Get Shot in Head, Get Ship Named After You!

[Captain Seafort]

Carriers are named after Civil War Battles...Our destroyers and frigates are named after people

So what (or rather who) exactly were Langley, Franklin, Randolph, Hancock and Forrestal named for? You've been naming them after people right from the start.

[MKSheppard]

Abraham Lincoln was one of our greatest presidents.

Giffords? She's just a random congresscritter who shot to national fame when an insane nut tried to kill her and failed thanks to the magic of MEDICAL SCIENCE.

[Ritterin Sophia]

FDR was also a kind of important wartime president, and past that had spent his entire political career arguing hard to increase the strength of the navy long as well as serving as IIRC assistance Sec Navy. Also he died in office. If Giffords died this would be a lot less objectionable.

I don't understand. Why is honoring a politician who survived a bullet to the head so objectionable a candidate to name a ship after? Surely the Navy should be happy to honor someone who was shot and despite that still goes on to continue doing what she did without fear? Is there some kind of unwritten rule that ship names can only be allowed to be used to exalt the military?

[Julhelm]

Not to mention Rickover changed the whole nomenclature for fast attack subs when he named the 688 class after cities as a gesture to those in congress he needed support from. Before that subs were always named after sea creatures.

[MKSheppard]

I don't understand. Why is honoring a politician who survived a bullet to the head so objectionable a candidate to name a ship after?

Except the politican did pretty much nothing before being getting shot in the head to be noticeable.

Surely the Navy should be happy to honor someone who was shot and despite that still goes on to continue doing what she did without fear?

So what?

These guys are more worthy:

Lt. Cmdr. (SEAL) Jonas B. Kelsall, 32, of Shreveport, La.
Special Warfare Operator Senior Chief Petty Officer (SEAL) Thomas A. Ratzlaff, 34, of Green Forest, Ark.
Special Warfare Operator Chief Petty Officer (SEAL) Brian R. Bill, 31, of Stamford, Conn.
Special Warfare Operator Chief Petty Officer (SEAL) Kevin A. Houston, 35, of West Hyannisport, Mass.
Special Warfare Operator Chief Petty Officer (SEAL) Matthew D. Mason, 37, of Kansas City, Mo.
Special Warfare Operator Chief Petty Officer (SEAL) Stephen M. Mills, 35, of Fort Worth, Texas
Explosive Ordnance Disposal Technician Chief Petty Officer (Expeditionary Warfare Specialist/Freefall Parachutist/Diver) Nicholas H. Null, 30, of Washington, W.Va.
Special Warfare Operator Chief Petty Officer (SEAL) Robert J. Reeves, 32, of Shreveport, La.
Special Warfare Operator Chief Petty Officer (SEAL) Heath M. Robinson, 34, of Detroit, Mich.
Special Warfare Operator Petty Officer 1st Class (SEAL) Darrik C. Benson, 28, of Angwin, Calif.
Special Warfare Operator Petty Officer 1st Class (SEAL/Parachutist) Christopher G. Campbell, 36, of Jacksonville, N.C.
Master-at-Arms Petty Officer 1st Class (Expeditionary Warfare Specialist) John Douangdara, 26, of South Sioux City, Neb.
Cryptologist Technician (Collection) Petty Officer 1st Class (Expeditionary Warfare Specialist) Michael J. Strange, 25, of Philadelphia, Pa.
Special Warfare Operator Petty Officer 1st Class (SEAL/Enlisted Surface Warfare Specialist) Jon T. Tumilson, 35, of Rockford, Iowa
Special Warfare Operator Petty Officer 1st Class (SEAL) Aaron C. Vaughn, 30, of Stuart, Fla.
Special Warfare Operator Petty Officer 1st Class (SEAL) Jason R. Workman, 32, of Blanding, Utah
Special Warfare Operator Petty Officer 1st Class (SEAL) Jesse D. Pittman, 27, of Ukiah, Calif.
Special Warfare Operator Petty Officer 2nd Class (SEAL) Nicholas P. Spehar, 24, of Saint Paul, Minn.

Chief Warrant Officer David R. Carter, 47, of Centennial, Colo. He was assigned to the 2nd Battalion, 135th Aviation Regiment (General Support Aviation Battalion), Aurora, Colo.
Chief Warrant Officer Bryan J. Nichols, 31, of Hays, Kan. He was assigned to the 7th Battalion, 158th Aviation Regiment (General Support Aviation Battalion), New Century, Kan.
Sgt. Patrick D. Hamburger, 30, of Lincoln, Neb. He was assigned to the 2nd Battalion, 135th Aviation Regiment (General Support Aviation Battalion), Grand Island, Neb.
Sgt. Alexander J. Bennett, 24, of Tacoma, Wash. He was assigned to the 7th Battalion, 158th Aviation Regiment (General Support Aviation Battalion), New Century, Kan.
Spc. Spencer C. Duncan, 21, of Olathe, Kan. He was assigned to the 7th Battalion, 158th Aviation Regiment (General Support Aviation Battalion), New Century, Kan.

Tech. Sgt. John W. Brown, 33, of Tallahassee, Fla.
Staff Sgt. Andrew W. Harvell, 26, of Long Beach, Calif.
Tech. Sgt. Daniel L. Zerbe, 28, of York, Pa.

As they all volunteered multiple times over to be shot at and other important stuff like that.

[Simon_Jester]

Julhelm, we stopped building battleships- the custom of naming warships after states still made sense, though, so ballistic missile subs got it. We stopped building so many cruisers after the surge of WWII-era gun-armed ships declined, so there were a lot of cities that had once gotten warships named for them, and not enough cruisers to do it. So shifting city names to the attack subs made sense too.

It makes as much sense to name warships after cities and provinces now as it did in 1912 or 1962, but we build different types of ships now, so the classes that get those names change.

I don't understand. Why is honoring a politician who survived a bullet to the head so objectionable a candidate to name a ship after? Surely the Navy should be happy to honor someone who was shot and despite that still goes on to continue doing what she did without fear? Is there some kind of unwritten rule that ship names can only be allowed to be used to exalt the military?

The problem is that we get more and more of this- our ships are being named after political personalities, almost without thinking about the strength of their legacy. It seems almost guaranteed that every future president of the United States will get a carrier named after him. They're naming the lead ship of the new carrier class USS Gerald R. Ford, for pity's sake- and about all he did was keep the Oval Office warm for a few years. As far as the history books go, he's as forgettable as Millard Fillmore.

It's not that he was a bad man, just that there's nothing about him that makes it important to have a ship sailing around named for him into the 2040s or 2050s.

Congressmen get into it too- first it was a custom of naming warships for historical figures in the past after there'd been time to judge their legacy (USS Henry Clay). Then we started naming ships for more recent

To me, this is a minor symptom of the rise of egotism in American politics: the political class is willing to build memorials to any member of the political class, and seems to consider this more important than anything else. It's more important than historical traditions of the navy (the reason for naming ships Independence, Constellation, Ranger, Enterprise, and so on). It's more important than honoring the places those politicians are supposed to represent (when battleships were as important as carriers are now, they were named for states, although the missile submarines are an honorable subsitute).

[Lonestar]

So what (or rather who) exactly were Langley, Franklin, Randolph, Hancock and Forrestal named for? You've been naming them after people right from the start.

In fact, our very Second President had a ship named after him, while he was in office:

The first John Adams was originally built as a frigate in 1799, converted to a corvette in 1809 and later converted back to a frigate in 1830 for use in the United States Navy. Named for President John Adams, she fought in the Quasi-War, the Barbary Wars, the War of 1812, the Mexican-American War and the American Civil War.

This frigate should not be confused with the frigate USS Adams.

John Adams was built for the United States by the people of Charleston, South Carolina, under contract to Paul Pritchard and launched in the latter's shipyard some 3 miles from Charleston 5 June 1799. The new frigate, Captain George Cross in command, sailed on or about 1 October for Cayenne, French Guiana, to operate against French privateers based at that port. Before she arrived at Cayenne, the British had captured Surinam making the French base in Guiana unsafe for privateers and prompting Captain Cross to sail on to Guadeloupe to join her squadron.

[Simon_Jester]

It's not so bad as long as politician names don't choke out other types of names.

I'd be happier, though, if we stuck to only naming warships for people who are safely dead and whose legacy can be viewed in historical hindsight. The litmus test should be "should the men and women serving on this ship be expected to care who this person is? Are they important enough to the history of the navy, or the country, that they matter?"

In thirty years, Giffords will be a historical footnote, if that. In thirty years, Gerald R. Ford will be in much the same position. We don't have a ship named for Coolidge now (that would be a great name for a stealth ship, granted). Why should we have one named for Ford in 2050?

[Lonestar]

Eh, if I were King I would just mandate that you have to be dead for at least 50 years before you can get a ship named after you. All stop.

[Julhelm]

Julhelm, we stopped building battleships- the custom of naming warships after states still made sense, though, so ballistic missile subs got it. We stopped building so many cruisers after the surge of WWII-era gun-armed ships declined, so there were a lot of cities that had once gotten warships named for them, and not enough cruisers to do it. So shifting city names to the attack subs made sense too.

The nomenclature for the 688 only changed to cities because Rickover needed to bolster his influence in congress to series produce "his" 688 class over the USN's preferred CONFORM and then Fat Albert designs.

[Captain Seafort]

So what (or rather who) exactly were Langley, Franklin, Randolph, Hancock and Forrestal named for? You've been naming them after people right from the start.

There you go then, although I was responding to the specific complaint about carriers, and the assertion that the Kennedy was the first named after an individual.

The nomenclature for the 688 only changed to cities because Rickover needed to bolster his influence in congress to series produce "his" 688 class over the USN's preferred CONFORM and then Fat Albert designs.

True, but it still makes sense for SSNs to get the old cruiser nomenclature.

[Mr Bean]

Langley, Franklin, Randolph, Hancock and Forrestal are not US Presidents, my point was our naming nomenclature changed to US Presidents for Carriers with JFK. There have been deviations or times we switched to different methods but until the JFK they were not vanity projects.

[Lonestar]

Langley, Franklin, Randolph, Hancock and Forrestal are not US Presidents, my point was our naming nomenclature changed to US Presidents for Carriers with JFK. There have been deviations or times we switched to different methods but until the JFK they were not vanity projects.

Except for the USS John Adams, which was comissioned during his Administration.

[Mr Bean]

Except for the USS John Adams, which was comissioned during his Administration.

Adams was not a Carrier my point stands. Each class of ship has it's own naming rules and we've been breaking those rules so we can name ships after things that are sure to ensure shitty ship names.

[Captain Seafort]

Langley, Franklin, Randolph, Hancock and Forrestal are not US Presidents, my point was our naming nomenclature changed to US Presidents for Carriers with JFK.

You didn't say anything about presidents - you complained specifically that individuals were limited to destroyers and frigates. In any event, it's not as if you had a system before JFK - it was a mish-mash of individuals, various battles and previous ships.

There have been deviations or times we switched to different methods but until the JFK they were not vanity projects.

Other than the Hancock, which was effectively 30,000 tons of product placement.

[Lonestar]

Adams was not a Carrier my point stands. Each class of ship has it's own naming rules and we've been breaking those rules so we can name ships after things that are sure to ensure shitty ship names.

Frigates were the largest ships in the USNs early history.

Point is, the USN has a grand old tradition of naming ships for political purposes, and it's silly to pretend otherwise.

[Julhelm]

True, but it still makes sense for SSNs to get the old cruiser nomenclature.

How so when you actually have cruisers still, and submarines were traditionally named after sea creatures?

Besides, ever since SSN-21 naming conventions seem to be all over the place with the three Seawolf class boats getting completely unrelated names and then the FSSN gets named after states.

[Captain Seafort]

How so when you actually have cruisers still, and submarines were traditionally named after sea creatures?

Because a single morden SSN is a vastly more capable and more important asset than a WW2-era boat, and modern US cruisers are no different in role than destroyers.

Besides, ever since SSN-21 naming conventions seem to be all over the place with the three Seawolf class boats getting completely unrelated names and then the FSSN gets named after states.

The fact that the system's since been binned says nothing about its appropriateness.

[Julhelm]

Because a single morden SSN is a vastly more capable and more important asset than a WW2-era boat, and modern US cruisers are no different in role than destroyers.

It still doesn't change the fact that naming conventions only changed because the 688 class was hyperexpensive.

[Captain Seafort]

It still doesn't change the fact that naming conventions only changed because the 688 class was hyperexpensive.

I acknowledged why the system was changed in my original post: I simply pointed out that it was also a good idea.

[Julhelm]

I don't like it, though when it's literally "fund this and we'll name a sub after your hometown". It also means a whole ton of legendary submarine names are now no longer in use because politicians must be courted.

[That NOS Guy]

Frigates were the largest ships in the USNs early history.

Point is, the USN has a grand old tradition of naming ships for political purposes, and it's silly to pretend otherwise.

Keep in mind Adams was a subscription frigate much like Philadelphia and Essex so it's really not the same. Even at the height of the fight to get the first six frigates done no one decided to name one Patrick Henry to get Southern votes. Now, you'd make a stronger case with the George Washington which was 20 gun brig which served in the Barbary Wars which was a purchased and converted ship.

That noted, we can find many exceptions to the Navy naming conventions (even the eponymous fictional Abraham Lincoln of Verne and Madame Butterfly) but they are one offs. While the the Navy has traditionally found some merit in the exception, the Giffords case appears to fast becoming the rule. Then again, there's probably larger irony in naming an aircraft carrier after Harry Truman.

[Captain Seafort]

Then again, there's probably larger irony in naming an aircraft carrier after Harry Truman.

If you want irony you should look at Churchill's idea for one of the QEs. HMS Oliver Cromwell.

[That NOS Guy]

If you want irony you should look at Churchill's idea for one of the QEs. HMS Oliver Cromwell.

Well met, wasn't that one quashed by the King? Plus, the Truman actually got commissioned.

[Captain Seafort]

Well met, wasn't that one quashed by the King?

Yep. Understandable so.

It makes me wonder if there's ever been a proposal for a USS Benedict Arnold.