Today in Navy History

 

Today in Navy history ...The rate of Chief Petty Officer (1893) and the US Naval Command in Vietnam (1966) were established. (Thank you US Navy Calendar). April Fools!!!!!!! These drawings have nothing to do with any of that. (And speaking of Vietnam I noticed I got a visitor from Hanoi!!!!!!!!!! Awesome! Attention visitors from far-flung places: Please leave a comment, even if it's just "Hello"!)

I didn't get a job this morning, so I'm killing some time before I attempt to put in some laps at a pool with blood warm water. These are some old sketches. The bearded sailor is from a collection of photos from the WWII-era USS West Virginia (after it had been rehabilitated, post- Pearl Harbor). Apparently the Captain allowed them to grow beards to foster a "Mountaineer" espirit de corps. (I love those old school deck jackets, btw). One of the other sketches might be a Marine, but that's "maritime" in my book. I'm definitely going to do some oil painting later today...Update on that will be forthcoming.

And...I also have to say that the April photo in the 2010 Jack Tar Calendar is much cooler than the one in the Naval Historical Society's. Just sayin'...

Remember Pearl Harbor

 

Kind of an underwhelming offering today, but I barely had any energy to begin with- and I barely have any energy now. I did this during a short break today.

The USS West Virginia had an interesting "life" from Pearl Harbor onwards. You can see her burning in some of the most iconic shots of the attack, and she was resurrected from the grave to fight again and started getting her licks in during the battle of Leyte Gulf. You can read all of this on her Wikipedia page. As you can see I chose to draw her resplendent in her dazzle paint. (Check out this one too.)

There are also some little known horrifying facts about the "WeeVee". Did you know that after the WVA was raised, three dead sailors were found in a sealed, airtight room with ration packages, water and a marked calendar indicating that they'd survived up to the 23rd of December? Horrible. Horrible way to go. You can read about the salvage efforts on the WVA in Edward Raymer's excellent memoir, "Descent into Darkness".

Anyways, that's all I've got for today.