In general, we publish two types of articles: scholarly, entertaining (we hope) analyses based mostly on primary sources; and first-person accounts based on real-time experience. In this issue, we serve up more of the latter.
Brendan Greeley, Naval History associate editor and former staff writer for Aviation Week & Space Technology, recently spent an afternoon in El Paso, Texas, talking with Western artist, author, and former Life magazine World War II combat artist Tom Lea about his memories of recording the often troubling images of war. Greeley’s engaging profile—accented with Lea’s stirring artwork—serves as the centerpiece for this issue.
First-person accounts help tell the 50th anniversary stories of the last launch from the carrier Franklin, just as Japanese bombs were tearing holes in her flight deck and setting her afire, and of the Navy’s supporting role in helping the First, Third, and Ninth Armies across the Rhine River in March 1945.
Also in this issue, we battle Chinese pirates in the 1850s and go below- decks at the U.S. Naval Academy.