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Posted on 08/03/2003 10:51:44 PM PDT by 68-69TonkinGulfYachtClub
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NOTE: CLICK ON EACH GRAPHIC ON THIS TABLE TO GO TO A COAST GUARD RELATED SITE
Brief Timeline of The U.S. Coast Guard
On any given day, the men and women of the Coast Guard:
Most important, the Coast Guard saves lives.
Now that's a respectable day's work. All from a service of only 35,000 people, fewer than the New York Police Department. And by the way, the Coast Guard is the only service in which the role of women is unrestricted. Regular Coast Guard Total 35,000 Coast Guard Reserves Activated since 9/11 2900 The Coast Guard increased its vigilance, readiness, and patrols to protect the country’s 95,000 miles of coastline, including the Great Lakes and inland waterways. CLICK HERE for the Coast Guard marching song "The civilian volunteer component of the United States Coast Guard" In the summer of 1934 a yachtsman named Malcolm Stuart Boylan planted the seed that eventually sprouted as the U.S. Coast Guard Auxiliary. Boylan had just been elected commodore of the newly-created Pacific Writers' Yacht Club, which was about to undertake a cruise from its home in Los Angeles to Catalina Island. Boylan asked a Coast Guard acquaintance, LTCDR C.W. Thomas of the cutter Hermes, to inspect the club's boats before their departure. Another of the Hermes's officers, LT F.C. Pollard, made the trip to Catalina on board Boylan's yacht, and the two men had a long discussion about the relationship between the Coast Guard and the boating community. On August 23, 1934, Boylan sent Pollard a letter outlining a basic concept for a Coast Guard reserve: ... A Coast Guard Reserve would be an excellent thing to perpetuate its traditions, preserve its entity and, more particularly, to place at the disposal of CG officers, auxiliary flotillas of small craft for the frequent emergencies incident to your...duties. A copy of Boylan's letter made its way to Washington, and to the desk of CDR Russell Waesche, an aide to the Commandant of the Coast Guard. Waesche saw merit in the idea, but it languished for some five years. In 1936 Waesche was promoted to rear-admiral and appointed Commandant. He was a forceful, energetic man, and the creation of a Coast Guard reserve became one of his favorite projects. With the backing of the Secretary of Commerce, the Secretary of the Navy, and several influential Congressmen, RADM Waesche finally was able to gain Congressional approval for the concept. On February 19, 1941 Congress passed a law restructuring the Coast Guard Reserve. Henceforth the Coast Guard was to operate two reserve forces. The existing civilian reserve organization was renamed the U.S. Coast Guard Auxiliary. A new U.S. Coast Guard Reserve was to function on a military basis as a source of wartime manpower, like the reserves of the other armed services. The officers running the Coast Guard appreciated the staggering demands that war would put on it, and the value of the new reserve system in helping them meet those demands. By the summer of 1941 the District Commanders were sending Coast Guard headquarters lists of boats owned by Auxiliarists that would make good patrol craft - and requisitioning Lewis machine guns, Thompson submachine guns, rifles, and pistols for them. On November 1, 1941, President Roosevelt signed an order transferring the Coast Guard from the Treasury Department to the Navy Department. A few weeks later the Japanese attacked Pearl Harbor, and the Coast Guard's reserve system was put to the ultimate test. On the night of December 7, amid rumors of Japanese invasion, twenty Coast Guard Auxiliarists from the 13th District took their boats out of Seattle on the service's first wartime patrol cruise. In May, 1942 the Secretary of the Navy authorized uniforms for the Coast Guard Auxiliary. Perhaps the Auxiliary's most important contribution to the war effort came in the form of the Volunteer Port Security Force. An executive order of February, 1942 directed the Secretary of the Navy to take the necessary steps to prevent "sabotage and subversive activities" on the nation's waterfronts. The task of protecting the hundreds of warehouses, piers, and other facilities that kept the American shipping industry in business fell to the Coast Guard, which in turn delegated it to the Reserve and the Auxiliary. As the war went on and the Coast Guard's resources were stretched thinner, Auxiliarists and TRs were called upon to fill gaps wherever active duty Coast Guardsmen left them. Auxiliarists' boats patrolled the waterfronts and inlets looking for saboteurs, enemy agents, and fires. At least one unit of temporary Reservists, recruited from the Auxiliary, patrolled east coast beaches on horseback. Other Auxiliarists manned lookout and lifesaving stations near their homes, freeing regular Coast Guardsmen for sea duty. When a flood struck St. Louis in the spring of 1943, Coast Guard Auxiliarists and Reservists evacuated seven thousand people and thousands of livestock. The Auxiliary and the Reserve attracted their share of celebrity members. Actor Humphrey Bogart took his yacht on several patrols out of Los Angeles, and Arthur Fiedler, conductor of the Boston Pops Orchestra, put in his twelve hours per week on patrol duty in Boston Harbor. During the Vietnam conflict several Coast Guard cutters were taken off their normal stations and sent to Southeast Asia. Auxiliarists put their boats to work on patrol duty. The years 1992 and 1993 saw the Auxiliary's ingenuity and dedication tested by disasters precipitated by weather and international politics. Auxiliarists evacuated hundreds of people from the path of Hurricane Andrew, and from the scenes of devastating floods in the Midwest. In 1994 a military coup in Haiti released another surge of immigrants heading for Florida. The Coast Guard and the Auxiliary mobilized in the largest search-and-rescue operation since the Second World War.
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The United States Coast Guard, one of the country's five armed services, is also one of the most unique agencies of the federal government. We trace our history back to 4 August 1790, when the first Congress authorized the construction of ten vessels to enforce tariff and trade laws, prevent smuggling, and protect the collection of the federal revenue. Known variously as the Revenue Marine and the Revenue Cutter Service, we expanded in size and responsibilities as the nation grew. These added responsibilities included humanitarian duties such as aiding mariners in distress. Our law enforcement functions also continued to expand. Congress tasked us with enforcing laws against slavery, piracy, and enlarged our responsibilities to prevent smuggling. We were also given the responsibility to protect the marine environment, explore and police Alaska, and chart the growing nation's coastlines, all well before the turn of the twentieth century. The service received its present name in 1915 under an act of Congress when the Revenue Cutter Service merged with the Life-Saving Service. The nation now had a single maritime service dedicated to saving life at sea and enforcing the nation's maritime laws. We began to maintain the country's aids to maritime navigation, including operating the nation's lighthouses, when the Lighthouse Service was transferred to the Coast Guard in 1939. Later, in 1946, Congress permanently transferred the Bureau of Marine Inspection and Navigation to the Coast Guard, thereby placing merchant marine licensing and merchant vessel safety under our purview. The Coast Guard is one of the oldest organizations of the federal government and, until the Navy Department was established in 1798, we served as the nation's only armed force afloat. We have continued to protect the nation throughout our long history and have served proudly in every one of the nation's conflicts. Our national defense responsibilities remain one of our most important functions even today. In times of peace we operate as part of the Department of Homeland Security, serving as the nation's front-line agency for enforcing our laws at sea, protecting our coastline and ports, and saving life. In times of war, or on direction of the President, we serve under the Navy Department. |
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413 posted on 08/03/2003 9:20 PM PDT by M0sby (Proud Marine Corp's Wife!)
Good Morning Everyone!!!
The First Ten Cutters
| Cutter Name (click on name for more info.) | Date launched: | Where built: | Station: | First Commanding Officer: |
Disposition |
| Vigilant | March 1791 | New York, NY | NY | Patrick Dennis | Sold; Nov 1798 |
| Active | 9 April 1791 | Baltimore, MD | MD | Simon Gross | Sold; 1800 |
| General Green | 7 July 1791 | Philadelphia, PA | PA | James Montegomery | Sold; Dec 1797 |
| Massachusetts | 15 July 1791 | Newburyport, MA | MA | John Foster Williams | Sold; 9 Oct 1792 |
| Scammel | 24 Aug 1791 | Portsmouth, NH | NH | Hopley Yeaton | Sold; 16 Aug 1798 |
| Argus | 1791 | New London, CT | CT | Jonathan Maltbie | Sold; 1804 |
| Virginia | 1791 | Norfolk, VA | VA | Richard Taylor | Sold; 1798 |
| Diligence | June/July 1792 | Washington, NC | NC | William Cook | Sold; 1798 |
| South Carolina | 1793 ? | Charleston, SC | SC | Robert Cochrane | Sold; 5 Jun 1798 |
| Eagle | 1793 | Savannah, GA | GA | John Howell | Sold; 14 Sep 1799 |
NOTE:
The North Carolina, purchased in 1792 for use as a revenue cutter, was not one of the first ten cutters asked for by Hamilton and whose funding and construction were authorized by Congress on 4 August 1790 and is therefore not included in this list. There were a number of vessels, however, that served as revenue boats in the period prior to Congress' authorization to build the ten cutters. Some were operated by the various states during the Confederation Period while others were operated by the federally appointed customs collectors in the ports after the formation of the government in 1789. These "federal" revenue boats and craft varied in type and size, such as Philadelphia collector Sharp Delany's "barge with sails," that served before, during, and well after the General Green entered service in the waters around Philadelphia. But such craft were not "sea-going" vessels capable of sailing well away from a protected harbor as the cutters were specifically designed to do.
Therefore, the above list contains the "first" cutters as recognized by the U.S. Coast Guard.
Thanks for the thread to remind me that it's Coast Guard Day. We used to have a big cookout at the station and invite all the families. I suspect they still do.
I remember one Coast Guard Day picnic when I had the cox'n duty, and me and my crew were all hoping there wouldn't be any calls before the burgers were ready. Then of course the bell rang, and we dropped our sodas and ran down to the boat.
The OD gave us the position on the radio. Sailboat taking on water, kids on board. When we got on scene, only the mast and part of the bow were showing, and 5 heads bobbing in the water, no PFDs. We pulled the three kids and their parents on board the 41', and headed back in.
I was calling in to tell the station to have an ambulance at the dock, but the father waved me off. He said they were fine and didn't want to go to the hospital. So we brought them back to the station, fired up the grill again, and they joined right in the picnic with our families while they waited to be picked up by friends.
Before long the kids were playing volleyball, and as I watched them, I had a big lump in my throat. Just an hour before, they were treading water and practically in the jaws of death, and now they were doing what kids were supposed to be doing.
It was one of many memorable days that made me very proud of having the opportunity to serve.
| War/Conflict |
| Quasi-War with France |
| Civil War |
| Spanish-American War |
| World War I |
| World War II |
| Korean War |
| Vietnam War |
| Mayaguez Incident |
| Grenada: Operation Urgent Fury |
| Panama: Operation Just Cause |
| Persian Gulf: Operations Desert Shield/Storm |
| Afghanistan: Operations Enduring Freedom |
| Iraq: Operations Enduring Freedom & Iraqi Freedom |
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