DNA identification and the men of the USS Oklahoma
USS Oklahoma (BB-37) was commissioned in 1916, a Nevada-class battleship. the first class of oil-burning dreadnoughts (an “all-big-gun” armament scheme, with an unprecedented number of heavy-caliber guns, and steam turbine propulsion).
Improvement over the Musket
The Needle Gun name comes from the firing pin, long and slender like a needle. It pierced clear through the paper-encased cartridge to strike the primer. They really became well known for their use in the Franco-Prussian War of 1870-71.
Normandy’s best kept secret
I was watching “Expedition Unknown” on the Discovery channel Season 8, Episode 1 when I learned about Maisy Battery. I posted about it then and you can read that one here. I was anxious to get this book and was not disappointed. A British military historian and author, Gary Sterne found Maisy Battery after locating a hand-drawn map in a US Army veteran’s uniform he had purchased. He is a keen collector of militaria and was a co-founder of “The Armourer and Skirmish Magazines“.
Have you forgotten?
This post was originally published on 9/11/2020 and updated on 9/11/2021
Where were you on September the 11th, 1999 at 8:46 am? I was at work, D&B Software (Geac/MSA) watching on a TV, on a roll cart, that John Hilyer set-up quickly so we could all watch.
The USS Doyle DMS-34, obliviously named after me, was a Gleaves-class destroyer (one of sixty six destroyers built 1938-42, designed by Gibbs & Cox, their first ship was called Gleaves). Doyle was built by the Seattle-Tacoma Shipbuilding Co., Seattle, Washington; sponsored by Mrs. C. M. Maloney and launched March 17, 1942.
They are commonly referred to as “Incendiary Grenades”
I was reading a World War II book on D-Day and they are constantly using thermite grenades. I thought I would do a little research. Most varieties are not explosive, but can create short bursts of extremely high temperatures focused on a very small area for a short period of time.
The Grumman TBF Avenger was the replacement for the The Douglas TBD Devastator, the U.S. Navy’s main torpedo bomber introduced in 1935. Designed by Leroy Grumman it took first flight August 7, 1941 with one of the two proto types crashing.
Otjikoto Lake is in the Republic of Namibia, in the country of Southern Africa which shares land borders with Zambia and Angola to the north, Botswana to the east and South Africa to the south and east.
Eugene Burton Ely was born in Iowa, 1886, and was the first aviator to take off from a ship and land on a ship. He flew a Curtiss Model D bi-plane from a platform constructed on the bow of the cruiser USS Birmingham at Hampton Roads, Virginia, on November 14, 1910. It was a rainy, foggy day but he was able to take off, dip so low that the plane actually touched the water but recovered and flew one and a half miles to land safely on shore.
Chad Underwood, retired Navy pilot, took this video of the unidentified flying object (UFO) in November 2004, from an infrared camera on the left wing of his F/A-18 Super Hornet. He was flying a training exercise, near San Clemente Island just off the coast to San Diego, from the USS Nimitz.
