Shangri La (CVA 38) - Naval Cruise Book

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'Y . . ,4 Sill? The time - April IS, l942. American B-25 bombers were being launched from the flight deck of a mobile airfield at sea for the first time. The place was the Pacific, 800 miles from Tokyo. Lieutenant Colonel Jimmy Doolittle was leading a strike-force of I6 bombers into Japan. The outcome of this raid eventually caused the construction of the attack aircfart carrier USS SHANGRI-LA. The United States Ship HORNET launched the Doolittle Raid. Both the ship and the raid were to make history and make way for the future. For SECURITY, President Franklin D. Roosevelt told newsmen that the ill-fated bombers had come from a secret base in Shangri-La, the fic- tional land described in James Hilton's novel Lost Horizon. Following the sinking of the HORNET at the bat- tle of Santa Cruz, the United States Treasury Department held a special fund-drive to raise money for the construction of a new aircfaft car- rier to be named SHANGRI-LA. The mission of the ship was already planned. She was to launch a strike-force to re-bomb Tokyo. In reponse to the fund drive, Americans bought more than 900-million dollars of war bonds and stamps. The SHANGRI-LA was constructed from these funds. The ship was launched February 24, l944, as a crowd of lO0,000 looked on in Norfolk Navy Yard, Portsmouth, Va. These people had bought and paid for her and now she was being launched to serve them. September IS, I944, SHANGRI-LA was commis- sioned and operated out of Norfolk, Va. until mid-January of the following year while complet- ing sea-trials and her shakedown cruise. Then she went to Pearl Harbor via the Panama Canal. The Commander-in-Chief of the United States Pacific Fleet accepted her for duty in the Seventh Fleet. She was off to war.