When the Training Ship Docked at Fort Trumbull

     Training ships are a long-established feature of maritime training programs, whether for the Merchant Marine, Coast Guard or Navy.  Most instruction at Fort Trumbull took place in classrooms and simulated shipboard facilities (including a "bridge" atop one of the buildings), but the impressive training ship American Mariner visited from time to time for short cruises into Long Island Sound for real-life shipboard training.  

Left: S.S. American Mariner

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     American Mariner was a 10,000 ton Liberty Ship launched at Baltimore in 1941 and converted to a training ship the next year. After the war she became a Coast Guard training ship, then the training ship for the U.S. Merchant Marine Academy at Kings Point. Mothballed from 1953 to 1956, she was chosen for conversion to a missile tracking ship and, while in the Pacific, radar-tracked NASA Astronaut Wally Schirra's Project Mercury transits. After that her time was up and in 1966 she was scuttled in Chesapeake Bay for naval target practice, a sad end for the only ship to serve the merchant marine and all four military branches.   

Below: Instruction aboard another training ship