THE NAVY'S 1st AIRCRAFT CARRIER

Eugene Ely takes his Curtiss pusher airplane off from the deck of USS Birmingham on 14 November 1910 .  It was the First airplane takeoff from a warship. He flew for two miles before landing on a Willoughby Spit beach.  

We are really looking at "THE OLD NAVY" in these photos.  Would not say it made me homesick but when I was a swab jockey I served in some old buckets.  One was USS TEXAS (BB-35), USS RANGER (CV-4) and USS STOCKTON (DD-73).  In TEXAS we slept in hammocks.  When we transferred we lashed our bucket into our seabag & hammock because these ships had no showers.  I still had my bucket when I reported to NAS Lakehurst in late 1940 after we turned STOCKTON over to the RN in Halifax .  We still had to scrub our own clothes so the bucket was handy.

CDR Don Cruse USN RET