History Happenings

What’s going on in the Naval Order…..

USS Constitution - Flagship of the Naval Order

A link to the Constitution of the United States

History Happenings Around the Order

USS Stark (FFG 31) 37th Anniversary

17 May 2024

Stark Memorial Remembrance Service. Naval Station Mayport

NavSta Mayport set up a special STARK page that shows one of our lost shipmates to two Iraqi Missiles on May 17, 1987, every day until May 17th. You can see them all as they are posted! Go to this page: https://www.facebook.com/nsmayport

Tell your family and friends to go there daily to see the memorial to each of our STARK sailors.

National Medal of Honor Day

25 March 2024

Find out more about the Medal of Honor

and read Their Stories!

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Nimitz Graybook

Doing research or just interested in raw Naval History? Try looking at the 8 Volumes of the Nimitz Graybook and get ‘inside’ World War II in the Pacific!!!!

Access the Graybook

Monthly History Presentation

e-mail vcgcomms@navalorder.org for more information.

NAVAL ORDER OF THE UNITED STATES

presents

Dr Felix Haynes, PhD

and a discussion of

“CAPT Kenneth Whiting; Aviation Pioneer”

8 May 2024, 2000 EDT

Kenneth Whiting, born at Stockbridge, Mass., 22 July 1881, was appointed Naval Cadet 7 September 1900. He graduated with the class of 1905 and was commissioned Ensign 25 February 1908 after serving the required sea duty. Having volunteered for submarine duty, Whiting subsequently commanded Porpoise, Shark, Tarpon, and Seal. Convinced that a man could escape from a sunken submarine through a torpedo tube, on 15 April 1909 he proved the feasibility of his theory by swimming out of the 18" torpedo tube of Porpoise, submerged at 20 feet in Manila Bay. A year later Glenn Curtiss offered to train the first naval aviator and Whiting applied (he talked his friend and classmate Theodore G. "Spuds" Ellyson into doing the same, and to Whiting's horror Ellyson was accepted and became Naval Aviator #1.)

In 1914 Whiting finally obtained orders to Dayton, Ohio, where he became the last naval officer taught to fly by Orville Wright himself. Whiting was designated Naval Aviator #16. As a true pioneer of naval aviation, he assumed command of the 1st Naval Air Unit in France following America's entry into World War I. Lt. Comdr. Whiting was then assigned to command Naval Air Stations 14 and 15 at Killingholme, England. For this service he was awarded the Navy Cross "for exceptionally meritorious service in a duty of great responsibility." Whiting never left aviation and was one of the earliest advocates of a ship able to operate airplanes, an "aircraft carrier" — a "plane carrier," as it was known at the time. He was partially responsible for the conversion of collier Jupiter into the Navy's first aircraft carrier Langley, of which he was the first acting commanding officer ("Whiting agitated for carriers from the spring of 1916 until 1919, when the Langley conversion was authorized," remembered retired Rear Admiral George van Deurs.) On 18 November 1922 Commander Whiting, piloting a PT seaplane, made the first catapult launching from Langley, at anchor in the York River. Whiting was personally responsible for the development of carrier operations aboard the experimental Langley and continued active participation in naval aviation, commanding Langley (1933–1934) and Saratoga (1934–1935), and various air squadrons prior to his retirement as Captain 30 June 1940. He was then retained on active duty as General Inspector of Naval Aircraft, Eastern Division until 1943. Captain Whiting was assigned command of the Naval Air Station, New York, 19 February, and held this post until his death 24 April 1943. Seaplane tender USS Kenneth Whiting (AV-14) and Whiting Field, a Naval Air Station at Milton, Florida were named after him. Sources: DANFS United States Naval Aviation 1910–1995 USS Saratoga CV-3, by John Fry CDR Kenneth Whiting, photographed aboard Saratoga while serving as her executive officer, 1927–1929 (NHC photo) NavSource Naval History

Biographical:

Felix Haynes began his career as an Army ROTC graduate and with service in Vietnam. He earned three University of Florida degrees and spent a career serving in community college administration. He served as president of three community college campuses in Florida, Illinois and Maryland, and attended the Military History Fellowship program at West Point. Turning to a lifelong interest in writing, Haynes published three historical fiction novels about important places in his life—Panama, Scotland, and Vietnam—before deciding to make the transition to nonfiction. After listening to stories told by his father about a World War II ship he had served on called the USS Kenneth Whiting the author researched Whiting’s significant accomplishments in submarines and naval aviation and chose to write the first-ever biography of Kenneth Whiting. Along with his continuing interest in writing, Haynes and two friends established a community newspaper, the Plant City Observer, a decade ago. He has been a member of Rotary since 1985. He also serves on an Episcopal Church vestry and on several nonprofit and community boards. He and his wife Susan have been married fifty-four years and have four adult children, all adopted.

Watch this Naval Order History Presentation Zoom Meeting!

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Meeting ID: 812 4147 0593

Passcode: 7041890

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Find your local number: https://us02web.zoom.us/u/kLHOpRFtE

Upcoming History Night Presentations

June 12, 2024: Bob McLaughlin, “The Capture of U-505”

July 10, 2024, Dr. Charles Meimeyer, USMC operations post Vietnam to Desert Storm

August 14, 2024, K.A. Nelson, The Killing Shore” German U-Boats off New Jersey

Join us each week for Sea Stories and other tales with the

Naval Order of the United States

Each week we will have time set aside on-line for Sea Story Night on Zoom. Each Thursday Night during, on a not to interfere basis with other Naval Order Activities at the National and Local Level, the room will be open for Sea Story Night. A completely and totally informal gathering of Comrades and Shipmates to Talk about and share whatever is on their minds. Coordinate with friends and meet here in this open room forum…. all are welcome! This is a result of some suggestions from our Congress inputs, so join us for an hour or two by Linking below at 2000 EST / 1900 CST / 1800 MST/ and 1700 PST (and whatever time that translates to for Hawaii!!) each Thursday! Join us and listen share yours! This is an unmoderated site!

Click HERE for the Sea Story Page!!!

The site will always be available for those who would like to get together on their own!!

Remembering the “Four Chaplains”

Watch here and remember the sacrifice and commitment on Feb 3, 1943 of 4 men of different faiths to gives their lives for the lives of others. The story of these men aboard the USS Dorchester:

Video of the “Four Chaplains”

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Past History Night Presentations

A compilation of the presentations from Past Naval History Nights

10 April 2024

Captain John Rodgaard, (USN, Ret)

“TailShips”

The story of three US Navy destroyer escorts (DEs) and their crews, comprising Escort Squadron 8, is a tale that took place at the height of the Cold War – specifically the Cold War below, on and above the Mediterranean Sea. Obsolete, except for the experimental anti-submarine warfare (ASW) sensor that each ship carried, the USS Hammerberg (DE-1015), USS Courtney (DE-1021) and USS Lester (DE-1022) were ordered to the Mediterranean Sea to demonstrate the potential of a sensor – a technology relying on a passive towed array detection sensor system of microphones or hydrophones that the Navy officially designated as the Interim Towed Array Surveillance System, or ITASS. However, the crews of the ships simply called them ‘Noodles’ or ‘Tails’.

These ‘tailships’ entered Mare Nostrum in the autumn of 1970, and it was during this period in the long maritime history of the inland sea that the US and North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) navies saw a naval operational environment characterized by the most intense concentration of Soviet submarines and surface ships outside of Soviet home waters. In fact, the years between 1970 and 1973 saw the tailships and the ships of the Sixth Fleet operating against the largest Soviet naval presence outside of its home waters in the history of the Soviet Navy or its Czarist predecessor, whose navy periodically operated in the Mediterranean during the 18th and 19th centuries. The Mediterranean became the focal point in the great naval rivalry of the United States and its NATO allies against the Soviet Union’s Voyenno-morskoi flot.

Biographical:

Captain John Rodgaard, USN (Ret.) has over 41 years with the naval service of the United States, with 29 years of commissioned service as a naval intelligence officer. He co-authored A Call To The Sea: Captain Charles Stewart of The USS Constitution (2005); author of A Hard Fought Ship: The Story of HMS Venomous (2010 & 2017), and the co-author/editor of From Across the Sea: North Americans In Nelson’s Navy (2020). He is the recipient of the Naval Institute’s History Author of the Year for the year 1999. He has contributed to Naval History Magazine, the Mariner’s Mirror, and the Naval History Foundation’s Naval History Book Reviews. As the chairman of The 1805 Club (www.1805club.org), he is the co-editor of the Club’s annual The Trafalgar Chronicle. Captain Rodgaard holds an A.B. in History and Political Science; an M.A. in Political Science, and a 1994 graduate of the Naval War College.

Watch this Naval Order History Presentation!

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13 March 2024

Dr. David Winkler, PhD, CDR (USN, Ret)

**‘America’s First Aircraft Carrier: USS Langley and the Dawn of US Naval Aviation’**

America’s First Aircraft Carrier covers the story of USS Langley, a vessel commissioned as an experimental aircraft carrier to launch and recover land planes. Many books on the history of American naval carrier aviation have been written. Yet, no biographical work has been written about the ship led the way. Langley’s fledgling role as an experimental platform, which evolved into an operational asset for the fleet, is usually placed within a framework that still envisions the big guns of the ‘ships of the line’ prevailing in the decisive battle. With many of the fleet’s battleships settling into the mud bottom of Pearl Harbor on the morning of December 7, 1941, the Navy had no choice but to turn to aircraft carriers as its primary conveyors of offensive power. That American fleet commanders were so ably capable of shifting to this new paradigm reflects an appreciation and comfort level with naval aviation thanks to the interwar period where the Navy conducted war games in the form of twenty-two fleet problems and a number of joint Army-Navy grand exercises, along with frequent monthly tactical exercises. With naval aviation demonstrating its potential over the waters of the eastern Pacific, western Atlantic, and Caribbean, reports from those exercises made their way to the US Naval War College in Newport, RI, to influence the conduct of mock battles on the wargaming floor.

Commissioned in 1913 as the collier Jupiter, the Navy’s first aircraft carrier initially served as the Navy’s sole operational carrier, then serving in concert with Lexington, Saratoga, and then Ranger, and then as an airplane tender servicing long-range patrol bombers before being lost in February 1942 due to enemy air action south of Java. Through two decades, Langley also plays a prominent role in the biographical narratives that have been written about pioneers in naval aviation, such as William F. Moffett, Joseph M. Reeves, John H. Towers, Patrick N.L. Bellinger, and Marc A. Mitscher – in his talk, Dr. Winkler will focus on a few of the pioneers of naval aviation and don’t be surprised if there is some crossover to Dr. Winkler’s other recent book – Witness to Neptune’s Inferno: The Pacific War Diary of Lieutenant Commander Lloyd M. Mustin. .

Biographical:

David F. Winkler had served for over a quarter-century as the staff historian at the now-decommissioned Naval Historical Foundation, and currently co-compiles Tuesday Tidings with the National Maritime Historical Society and as the Assistant Historian General for the Naval Order of the United States. He also an Adjunct Professor with the Naval War College, teaching the Strategy and War Curriculum at the Washington Navy Yard. In recognition of his collaborative efforts to promote educational outreach with like-minded organizations, in 2022 he received the prestigious National Maritime Historical Society Distinguished Service Award. Prior to his appointment to serve as 2020 - 2021 Lindbergh Chair of Aerospace History at the Smithsonian National Air and Space Museum to research the history of USS Langley, Winkler was appointed as the United States Naval Academy’s Class of 1957 Chair of Naval Heritage for the 2019 - 2020 academic year. He also authored or co-authored four major military history books and hundreds of short naval history articles including a monthly column in the Navy League’s Sea Power journal.. Winkler holds a bachelor of arts degree in political science from The Pennsylvania State University, where he earned his naval officer commission; a master of arts degree in international affairs from Washington University; and a Ph.D. in history from American University. An updated edition of his dissertation, Cold War at Sea, first printed in 2000, was published by the Naval Institute Press in December 2017. Recalled to active duty in 1998 to write a history of the Navy in the Persian Gulf, Winkler subsequently published Amirs, Admirals, and Desert Sailors with the Naval Institute Press in 2007. In 2014, he independently published Ready Then, Ready Now, Ready Always, which is a history of the naval reserve. His most recent book, Tribute to a Generation: Haydn Williams and the Building of the World War II Memorial, was also published in 2020 by the Naval Institute Press.

Watch this Naval Order History Presentation!

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14 February 2024

Dr. David Kohnen

The Last British Invasion of America: The Beatles in the Global Maritime Arena

So you thought all of Maritime History had ships involved?? The sun never set upon the British Empire and its historical influence upon American culture in the global maritime arena. For three centuries, Britannia famously “ruled the waves – and waived the rules.” Armageddon loomed as the atomically charged backdrop for the fading influence of the British Empire when Soviet and American variants squared off for another global fight. The Cuban Missile Crisis and subsequent assassination of John F. Kennedy fit the bleakness of the times when Ed Sullivan provided a brighter vision of the future on the international stage. Sixty years ago in February of 1964, Sullivan introduced the “four lads from Liverpool” on television to launch the last British invasion of America. “Tomorrow never knows” as the history of The Beatles remains an unexplored area of interest for future historians and strategic theorists.

Standing at the proverbial crossroads between maritime history and wars of the past, The Beatles drew from their own experiences in the maritime cities from postwar Liverpool to Hamburg to New York to Tokyo and Melbourne to change global debates about the uniquely human phenomenon of war. Never relenting in their quest to wage peace on the global stage, The Beatles modified the traditions of Britannia to create their own propaganda. John Lennon explained that The Beatles and their associates, “would sell our product, which we call peace [and] to sell a product you need a gimmick, and the gimmick we thought was BED; [and] we thought BED; because bed was the easiest way of doing it, because we are lazy.” The Beatles peace campaign sparked fresh debates about the question of war and the postwar order. Given the recent declassifications of Central Intelligence Agency and Federal Bureau of Investigations files, the following presentation provides a fresh analysis of The Beatles by examining the influences of culture, technology, and peacetime military policy in the 1950s and 1960s. Historical trends defined the global context, as The Beatles certainly influenced the key strategic debates of their times with such assertions as, “Give Peace a Chance” and “War is Over (if you want it).”

Biographical:

David Kohnen completed doctoral studies with the Laughton Professor of Naval History at the University of London, King’s College. As a historian in museums, he produced the award-winning exhibits surrounding the captured German submarine U-505 in Chicago and the Battleship USS Wisconsin (BB-64) in Virginia. Kohnen’s past published works include 21st Century Knox: Influence, Sea Power, and History for the Modern Era (Naval Institute Press, 2016) and Commanders Winn and Knowles: Winning the U-Boat War with Intelligence (Enigma Press, 1999). Looking outward, Kohnen completed work on his forthcoming book, King’s Navy: Fleet Admiral Ernest J. King and the Rise of American Sea Power, 1897-1947 (Schiffer Publishing, forthcoming in fall of 2024).

Watch this Naval Order History Presentation Zoom Meeting!

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10 January 2024

Dr. David A. Smith

“A New Force at Sea: George Dewey and the Rise of the American Navy”

A New Force at Sea tells the story of one of the most important officers in the U.S. Navy between the Civil War and World War II. Born in Montpelier, Vermont, George Dewey attended the still relatively new U.S. Naval Academy, graduating in 1858. He served with distinction in the Civil War in the Union Navy, saw a significant amount of action in the Mississippi River and along the Atlantic coast, and was singled out for his leadership and bravery by his superior officers. In the wake of the war, Dewey remained in the Navy as an officer, but the American people were generally uninterested in any role their nation could play in the broader world and the Navy languished. Dewey however, refined his perception of what American global naval strategy could be.

Dewey had a profound understanding that his career bridged two seminal periods in American naval history, and clearly understood the repercussions of his victory at Manila. He died in Washington in January 1917, shortly before the United States entered World War I fighting against Germany as he had foretold years earlier. He was buried at Arlington National Cemetery but shortly after reinterred at the Washington National Cathedral, the only U.S. military officer to have such an honor. 

About our Speaker: David A. Smith is a Senior Lecturer in American History at Baylor University in Waco, Texas. In addition to being the author of A New Force at Sea and Money for Art: The Tangled Web of Art and Politics in American Democracy (Ivan R. Dee, 2008), his columns on art, culture and politics have appeared in the Weekly Standard, the Wall Street Journal, the Dallas Morning News, the Austin American-Statesman, and the Waco Tribune-Herald. He has been featured on NPR’s Morning Edition, the Mars Hill Audio Journal, The Jim Bohannon Show, WNYC’s “Soundcheck,” KERA’s “Think,” WBAP’s “Mark Davis Show,” and numerous other national and regional radio shows. He serves on the board of directors of the Waco Cultural Arts Fest, and his book reviews have appeared in outlets from the Washington Times to the Naval War College Review. He has won awards for his teaching at Baylor and at the University of Missouri.

Watch this Naval Order History Presentation Zoom Meeting!

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13 December 2023

CAPT Michael A. Lilly, USN (Ret)

“More Frightening than a Kamikaze!”

“More Frightening than a Kamikaze!” is the harrowing tale of the first collision between an American aircraft carrier (USS Wasp (CV-7)) and a destroyer (USS Stack (DD-406)) in U-boat infested waters on St. Patrick’s Day 1942. During the morning watch (0400-0800), the Wasp tore out of the fog just 150 yards from the Stack off its port bow. In less than 13 seconds, the carrier plowed into the Stack, pinning it against its bow and pushing the tiny destroyer through the water sideways. Dead in the water, the destroyer could not signal the carrier that initially had no idea it had a destroyer trapped on its bow. Captain Michael A. Lilly, USN, (Ret) recounts the story in vivid detail, much of which he learned from his father, then-Ens. Tony Lilly, and the investigation into the accident. He describes the heroic action of the Stack’s crew, including a Torpedo Mate who was awarded the Navy Cross for risking his life in roiling waters awash the destroyer to disarm its 24 torpedoes. He explains the bizarre events that unfolded on the bridge of the Wasp. Why did the Stack wind up off course? Who was at fault? What happened to the principal parties on both ships?

About our Speaker: Captain Michael A. Lilly, USN (Ret.) had a distinguished career as Hawaii's Attorney General and as a trial attorney. He is a founding director emeritus of the USS Missouri Memorial Association, which operates the Missouri as a memorial and tourist attraction. He authored “Nimitz at Ease”, relating how his grandparents helped Nimitz cope with the stresses of command and win the Pacific war. A Vietnam War combat veteran, his personal decorations include the Legion of Merit, Defense Meritorious Service Medal, and two Meritorious Service Medals. He retired as a surface warfare captain after 30 years of service, active and reserve.

Watch this Naval Order History Presentation Zoom Meeting!

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8 November 2023

Dr Phillip T. Parkerson, PhD

“THE ONE SHIP FLEET: USS BOISE - WWII Naval Legend”

The Brooklyn-class light cruiser USS Boise (CL-47) became one of the most famous US combat ships of World War II, already internationally renowned following her participation in the naval battles in the Solomons in 1942. After repairs and modifications, in 1943 Boise was sent to the Mediterranean theater, there to participate in the invasions of Sicily, Taranto, and Salerno, and furthering her fame by destroying enemy tanks during armored counterattacks at Gela, Sicily and Salerno.

From the Mediterranean, Boise was sent to the Southwest Pacific theater to join the US Seventh Fleet for the campaign in New Guinea in 1943–44 and then the invasion of the Philippines. She fought in the battle of Leyte Gulf, notably in the night engagement in the Surigao Strait, where battleships faced off against each other for the last time in maritime history. Boise was credited with helping to sink a Japanese battleship. She also fought off the suicide planes known as kamikazes at Leyte and later at Lingayen Gulf during the invasion of Luzon.

MacArthur used her as his flagship for the Luzon attack, thereby adding to her already considerable fame, then after helping retake Corregidor and other islands in the Philippines, Boise carried the general on a triumphant tour of the islands. This tour was interrupted for the invasion of Borneo, but resumed after the beach was secured. After MacArthur left the ship in June 1945, she returned to the United States for an overhaul that was completed just as the war ended. Over the course of the war she was awarded eleven battle stars, more than any other light cruiser in her class.

This full account of USS Boise’s war not only provides insight into how one ship navigated a global conflict, but also insight into the experiences of the men who served on her, and a new perspective on the naval campaigns of the war.

About the Speaker: Phillip Parkerson is a retired diplomat and historian. He holds a Ph.D. in History and Latin American Studies from the University of Florida and was Assistant Professor of History at Middle Georgia College (now Middle Georgia State University). After 20 years in the U.S. Foreign Service, he retired in 2003 and then served as Director of International Education at Miami Dade College and most recently as Adjunct Prof. of History at Broward College-Santa Cruz, Bolivia. Parkerson has published several books and articles in academic journals on the history of Bolivia and Peru. A second edition of his book on the Peru-Bolivia Confederation (1835-39) was published in 2019 by the Government of Bolivia in the Biblioteca Boliviana del Bicentenario (Bolivian Bicentennial Library), a collection of 200 works on Bolivia selected by a distinguished panel of academics and writers. A native of Eastman, Georgia, he currently resides in Santa Cruz, Bolivia.

Watch this Naval Order History Presentation Zoom Meeting!

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11 October 2023

Dr Michael A. Verney, PhD

“A Great and Rising Nation:

Naval Exploration and American National Maturity, 1815-1860”

Between 1838 and 1860, the US Navy dispatched seventeen exploring expeditions across the globe. These voyages were diverse; they emerged from various imperial impulses, and they ranged from the Antarctic to the Arctic, from Ottoman Palestine to Japan, and from South American rivers to the North Pacific.

What they shared in common, however, was a conscious attempt to prove that the United States was the cultural equal of the Great Powers of Europe. The effort to present the United States as an European-style scientific empire can be seen in legislative efforts to promote naval exploration, the kinds of science that the Navy conducted overseas, the fine scientific and narrative tomes of naval exploration, and in the specimens displayed in the nation’s first, publicly funded national museum of natural history.

About the Speaker: Michael A. Verney is assistant professor of History at Drury University in Springfield, Missouri. He specializes in the global history of the early US republic with a focus on maritime and naval expansion and global encounters. He earned his B.A. in 2008 from the University of Massachusetts Amherst and his Ph.D. in History from the University of New Hampshire in 2016. He is the author of A Great and Rising Nation: Naval Exploration and Global Empire in the Early US Republic, which was published by the University of Chicago Press in July 2022. He has previously published pieces on the first US citizens to voyage to the Indian subcontinent in the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries. His second book project will examine Commodore Matthew Calbraith Perry’s mission to Japan in light of the North Pacific Exploring Expedition, a forgotten but massive US naval survey of East Asian and Russian waters in the mid-1850s.

Watch this Naval Order History Presentation Zoom Meeting!

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13 September 2023

Dwight Hughes

**“The Naval Civil War in Theaters Near and Far”**

In his classic treatise of strategy, On War, Carl von Clausewitz discussed “different factors of space, mass, and time” related to battle, one of which is “theater of operations.” He defined an operational theater as: “A sector of the total war area which has protected boundaries and so a certain degree of independence.” Protected boundaries might consist of fortifications, natural barriers, or simply distance. Combat theaters of the Civil War are identified as the Eastern, the Western, and the Trans-Mississippi with subordinate campaign theaters in each.

The naval side of the conflict also can be defined in terms of theaters, which interacted with but are distinct from military counterparts. These naval theaters warrant independent consideration as: the Offshore Blockade, Littoral Coasts and Harbors, Heartland Rivers, and the Wide Oceans.

Bounded primarily by land-water interfaces, some wet theaters overlapped terrestrial sectors and extended into the continental core while others stretched beyond familiar battlefields to the far side of the world. Each exhibited unique characteristics and posed exceptional challenges to the United States and Confederate States navies and to their command authorities. Each employed unprecedented technologies, strategies, tactics, and command procedures.

The blockade was a bold and contentious strategy for a novice commander in chief, the largest military campaign of the war. In the littoral, titanic clashes erupted against powerful defenses while the U.S. Navy and Army began to envision joint operations leading to massive amphibious invasions. Naval and military operations converged most thoroughly in the heartland where riverine warfare was invented blending maritime mobility and firepower with hard fighting on land.

More successful than should have been expected, the Confederate Navy focused on underdog strategies: commerce raiding and blockade running at sea, with defense of key fortified positions along interior lines ashore bolstered by asymmetric new technologies including ironclads, torpedoes (mines), and submarines. On the oceans, swift Rebel commerce raiders blended the ancient technology of sail with revolutionary machine propulsion causing immense damage to powerful Yankee shipping and whaling interests.

This presentation introduces naval theaters and discusses their unique strategic, tactical, technological, and command characteristics. Based on an essay in The Civil War on the Water: Favorite Stories and Fresh Perspectives from the Historians at Emerging Civil War (Savas Beatie, 2023).

About the Speaker: Dwight Hughes is a public historian, author, and speaker in Civil War naval history (www.CivilWarNavyHistory.com). Dwight graduated from the U.S. Naval Academy in 1967 and served twenty years as a surface warfare officer including with river forces in Vietnam. He holds an MA in Political Science and an MS in Information Systems Management. Dwight authored A Confederate Biography: The Cruise of the CSS Shenandoah (Naval Institute Press, 2015) and Unlike Anything that Ever Floated: The Monitor and Virginia and the Battle of Hampton Roads, March 8-9, 1862 (Savas Beatie, 2021). He edited and contributed to The Civil War on the Water: Favorite Stories and Fresh Perspectives from the Historians at Emerging Civil War (Savas Beatie, 2023). Dwight is a contributing author at the Emerging Civil War blog and has presented at numerous roundtables, historical conferences, and other venues.

Watch this Naval Order History Presentation Zoom Meeting!

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9 August 2023

Dr. Karl Zingheim, PhD

“Disaster at Point Honda”

On a moonless and foggy September night a century ago, fourteen destroyers charged through mounting seas off the rocky central California coast, bound for home in San Diego. In this era before radar, and when radio navigation was still a dark art, piloting ships in those conditions required a practiced eye, intuition, and luck. Onward the ships ploughed into a head sea, their column stretching for miles. Their voyage plan required a left turn into the Santa Barbara Channel and threading through the Los Angeles shipping traffic, all at twenty knots sustained speed!

With the last visual fix off the coast now several hours old, the destroyers were navigating by stop watch now, and just three hours before midnight, the lead ship made the scheduled turn on time. Each ship behind sought the knuckle turbulence in the water where the preceding ship had turned, and in a matter of minutes, a maelstrom din of alarms, whistles, and frantic orders rent the night as one ship after the other discovered the tiger trap of Pedernales Point. In just a quarter hour, seven ships were pinioned and ripped by the rocks of the California coast, the remainder of the formation vaguely discerned the hazard in time to avert disaster, though two of them still sustained damage in their escape. For the men on the wrecks, the night became a savage struggle for survival as the unrelenting sea threw them about and silenced their ships. Heroic efforts to stay alive on the jagged rocks and cliffsides, as well as improvised rescues from rail workers and ranchers ashore, defined the human response to this tragedy. By daybreak, the seven crews were succored ashore, except for twenty-three men lost on a capsized destroyer. All of the hulks were beyond salvage. To this day, questions linger over this catastrophe. Why the excessive speed under poor conditions and along a treacherous route? Why weren’t definitive measures taken to establish a navigational fix before the fateful turn? Why did the following ships assume the leader knew exactly where they were? Why did half the formation crash into the rocks before the other ships were warned off? These questions and more will be addressed during August’s special presentation.

About the Speaker: Karl Zingheim serves as the Staff Historian for the USS Midway Museum. A 1986 graduate of the U.S. Naval Academy, he served in the amphibious forces in the Navy, where he qualified as a Surface Warfare Officer, and taught at the Naval Amphibious School in Coronado. Later, he attained his Master of Arts Degree in Military History at Norwich University. An early advocate for the establishment of a naval museum in San Diego, Professor Zingheim has served with the USS Midway Museum since its inception. He is a faculty member as well with the Museum’s Midway Institute, and teaches at San Diego State University’s Center for War and Society.

Watch this Naval Order History Presentation Zoom Meeting!

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12 July 2023

Dr. John Sherwood, PhD

“A Global Force for Good: Sea Services Humanitarian Operations in the Twenty-First Century”

John Sherwood will discuss his forthcoming book which examines three of the most significant Navy humanitarian and disaster relief operations in recent history: Operation Unified Assistance (the response to the 2004 Indonesian earthquake and tsunami); Hurricane Katrina (2005); and Operation Tomodachi (the response to 2011 earthquake, tsunami, and nuclear disaster in Japan). Where appropriate, he also will discuss the role of the Marine Corps, Coast Guard, and other Armed Forces in these operations. Based on documents held by the Naval History and Heritage Command and oral histories conducted by reservists and the author, the book argues these humanitarian operations represent some of the Navy’s biggest wins in recent history. They have had a greater strategic impact in the world than many of the Navy’s recent combat operations. Nothing underscores American commitment to helping a foreign partner or a disaster affected U.S. region more visibly than a super carrier, a big deck amphibious warship, or a hospital ship—our most valuable strategic assets and symbols of American global power—showing up on the horizon to lend a helping hand during a country or a region’s darkest hours.

About the Speaker: John Darrell Sherwood is a historian at the Naval History and Heritage Command (NHHC). He holds a Ph.D. in history from The George Washington University, and has authored seven books on military and naval history. His book, War in the Shallows: U.S. Navy Coastal and Riverine Warfare in Vietnam, 1965-1968 (2015), won the North American Society of Oceanic History’s John Lyman award. His forthcoming work, A Global Force for Good: Sea Services Humanitarian Operations in the Twenty-First Century (September 2023), examines recent sea services disaster relief operations. During the 2019-2020 academic year, he was selected as a Fulbright-Schuman European Union Affairs fellow and spent time at Institute for Security Policy at Kiel University (ISPK) and the Hellenic National Defense College in Athens. Sherwood serves as a co-host for the Preble Hall Podcast hosted by the U.S. Naval Academy Museum. His current writing projects focus on NATO maritime operations and also naval leadership.

Watch this Naval Order History Presentation Zoom Meeting!

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14 June 2023

Dr. James E. (Chris) Rentfrow, PhD

“What Your Campus Program is Doing to Advance the New Museum”

Dr. Rentfrow, Director of the Navy Museums Division, will update us on the Navy Museum and its plan for the future and what we can do to assist!

About the Speaker: A native of Atwater, CA, Dr. Rentfrow graduated from the U.S. Naval Academy in 1989, earning a bachelor’s degree in Political Science. He earned his Naval Flight Officer wings in September 1990. Dr. Rentfrow began operational flying in the EA-6B Prowler in February 1992 with the “Yellowjackets” of VAQ-138. Subsequent squadron tours included duty with the Navy’s Reserve EA-6B squadron, VAQ-209, as well as a Department Head tour with the “Rooks” of VAQ-137. During his operational tours, Dr. Rentfrow deployed aboard USS Nimitz (CVN-68), twice aboard USS Theodore Roosevelt (CVN-71), and aboard USS John C. Stennis (CVN-74). Dr. Rentfrow flew or otherwise participated in Operations SOUTHERN WATCH, DENY FLIGHT, DELIBERATE FORCE, ENDURING FREEDOM, and IRAQI FREEDOM. Other positions included staff duty as Electronic Warfare Officer, USS Kitty Hawk (CV-63) Battle Group, and shore teaching tours at the U.S. Naval Academy and U.S. Naval War College. In 2008, Dr. Rentfrow was selected to enter the Permanent Military Professor program. He retired from active duty in June 2019 as Associate Professor of History at the U.S. Naval Academy. In December 2019, Dr. Rentfrow joined the Naval History and Heritage Command as Director of the National Museum of the United States Navy and the NMUSN Campus Program Office. In January 2023, Dr. Rentfrow was named Director of the Navy Museums Division, Naval History and Heritage Command. Dr. Rentfrow is an in-residence graduate of the Air Command and Staff College, Maxwell AFB, Alabama. He holds a M.S. in Human Resource Management from Troy State University, Montgomery, and a Ph.D. in U.S. History from the University of Maryland, College Park. He is the author of a monograph, “Home Squadron: The U.S. Navy on the North Atlantic Station,” published in 2014. During his active-duty career, Dr. Rentfrow accumulated over 2100 EA-6B flight hours and over 400 carrier arrested landings. His decorations include the Legion of Merit, the Strike/Flight Air Medal (6 awards), the Meritorious Service Medal (2 awards), the Navy/Marine Corps Commendation Medal with Combat “V”, and various service awards and ribbons. -

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Slide Deck from the Presentation

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17 May 2023

Dr Evan Wilson, PhD

“The Horrible Peace”

Few battles in world history provide a cleaner dividing line than Waterloo: before, there was Napoleon; after, there was the Pax Britannica. While Waterloo marked France’s defeat and Britain’s ascendance as an imperial power, the war was far from over for many soldiers and sailors, who were forced to contend with the lasting effects of battlefield trauma, the realities of an impossibly tight labor market, and growing social unrest. The Horrible Peace details a story of distress and discontent, of victory complicated by volcanism, and of the challenges facing Britain at the beginning of its victorious century.

Examining the process of demobilization and its consequences for British society, Evan Wilson draws on archival research and veterans’ memoirs to tell the story of this period through the experiences of veterans who struggled to reintegrate and soldiers and sailors who remained in service as Britain attempted to defend and expand the empire. Veterans were indeed central to Britain’s experience of peace, as they took to the streets to protest the government’s indifference to widespread unemployment and misery. The fighting did not stop at Waterloo.

About the Speaker: Evan Wilson is an associate professor in the Hattendorf Historical Center. He researches the naval history of Britain and other countries from the eighteenth to the twentieth centuries. He is the author or editor of five books, most recently “Navies in Multipolar Worlds: From the Age of Sail to the Present” (2020), which he edited with Paul Kennedy. In 2018, he won the Sir Julian Corbett Prize in Modern Naval History for an article based on research using the U.S. Naval War College’s historical collection. Before coming to Newport, he was the associate director of International Security Studies at Yale University. He holds degrees from Yale, Cambridge and Oxford.

Watch this Naval Order History Presentation Zoom Meeting here!

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April 12, 2023

Capt. Michael A. Lilly, USN (ret)

Nimitz at Ease:

How a Honolulu Couple helped Nimitz Cope with the Stresses of Command

Capt. Michael A. Lilly, USN (ret), author of Nimitz at Ease, will discuss unique insights into the Fleet Admiral never before published.

The day after taking command, the press asked Nimitz what he was going to do with his fleet under water. In response, Nimitz said he was a Kama‘aina and replied with a Hawaiian word - ho`omanawanui. Where did he learn that word and what did he mean?

Lilly’s grandparents and old friends of the Fleet Admiral, Una and Henry A. “Sandy” Walker, gave Nimitz time, space and a place away from the enormous stresses of command which in a small but meaningful way helped him cope with and win the Pacific War. With his grandmother’s diary and hundreds of unpublished letters, memorabilia, and unpublished photos with Nimitz, his aide, and other subordinate admirals and Nimitz’s digitized 4,023-page command log, the Graybook, Lilly was able to track Nimitz’s daily activities in war and peace.

What emerges is the story of how the Walkers freed Nimitz from the horrors of war. Nimitz agonized over issuing commands that resulted in death or injury to tens of thousands of service members. “You killed my son on Tarawa,” a bitter mother painfully wrote.

The military does not prepare leaders for handling such tensions. For Nimitz, the pressures manifested in chronic insomnia and intestinal distress, exacerbated by recurring malaria. Nimitz found time “at ease” with the Walkers, most of it spent on weekends at their beach house on a six-acre estate on the north shore of Oahu where he got into a swim suit, pitched horseshoes, and watched the sun set over the spectacular Ko‘olau Mountains.

Along with beautiful images of Hawaii, Lilly takes us on a journey to the past, to old Hawaii and the war in the Pacific. The story will include anecdotes and photos, showing how a tough guy with a difficult command spent his days “at ease”. He also explains Nimitz’s use of the Hawaiian word ho`omanawanui.

About the speaker: Capt. Lilly is former Hawaii Attorney General and a founding director emeritus of the USS Missouri Memorial Association, which operates the Missouri as a memorial and tourist attraction. A Vietnam War combat veteran, his personal decorations include the Legion of Merit, Defense Meritorious Service Medal, and two Meritorious Service Medals. He has authored over one hundred articles on history and the military in publications such as the Naval History Magazine, Proceedings, and the Navy League. He and his wife, the former Cindy Walter, have four children and live on the islands of Maui and Oahu.

Watch the Zoom Presentation here!

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March 8, 2023

Tim Loughman

“A Strange Whim of the Sea: The Wreck of the USS Macaw”

Tim Loughman, author of A Strange Whim of the Sea: The Wreck of the USS Macaw will discuss his recently published narrative about the loss of a submarine recovery ship at Midway during the latter stages of World War II.

About the book: On January 16, 1944, the submarine rescue vessel USS Macaw ran aground at Midway Atoll while attempting to get a towing line to the stranded submarine USS Flier. The Flier was pulled free six days later, but another three weeks of salvage efforts plagued by rough seas and equipment failures failed to dislodge the Macaw. On February 12, amid huge waves, the ship began to slip aft into deeper water. As night fell and the Macaw slowly sank, the twenty-two sailors on board―ship's captain Paul W. Burton, his executive officer, and twenty enlisted men―sought refuge in the pilothouse, but by 2:30 a.m., that compartment had flooded almost entirely. Burton gave the order to open the portside door and make for the foremast. Three men climbed it but most of the others were swept overboard. Five of them died, including Burton. Three sailors from the base at Midway also lost their lives in two unauthorized rescue attempts.
Drawing on survivors' contemporaneous written statements and interviews conducted over a span of thirty years, A Strange Whim of the Sea: The Wreck of the USS Macaw traces the ship's service from its launch on San Francisco Bay to its disastrous final days at Midway. Ultimately, for Burton and the Macaw the real enemy was the sea, and in a deadly denouement, the sea won. Highlighting the underreported role auxiliary vessels played in the war, A Strange Whim of the Sea engages naval historians and students alike with a previously untold story of struggle, sacrifice, death, and survival in the World War II Pacific.

About the speaker: Tim is a journalist who grew up in Orinda, California; before moving to Ohio. Graduating from St. Francis de Sales High School, Toledo, Ohio, he went on to obtain a BA in history from Dartmouth College, 1976; and completed graduate school at the Medill School of Journalism, Northwestern University 1991.

Following graduate school he taught English in St. Petersburg Russia for three years before returning to the States where he put his journalism degree to work, copyediting and occasional reporting for various newspapers in California, including the Oakland Tribune and the Tribune of San Luis Obispo County; as well as copyediting for various book publishers, mainly the State University of New York Press.

Watch the Presentation here!

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February 8, 2023

Anna Gibson Holloway, PhD

“More Tons—Less Huns”: The Virginia Shipbuilding Corporation

When the United States entered World War I, the US Navy had already been engaged in a building program under the Naval Act of 1916. The merchant fleet, however, had shrunk over the years, with much of American cargo carried in foreign vessels until the Shipping Act of 1916 sought to turn the trend around. However, this was a peacetime Act. The wartime needs of a robust American merchant marine were a different matter, and this led to the rapid expansion of shipbuilding, particularly on the east coast. On April 17, 1917, the United States Shipping Board created the Emergency Fleet Corporation, which was to oversee a program which would build “Men-carrying, Food-bearing, Munition-laden Ships.” Eventually under the direction of businessman Charles A. Schwab, the hope of the Corporation was to increase American merchant tonnage from a production of only 250,000 tons per year to a fleet that measured over 9 million tons. In Alexandria, Virginia, a shipyard sprang up at Jones Point almost overnight. Known scam artist Charles Morse was the mover and shaker behind this operation. In this presentation historian Anna Holloway will bring to life a story of deception, city renewal, a slogan contest, luxurious parties, and much-needed ships.

About our Presenter: DR. ANNA GIBSON HOLLOWAY, PhD, Maritime Historian, Washington, DCis the Fleet History Team Lead within the Histories Branch of the Naval History and Heritage Command (NHHC) in Washington, D.C. There she is responsible for the team of professional historians who produce the Dictionary of American Naval Fighting Ships (DANFS) as well as other short- and long-form publications and projects dealing with sailor stories, fleet history, and fleet support. Prior to her time at NHHC, she served as the Maritime Historian for the National Park Service (NPS) in Washington, DC, where she provided expertise relating to American maritime history in all of its forms, through consultation, speaking engagements, publications, and primary source research. There she also administered the National Historic Lighthouse Preservation Act Program (54 USC 305101-305106), and assisted in the administration of the National Maritime Heritage Grant Program (16 U.S.C. 5401). From 2000 to 2014, Anna held a variety of positions at The Mariners’ Museum in Newport News, VA, culminating in Vice President of Museum Collections and Programs. There she oversaw the Curatorial, Collections Management, Education, Conservation, Photography & Licensing, Exhibition Design, Web and social media presence, and the USS Monitor Center functions of the institution. As Curator of the award-winning USS Monitor Center, she led a multi-disciplinary team in the creation of the 20,000 square foot exhibition, and assisted in the development of the Center’s state-of-the-art conservation facility. In the waning years of the 20th century, she was Manager of School Tour Programs for the Chrysler Museum of Art in Norfolk, VA, served as crew on Jamestown Settlement’s replica ships Susan Constant, Godspeed, and Discovery, and was a puppeteer and understudy fire-eater for the Colonial Williamsburg Foundation.

This Winston-Salem, N.C. native graduated from The University of North Carolina at Greensboro with baccalaureate degrees in English Literature and Classical/Medieval Civilization. She received her Master’s degree in Early Modern History and her PhD in American History from the College of William and Mary in Williamsburg, VA.

Dr. Holloway has lectured internationally on a variety of maritime topics, published articles in national magazines and journals, curated numerous exhibitions and programs, appeared on national television, and is the co-author (with Jonathan White) of “Our Little Monitor” (Kent State University Press, 2018). Her current research interests revolve around 19th century marine salvage firms in the Tidewater and Eastern Shore areas of Virginia, with a particular emphasis on B & J Baker and Co. of Norfolk, VA

Watch the Presentation here!

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January 11, 2023

Trent Hone

“Mastering the Art of Command:

Admiral Chester W. Nimitz and Victory in the Pacific”

Mastering the Art of Command is a detailed examination of Admiral Chester W. Nimitz’s leadership during World War II. It describes how he used his talents to guide the Pacific Fleet following the attacks on Pearl Harbor, win crucial victories against the forces of Imperial Japan, and then seize the initiative in the Pacific. Once Nimitz’s forces held the initiative, they maintained it through an offensive campaign of unparalleled speed that overcame Japanese defenses and created the conditions for victory. 

As a command and operational history, Mastering the Art of Command explores how Nimitz used his leadership skills, command talents, and strategic acumen to achieve these decisive results. Hone recounts how Nimitz, as both Commander-in-Chief of the Pacific Fleet (CINCPAC) and Commander-in-Chief of the Pacific Ocean Areas (CINCPOA), revised and adapted his organizational structure to capitalize on lessons and newly emerging information. Hone argues that Nimitz—because he served simultaneously as CINCPAC and CINCPOA—was able to couple tactical successes to strategic outcomes and more effectively plan and execute operations that brought victory at Midway, Guadalcanal, the Marshall Islands, the Philippines, Iwo Jima, and Okinawa.   As a study of leadership,  uses modern management theories, and builds upon the approach in his award-winning Learning War. Trent Hone explores the challenge of leadership in complex adaptive systems through Nimitz’s behavior and causes us to reassess the inevitability of Allied victory and the reasons for its ultimate accomplishment. A new narrative history of the Pacific war, this book demonstrates effective patterns for complexity-informed leadership by highlighting how Nimitz maintained coherence within his organization, established the conditions for his subordinates to succeed, and fostered collaborative sensemaking to identify and pursue options more rapidly. Nimitz’s “strategic artistry” is a pattern worthy of study and emulation, for today’s military officers, civilian leaders, and managers in large organizations. “USNI”

About our presenter: Trent Hone is an authority on the U.S. Navy of the early twentieth century and a leader in the application of complexity science to organizational design. He studied religion and archaeology at Carleton College in Northfield, MN and works as a consultant helping a variety of organizations improve their processes and techniques. Mr. Hone regularly writes and speaks about leadership, sensemaking, organizational learning, and complexity. His talents are uniquely suited to integrate the history of the Navy with modern management theories, generating new insights relevant to both disciplines.

Watch the Zoom Presentation here!

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December 14, 2022

Daniel Allen Butler

About Pearl: December 7, 1941:What happened at Pearl Harbor?
What really happened?

The Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor is one of those rare moments where, in the space of a few hours, the "hinge of Fate" turned and the course of history was utterly changed. Nearly eight decades later, it has become one of those events which almost everyone knows of, but hardly anyone seems to know about. How – and why – did the Empire of Japan and the United States of America collide on blood and flames that Sunday morning when the sun rose and the bombs fell?

Pearl: December 7, 1941 is the story of how America and Japan, two nations with seemingly little over which to quarrel, let peace slip away, so that on that “day which will live in infamy,” more than 350 dive bombers, high-level bombers, torpedo planes, and fighters of the Imperial Japanese Navy did their best to cripple the United States Navy’s Pacific Fleet, killing 2,403 American servicemen and civilians, and wounding another 1,178.
It’s a story of emperors and presidents, diplomats and politicians, admirals and generals—and it’s also the tale of ordinary sailors, soldiers, and airmen, all of whom were overtaken by a rush of events that ultimately overwhelmed them. Pearl shows the real reasons why America’s political and military leaders underestimated Japan’s threat against America’s security, and why their Japanese counterparts ultimately felt compelled to launch the Pearl Harbor attack.
Pearl offers more than superficial answers, showing how both sides blundered their way through arrogance, over-confidence, racism, bigotry, and old-fashioned human error to arrive at the moment when the Japanese were convinced that there was no alternative to war. Once the battle is joined, Pearl then takes the reader into the heart of the attack, where the fighting men of both nations showed that neither side had a monopoly on heroism, courage, cowardice, or luck, as they fought to protect their nations.

About our presenter: A maritime and military historian, the author (through mid-2021) of eleven books. Some of his previous works include 'Unsinkable'--the Full Story of RMS Titanic; Distant Victory--the Battle of Jutland and the Allied Triumph in the First World War; The Other Side of the Night: The Carpathia, the Californian, and the Night the Titanic was Lost; The Burden of Guilt: How Germany Shattered the Last Days of Peace, Summer 1914; Shadow of the Sultan's Realm: the Destruction of the Ottoman Empire and the Creation of the Modern Middle East; Field Marshal--the Life and Death of Erwin Rommel; and his newest, Pearl - December 7, 1941. Educated at Hope College, Grand Valley State University, and the University of Erlangen (FAU), Butler served in the United States Army before becoming a full time author. He is an internationally-recognized authority on military and maritime subjects and a popular guest-speaker, having given presentations at the National Archives in Washington DC, the Mariners Museum, and in the United Kingdom. From 2002 to 2010, he was also a frequent guest in the on-board enrichment series of Cunard's Queen Elizabeth 2 and Queen Mary 2, as well as the ships of the Royal Caribbean and Norwegian cruise lines.

Butler is currently at work on two new projects: The Convoy -- ONS-5 and the Last Stand of the Wolfpacks; and TANK! -- The Battle of Arracourt, September 1944.

His personal website can be found at www.danielallenbutler.org.

Watch the Zoom Presentation here!

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November 9, 2022

Dr. Chuck Steele, PhD

Professor of History, United States Air Force Academy

‘The Perils of Parochialism or Too Much of Anything is Bad for You!’

One of the greatest benefits of studying the history of warfare is the possibility of it facilitating an understanding of why wars, campaigns, and battles are won or lost. Perhaps the most oft-quoted refrain from Carl von Clausewitz’s On War is that “war is merely the continuation of policy by other means.” In this instance, war is supposed to be an outgrowth of a political problem, and it follows that the history of warfare is thus a history of using violence to solve political issues. Unfortunately, progressing from this underlying assumption to an honest appraisal of the constantly evolving means of solving runaway political problems is far from simple. In particular, military organizations often conflate heritage with history and obscure the search for truth with a need to preserve the values they hold most dear. The worth of studying naval history is not to be found in what it tells its students about how things have always been and will always be. Rather its value is better found in its ability to show the diversity and complexity of problems associated with the waging of war. Indeed, history stands alone in the process of professional military education when it comes to the study of character and leadership in the crucible of war if that study is to be bounded by reality and presented in context true to the conditions of the time.

About the Presenter: Dr. Chuck Steele is a Professor of History at the United States Air Force Academy. He has served as the course chair for USAFA’s offerings in Russian history, naval history, military thought and strategy, technology and warfare, the core and scholar’s courses in modern military history, and the history of the First World War. In addition to being recognized for teaching excellence in military history at West Point and the Air Force Academy, Chuck was the class of 2017 Humanities and Social Sciences recipient of the William H. Heiser Award, chosen by the cadets as the "Outstanding Senior Faculty Educator." He is a graduate of the University of California, Berkeley (BA, History 1987), King’s College, the University of London (MA, War Studies 1990), and West Virginia University (Ph.D., History 2000).

Watch the Presentation Here!!!

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12 October 2022

Dr Thomas Sheppard

‘Commanding Petty Despots; The American Navy in the New Republic’

Commanding Petty Despots tells the story of the creation of the American Navy. Rather than focus on the well-known frigate duels and fleet engagements, Dr Sheppard looks at the norm of civilian control and how this concept evolved in the early American republic. For naval officers passionate about honor and reputation, willingness to put themselves in harm’s way was never a problem, but they were far less enthusiastic about taking orders from a civilian Secretary of the Navy. The first secretary, Benjamin Stoddert, tolerated insubordination from “spirited” officers who secured respect for the American republic from European powers. By the end of the War of 1812, however, the culture of the Navy’s officer corps had grown considerably when it came to civil-military strains. A new generation of naval officers, far more attuned to duty and subordination, had risen to prominence, and Stoddert’s successors increasingly demanded recognition of civilian supremacy from the officer corps.

About the Author: Dr. Thomas Sheppard, PhD is an assistant professor of military history at the Marine Corps University Command and Staff College. He earned his doctorate in military history from the University of North Carolina in 2014. His work has appeared in The Journal of Military History, Security Studies Quarterly, and Understanding the U.S. Military (Routledge Press, 2022). Commanding Petty Despots is his first book.

Watch Presentation: Click Here!!!!

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September 14, 2022

Major Brian Walter, USA (Ret.)

The Longest Campaign Britain’s Maritime Struggle in the Atlantic and Northwest Europe, 1939-1945

and

Blue Water War The Maritime Struggle in the Mediterranean and Middle East, 1940-1945

Please join historian and author Major Brian Walter, USA (Ret.) as he reviews World War II’s Atlantic and Mediterranean campaigns through the lens of the overarching logistical struggle. Nearly all maritime operations during World War II were directly or indirectly related to this all-important logistical contest as both sides sought to logistically fulfill their own strategic and tactical needs while denying the same to their enemies. Highlights of the discussion will include the battle of the Atlantic (World War II’s most important campaign), concurrent Allied efforts to impede German maritime trade in the Baltic, and the competing supply and interdiction efforts underway in the Mediterranean. In covering these topics, the presentation will also correct some persistent myths that remain prevalent regarding these critical contests.

Brian E. Walter is a retired U.S. Army Major from a combat arms branch with a Bachelor of Science Degree in Political Science and International Relations. A Distinguished Military Graduate and recipient of the Excellence in Military History Award from the U.S. Army Center for Military History and the Association of the United States Army, he has been a student of the British military during the Second World War for more than 30 years. He currently resides in his home state of Minnesota where he continues to write on a number of military and historical subjects.

Watch the Presentation here!

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August 10, 2022

Dr. Craig L. Symonds, PhD

Nimitz at War

Command Leadership from Pearl Harbor to Tokyo Bay

The book reveals how the quiet man from the Hill Country of Texas eventually surmounted the many challenges he faced upon taking command of the Pacific Fleet just days after the attack on Japanese Pearl Harbor. Using Nimitz’s headquarters—the eye of the hurricane—as his vantage point, Craig Symonds covers all the major campaigns in the Pacific from Guadalcanal to Okinawa. He captures Nimitz’s composure, discipline, homespun wisdom, and most of all his uncanny sense of when to assert authority and when to pull back. In retrospect it is difficult to imagine anyone else accomplishing what Nimitz did. As Symonds’ absorbing, dynamic, and authoritative portrait reveals, it required qualities of leadership exhibited by few other commanders in history, qualities that are enduringly and even poignantly relevant to our own moment.

About the Presenter: Craig L. Symonds is Professor Emeritus at the United States Naval Academy, where he taught naval history for thirty years, including four years as History Department Chair. He also taught at Britannia Royal Naval College in Dartmouth, England. From 2017 to 2020 he was the Ernest J. King Distinguished Professor of Maritime History at the U.S. Naval War College. He is the author of seventeen books, including Decision at Sea, Lincoln and his Admirals, The Battle of Midway, Neptune: The Allied Invasion of Europe and the D-Day Landings, and, most recently, World War II at Sea: A Global History. His works have been translated into several languages and received numerous awards, including the Lincoln Prize, the Roosevelt Prize, and the Dudley Knox Medal for Lifetime Achievement.

More on Dr. Symonds at: https://global.oup.com/academic/product/nimitz-at-war-9780190062361?cc=us&lang=en&

Watch Dr. Symonds’ Presentation Here!!

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Wednesday July 13, 2022

New York Times Best Selling author of ‘The Rise and Fall of Great Powers’

Dr Paul Kennedy

VICTORY AT SEA

Naval Power and the Transformation of the Global Order in World War II.

In this engaging narrative, brought to life by marine artist Ian Marshall’s beautiful full‑color paintings, historian Paul Kennedy grapples with the rise and fall of the Great Powers during World War II. Tracking the movements of the six major navies of the Second World War—the allied navies of Britain, France, and the United States and the Axis navies of Germany, Italy, and Japan—Kennedy tells a story of naval battles, maritime campaigns, convoys, amphibious landings, and strikes from the sea. From the elimination of the Italian, German, and Japanese fleets and almost all of the French fleet, to the end of the era of the big‑gunned surface vessel, the advent of the atomic bomb, and the rise of an American economic and military power larger than anything the world had ever seen, Kennedy shows how the strategic landscape for naval affairs was completely altered between 1936 and 1946.

See Dr Kennedy’s Presentation Here!

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8 June, 2022

Capt Kevin Miller, USN (Ret)

“A Silver Waterfall”; a factual historic fiction novel of the battle of Midway

In the desolate middle of the largest ocean on earth, two great navies met, one bent on conclusive battle, the other lying-in ambush. Six months after Pearl Harbor, Yamamoto again crossed the Pacific with the most powerful naval armada the world had ever seen, this time to finish the job. Nimitz waited for him with what he had, placed exactly where he needed it. Both admirals depended on their fliers, some veterans of battle, others raw and unproven. During World War II, striking first meant decisive victory.

The Silver Waterfall is a factual historic fiction novel of the battle of Midway told by today’s master of aircraft carrier aviation fiction about the men who fought in one of the most pivotal and epic naval battles in world history.

Reviews: Not since Herman Wouk’s War and Remembrance has the story of Midway been told with such allure.”

Peter Fey, author of Bloody Sixteen.

“If you’ve wondered what more could be written about the Battle of Midway, here’s the answer: Kevin Miller has delivered the perfect amalgam of vivid military history and unforgettable fiction. Through the viewpoints of the combatants on both sides The Silver Waterfall evokes the drama and raw terror of the battle that changed the course of the war. Historical fiction at its best.”

Robert Gandt, author of Angels in the Sky and The Twilight Warriors

View Discussion Here!

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May 11, 2022

Roger L. Crossland

THE ABALONE UKULELE

A Tale of Far Eastern Intrigue

The Abalone Ukulele: A Tale of Far Eastern Intrigue is an historical novel set in 1913 Shanghai, where four cultures are about to collide: China, Korea, Japan, and the US. The point of collision is three tons of Japanese gold ingots meant to undermine an already collapsing China.

Three ordinary men, a disgraced Korean tribute courier, a bookish naval officer, and a polyglot third-class quartermaster realize they must foil Japanese subversion and — with sub rosa Asiatic Station support — highjack that gold to finance a Korean insurrection. Three ordinary women complicate, and complement, their efforts: an enigmatic Changsan courtesan, a feisty Down East consular clerk, and a clever Chinese farm-girl.

It is a tale that wends through the outskirts of Peking to the Yukon River; from the San Francisco waterfront to a naval landing party isolated on a Woosung battlefield; from ships of the US Asiatic Fleet moored on Battleship Row to a junk on the Yangtze; and from the Korean gold mines of Unsan to a coaling quay in Shanghai. Soon a foreign intelligence service, a revolutionary army, and two Chinese triads converge on a nation's ransom in gold.

Visit Publisher Website: http://www.newacademia.com
Facebook: www.facebook.com/NewAcademia
Watch Presentation HERE!!!!

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13 April 2022

Guest Speaker/Presenter Dr. Marc Wortman.
with a presentation on his book,

Admiral Hyman Rickover: Engineer of Power

Hyman George Rickover (1899–1986), born in a Polish shtetl, was the longest-serving U.S. military officer in history and an almost mythical figure in the United States Navy. Possessing engineering brilliance, a ferocious will, a combative personality, and an indefatigable work ethic, he oversaw the development of nuclear marine propulsion and the first civilian nuclear utility. Marc Wortman will describe the constant conflict Rickover faced and provoked, tracing how he revolutionized the Navy and Cold War strategy.

Watch Marc Wortman’s Presentation Here!

Those NOUS members wishing to purchase a copy at a 40% discount on the $26 cover price plus free shipping, less than Amazon(!), enter the code RICKOVER at https://www.jewishlives.org/books/rickover checkout. The first printing has sold out and copies ordered now will take a bit to arrive.
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Naval History Night with CAPT Stan Carpenter, Ph.D.

The Rise and Fall of the Austro-Hungarian Navy, 1900-1918

9 March 2022

Most Americans are unaware that the Austro-Hungarian Empire developed and built a significant naval force from the late 19th century until the outbreak of World War I in 1914. Two dynamics drove the naval expansion that included large, powerful dreadnought-type battleships as well as cruisers, destroyers, small craft and submarines. First, the threat of an aggressive Italy in the Adriatic region as Italy expanded its battleship fleet in the same period. Secondly, the power of the maritime theories of Rear Alfred Thayer Mahan, USN, who argued in his several books that the way for great nations to arise and maintain their status and power was through maritime strength. That meant taking command of the sea through decisive battle between great powerful battle fleets. Many nations that had not previously been maritime states such as Japan, Imperial Germany, and the Austro-Hungarian Empire began building fleets. From the time of the naval victory over the Italians at the Battle of Lissa in 1859, the Austro-Hungarians rapidly built a robust force. The presentation addresses the growth of the fleet and the establishment of a naval tradition in the two decades prior to World war I and then its relatively small actual role in the war leading to its demise with the collapse of Austria-Hungary at the end of the war in 1918.