Field Trip to the U.S.S. Alabama Battleship

[seger98]

Wife & I went over to Mobile Bay to see the U.S.S. Battleship Alabama, recomended viewing!

First picture is of the outside

2) Is a frontal view

3) Stats

4) 16in. shells (I wonder how far the wife could be blown out of that gun?)

5) Surgeon's table

6) View looking back towards the plane lift & catapult

7) View from the catapult back

8) Bomber the "Calamity Jane"

9) Inside the U.S.S. Drum Submarine

10) Outside the U.S.S. Drum

Here is a link to a Civil War Submarine that is on display there, camera didn't take picture of it

http://www.charlestonillustrated.com/hunley/index.html#

I was really amazed at how big it was & you could feel the sacrifice those men & women made that served on that ship.

I couldn't handle the bathroom situation, no doors & you crapped in a trough facing some other guy there was like 20 crappers in a row! Nope, I'm gonna dump out in the hall somewhere & blame it on the other guy!

The kitchen area was pretty neat & all of the different compartments there were for the doctors, dentists, blacksmiths, carpenters etc. etc.

It was so amazing how that ship was put together, I would recommend it to anyone that makes it around there to see it!

I hope you like taking the field trip with us, Chris & Kathy

 

[*Molly*]

Excellent pics, its just like the one I saw in Texas..
Thanks for sharin'

Molly.

 

[seger98]

Oops I forgot #9 photo Might as well add another then too.

 

[Cynangyl]

Looks like a great field trip, thanks for taking us too!

 

[fossis]

Thanks for posting, we owe a lot to those ships & their 'brave crews'.

Fossis..............

 

[ark turtle]

Seger98;

The ship looks great, but I liked the girl best....ha ha







ArkTurtle

 

[RevJoel]

Got to visit the Hunley Restoration Museum on the old Charleston Naval Base. That sub was and still is awesome.

While you were on the USS Drum, did you see the sign? The one that says, "There are two type of ships; Subs and targets".

 

[seger98]

Got to visit the Hunley Restoration Museum on the old Charleston Naval Base. That sub was and still is awesome.

While you were on the USS Drum, did you see the sign? The one that says, "There are two type of ships; Subs and targets".

I did not see that sign. There was so much to see & people behind us that I'm sure we missed more then what we saw.

Although I gotta admit (and I never thought I would) I would have rather served on the sub then the battleship!

 

[seger98]

My father brought me there when we lived in Pascagoula, MS when I was 8 years old. Every time I head to Florida for a motorcycle rally I always pass her and sometime when I have the time go back and see her. I read in a paper about a year or so that they were having problems raising money to keep her in shape, ie, like getting rid of rust, painting, cleaning, and water seepage down in the bottom decks below the water line. The sub looks in bad shape on the outside with all the rust on the hull.

Yes you are correct, they get no state or federal funding at all (which seems wrong to me) to keep it up, donations & entry fee's is all. There was some people working on board both when we were there!

 

[TheHarleyMan2]

But isn't it a CITY or STATE park? It seems if it is, the parks service should get money to refurbish them.

 

[seger98]

But isn't it a CITY or STATE park? It seems if it is, the parks service should get money to refurbish them.

I'm not sure about that.

 

[Ray S S]

AHHHH, some great pics there. I can tell by the photos that uou must have had a great time. It is so interesting to tour those old battleships. They let us know a little of what the crews must have gone through. When we were Out in the San Diego area a couple years ago we visited the USS MIDWAY, an aircraft carrier. One surprising part of the tour was that
the guy next to me had served on The MIDWAY in the war. He felt pretty good when we toured the Bridge. He had never been
through it while serving. But, he said that was good cause the only ones that got to go to the Bridge was because they were in trouble and had to report to their Commander. I have some photographs of our tour, maybe i'll dig them out and
post them sometime.

Thanks for sharing your tour with us.

Ray

 

[seger98]

AHHHH, some great pics there. I can tell by the photos that uou must have had a great time. It is so interesting to tour those old battleships. They let us know a little of what the crews must have gone through. When we were Out in the San Diego area a couple years ago we visited the USS MIDWAY, an aircraft carrier. One surprising part of the tour was that
the guy next to me had served on The MIDWAY in the war. He felt pretty good when we toured the Bridge. He had never been
through it while serving. But, he said that was good cause the only ones that got to go to the Bridge was because they were in trouble and had to report to their Commander. I have some photographs of our tour, maybe i'll dig them out and
post them sometime.

Thanks for sharing your tour with us.

Ray

We would love to see you photo's of the ship you were on, there were so many more we would have liked to have taken but our camera only holds 12 photos The one room we walked into had all the names of the people that had served on that ship, now knowing that they were WWII alot of those folks are no longer around! I would have liked to have taken a picture of that room. Kathy & Chris

 

[DigginThePast]

Great pics, thanks for sharing. I wouldn't mind taking a field trip there myself.

 

[rmptr]

USS Alabama is GREAT!

Thanks for posting all the pics!

I had learned something earlier today about the big guns...

When it says 16" 45 cal. it means the length of the barrel is 45 times the bore size.
That would mean the barrels were 60ft long! Wow!
A projectile probably weighed a ton and I'll bet the charge was around 600lbs of powder.

Fun!


rmptr

 

[RevJoel]

When I was teaching at a parochial middle school here I took the kids in my class to Charleston to Patriot's Park. Aboard the USS Yorktown we defined Big as the Machinist Shop. There they had turret lathes, huge Rockport mills and an endless array of tools to make any part needed to repair the ship. Aboard the USS Clamagore, a diesel sub, the Machinist there defined small. Their shop was a swing down work shelf with a 6" vise and small array of ball peen hammers and a lot of files, yet the Machinist on the sub, using the minimal equipment was expected to make/repair parts just like his counterpart on the Yorktown. Well I guess it was a case of "you gotta do what you gotta do"!

 

[seger98]

Thanks everyone for the comments, it means alot to hear it from you all, there will bea test next week.. LOL

rmptr, I did not know that, thanks for telling us all.

Chris

 

[CaptJohn]

When I was in Grade School we kids gave our lunch money one day to begin the fund to buy the Battleship ALABAMA and bring it to Mobile from Va. I think it was a state wide effort that day.

 

[Th3rty7]

really good pics Chris, that thing's a beast, hard to believe how sophisticated todays modern warships are compared to this class. 4 props each weighing 18.5 tons, unreal! According to the plaque it only saw 5 years of action, that seems pretty shortlived to me. 22 confirmed downed enemy planes is what I'm talking about! get some.

 

[silvercop]

went there last july....fun trip but it was so hot you could not stay in the ship long