Climax and Closure
When the last class graduated from Fort Trumbull on April 30, 1946, 15,473 officer candidates had completed the four-month training curriculum that began on September 1, 1942.
Although the war had ended the previous September, Merchant Marine officers and seamen were still needed to handle the return of three and a half million troops from Europe and Asia, quantities of materiel, and eventually thousands of war brides, other non-combatants, and refugees.
But the ship traffic still moved in both directions: in the aftermath of war the Merchant Marine carried relief cargoes - food, clothing, medical supplies, farm implements, dairy cattle, and much else - for beleaguered civilian populations in devastated countries.
A memorial at Fort Trumbull bore the names of 125 graduates who made the ultimate sacrifice while serving their country in the Merchant Marine. The memorial was relocated years later to an attractive waterfront site in the Fort Trumbull neighborhood.
The Fort Trumbull school's operations were transferred to the U.S. Merchant Marine Academy at Kings Point in 1946, and the last of the Maritime Service training bases were closed in 1954. Today Kings Point and the six regional maritime academies (California, Maine, Massachusetts, New York, Texas A&M, and Great Lakes) continue to provide maritime training and education under the authority of the Maritime Administration (MARAD) in Washington, DC.