Naval History & Heritage Command

09/21/2024

Looking for some quick and easy activities for today? How about designing your own WWII aircraft paint scheme? Share your creations in the comments!

09/20/2024

Naval History and Heritage Command (NHHC) announced the 2023-2024 Navy History and Heritage Awards Program winners during an awards ceremony aboard the USS Midway Museum on Sep. 19, 2024.

The 2023-2024 winners were:
Maintenance Excellence Pennant (Maintenance “E”)
Battleship New Jersey

History and Heritage Excellence Pennant (History “E”)
Battleship Texas Foundation

Curatorial Excellence Pennant (Curatorial “C”)
USS ALABAMA Battleship Memorial Park


Congratulations to all!

Read the full release with details about the winners here:

Naval History and Heritage Command (NHHC) announced the 2023-2024 Navy History and Heritage Awards Program winners during an awards ceremony aboard the USS Midway Museum in San Diego, Sep. 19, 2024.

09/20/2024

Today we've decided to make it a in honor of !

In 1943, artist Carlos Andreson received a commission from Abbott Laboratories to create this charcoal drawing as part of series depicting patients in stateside naval hospitals. This piece of shows a group of patients working on different projects utilizing their hands as part of the Navy’s recreational therapy program. The nurses, known as the “grey ladies,” assist each patient with their project.

09/20/2024

For this we're also sharing a video that highlights artwork about the Great White Fleet.

Learn even more about the in one of NHHC's newest publications, where the world cruise of the Great White Fleet and its context is analyzed to provide worthwhile lessons for today's naval professionals. Download a copy for free here:

https://www.history.navy.mil/research/publications/publications-by-subject/pacific-effect.html

09/20/2024

the third Friday in September - today - is National POW/MIA Recognition Day?

honors and remembers the more than 80,000 American service members still missing from past conflicts.

In the Sextant’s latest blog, Remembering Resistance: U.S. Navy POWs at the Hanoi Hilton, learn about some of the captured who led resistance efforts from behind bars during the Vietnam War amidst the horrors these POWs had to endure.

https://usnhistory.navylive.dodlive.mil/Recent/Article-View/Article/3902922/remembering-resistance-us-navy-pows-at-the-hanoi-hilton/

On Aug. 5, 1964, Lt. j.g. Everett Alvarez, Jr., a young U.S. Navy aviator, had just finished bombing a North Vietnamese patrol boat base in retaliation for the Tonkin Gulf Incident when his Douglas

09/20/2024

This by William F. Draper - "Waiting" - is our pick for !

Aboard a transport bound for Guam, Marines make themselves at home. They use their shelter-halfs as canopies to ward off the tropical sun and now try and relax with card games.

🖌

09/19/2024

FYSA - if you're hoping to visit this October!

09/19/2024

Looking for a dose of on this ? How about a refresher on how to fold your Navy uniform - can you remember all of the steps for each item?

No matter whether you're a seaman recruit struggling through boot camp or an old timer on your last hitch, you will be well repaid by a careful study of the diagrams on these pages. You'll benefit in two ways: Your clothing will always be in shipshape condition, and you'll find more room in your sea...

09/18/2024

This essay, "A Plea in Favor of Maintaining Flogging in the Navy", was written by an anonymous US Navy officer on the benefits of flogging for maintaining discipline, probably written in the 1840s.

He explains, "The crew of the ship of war come on board mostly as strangers to each other, to be banded together for a specified and limited period, at the expiration of which their association ceases, and they separate. They are without any but casual ties to link them to each other, or to identify their interests with the welfare of the vessel in which they sail...When aboard, they form a whole, which cannot be weakened by discharges. They are to be kept together, the wicked and the worthless, as well as the rest."

Read the rest of here:
https://www.history.navy.mil/research/library/online-reading-room/title-list-alphabetically/p/plea-favor-maintaining-flogging-navy.html

As at the present time a great effort is being made to abolish the law which authorizes flogging in the Navy as one method of punishment, a member of that service desires to express his views upon the subject. The Navy is the armed police of the country upon the ocean; its purposes are warlike, and....

09/17/2024

that this week is National Rehabilitation Awareness Week? honors the services provided by rehabilitation professionals and the difference they provide in the lives of their patients.

During World War II, rehabilitation in the U.S. Navy expanded into a comprehensive multidisciplinary program to support the influx of disabled veterans returning from active theaters.

09/17/2024

"JETTISON - To heave goods overboard"

Want to see more illustrations of different Naval terms? Check out our online reading room and scroll through "Shiploading: A Picture-Dictionary of Shiploading Terms"! What's the most obscure term you can find?

https://www.history.navy.mil/content/history/nhhc/research/library/online-reading-room/title-list-alphabetically/s/shiploading-picture-dictionary.html

09/16/2024

, on September 14, members of NHHC's Outreach Team were able to attend the commissioning for thefast-attack Virginia-class submarine USS New Jersey (SSN 796). USS New Jersey is the first designed for a fully integrated male and female crew!

New Jersey’s commanding officer Cmdr. Steve Halle called the event “a truly historic moment” before ’s sponsor, Susan DiMarco - wife of former Secretary of Homeland Security Jeh Johnson - gave the crew the traditional order to “man our ship and bring her to life.”

09/16/2024

This photo of and Motion Picture Actors was taken in 1931.
They are standing by a Curtiss F8C-4 aircraft of Fighting Squadron 1-B, at Naval Air Station, North Island, California, while filming the movie Helldivers.

Those present are (from left to right): Actor Cliff Edwards; Lieutenant (Junior Grade) John S. Thach, USN; Actor Clark Gable; Actor (and USNR Officer) Wallace Beery; Lieutenant (Junior Grade) H.S. Duckworth, USN, and Lieutenant (Junior Grade) E.P. Southwick, USN.

09/15/2024

in 1944, Operation STALEMATE II began. Against strong Japanese opposition, the First Marine Division landed and developed a beachhead on the southern shores of Peleliu. Preceded by aerial bombing and naval gunfire, marines gained more ground with the capture of an airfield.

09/15/2024

that Naval Station Great Lakes was on the National Register of Historic Places - NPS? in 1986, it was added as Great Lakes Naval Training Station historic district covering 1,932 acres, 43 buildings, 14 structures, and six objects.

📸: More than 3,000 recruits and 1,200 staff members from Recruit Training Command form a blue and gold "N". Recruit Training Command is the Navy's only boot camp. (U.S. Navy photo by Scott A. Thornbloom)

09/14/2024

Can't make the walking tour of the historic Washington Navy Yard today? Check out this descriptive guide of the Navy Yard in our online reading room!

As a reminder, the Walking Tour is offered on the second and last Saturdays of each month, April through September.

Register on Eventbrite (https://www.eventbrite.com/o/national-museum-of-the-united-states-navy-31875935485?) or e-mail the National Museum of the United States Navy at: [email protected]

https://www.history.navy.mil/content/history/nhhc/research/library/online-reading-room/title-list-alphabetically/h/history-descriptive-guide-us-navy-yard-washington-dc.html

HISTORY AND DESCRIPTIVE GUIDE OF THE U.S. NAVY YARD, WASHINGTON, D.C. ------------------------------------- COMPILED BY F. E. Farnham and J. Mundell. -------------------------------------- WASHINGTON, D.C.: GIBSON BROS, PRINTERS AND BOOKBINDERS. 1894.

09/13/2024

This on canvas by Sam L Massette titled, "Haleakala (AE-25) & Desert Storm" is our selected piece of for .

During the ships short deployment during the conflict, the combat logistics force ship replenished 15 ships while underway, and delivered cargo supporting Marine units ashore.
🎨

09/12/2024

From the 📸 archives: Sailors inspecting a weapon.


(Photographs taken by Jay Alan Lederman during his service as a in the World War II era)

09/11/2024

"People see history as something that happens in the past to someone else, and it usually is. Until that day when history happens to you."

Susan Henson was a lieutenant junior grade serving in the Pentagon on Sept. 11. Twenty years later in 2021, she found the courage to tell her story as a survivor of the attacks.

Read it here: https://usnhistory.navylive.dodlive.mil/Recent/Article-View/Article/2756575/a-sept-11-pentagon-survivor-20-years-later/

Sept. 11, 2001, is one of those specific moments in time when everyone in the entire generation recalls exactly where they were, much like previous generations knowing where they were for the first

09/10/2024

"Waves of the Navy, there’s a ship sailing down the bay, and she won’t slip into port again until that vict’ry day!" Explore the cover art and lyrics of Navy sheet music with songs like "Waves of the Navy," "The Navy Air Song" and "Bell Bottom Trousers". These pieces evoked a range of feelings, both patriotic and whimsical. To enhance the experience, sheet music covers visually interpreted songs — and could be serious, sentimental or even comical.

Look through (and even perform!) this sheet music here: https://www.history.navy.mil/browse-by-topic/heritage/customs-and-traditions0/the-navy-hymn1.html

09/10/2024

Check out our latest podcast! --> https://bit.ly/4ggjETL

On this episode, Gordon Calhoun, a Curator at the National Museum of the U.S. Navy, and Thomas Frezza, a Public Affairs Specialist with NHHC, discuss the animals who have served throughout U.S. Naval History. Whether they were being used as a source of nourishment for Sailors out on long journeys, as mascots for various ships, commands and institutions, or as beloved pets and crewmates, animals have always played a crucial role in the Navy. Learn about Admiral George Dewey's dog "Bob," various mascots like that of USS Connecticut (Battleship # 18), the rooster of various USS Saratoga ships, and the U.S. Naval Academy's goat. Animals continue to serve in the Navy to this day, protecting harbors, recovering objects, and helping support Sailors with the stresses of military life at sea with dogs like "Sage," "Ike," and "Captain Demo".

09/09/2024

Vice Admiral James B. Stockdale, President of the U.S. Naval War College (when this photo was taken) demonstrates how he used his prison-issued enameled tin cup as a listening device while he was a Prisoner of War in Vietnam from Sept. 1965 until his release in 1973.

in 1965, Stockdale was shot down over North Vietnam and captured by the North Vietnamese.

From the start, Stockdale refused to cooperate with his captors. After being caught urging other POWs to resist, he and 10 other senior POWs were taken to another jail block where they were frequently tortured. He spent two years in heavy leg irons and four years in isolation, but he didn't waver. He led the POWs' culture of defiance, finding ways to communicate and govern prisoner behavior that gave them all hope. In several instances, Stockdale deliberately disfigured his face with sharp objects or by beating it against the bars so that the Vietnamese could not use him in propaganda broadcasts.

Stockdale was awarded the Medal of Honor when he was released.

(Photo by JO1 Rick Boyle, Newport RI)

09/09/2024

🎉Today the Navy Department Library opens in their new facility on the Washington Navy Yard. 📖 Visit them from 9 a.m. to 3 p.m. Monday – Friday or browse online anytime at the https://www.history.navy.mil/research/library/online-reading-room.html

Visitors without a DoD Common Access Card (CAC) or military ID must report to the Visitors Center at the Washington Navy Yard 11th and O Street gate with a valid photo ID to enter base. Vehicle registration and proof of insurance is also required for visitors wanting to drive on base.

09/09/2024

Hampton Roads Naval Museum is our in the spotlight for today's !

has a 3D tour of their new Battle of Hampton Roads exhibit?

Check it out here: https://my.matterport.com/show/?m=zGzE4CqNi1H.

Can't get it to load? also has their new Heritage Hunt, which takes you to all seven cities of to learn about the Navy’s history in the area! Find the Heritage Hunt here: https://www.history.navy.mil/content/history/museums/hrnm/education/hampton-roads-heritage-hunt.html

Matterport 3D Showcase.

09/08/2024

in 1966, the television show "Star Trek" made its U.S. debut! went on to become a cultural phenomenon.

that the creator, Gene Roddenberry, picked the name USS Enterprise for their ship because of the Battle of Midway?

Roddenberry explained, “I’d been an army bomber pilot in World War II. I’d been fascinated by the navy and particularly fascinated by the story of the Enterprise in World War II, which at Midway really turned the tide in the whole war in our favor. I’d always been proud of that ship and wanted to use the name.”

Read about it here:

In the fictional history of Star Trek[1] there are few days more important than 5 April. On that day in 2063, Vulcans landed in Bozeman, Montana following Zefram Cochrane’s successful test of a

09/07/2024

📚⚓ In just a few days the Navy Department Library will reopen to the public in its new facility on the Washington Navy Yard.

Over the past 224 years, the library has journeyed through various locations and even survived the 1814 burning of Washington. From a tavern in Trenton, NJ to prestigious quarters in Washington D.C., the library’s rich history reflects its resilience and dedication to preserving naval heritage.

Learn more about the library at https://www.history.navy.mil/research/library/about/library-history.html

09/07/2024

📸: Vice Admiral Marc A. Mitscher - Commander, Task Force 58 - is highlined from a destroyer to USS Randolph (CV-15) via boatswain's chair, in May 1945. This was the third time he had transferred his flag in four days, as his two previous flagships, USS Bunker Hill (CV-17) and USS Enterprise (CV-6) had both been badly damaged by Kamikaze hits off Okinawa.

(Photographed by Ensign H.F. Barrett)

09/06/2024

in 1944, U.S. Navy fast carriers attacked Palau Island—where the first landings in the Western Carolines were to take place—doing extensive damage to ammunition and supply dumps, barracks, and warehouses.

Read more about the strikes on our website:

Download a PDF Version of United States Navy at War: Second Official Report to the Secretary of the Navy [18.8MB]

09/06/2024

UPDATE (9/9/24, 10 a.m.): Phone lines are back up. If you need to contact NHHC, information is available here: https://www.history.navy.mil/about-us/contact/directory.html

ATTENTION: the public phone line for NHHC is temporarily down. For urgent matters and until further notice, please email [email protected]

Thank you for your understanding!

09/06/2024

Our featured piece of 🖌for is this watercolor painting by John Charles Roach named "Downtime for an A-7".