America (CV 66) - Naval Cruise Book

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Opposite: The first AMERICA presented to France, 1783. Middle: Schooner Yacht AMERICA, 1851 ... the radical hull and sail design became the model for future yachts . winner of 1st America Cup 1852. Top left: laying of keel of Schooner AMERICA. Top right: Steamship AMERIKA 1905 ... a troop transport in WWI. Above: SS AMERICA . . . passenger liner and troop transport in WWII.

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HISTORY OF AMERICA Although there have been five ships named America, ' only two have been designed specifically for naval service. The present AMERICA is the first warship so named to be commissioned into the fleet of the United States Navy. Her identity has been established by the officers and men who serve her. The first AMERICA, intended to be a formidable 74 gun warship of the line for Continental Navy, was begun in 1777. Lack of funds and subsequent delays in construction post- poned her completion until 1782. Just a few months before her launching, the Continental Congress gave her to the French Navy to replace MAGNIFIQCIE which was lost by grounding in Boston Harbor and subsequently denied John Paul Jones command of her in 1783. The second AMERICA, a schooner, served for more than 70 years. She was built in 1851 for Commodore John C. Stevens and won the first America Cup race in 1852. Ten years later, during the Civil War, the Confederacy obtained and pressed her into service as a blockade runner. She was later retaken by Federal forces and served the Union block- ading the harbors of the South for the duration of the war. In 1921, she was assigned to the U.S. Naval Academy. The third and fourth ships to bear the name AMERICA were steamships. AMERIKA, built in Ireland for the Ham- burg-American Line, was taken into U.S. Navy service in 1917, renamed AMERICA and used as a troop transport. She returned to service as a line in 1921 with the United States Line, retired in 1931, but returned to service as a troop transport with the advent of World War II. Also serving as a troop ship was the United States Lines ' passenger liner SS AMERICA, which served during World War II as WEST POINT. After the war, she was returned to the United States Lines and sold by them in 1964 to a foreign shipping com- pany which renamed her AUSTRAILIS.

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TTi fflWHWWttWfr ! ' . — ».i».vi- ' Vi.v »v v «ivj.!f|iy • WWIj,IIIIIIIIIIIIIW!W i , , ■- , ' After more than 200 years, the name and ship were finally united in defense of the country whose name she so proudly bears. Her name was the personal choice of the late President John R Kennedy. She is conventionally powered, but at one point, while still on the drawing boards, AMERICA was designated to be nuclear powered. Plans were changed before the keel was laid, but some diagrams and component blueprints still bear the name GSS AMERICA (CVAN-66). A modified FORRESTAL class carrier, her major distinctions being elevator configuration and a modernized island structure. AMERICA is an enormous ship. For instance if the Eiffel Tower was laid on her flight deck, the Paris landmark would overhang a mere 5 feet. The carrier ' s length is twice the height of the Washington Monument and is only 202.5 feet shorter in length than the stupendous Empire State Building. The keel was laid on 9 January 1961 as Hull 561 in Shipway 10 at Newport News Shipbuilding and Drydock Company. Three years later, Mrs. Catherine T McDonald, wife of the Chief of Naval Operations, christened AMERICA. After sea trials and acceptance trials, AMERICA was commissioned on 23 January 1965. Over six thousand spectators crowded the ship ' s hangar deck to view the commissioning and hear addresses by Secretary of State, Dean Rusk, Secretary of the Navy, Paul H. Nitze, and the Governor of Virginia, A. S. Harrison. Top left: under construction at Newport News Shipbuilding and Dry Dock Company, 1 July 1961. Above and opposite top left: flight deck, island and mast. Right: Mrs. David L. McDonald launches America, February 1964. Opposite middle: The newly commissioned AMERICA. Opposite bottom: Preliminary sea trials, December 1964.