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October 1919—The passage of 70 years has veiled Lieutenant Commander K. S. McIntosh’s opening-sentence reference to . shouts of ‘Remember the crime of Seventy-three!’ and answering yells of ‘American tin!’ ’' The “crime” of 1873 was the adoption of the gold standard by the United States, which converted our enormous and growing national wealth in silver into relatively worthless “American tin.” No less cryptic is McIntosh’s title “U.S.C.N.” The reader must scan 17 of the article’s 25 pages before discovering the proposal for a “United States Commerce Navy.”
McIntosh’s U.S.C.N., the largest mercantile fleet in the world, will be composed of captured enemy ships and those we built with our Liberty Bond riches. Independent of our costly, inefficient merchant marine, the U.S.C.N. will carry our Bag and our products to all corners of the world.
The vitality of McIntosh’s paper stems from his precise proposals for freight and passenger rates, crew composition (including salaries and rations) cost of fuel, schedules, routes and even turnaround times. Yet. if he seems to be part economist, he is also part poet. Seeking to explain (even then) our neglect of Latin America, he points out that “the darkest place in the room is exactly under the candlestick.” His foredoomed U.S.C.N. might have gone a long way toward dispelling the darkness that still enshrouds those directly under Freedom’s candle.
October 1939—It’s tell-it-like-it-is time! Ensign John. W. Welch, U. S.
Naval Reserve, who was 15 in 1911 when he first hauled grain around Cape Horn in a square-rigger, hates the recent Pollyanna-sounding Merchant Marine special issue. In “Our Oceanic Ills,” Welch fearlessly lowers the boom on shipowners, unions, an uncaring Congress, and a lethargic public. He applauds the words that got Joe Kennedy fired as head of the Maritime Commission: “Conditions in the American Merchant Marine are rotten!”
The gallant, outspoken Welch signed on as master of famed author-adventurer Richard Halliburton’s junk and—in March 1939—died with Halliburton during an attempted crossing from China to San Francisco’s World’s Fair.
Finally, Richard McKay, grandson of Donald McKay, tells us how America’s premier clipper-ship builder may have kept a bellicose Britain from joining with the South during the Civil War. In London on business in 1861, he warned his British admirers not to test the North’s presently puny fleet in a naval war because “Our facilities for building a New Fleet are greater than those of any of the great European Naval Powers—I think even . . . greater than all of them combined.”
October 1958—In (or is it “on?”) these pages will be found the usual amount of subliminal stuff sneaked in by editors, advertisers, and contributors simply to make the reader feel good about his or her profession. Whatever their actual occupation, all Proceedings readers are presumed to be vi- carious/active-duty naval officers (V/ADNOs). V/ADNOs tend to quibble interminably about things like serving “in” a ship or “on” her. In his classic “Naval Customs, Traditions, and Usages,” our supreme savant, Vice Admiral Leland P. Lovette, recognizes the question but declines to involve himself in such a trivial argument. But Captain R.P. Maurice seeks to end the debate this month by asking if civilians live in or on a house or work in or on a factory. ADNOs, he concludes, serve in ships. (But he fails to say whether they sleep in or on bunks.)
V/ADNOs so revere the name of Alfred Thayer Mahan that they salivate even if—as in “An Atom-Age Navy”—an author repeats Mahan’s quote of a 16th-century “Dutch statesman” on the unlikely subject of Dutch penury.
V/ADNOs are pushovers for advertisers such as LORAL, whose copy writers invoke the name of former V/ADNO Robert E. Stockton who, in 1841, turned down the post of Secretary of the Navy and chose instead to invent the screw propeller that revolutionized ship propulsion.
V/ADNOs, God knows, arc just like you and me. Or is it ”1?”
—Clay Barrow
services. With eight members on the E > torial Board, there are usually two °r three changes in a year. The past L months have been different. Since May- five new directors have taken their places on the Naval Institute’s Board of Contro and Editorial Board. „
Rear Admiral J. D. Taylor, U. ^ Navy, Director, Aviation Plans an Requirements (OP-50) „
Major General M. P. Caulfield, U- ' Marine Corps, Deputy Commandan for Training and Education- MCCDC s
Captain R. T. E. Bowler III, U- »• Navy, Executive Assistant to Con mander Naval Sea Systems Com mand
Captain M. A. McDevitt, U. S. Special Assistant to CNO and Exe utive Director of CNO Execute
Panel (OP-OOK)
Lieutenant T. J. Galpin, U. S. NaV-“ Member of Strategic Concep Group . f
Are you wondering if Captain Bow is related to Commander R. T. E. ' Bu , Bowler, my predecessor? Our new Boa ^ member is indeed Bud’s son. Bud Pas^ away five years ago after serving as
Naval Institute’s Secretary/Treasurer an
Publisher for 22 years. We are deligj1 e to have a Bowler back on the Board-
Campaign for the U. S. Naval Institute
The U. S. Naval Institute is poise^0 begin a major fundraising drive to P vide endowment and building fun ^ Funds raised will support our education and historical programs and renovate^ new headquarters building crucial to U. S. Naval Institute’s future growth-^
I urge each member to join in supp* 1 ing the work of the U. S. Naval Inst|ta._ by making one-time contributions, m annual pledges, and/or by planning P to be made at later dates from his or estate. aj
Although our overall fundraising 6? is $5.9 million, a top priority is to rat $2.5 million to renovate a substan^ building available to us here at the NaV‘_ Academy as our headquarters. The La paign and the Building Fund are detai ^ in the Membership News included w this issue of Proceedings.
Your impact on the Campaign can doubled! Your gift will be matched W Zachary and Elizabeth Fisher, str0 supporters of the naval services and Naval Institute, who have pleur1- $750,000 to our cause. aj
Remember, contributions to the Na
Proceedings / October