United States Merchant Marine Academy - Midships Yearbook (Kings Point, NY)

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not in full use. It was not until spring of 1940 that Captain John Hope Clark, the District Cadet Training In- structor could announce the estab- lishment of a receiving station at the Coast Guard Air Station in Biloxi, Mississippi. By June 30 three cadets reported there. On October 5, 1940, soon after the outbreak of war in Europe, ca- dets began to be enrolled as ''Ca- dets, Merchant Marine Reserve, with a grade of Midshipman when called to active duty. This develop- ment, the upshot of a lenghtly dis- cussions between the Maritime Commission and the Navy Depart- ment reaffirmed the interdepen- dence of the naval and merchant services. This reserve plan laid the foundation for the title Midship- man and the Naval Reserve wings which Kings Pointers-with one eight year lapse-have worn ever since. By the fall of 1941, overcrowding at the Cadet schools had reached crisis proportions. Telfair Knight, Di- rector of the Division for training, urgently reiterated his request that the Maritime Commission acquire its own training facilities. A young offi- cer at Washington Headquarters, Lauren S. McCready explored the Atlantic Coast unsuccessfully from Baltimore to Newport News in No- vember. Suddenly, the search was over. Early in December, it was learned that the twelve acre estate of the late Walter P. Chrysler at Kings Point was for sale by his heirs. Legis- lation authorizing the transaction was approved by the President March 4, 1942. By that date every building, from the mansion the greenhouses and garages had been put to some training use. 12 Opening

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By regulations issued in October 1939, the cadet training course was set a four .ea s: ’he first, second, and as o be spem on shipboard, the third in shores de schooling. This timetable a - lowed headquarters two ears to de- elop dr v- and classroom facilities But it was ’me o shift focus to the tie d. There was a need to establish the three Port District receiving stations. The Pa- ciific Coast was ’he first to get its rece • - irs station n operation. The first four cace s appointed by the Maritime Co—r iss on ur der the new system re- ported to the California State October 2, 1939. it was compelled to close janu- ary 1940, when the California State sailed on her annual training cruise. The Atlantic Coast receiving s’ation and cadet school was somewhat less harried by tenancy problems than its Pacific counterpart. Phillip C. Mahady, the Mew York Port Instructor knocked at the gate of the Xe»r York Merchant Marine Academy. That school s Cap- tain James Harvey Torr b, always sympa- thetic the the budding Cadet corps .agreed that he Mar vime Commission might pay room and board for quar- ters and share in the use of the recently opened training facilities at Fort Schyler. The first two federal cadets as- signed o that base arrived October 16, 1939. If the New York District had the smoothest sailing, the New' Orleans District had, by all odds, the roughest. To begin w ?h, there .as no state mari- time academy on the Gulf Coast to which the federal program might look to for shelter. t er the armed services seemed to have no storefront space ■ % ill Clockwise from below: Learning how to use a stadi- meter. Entrance to San Mateo, the offspring of the Academy's Pacific Coast District School. Cadet se- curing deck lashing prior to sailing. Entering New York circa 1943 Opening 11

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Facing page top to bottom: Cadets leaving New Orleans District Office, Artists con- ception of the United Stats Coast Guard Merchant Marine Academy. The Walter Chrysler estate, on Long Island's gold coast. This page clockwise from below: The haz- ards of war at sea. An example of the mini- mal fire power which armed merchant ves- sels possesed. The present day War Memorial. A classroom in the basement of the Chrysler mansion shortly after its acquisition. TO COMMEMORATE cadet midshipmen AND GRADUATES OF THE U S MERCHANT MARINE ACADEMY LOST IN WORLD WAR II General Order 28, which superseded 23, provided that the eligible list should henceforth be base on a National Com- petitive Examination. The first examina- tion was held on April 17, 1939. Pre- pared by the American Council of Education, it covered six subjects: Grammar, Literature, History, Algebra, Geometry, and Physics. The examina- tion was taken by 450 applicants, 166 passed. Later examinations were held January 29 and November 16 1940, and June 7, 1941, with 740 applicants sur- viving. The fifth examination was taken by 395 candidates on a December Sat- urday when Japanese carriers were manuvering into launching formation a few hundred miles north of Oahu. There was never time to correct it. From the moment Congress declared war on December 8, 1941, there were cadets at sea, and imminently under at- tack. Of the 445 then in training at least two-thirds were aboard ship, since the original four year (ship-ship-shore- ship) training plan had run as yet barely three years. In subsequent months, this floating component steadily increased. War conditions often intervened to disrupt the orderly rotation of students from Basic to Ship to Advanced, cadets were unavoidably kept at sea beyond their scheduled return, and it became necessary to make alternate curricular provisions whereby the requirements of the second and even first class year might be fufilled on board ship. At the peak of its training operations, be- tween 3500 and 4000 cadet-midship- men were waterborne at one time. Despite the increasingly lethal po- tential of going to sea, the Cadet Corps' luck held. No cadet lives were lost from war causes before December 7, 1941, or for more than three months after that infamous date. Though the subma- rine offensive against American ship- ping broke in full fury almost at once, they almost lasted out the whole winter intact. On March 19 the blow finally fell. On that day the old shipping board freighter Liberator of Lykes Brothers Steamship company was lost by enemy action, and with her Cadet Howard Payne Conway, Jr. The Battle Standard count had begun. + 71