Posts Tagged ‘Ships’

16th November
2010
written by Richard

Rebuilt by the pennies of school children and as sound as on that autumn day more than 135 years ago when she slid down the ways . . . the U.S.S. Constitution, most famous vessel in the American navy, is due alongside Broadway pier this forenoon.  —San Diego Union, January 21, 1933.

In the winter of 1933, thousands of San Diegans flocked to the foot of Broadway to see the most famous naval ship in U.S. history.  Read about Old Ironsides in San Diego

11th November
2010
written by Richard

Bold adventure, lurking danger, mutiny, death—the story of all this, running like some tale of the days of the Spanish conquests of the New World, was brought to San Diego today by the big tramp steamer Maori King.   

Click here for the story of the Maori King.

The tramp steamer Maori King.

22nd October
2010
written by Richard

The flagship of the Pacific Squadron arrived unexpectedly in San Diego in late December 1891. “Our presence is probably a surprise to you,” said the ship’s captain, Rear Admiral George Brown.  “We were ordered to San Diego and here we are.  We shall take on about 250 tons of coal and will then be on waiting orders.”

Within days, Brown’s ship was joined by another cruiser, the USS Charleston. The ships would spend the next six weeks in San Diego.

The story of the White Squadron.

USS San Francisco

16th September
2010
written by Richard

In the early 1900s, the ultimate status symbol for a business tycoon in America was a luxurious, ocean-going yacht. A personal mark of opulence in San Diego was the 226-foot steam yacht Venetia, owned by John Diedrich Spreckels. Read more about Spreckels’ famed yacht: The Venetia.

The “Venetia” leaving San Diego in 1924. From Adams, The Man: John D. Spreckels.

15th July
2010
written by Richard

July 29 – 8 to meridian. At 10:30 hauled up courses, standing in for harbor of San Diego.  At11:30 came in to 9½ fathoms; hoisted out boats . . . At 3:40 the launch and Alligator under command of Lieutenant Rowan, and the Marine Guard under Lieutenant Maddox, left the ship to take possession of the town of San Diego.

–Log of the USS Cyane.

Read the story of the first flag raising over San Diego in 1846: Raising the flag

14th June
2010
written by Richard
Captains and officers of San Diego's "Yippie" boats.

Captains and officers of San Diego’s “Yippie” boats.

We called ourselves the pork chop express. We carried meat and vegetables from Pearl Harbor all over the central Pacific. . . Sometimes we’d come back from an 1,800 jaunt, load up with pork chops and go right out again. We were so slow that almost anything could have caught up with us and sunk us.

The story of San Diego’s tuna fleet in World War II: The Pork Chop Express.

12th June
2010
written by Richard

The city of San Diego has been the namesake for two U.S. Navy ships with distinguished careers in the two world wars. The armored cruiser USS San Diego served in World War I before its sinking by a German mine off the New York coast in 1918. Another USS San Diego would fight in World War II, remembered by San Diego author Fred Whitmore as “the unbeatable ship that nobody ever heard of.”  Read more about the USS San Diego of World War II.

29th April
2010
written by Richard

The arrival of the British tall ship Dudhope in San Diego harbor on November 30, 1914 was an impressive sight.  Describing her “massive yards and mast and the white sails hauled tight by the brisk breeze” the Union called the 2000-ton tall ship a “marine spectacle.”

 The steel-hulled bark had the historic distinction being the last cargo-carrying windjammer to enter San Diego via the storied Cape Horn route.  But the ship would be better remembered for a surprising mutiny.

Read more about “The Dudhope Mutiny”

22nd April
2010
written by Richard

Within the next twenty days San Diego harbor will assume a warlike appearance, for twenty vessels of the navy, including the two submarines Grampus and Pike . . . will be in the waters of the inner bay . . .

Go to submarines.