A Luxury Liner Once More?
The famed ocean liner SS United States could avoid the scrap yard with the announcement in February that a luxury cruise-ship line plans to renovate the vessel and return her to sea.
The 4 February announcement in Manhattan by the SS United States Conservancy, the nonprofit organization that owns the ship, and Crystal Cruises that the 64-year-old ship could return to transatlantic service from New York and other voyages from the city and additional American ports came as a surprise. The conservancy has been focused in the past few years on trying to return the 990-foot vessel, now mothballed in Philadelphia, to New York for a new life as a stationary attraction. But finding a developer willing to do that and a permanent site for the ship proved frustrating.
“We would be remiss if we would pass up an opportunity to restore such an important symbol of luxury travel and a bygone era of Americana,” said Crystal chief executive Edie Rodriguez.
The company will pay the $60,000-a-month carrying charges to keep the ship docked in Philadelphia while studying the feasibility of upgrading her. If the determination, expected by the end of the year, is favorable, Crystal will negotiate the purchase of the vessel from the conservancy.
Crystal would reconfigure the exterior of the ship to add balconies on her sides in keeping with most modern cruise ships. It would give the United States a slightly more boxy look amidships.
“We think this is the best way to save the ship,” said Susan Gibbs, the conservancy executive director and granddaughter of the ship’s designer, the late William Francis Gibbs (see “Looking Back: The Last Great American Liner,” August 2013, p. 6). “The essence of her will remain front and center.”
Rodriguez said rebuilding the vessel with her entirely gutted interior would cost in excess of $700 million. “Failure is not an option,” said Rodriguez, adding that the only thing that would stop the project is if the Environmental Protection Agency found pollution on the ship could not be remediated.
The ship carried 2,000 passengers when she was launched in 1952. It would be transformed into an 800-guest vessel with 400 luxury suites. Original features including the Promenade Deck and Navajo Lounge will be retained.
If the renovation goes forward, Gibbs said, the conservancy would focus on building a museum ashore, ideally in New York.
The United States’ maiden voyage in 1952 set the still-current record for the fastest transatlantic passenger-ship crossing. Her role superseded by passenger jets, she was taken out of service in 1969.
—Bill Bleyer
New Museum Director Appointed
Captain Sterling Gilliam (U.S. Navy, Retired) has been appointed the new director of the National Naval Aviation Museum at Naval Air Station Pensacola, Florida.
“We’re very lucky to have Sterling leading the staff of the world’s third-largest aviation museum,” said Naval History and Heritage Command Director Sam Cox. “I’m confident Sterling will build on the work of those who came before him, and lead the museum to new heights.”
Gilliam, who has commanded a carrier-based electronic attack squadron, a fleet replacement squadron, and a deployed carrier air wing, also served as the Tailhook Association’s president from 2010 to 2015.
“The opportunity to work with the professionals of naval aviation during my 30-year active-duty career was the greatest of honors,” he said. “To return as the director of the National Naval Aviation Museum represents the chance of a lifetime. I am honored and humbled by the appointment and look forward to helping tell our incredible 104-year story.”
Naval War College Museum Announces Two Exhibits
In January, the Naval War College Museum in Newport, Rhode Island, opened two new exhibits. The first, “The Face of Nelson,” features one of Admiral Lord Nelson’s life masks. On loan from the National Museum of the Royal Navy, the mask was made in Naples, Italy, soon after Nelson won the Battle of the Nile in 1798.
“So much of the artwork we have of Nelson portrays him in an idealized and romanticized light, which is understandable considering his status as one of the most heroic and revered figures in naval history,” said museum curator Rob Doane. “This mask is unique because it humanizes Nelson for current generations.”
The mask is one of four known to exist, and it is accompanied by a selection of prints and paintings from the Naval War College Museum, the Navy Art Collection, the U.S. Naval Academy Museum, and the Anne S. K. Brown Military Collection at Brown University. The exhibit will run until 30 September.
The second exhibit, “Deep Freeze! The Seabees in Antarctica, 1955–1956,” commemorates the 60th anniversary of Operation Deep Freeze I with a selection of artifacts related to the Navy’s support of early scientific programs in Antarctica. Visitors will see 28 paintings, illustrations, and sketches loaned from the Navy Art Collection that document the role of the Seabees of the U.S. Navy Mobile Construction Battalion (Special) Detachment One, who constructed buildings, fuel-tank farms, and airfields. Artifacts, equipment, memorabilia, and clothing on display span nearly 40 years of missions to Antarctica. The exhibit closes on 20 May.
Call for Dissertation Research
The North American Society for Oceanic History has called for submissions to the James C. Bradford Dissertation Research Fellowship in Naval History. Applicants must have completed all requirements for a PhD and have an approved dissertation proposal on file at their degree-granting institution.
Topics covering any period of U.S. and North American naval history, can include strategy, tactics, and operations; institutional development and administration; biography, personnel, and social development; exploration, science, and technology; and policy and diplomacy.
Those interested should send application materials and letters of recommendation by 1 April to [email protected]. For more information, please visit http://kellykathleenchave.wix.com/nasoh#!bradford-fellowship/c1h1d.
What’s Up at the NHHC
Combat Artist Is Eyewitness to History
If warfare is an art, then the Naval History and Heritage Command (NHHC) has warriors. When Morgan Wilbur deploys aboard ships or to combat commands, he comes armed—with brushes, canvas, palettes of oil colors, sketchpads, and pencils. The only point-and-shoot capability in his arsenal is a digital camera.
Wilbur and Kristopher Battles are the two artists assigned to the Navy Combat Art Program, which was created in 1941 to document major naval operations during World War II. During peacetime, the program diversified its portfolio by adding civilian artists and documenting noncombat Navy subjects in paintings. In 1986 the program and the Navy Art Gallery became part of the Naval Historical Center (redesignated the Naval History and Heritage Command in 2008).
“The creation of art is an important way to document Navy activities,” said Gale Munro, head of the Navy Art Gallery. “A skilled artist can use his or her ability to focus attention on what is significant, telling a story clearly and economically.”
Wilbur’s most recent deployment is the focus of a new exhibit currently on display at the National Museum of the United States Navy, located at the Washington Navy Yard. The five-painting exhibit showcases members of Mobile Diving and Salvage Unit (MDSU) 1, who were conducting underwater searches for World War II submarines during the summer of 2014. MDSU-1 was operating from the rescue and salvage ship USNS Safeguard (T-ARS-50) off the coast of Japan.
“It was my first dive expedition. I was watching the various divers, and they are very motivated and love what they do. The equipment and its variety of colors of hoses and gear are visual feasts for an artist,” Wilbur said.
Since photography has existed only since 1826, the visual record of the U.S. Navy and its ships and members for its first 100 years or so is in the form of drawings, paintings, models, and art. The U.S. Navy possesses more than 20,000 artworks, dating back to 1540—a painting of the construction of a Dutch ship. It was part of a collection gifted to the NHHC by the Naval Historical Foundation.
Wilbur got noticed as the art director for Naval Aviation News magazine in 1996. On occasion, his oil paintings were used in the magazine. Some of those paintings were added to the Navy Art Gallery’s collection and drew the attention of Munro. She was already familiar with another combat artist named Wilbur—Capain Edward T. Wilbur—a Navy pilot and Morgan’s father.
Munro asked if the younger Wilbur minded being sent to ships at sea or to shore units for the Combat Art Program. Wilbur jumped at the opportunity. He had joined the Naval Air Reserve out of high school, flew on board P-3 Orion aircraft as part of Patrol Squadron 68, and retired as an aviation antisubmarine warfare operator first class.
According to Wilbur, getting the chance to witness the events he photographs and sketches makes his paintings better. “I knew years ago that if I could get to a place and see what’s going on, I would be able to recall that memory for years to come.”
As a licensed civilian private pilot, he has been inspired by cloud formations, and as a naval air crewman, he witnessed the vivid colors and dynamic movement of the ocean. As a combat artist, Wilbur was under way on board an aircraft carrier in the western Pacific and on a destroyer transiting to Guam.
Wilbur has been in high demand since being hired. He’s been to Iraq several times, where he observed Navy medical teams; has flown with a Marine C-130 crew; and, during one trip, visited an Army civil affairs unit. “Seeing a U.S. Navy sailor in an Army uniform with only his crow to distinguish him being in the Navy was wild. I did a painting of him for our collection,” Wilbur said. Later, while on a trip to Afghanistan, he documented Seabees constructing a combat outpost.
Munro generally makes contact with the public-affairs officers on ships or shore to get an invitation for an artist ride-along. “We are always looking for artist opportunities,” Munro said. “We survey the collection for need, which community we haven’t documented recently that we need to refresh.” Her branch includes funding each year for either one major deployment or two minor ones. Occasionally, a command will reach out to have an artist document an event, such as the rebalance of the U.S. Navy fleet to the Pacific.
“The best thing is what I get to do here for the Navy,” Wilbur said. “On every trip, I tell people I’m a Navy artist and I’m here to tell their stories, and they’re surprised the Navy does this. I think it’s great for our sailors to know the Navy wants to document what they do for history.”
—Devon Hubbard Sorlie, NHHC