Annapolis (AGMR 1) - Naval Cruise Book

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U55 ixmlsmm ms SHIPS HI S TOR Y The decision to give the name ANNAPOLIS to the Navy's first Communi- cations Major Relay Ship came from a suggestion which emanated from the office of the Director of Naval Communications. The naming of the first AGMR after the city of Annapolis commemorates the establishment of one of the Navy's first wireless', stations there in 1902. In addition, Annapolis today is the site of the Navy's oldest existing radio station which is currently providing the transmitter facilities for the Naval Communications Station in Washington, C D.. The AGMR-1 is the third ship to bear the name Annapolis. The first ANNAP- OLIS was a gun boat commissioned in 1895 which served with distinction in the Spanish-American War and later with the Asiatic Fleet, as a training ship at the Naval Academy, and on patrol in Mexico and Central American waters before being decommissioned in 1919. The second ANNAPOLIS was a palm! friglgte, commissioned in December, 1944, which served as a convoy escort ship ma in co ' - 9 n'U0y TU726' tO Algeria and later being attached to the Pacific Fleet where she was decommissioned in 1946' and sold to Mexico. The fU'S'f07'y Of the present ANNAPCLIS began in August of 1962 when the decomm d ' ' ZSSZOHQ ESCOH Aircraft Comer, Uss GILBERT ISLANDS KCVE-1071 gg? toyed from he? berth at Bayonne, New Jersey to the New York Naval P zpyarli for conversion to the AGMR-1. As a CVE she had seen action in the NZCZjJj?CthZf3T?9Q fZZTOkZiawafGunto operation and Australian operations in Borneo. , 9 O ship was t b - - l 'll a vital communication need of the A? e' Converted and Tecommzsszoned to fu fz U09 S operating forces.

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USS ANNAPOLIS KAGMR-lj, Auxiliary General Major Relay, Number One,' a ship designed to bring Naval Communications to any Naval unit ashore or afloat, anywhere in the world, with speed and accuracy,' to provide a voice for command when and where it is needed. With specially designed antenna systems constructed on her flight deck, the latest in complex communications equipment in her newly-constructed communications spaces, capacious fuel tanks and what is most important, her smoothly functioning and well trained crew of 700, ANNAPOLIS is capable of operating for protracted periods of time in remote corners of the world's oceans,' augmenting existing shore communi- cation facilities, temporarily extending essential Naval communication services in areas of special operations, or providing communications in areas where they might have been lost or where they may never have existed. Her tasks: to provide fleet broadcasts, inter-area relay circuits and relay circuits for ship to ship and ship to shore communications. She is a floating communications station, able to stay beyond the reach of hostile powers, not depending upon the whims of reluctant allies, carrying vital communications wherever a ship can go and capable of reaching any land area with her powerful transmitters. As her motto states, she is truly VOX MARIS , the Voice of the Sea and as the Voice from the Sea' the Voice of Naval Command, the Sound of United States Seapower. U55 AXNNAXF L-,HS

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, , t ,,,,,, , ,, i i sw, ,, ,,,,,,, ,,f, 4 1, , ' I 5 Qu 'Li 1 K 4 f 1 if Lf W me' ew- Nl. .1-7, V .4 ,J .,,, . ,.., Sn. V . , ' . . 3 f' 'f'5,, 'V o' . I , X. f H Captain Rowan reading his orders as he takes command. Among the dignitaries present are RADM B. F. Roeder, Dz'rector of Naval Communications, and the Mayor of the City of Annapolis, Maryland, Mr. Joseph H. Griscom, Sr.