Massachusetts Maritime Academy - Muster Yearbook (Buzzards Bay, MA)

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THE ACADEMY in des] erate need of trained officers for our fleets turned to the Academy for help. The academic course was shortened to eighteen months and the Nantucket was retired to spend the last of her days at the United States Merchant Marine Academy at Kings ' Point, New York. To accommodate the influx of new men into the school the Academy came ashore and was settled into Buildings at Hyannis on Cape Cod, in July 1942. The training cruises were made in Maritime Commission ships running short hauls along the coast. Throughout the war Massachusetts produced a goodly number of well trained, well equipped sailors for Uncle Sam ' s navies whose records proved Massachusetts men far and away the best among other maritime schools. An enviable record. With the War won, Massachusetts expanded and lengthented the academic curriculum to a three year course, awarding a Bachelor of Science degree in Navigation and Engineering to the graduates in addition to the Naval Reserve Commission and the Coast Guard license. The new school ship, the Academy ' s first since the Nantucket was retired in 1941, was the ex-navy gunboat Charleston PG 51. The cadets first boarded her in San Francisco in 1948. They sailed her proudly home through the Panama Canal and up the Atlantic seaboard to her new berth at the State Pier in Buzzards Bay. Plans for a larger academy went ahead at first in a grand style but have since been stalled in a myriad of state and federal red tape. Facilities are quickly becoming inadequate and positive action must be taken soon for the future hope of Massachusetts ' unborn merchant officers. As the class of 1954 graduates our sincerest hopes for the welfare of the school ride with the efforts of the academy officials and the schools commissioner ' s for a larger and more modern Massachusetts Maritime Academy.