We are a few days late in wishing the iconic cartoon character, Popeye the sailorman, a happy birthday. (Frankly, I am not sure how one sends birthday wishes to a cartoon character, in any case.) Popeye first appeared on January … Continue reading
Category Archives: History
Last April, we posted about a planned expedition to the Antarctic’s Weddell Sea on the icebreaking polar-supply and research-vessel SA Agulhas II. The Weddell Sea Expedition 2019 is now underway, and scientists have spent the past two weeks investigating the Larsen C … Continue reading
Yesterday we posted about the replica of Captain Cook’s HMS Endeavour which will be circumnavigating Australia to commemorate the 250th-anniversary of Cook’s arrival. Some critics have noted that Captain Cook did not actually sail around Australia. Coincidentally and almost simultaneously, archaeologists in London … Continue reading
To celebrate the 250th anniversary of Captain Cook’s voyage to Australia, HMS Endeavour, a replica of Cook’s ship, will circumnavigate the continent. Prime minister Scott Morrison has announced the Australian government will be providing 6.7 million Australian dollars (£3.72 million) … Continue reading
Recently the containership MOL Empire passed an abandoned sailboat in the mid-Atlantic around 1,500 nautical miles away from Jersey. The captain emailed photos of the boat to the Cross Jobourg Coastguard in France which was able to identify it as the Service Civique. The … Continue reading
For Throwback Thursday, an updated repost of an event from ten years ago — the other “Miracle on the Hudson.” Ten years ago this week, US Airways Flight 1549 made an emergency water landing in the Hudson River. If the plane’s … Continue reading
Today marks the 100th year anniversary of the Great Boston Molasses Flood, which inundated Boston’s North End sending a wall of molasses, killing 21 and injuring 150. The Purity Distilling Company built a large molasses storage tank on Commercial Street in Boston’s North … Continue reading
In August of 1772, a powerful hurricane devastated much of the Leeward Islands in the Caribbean. On the island of St. Croix, the town of Christiansted was virtually leveled. An impoverished 17-year-old clerk, who worked for a local merchant, wrote a letter to … Continue reading
On New Year’s Eve 1918, over 200 men crowded the dock at the port of Kyle of Lochalsh waiting to the board the HMY Iolaire, a 190′ long iron-hulled yacht requisitioned by the Admiralty. Most of the men were Royal Navy Reservists. … Continue reading
Here is a wonderful sea story which appears to be more or less true. RMS Warrimoo was an Australian/New Zealand passenger ship, launched in 1892. The ship is best remembered for crossing the intersection of the international dateline and the equator at precisely the turn of … Continue reading
Recently, teams of Navy specialists have successfully removed 230,000 gallons of fuel, or close to 800 tons, still aboard the Prinz Eugen when it sank at Kwajalein, 72 years ago. The bottom of the lagoon at the Kwajalein Atoll is … Continue reading
A report from a few years ago. A story well worth retelling. Today the Christmas Ship is Chicago’s largest all-volunteer charitable support program for inner-city youth and their families at Christmas time. At the turn of the twentieth century, the “Christmas Tree … Continue reading
I will admit to being dependent on GPS. I rely on it for both maps and apps on my phone as well as the chartplotters on several tablets on my boat. Nevertheless, until recently I knew nothing of Gladys West, a … Continue reading
Researchers believe that wreckage found off the coast of Filey in Yorkshire is from the American warship USS Bonhomme Richard. The ship, under the command of John Paul Jones, fought a four-hour battle with HMS Serapis off nearby Flamborough Head in … Continue reading
On National Pearl Harbor Remembrance Day, the iconic USS Arizona Memorial remains closed to the public. As we posted last June, the memorial close indefinitely after structural cracks in the memorial dock were reported in early May. The National Park Service (NPS) … Continue reading
Regardless of what one may think of the political career of the late President George H.W. Bush , who died recently at the age of 94, it seems worthwhile to remember his service as one of the youngest pilots in the US Navy during … Continue reading
This is a bizarre story which we have been following for, literally, years. It looked for an instant like it might be resolved and then things fells apart once again. Tommy Thompson — engineer, treasure hunter, alleged swindler, and the current … Continue reading
Andrew Fitzgerald, the last of the four-man crew of the Coast Guard Motor Lifeboat CG-36500, which rescued the crew of the SS Pendleton, has died at the age of 87. On February 18, 1952, the 36′ motor lifeboat set out from Station Chatham, Massachusetts, … Continue reading
Happy Thanksgiving! Today has been celebrated as a day of Thanksgiving in the United States on the third Thursday of November since 1863. The holiday is notionally based on a harvest feast in 1621 between Native Americans and Puritans who had arrived on the … Continue reading
Here is a fascinating bit of history from the “History Guy” about when the navies of the Republic of Texas and the Republic of the Yucatan faced off against the most modern warships of their time, the ironclads of the Mexican … Continue reading