In January 2005, naval tradition, Greek mythology, Native American heritage, and 21st-century advanced technology all came together with the formal stepping the mast ceremony for the future amphibious transport dock ship USS Mesa Verde (LPD-19). While a mast-stepping ceremony is not new to the U.S. Navy, the blending of thousands of years of tradition and heritage in the shadows of Mesa Verde’s Advanced Enclosed Mast/Sensor System is unique.
Historically, the placement of the mast into the hull was the dramatic moment in ship construction when the shell truly became a sailing ship. The mast had to be maneuvered through a hole in the deck, surrounded by supporting chocks and then positioned into a slot, or step, cut in the keel.1 While both a tedious and critical evolution for wooden sailing ships, the installation of masts in steel warships remains a milestone in the production of a vessel.
The tradition of a stepping the mast ceremony may be nearly as old as shipbuilding itself. The Greeks and the Romans placed coins with the dead so they could pay the mythological ferryman Charon to convey them across the river Acheron into the underworld. Ancient mariners and builders started placing coins in the hole where the mast was to be stepped. Coins have been discovered under the masts of wrecked ancient Roman ships, perhaps placed there to provide the same requisite toll for sailors lost at sea.2
Alternatively, the coins may have been just for good luck. Viking ships had places under the masts for coins or amulets, and coins were placed under the masts of the USS Constitution. Gold or silver coins or ones with 7s in their dates were thought to bring the best luck.3 Another possible explanation for the origin of the practice is that if a ship was de- masted, the coins could be used to procure another mast.
Even steel-hulled ships with steel masts retained the coin tradition. For example, when the cruiser USS New Orleans (CA-32) was built, 33 dimes, nickels, and pennies were placed under her mainmast to represent the ship’s launch year, 1933.4 More recently, coins adding up to the equivalent of U.S. Navy ships’ hull numbers have been placed at the base of their masts.
One look at the Mesa Verde, however, and a mast-stepping problem becomes immediately apparent: The amphibious transport dock has no pole-like mast. Instead, she and the other ships of the San Antonio (LPD-17) class each feature two boxy Advanced Enclosed Mast/Sensor Systems. Manufactured by Northrop Grumman Ship Systems Gulf port Operations, the 60-foot-tall and nearly 35-ton AEM/Ss are the largest composite material structures ever installed on board U.S. Navy ships. Because the AEM/S System masts are landed into place instead of being stepped, coins and artifacts are later placed in a ceremonial box on board the ship.
As their name implies, the system serves dual purposes as both masts and sensors. The masts fully enclose essential radar and communications antennas, thus reducing wear and tear from weather and sea spray, and are fabricated from material that allows transmission of radar and communication signals but blocks noise or other frequencies that might interfere with the ship’s own emissions. By reducing false targets and limiting signal loss, ship sensors and communications systems will demonstrate improved performance in future expeditionary roles.
The LPD-19’s formal stepping the mast ceremony was held at Northrop Grumman’s Pascagoula, Mississippi, shipyard on 14 January 2005, the day before she was christened Mesa Verde, in honor of southwestern Colorado’s Mesa Verde National Park. The mast stepping was particularly significant because it was the first time an LPD-17-class AEM/S System was dedicated. In accordance with recent tradition, a dime, nickel and four pennies were used to represent her hull number—19. Each coin’s date conveys a special meaning:
•A 1969 dime from Linda Campbell, the ship’s sponsor and wife of former Senator Ben Nighthorse Campbell of Colorado. 1969 was the birth year of their son, Colin
•A 1965 nickel from the Mesa Verde’s precommissioning crew and prospective commanding officer, Commander Shawn Lobree, for the sailors and Marines who will crew and embark in the ship. The date represents the commissioning year for USS Denver (LPD-9), the last amphibious transport dock with a Colorado namesake
•A 1906 penny from Mesa Verde National Park Superintendent Larry Wiese, representing the year the park was established
•A 1916 penny from the National Park Service, representing the year the service was established
•A 1996 penny from the Navy’s LPD-17 program office (PMS 317), representing the. year in which the contract for building the class’ first ships was awarded
•A 2002 penny from Northrop Grumman Ship System, representing the year in which construction started on Mesa Verde.
Placing mementos and artifacts with the coins is also part of modern mast-stepping ceremonies, and in the case of the Mesa Verde, these items were linked to the namesake national park and its early Native American inhabitants. The ancestral Puebloans moved into the Mesa Verde area about ad 500, living among the alcoves of the area’s cliffs. Not until about 1200, however, did they start to build the 600 cliff dwellings for which the popular national park is best known. The 24 tribes that affirm an ancestral affiliation with Mesa Verde National Park include the Pueblos of New Mexico, the Hopi tribe in Arizona, and the Ute and Navajo peoples. Peter Pino, a tribal administrator of the Pueblo Zia and a descendant of the early Puebloans participated in Mesa Verde’s mast stepping and christening.
At the first ceremony, Pino contributed a small handmade sprinkler and earthen pot that would be used to spread sacred water during his Native American blessing of the ship at the christening ceremony the next day. At the mast stepping, Pino explained the meaning of the artifacts: “I made the sprinkler from a yucca plant and decorated it with coral, turquoise, abalone seashells, a turkey feather, and an eagle feather. Together these symbolize the land, sea, and sky of the Mesa Verde region.”
“The clay pot, handmade by my wife Stella,” he continued, “is traditional Pueblo Zia pottery painted with natural materials and will hold water drawn from sacred springs at Mesa Verde. The actual sprinkling of the ship that will be part of my blessing at the christening represents precipitation, so important to our people.”5
Pino also donated a handmade buckskin pouch containing an obsidian arrowhead “to guide the ship and crew safely in the future.” Former Senator Campbell, whose father was a Northern Cheyenne Indian, contributed a silver ring, which years earlier he had personally handcrafted and decorated with images from Mesa Verde’s cliff dwellings. At the christening ceremony the next day, Pino performed his blessing, singing and speaking in Keresan, the language of Pueblo Zia, to bring peace and good luck to the audience, the crew, and the ship.
With her unique stepping the mast blending of tradition, heritage, and technology, USS Mesa Verde should carry good luck throughout her operating service life.
1. PCU Mason (DDG-87) Mast Stepping Ceremony 2 June 2001, originally cited at www.mason.navy.mil/step.htm. Most recently, USS John C. Stennis (CVN- 74) conducted a mast stepping cited at http://www.news.navy.mil/search/display.asp?story_id=18144.
2. Henning Henningsen, “Coins for Luck Under the Mast,” Mariner's Mirror, vol. 51, 1965, 208.
3. Ibid., 206.
4. Ibid., 205.
5. Mast Stepping Ceremony and interview between the author and Peter Pino, 14 January 2005.