Second Tour of Duty: Battleship Memorials

©2007 Carole Moore

 Merilyn Wong, a San Franciscan who has fought for more than a decade to bring the Iowa to her hometown, likes to watch the dark and silent ship from about 500 yards away, which is as close as the Navy allows. Wong says seeing the Iowa, a veteran of four wars, brings forth awe, pride and an unabashed desire to acquire it for her city.

 "It's an educational asset, a museum, a memorial and a part of our naval legacy," Wong, founder of the nonprofit Historic Ships Memorial at Pacific Square, says.

 For the Navy to transfer a ship to a state is the culmination of a long, expensive and involved process. The locations with battleship memorials already in place welcomed the tourist draw and financial boost they brought. But one city -- Wong's San Francisco -- has been divided by the prospect of offering a home to the Battleship Iowa. Opponents argue the ship's presence glorifies war and have offered a contentious proposal that would transform it into a museum dedicated to gays and other minorities in the military.

 Wong's attempt to persuade the city government to pursue the Iowa appeared shot down when officials voted against the proposal. Other towns interested in luring the Iowa redoubled their efforts, most notably nearby Stockton.. But Wong, whose tenacity rivals that of any battleship, characterizes the latest setback as simply another step in the process and says she's hasn't given up.

 "I [still] give it some chance," she says.

 The Iowa's history is both rich and quirky. The keel was laid in 1940 and the ship launched two years later. Pres. Franklin D. Roosevelt installed a bathtub -- the only one ever to grace a U.S. battleship -- when he traveled aboard the Iowa to the Teheran Conference. During World War II, the ship saw action in the Pacific at Guam, Tinian, Saipan and the Philippines. 

 Decommissioned and brought back to active service for the Korean War, the Iowa added Vietnam and the Gulf War to its list of conflicts. In 1989, a mysterious and still controversial explosion onboard killed 47 sailors and resulted in an investigation many say was flawed. The incident remains a source of speculation.

All but one of the Navy's now-decommissioned battleships bore the names of states. Battleships provided support and cover for invasions and troop landings, but their role was eventually eclipsed by aircraft carriers, which pushed them off the defense radar. A few ended up like the Oregon -- scrapped and converted to a barge in Guam -- while others were used for target practice. But a few, like the Missouri, New Jersey, North Carolina and Texas, were permanently anchored as combination floating memorials and museums.

 The Missouri is probably the best known. Now based in Pearl Harbor with the sunken remains of the Arizona, the Missouri hosted the formal surrender of Japan. Wong originally fought to bring the Missouri to her city, but the Navy chose instead to locate it at Pearl Harbor. Paul Stillwell, naval historian and author of numerous books about battleships, says the proximity of the two ships at the Hawaiian site is significant.

 "They form symbolic bookends of the war within a few hundred yards of one another," Stillwell says.

 Stillwell, who once served aboard the New Jersey, says the USS Texas was anchored as a memorial/museum in 1948 and the North Carolina, Massachusetts and Alabama went to their home states as part of a 1960s preservationist trend.

"Battleships have an imposing physical presence," Stillwell says, explaining the public's fascination with the mighty giants. In fact, according to the Battleship New Jersey's marketing director, Hope Corse, her ship sees a whopping 200,000 visitors a year.

 At full complement, the New Jersey carried a crew of nearly 3,000 men and was operational on and off for more than half a century. Corse says visitors witness everything from how the crew hauled 100-pound powder kegs to the computerized combat system.

 "There's a sense of time and place here, an 'I've been there, done that, seen it all,' to this ship," Corse says. It's a description that fits not only its wartime identity, but also its second life after the drums of war faded to silence.

 The Battleship New Jersey, located in Camden, NJ, has become a magnet for special events. The military uses it for ceremonies, corporations rent it for formal dinners, families camp on the deck to watch the fireworks on New Year's Eve and brides and grooms even say "I do," on board. Both the New Jersey and its smaller cousin to the south, the Battleship North Carolina, are entirely self-supporting.

 Berthed in Wilmington, NC, the North Carolina also saw combat in World War II. Capt. Dave Sheu, the battleship's director and also a former officer on the New Jersey, says the North Carolina definitely adds a different ripple to the town's Revolutionary War era flavor.

 "It brings in the day trippers," Sheu says.

 Whether or not the Iowa becomes a part of the San Francisco skyline and helps lure more visitors there has yet to be resolved, but no matter which city eventually claims the historic ship, Stillwell says the Iowa deserves to be preserved.

 "We need to have a better understanding of what was useful in the past, so we have a better understanding of how we got here today," he says. "At a minimum, this ship symbolizes the history of a nation and its greatest war."