Naval Museum collection)

In a ceremony timed down to the second, three warning whistles were to sound; the first a siren scheduled for 12:25 pm, with a whistle 30 seconds later and another 20 seconds after that.  With each siren or whistle blast, one of JFK's three initials would appear in lights on a giant board affixed to the bow.  Caroline was scheduled to smash the bottle against an angular protuberance affixed to the bow precisely on the third whistle blast scheduled for 12:26.

"Caroline, 9, stood in front of the bow of the mammoth attack aircraft carrier John F. Kennedy like a left-handed little leaguer at home plate," wrote Virginian-Pilot reporter Shirley Bolinaga, who was among the throngs of local and national news media to cover the event. 

As John Kennedy Jr. and Jacqueline Kennedy watch as Newport News Shipbuilding President Donald A. Holden helps Caroline Kennedy christen the carrier John F. Kennedy (CVA 67). (Newport News Shipbuilding photograph/ Hampton Roads Naval Museum collection)

The clock photographed behind the participants on the platform indicates that the event was running ahead of schedule, with Caroline taking her first swing at 12:09 and 55 seconds, and, unless a video of the event accessible online has been edited incorrectly, she attempted to break the bottle after the second blast. 

John Kennedy Jr. and Jacqueline Kennedy seem to react with dismay as Caroline Kennedy appears to have momentary trouble christening the carrier John F. Kennedy (CVA 67). (Newport News Shipbuilding photograph/ Hampton Roads Naval Museum collection)

"She held the bottle of Great Western champagne like a baseball bat and swung from the shoulder," wrote Bolinaga. "It hit with a clunk but it didn't break." 

After the bottle bounced off the angular rail affixed to the bow, Caroline tried again, striking home about three seconds later, sending bubbly in all directions, and sending the great ship into the James River.   

Caroline Kennedy christens the carrier John F. Kennedy (CVA 67) as her brother John Kennedy Jr., mother Jacqueline Kennedy, and Newport News Shipbuilding President Donald A. Holden react. (Newport News Shipbuilding photograph/ Hampton Roads Naval Museum collection)

"On the second try, the bottle, beribboned with red, white, and blue, shattered. Its bubbly contents splashed all over Caroline's aqua and white dress and red shoes, and splattered on her mother as Mrs. Jacqueline Kennedy clapped her gloved hands together in front of her face," wrote Bolinaga.  "The mother and her children watched as the 61,450-ton ship was floated from Shipway 11 into the James River." 

Jacqueline Kennedy, her brother John Kennedy Jr., and daughter Caroline Kennedy watch the carrier John F. Kennedy (CVA 67) as she backs away from the christening platform. Note Newport News Shipbuilding President Donald A. Holden pointing out details to Caroline, who has just christened the vessel. (Newport News Shipbuilding photograph/ Hampton Roads Naval Museum collection)

Watched by thousands of guests and dignitaries such as President Lyndon B. Johnson, Secretary of Defense Robert McNamara and Secretary of the Navy Paul Nitze, the carrier John F. Kennedy (CVA 67) backs away from the christening platform at Newport News Shipbuilding and Dry Dock Company in Newport News, Virginia, on May 27, 1967. Note the board affixed to the bow spelling out the initials "J.F.K.," emulating John F. Kennedy's handwriting in electric lights. (Newport News Shipbuilding photograph/ Hampton Roads Naval Museum collection)

The aircraft carrier John F. Kennedy (CVA 67) backs away from the christening platform at Newport News Shipbuilding and Dry Dock Company in Newport News, Virginia on May 27, 1967, as thousands of guests and dignitaries such as President Lyndon B. Johnson, Senators Robert. F. (Bobby) and Edward M. (Ted) Kennedy as well as Virginia Governor Mills E. Godwin look on. (Newport News Shipbuilding photograph/ Hampton Roads Naval Museum collection)

After her commissioning on September 7, 1968, USS John. F. Kennedy, the Navy's last conventionally-powered carrier, plunged headlong into the Cold War that dominated foreign policy during her namesake's administration, and those of the next four presidential administrations. Caroline Kennedy visited the ship at least once more during its active service, the first time when the carrier visited Boston in 1970.

Seen from an American escort, a Soviet Tu-95 Bear D maritime reconnaissance aircraft makes a close approach to USS John F. Kennedy (CVA 67) during her first foray into the Mediterranean in 1969.  (National Archives and Records Administration via Naval History and Heritage Command/Flickr)

The signing of the Paris Peace Accords in 1973 deprived Kennedy of a scheduled wartime deployment to Southeast Asia and a place in the history of the Vietnam War, but the carrier participated in continuous exercises and operations through war and peace, the last being during Operation Iraqi Freedom, with frequent visits and yard periods in Hampton Roads in between, until her decommissioning in 2007.  

A port bow view of the aircraft carrier USS John F. Kennedy (CV 67) coming down the Elizabeth River after leaving Norfolk Naval Shipyard on August 17, 1987. (Photographer's Mate 1st Class McCoy, National Archives and Records Administration image 330-CFD-DN-SC-88-05873 via Naval History and Heritage Command/Flickr)

Long after CV 67 was struck from the Naval Vessel Register in 2009, Caroline Kennedy was very much in active government service, having been appointed as ambassador to Japan by President Barak Obama, a post she held from 2013 to 2017.

U.S. Ambassador to Japan Caroline Kennedy pilots Naval Beach Unit Seven's Landing Craft, Air Cushion (LCAC) during a visit to NBU-7 Facilities in Sasebo, Japan, on October 7, 2016. The visit is part of a larger trip to Nagasaki Prefecture. (U.S. Navy Photo 161007-N-NY430-042 by Petty Officer 3rd Class Kristopher S. Haley via Naval History and Heritage Command/Flickr)

Although, sadly, her mother Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis, who died of cancer in 1994, and her brother John F. Kennedy Jr., who died while flying his plane to Martha's Vineyard in 1999, were not there to witness it, Ambassador Caroline Kennedy once again visited Hampton Roads to take her place in christening a vessel that will represent her family, her father, and the nation he led, far into the future. 

"Christened by the hand of a child," said Secretary of Defense Robert. S. McNamara in his prepared remarks for the day of the original John F. Kennedy's commissioning over 52 years ago, "it will begin an odyssey whose final landfall we cannot clearly foretell."   



* Two American aircraft carriers were named for aviation pioneer Samuel Pierpoint Langley: USS Langley (CV 1), converted from the collier Jupiter at Norfolk Navy Yard between 1920-22, and USS Langley (CVL 27), an Independence-class light carrier, commissioned in 1943. USS Wright (CVL 49) was another Independence-class carrier constructed during World War II, but she was named for both brothers, whereas the previous USS Wright (AZ 1/AV 1), which served in several different aviation support roles after its commissioning in 1921, was only named for Orville Wright.

USS John F. Kennedy appears as CVA 67 in the early part of the story and CV 67 later on. The designation was changed in 1974.

After Three Decades, an Ode to Joe

On April 16, 2001, Hampton Roads Naval Museum (HRNM) curator Joe Judge (center), along with (from left) HRNM Director Becky Dove and HRNM Exhibits Specialist Marta Nelson celebrate the opening of USS Wisconsin (BB 64) as a public attraction at Nauticus, the National Maritime Center, which is also home to HRNM. (Hampton Roads Naval Museum file)

By John Pentangelo
Director, Hampton Roads Naval Museum

It was with heavy hearts that we bade farewell to the Hampton Roads Naval Museum’s MAINSTAY Joe Judge on October 31, the mood lightened by the astounding World Series win the night before by his beloved Washington Nationals.

HRNM Curator Joe Judge (M.C. Farrington)

For thirty years, HRNM’s curator and deputy director graced us all with his intelligence, dedication, leadership, knowledge, wisdom, and humor. Since 1990, HRNM has grown from a small Department of Defense museum into the nexus of naval history education in the entire region. Joe’s enormous role in this stunning transformation is pure fact.

In 1990, HRNM consisted of three paid staff members and no volunteers. Almost immediately upon Joe’s arrival, the William & Mary grad set to work rewriting the main exhibits and preparing for the museum’s relocation from Pennsylvania House aboard Naval Station Norfolk to the Norfolk City-owned Nauticus downtown. In 1993, Joe was instrumental in the Navy’s acceptance of priceless artifacts illegally removed from the Civil War-era wrecks of USS Cumberland and CSS Florida.

The museum staff appears just in front of Pennsylvania House on Naval Station Norfolk just prior to closing that location in December 1993 and moving to Nauticus in downtown Norfolk, where HRNM reopened in June 1994.  Curator Joe Judge stands at upper right with Lt. j.g. Rob Haas, temporarily assigned to the staff by the base commander.  New director Elizabeth "Becky" Dove is at lower left, sitting next to Administrative Specialist Ofelia Elbo. (Courtesy of Joe Judge)

From 1998 to 2009, Joe assisted with the planning, management, and interpretation of the historic battleship Wisconsin (BB 64). It swiftly became one of the most popular tourist attractions in Virginia, hosting over 400,000 people in 2001 alone. He curated the new visitor orientation exhibit known as “The Wisky Walk” to introduce visitors to the battleship’s service to the country.

HRNM Curator Joe Judge discusses the transport of a de-militarized AIM-9 Sidewinder with museum registrar Michael V. Taylor.  Once a part of the museum's Cold War gallery, the missile is now on display as a part of The Ten-Thousand-Day War at Sea: The U.S. Navy in Vietnam, 1950-1975.  (Hampton Roads Naval Museum file) 

The other exhibits he has curated over the years have helped connect the American people to the Navy and educated Sailors about their history in meaningful ways. These include Nelson: the Man (1998); To My Loving Mother: Postcards from the Early 1900s; Without Us, They Don’t Fly (1996); The Sailor’s Friend: Animals and the U.S. Navy (1997); A Humanitarian Symbol: The U.S. Navy on the African Station; Cuba Libre!: The Spanish-American War in the Caribbean (1998); Pax Americana: The United States Navy in an Era of Violent Peace (1999); Picture Perfect: The U.S. Navy in Panoramic Photographs (2006); and the nationally-recognized Modern Terror on the High Seas (2009).

The museum gallery as it appeared when Pax Americana: The U.S. Navy in an Era of Violent Peace opened in 1999. (Hampton Roads Naval Museum file)

His work on the large-scale exhibitions 1907: The Jamestown Exhibition and the Launching of the New Steel Navy (2007) and The Ten-Thousand-Day War at Sea: The U.S. Navy in Vietnam (2019) made tremendous contributions to advancing the museum’s mission. Somehow he managed to find time to care for the museum’s artifact collections and a staff that includes fifteen paid professionals and 237 volunteers!

HRNM Curator Joe Judge works with Registrar Katherine Renfrew in moving the flag of USS Congress in the museum's Civil War gallery. (M.C. Farrington)

As my predecessor Becky Dove observed, Joe “is the glue that holds our institution together.”

Fair winds and following seas, Joe. It is up to all of us to stand the watch now!

Editor's Note: Mr. Pentangelo's article originally appeared in the November issue of The Scuttlebutt, the HRNM volunteer newsletter (Volume 2, Issue 9)

As HRNM Turns Forty, A Docent Remembers 25 Years of Service

Docent/ˈdōsənt/ noun 1. A college or university lecturer or teacher. 2. A person who leads guided tours especially through a museum or art gallery. Source: Merriam-Webster

J. Huntington "Hunt" Lewis as Lieutenant Commander Thomas O. Selfridge in the HRNM gallery. (Courtesy of Hunt Lewis)

By J. Huntington Lewis
HRNM Docent & Contributing Writer

I think I can speak best to the pleasures that I have enjoyed as a docent with the Hampton Roads Naval Museum over the past 25 years.

Friends.

When I began training as a docent, the museum was in the process of moving from the Pennsylvania House on Naval Station Norfolk to Nauticus, which had yet to be open. Our class of docents numbered around twenty. From March through April of 1994, we trained two days a week. One day was spent in formalized training; the other spent visiting other museums in the area. These were pre-[Battleship]Wisconsin days, and we developed a real comradeship, and we spent many years together.

Giving tours to visitors.

During our training period, we had no museum filled with artifacts for us to give practice tours, but we did have a diagram of where the artifacts would be located in the relocated museum at Nauticus together with a “script” listing the text contents of the new label plates. I knew that once the museum reopened, visitors might ask me questions to which I didn’t have ready answers. So from the “script” and the Dictionary of American Fighting Ships, I developed a pocket notebook that I refer to for on-the-spot answers. That development was the geneses of my knowledge of naval history and my confidence as a docent.

When asked during training what our preferences as a docent would be, I indicated a preference to work with the library or newspaper because I had always been more at ease with the technical aspects or things than interacting with people. But when the museum had its “soft opening” on May 1, 1994, a month before the official opening of Nauticus on June 1st, the museum was packed with visitors and every docent had to be out on the floor, and I found I enjoyed giving tours. When I am not on the floor, I’m still not much of a people person and not given to small talk, but on the floor I’ve become an outgoing person, to the extent that I’ve participated in the museum’s Speaker’s Bureau and do costumed interpretation, even hamming the latter up a bit.

Working with kids.

There were the third grade "Life at Sea" and fifth grade "Blacks in Blue" programs. For the third grade program, the Norfolk City School system sent all their third graders to Nauticus. Each day the students were divided into four groups, which rotated through Nauticus and the museum. So each morning, we had four "Life at Sea" presentations to give. Usually there were enough docents that a single docent would not have to do more than two presentations, but sometimes I had to do three and even all four.

The reactions of the kids were the fun part. When I talked about discipline and the "cat-o-nine tales", I would tell the class that a young man was caught washing his hands in the scuttlebutt, which was their drinking water. I would ask the children, “How many lashes do you think he deserves?” Some would say five or ten or maybe fifty, but then a youngster would pipe up and say a thousand. My response would be "You don't like him very well, do you?”

Then when talking about recreation–checkers, music, mending clothes–we would mention smoking, a very bad habit that you should never do, and then I would pass around a plug of tobacco saying “It smells like dirty armpit, doesn't it? “ Occasionally a kid wouldn't touch it or throw it away.

The fifth grade program for the Norfolk City School System was similarly organized. The museum presented the participation of blacks in the US Navy by highlighting noted characters followed by a “fun” exercise in which the students acted as a anti-aircraft gun crew. They were shown silhouettes of enemy and U.S. aircraft and told they needed to memorize those silhouettes because they might see one or more might be attacking their ship. Then a docent would “fly in” two larger silhouettes constructed in three dimensions one following the other. One of the silhouettes would be enemy, the other American. The class would then be asked “Which one would you shoot down?” The class usually identified the enemy, but I had to tell one teacher she shot down the American aircraft.

Research and being able to help visitors with their questions.

During my early years at the museum, one of my greatest joys was talking to World War II vets and pulling their ship’s histories for them. Again time tells and that opportunity has become rarer. One vet that I remember was a merchant mariner that had three ships torpedoed out from under him. He remembered being sheltered at one of the downtown Norfolk hotels, but remembered little about the hotel. Fortunately, he has written his name and address in Raleigh in our guest book which I retrieved after he and his wife had departed. I was able to dig up information on that hotel, and since my wife and I were shortly going to Raleigh to visit her family, I took the information with me and gave it to the vet in his retirement home. Other research has given me friends as far away as Germany and Australia. Friendships that I still maintain via the internet.

A chance to be creative.

Back in 1999, the museum director asked me if I could prepare a small entry for the Navy newspaper The Flagship. The entry would be the size of a small advertisement and would be sponsored by the Museum and The Flagship. This led to a 16-year effort of preparing weekly “Moments in Naval History.” These entries were historical (commemoration of battles), little known facts about the Navy, and if all possible I would give them a humorous twist. This obviously required a lot of research and gave me a chance to be creative at the same time.

In summary, I can only say that these years with the museum have been the most satisfying and enjoyable years of my life.

A "Department of One" Moves On

Hampton Roads Naval Museum Public Information Officer Susanne Greene displays a model of USS Seawolf (SSN 21). (HRNM Photo)

By Joseph Judge 
Hampton Roads Naval Museum Curator

This month the museum is bidding farewell to Susanne Greene, who has ably and single-handedly been the public relations and marketing face of HRNM for several years. Susanne came to the museum in December of 2005, and now in 2018 she is leaving us to continue supporting the Navy at the Naval Safety Center.

On arrival, Susanne was immediately turned to managing public events for the museum, a job which at that time was heavily focused on USS Wisconsin (BB 64), which the museum operated from 2000-2009. She developed marketing plans for the battleship and the museum.

Susanne also embarked on a series of long and successful relationships with media outlets including WTKR NewsChannel 3, WAVY-TV 10, WVEC Channel 13, The Virginian-Pilot, The Daily Press and The Flagship Military Newspaper. Susanne also initiated an ambitious series of visitor analyses to determine the museum's marketing strategy. She has been seen conducting visitor evaluations at military family events on Naval Station Norfolk, at local YMCAs, and at local festivals in downtown Norfolk as well as on-site at the museum.

Often her plans were hamstrung by very low (or non-existent) budgets, but she patiently carried on.
 
Susanne was also part of our special events team, advertising the events and urging the media to turn out at our latest exhibit, lecture or Lego Day. When a dramatic news event would wipe out our coverage she would smile and say, “I’m sorry the television stations couldn’t come, but you there’s nothing we can do when a giant hurricane is lurking out there!”

Susanne also witnessed the museum’s migration to the Naval History and Heritage Command and has been an invaluable liaison the headquarters’ robust public affairs staff. She has been a valuable member of the command’s marketing committee and web design team. These roles went hand-in-hand with maintaining the museum’s own web site which underwent numerous transformations during her tenure. Susanne also worked with United States Fleet Forces on media for the Stewards of the Sea exhibit and with our partners at Nauticus regarding media policies for the battleship Wisconsin.

Her press releases and media kits are legendary products around the museum. Many the flag officer, author, or VIP has departed HRNM with one under his or her arm.

Susanne accomplished all of this activity while, at different times, serving as the museums budget officer, purchase card holder and civilian timekeeper. Oh, and shipping millions of brochures and changing the museum’s telephone messages.

Susanne completed the Defense Information School’s Public Affairs Qualification Course and is a proud holder of two degrees from Old Dominion University, and is an avid follower of the Monarchs football team.

(HRNM Photo)

More than anything else, Susanne, a true “department of one,” carried a positive attitude and a cheerful smile to work every day. For this gift we thank her and wish her the best in her new assignment.