USS Arizona

Arizona had barely been in the union for two years when the keel was laid on battleship 39 (BB-39) at the Brooklyn Navy Yard, named after the 48th state. In attendance was Assistant Secretary of the Navy Franklin D. Roosevelt.

Battleships were the premier capital ships of any navy and had been revolutionized by the 1906 launch of the Royal Navy's HMS Dreadnought, the first all-big-gun ship. It lost the smaller-caliber weapons of its predecessors in favor of batteries of deadly 12-inch guns that could hurl shells for miles. The ship took its name from Queen Elizabeth I's saying, "I will trust in God and dread nought." This gave the name to all classes of future battleships.

Arizona, according to the New York Times, would be "the world's biggest and most powerful, both offensively and defensively, superdreadnought ever constructed." It was armed with three batteries of three 14-inch big guns each, with a range of 12 miles. The armor belt at its widest (made by Krupp) measured 13.5 inches; the deck was also armored. She was 608 feet long and displaced nearly 30,000 tons, becoming at the time the largest ship in the fleet (today’s new Gerald R. Ford carrier is 100,000 tons and more than 1,000 feet long).

Arizona was launched in 15 months with 75,000 people in attendance, including the state's governor, George W.P. Hunt. Esther Ross of Prescott christened her with two bottles, one of sparking wine and another of water from Theodore Roosevelt Lake (the state had recently passed prohibition).

 

By this time the Great War had been convulsing Europe for nearly a year. President Woodrow Wilson was determined to enforce American neutrality — in 1916, he ran on the slogan, "He kept us out of war." But this didn't last. Arizona completed her shakedown cruise to Guantanamo Bay Naval Base and required extensive repairs. When she left the yard, America was at war.

Arizona saw no action in the war. But in December 1918, after the armistice, she was in a fleet of 10 U.S. battlewagons that accompanied Wilson on his journey to the Paris peace conference. After returning to the states (as we called today's Nazi-sounding "homeland"), Arizona again sailed to France, then was sent to lend an American presence to cool off tensions between Italy and Turkey over the peace treaty. Next she put into the New York Navy Yard for modernization — including a deck for a spotter airplane.

In 1921, Arizona went through the Panama Canal to join the Pacific Fleet, based in San Pedro until 1940. In between were constant training, gunnery practice, good-will visits to Latin America, and practicing "Fleet Problems." These involved scenarios of various battleship engagements, such as at attack on the Panama Canal, the Philippines (an American colony), or Hawaii (U.S. territory). 

Eerily, one of these exercises involved a carrier attack on Pearl Harbor on Sunday, Feb. 7th, 1932. The carrier aircraft were successful.

Although Japan had been one of the Great War allies, it was seen as an eventual adversary in a future war. In one striking example, when an American warship paid a port call in Japan in the 1930s, the officers of both navies went drinking and had a wonderful time. At the end of the evening, one Imperial Japanese Navy officer said to his American counterpart, "We like you. We really do. It's a shame we will have to fight you." The American merely replied, "I know."

In 1934, Arizona was a star of the James Cagney movie Here Comes the Navy. It features exterior and interior shots of BB-39.

Arizona had an extensive overhaul at Puget Sound Navy Yard in 1940, then joined the fleet in Pearl Harbor. Tensions were increasing between the United States and Japan over the Japanese invasion of China, and President Franklin Roosevelt moved the Pacific Fleet to Pearl Harbor. There, in 1941, Arizona was moored on "Battleship Row" near USS Nevada and USS Oklahoma. On the morning of December 7th, the repair ship Vestal was alongside.

Postscript: Until its anti-aircraft batteries tried to fight off Japanese attackers on December 7th, 1941, USS Arizona never fired a shot in anger. But she was for a time the most advanced warship in the world, one that escorted presidents, was welcomed at foreign ports on three oceans, helped maintain a strong Navy in the decades when our military strength dangerously dwindled, and was important enough that the Japanese admirals — even with their carrier prowess — considered her destruction a triumph.

One-thousand-one-hundred-seventy-seven officers, sailors, and Marines perished aboard, fighting off the attack until a violent explosion shattered the superdreadnought. Photos of Arizona's death helped fill America "with a terrible resolve" (Admiral Yamamoto's words). And she is forever remembered in the landlocked state whose name she carried.

USS Arizona gallery (click on a photo for a larger image):

USS Arizona launched down the ways on June 19th, 1915 (National Archives).

The copper-encased bottle of Theodore Roosevelt Lake water used to christen the battleship (Library of Congress).

The Arizona in New York City, Christmas 1916. The tall fire-control masts are decorated as Christmas trees (National Archives).

Transiting the Panama Canal in 1921. For decades, American naval ships were designed to fit through the canal.

In 1930, the ship has new armored fire-control masts, part of an extensive modernization at the Norfolk Navy Yard. Then it returned to the Pacific (National Archives).

The battleship in 1934. 

The great ship fatally wounded, December 7th, 1941, 80 years ago this year. Almost all of the battleships sunk that day would be raised and repaired. But the Arizona's damage was too extensive (National Archives).

The USS Arizona Memorial, with the battleship's hull beneath it.

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My book, A Brief History of Phoenix, is available to buy or order at your local independent bookstore, or from Amazon.

Read more Phoenix history in Rogue's Phoenix 101 archive.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Comments

[John Cote]

I visited the Arizona resting place over 20 years ago. A deeply moving site. My lasting memory from that day was all the other visitors appeared to be Japanese.

[Jon7190]

Great article. It has always seemed interesting that the driest state's name is associated with one of the most well known naval tragedies. I too toured the memorial and found it to be solemn and fitting, as most everyone does.

Rogue, as an aside, the superstructure is the part of the Arizona that's gone, with the hull and deck the part that remains. Famously, also remaining is many gallons of fuel oil that still leak out several drops an hour every day, which can be seen when touring the site.

[Rogue Columnist]

Fixed, Jon. Thanks. I work without a net.

[El Kabong]

A fine piece. Thanks.

[ChrisinDenver]

Excellent article. I took my then-7-year-old son to Los Angeles for the day last summer to tour the USS Iowa. It was a reward for good behavior, and I was just so proud of how he did in school despite the pandemic. We had such a wonderful time. I have told him stories about growing up in Arizona and about the USS Arizona's destruction at Pearl Harbor; I hope to someday soon take him to tour the memorial.