I’ve been to a handful of museum ships- the USS Texas (BB-35), the USS Stewart & USS Cavalla (Seawolf Park in Galveston), the Jeremiah O’Brien in San Francisco, the HMS Belfast in London, and the USS Constitution in Boston. And I’ve been on tours of a handful of active-duty ships too (USS Texas (CGN-39), USS Lexington (CV-16, while it was still in commission), and HMS Berwick( F115)- it visited Houston in the late 70s, and my aunt somehow wrangled a tour for my father and I)
The USS Constitution was by far the best one of all. To a large degree, once you’ve seen one modern ship, you’ve seen them all- there’s a lot less variation than you might expect. But old sailing frigates are something else entirely, and the Constitution has some of the most interesting history as well.
I would like to see the USS Intrepid, and one of the Iowas; I imagine it’ll be the USS Missouri when we visit Hawaii in the next few years. I figure I’m going to see the USS Turner Joy next month as well. I also want to see U-505 in Chicago at some point as well. I also imagine that at some point, we’ll do the night aboard the Lexington in Corpus Christi as part of Boy Scouts.
USS Salem was better than Massachusetts, IMO. Hell of a lot less prepped and museumized, though; looked like the crew was just away someplace. Crammed to the gills with damage control supplies, machine shop stocks, &cet. (Closer to Boston than Fall River, also.) 20 odd years since been there, and it all may have changed. If you do go to to the Massachusetts, hit the whaling museum; the Lagoda is a half-scale whaler that is, in some ways easier to take in than seeing the Morgan in Mystic.
The Kidd, somewhere around Baton Rouge, is another good one. Again, over 20 years since I’ve seen it.
For a view from the other side of the war, you might try to find Hans Goebler’s (sp?) Steel Boat, Iron Hearts. Mr Goebler was a German crewman aboard the U505. Fascinating.
I don’t know if it’s still available, but I got my copy at the Museum’s U505 gift shop.
Another vote for USS Massachusetts. Been there probably 30 times though my life (lived 10 minutes from Fall River my whole life, and had a Navy family). Much of the ship has been restored and is fairly well maintained, even given 50 years of vandalism. My wife got me a ticket for their “firepower tour,” where you spend the day with very knowledgeable staff learning everything there is to know about the 16" guns and the fire control systems. Short of actually loading and firing a gun, you get hands on with everything.
USS Joseph P. Kennedy, also at Battleship Cove, is in great shape with new spaces they keep opening. Awesome example of a WW2 ship upgraded to a cold war vessel. Kennedy was in the movie Thirteen Days, too - she played herself.
USS Midway was a great tour, too. Thats a full day visit - there’s a lot to see between the aircraft on display and the spaces they have open.
Have a trip planned to USS New Jersey later this summer. Ryan’s videos have inspired me (even bought a 2’ piece of her teak deck).
This reminded me of the Russian sub moored next to the QM when I worked in Long Beach 20 years ago. The good news: It’s still there! The bad news:…
The Foxtrot-class Soviet submarine, known as the Scorpion, was moored next to the Queen Mary as a tourist attraction for nearly two decades before it was closed to the public in 2015 after it fell into disrepair. The sub has since sat abandoned and infested with raccoons.
Red Oak Victory is the last remaining Victory ship and is located in Richmond, California. She is named after Red Oak, Iowa, the town with the highest per capita losses during WWII. She spent most of her WWII career at Ulithi dispensing ordnance.
That reminds me: Did you see / ride the escalator on the Hornet? I think it went from the flight deck level to higher up the bridge structure. I wondered it if was original or added later. Was just a normal escalator, like the kind you see in a subway or shopping mall. But not usually a ship. (Do they have these in cruise ships? I wouldn’t know.)
Iirc I’ve been in plenty of aircraft carriers with escalators, apparently it’s a real thing but some of them are permanently off since they don’t confirm to commercial safety specifications. The one carrier I was on with a working escalator had to retrofit a commercial one into it.
HMS Victory (in Portsmouth in the UK) is an all time great for me. Though I’ve not been as an adult, and while there of plenty of things that were mind blowing as a little kid that are fairly underwhelming now, I would imagine it holds up.
Its an obvious one but the USS Abraham Lincoln in NY is really impressive, the ship itself is impressive but the display of aircraft is better than anything I’ve seen in the US outside the Smithsonian Air and Space museum.
A less well known one in the SF Bay Area that is also quite impressive is the USS Hornet in the East Bay.
There is also Roskilde ship musuem in Denmark which is pretty impressive, though you can’t actually go on the boats, so not sure if it counts?
Escalators had to be above the water line. They generally went from the Hangar Bay or one deck below the Hangar Bay to the deck below the flight deck.
On the USS Ranger the one escalator went from the Ready Rooms on the 2nd Deck (1 below Hangar Bay) up to the O3 level (1 below flight Deck). There was no down escalator. Technically they were for pilots only. But I recall there being exceptions, just not what the exceptions were. I did help fix it once or twice.
Interesting, yeah I was told on the USS Midway the escalator was so pilots or flight crew in their bulky flight gear didn’t have to go up those really annoying steep ladders everywhere.
