Morale: American Ship Name Conundrums
Ezoic
March 13, 2025: With all the personnel, ship building and deployment problems the U.S. Navy has, arguments over what to name ships should not be a problem. But it sometimes is. In the beginning the first president, George Washington, named the first six American frigates Chesapeake, Constitution, President, United States, Congress and Constellation. These ships were expensive, as in nearly $20 billion in 2025 currency. From then until the 1970s battleships were named for states, aircraft carriers for American Revolution battles Lexington or Saratoga, as well as military terms like Ranger, which refers to a form of elite infantry. Bonhomme Richard honored a successful warship of the American revolution. Cruisers were named for cities and towns, destroyers in honor of American Navy and Marine Corps heroes and submarines after fish. Many of the first American submarines built before World War II were given names consisting of a letter and a number, like L-3. These subs quickly acquired informal names used by the crew. Eventually U.S. submarines were all named after fish, in addition to a letters-number designation like SS-168 for the USS Nautilus. This sub served in the Pacific and was decommissioned and scrapped right after the war.
The first nuclear powered sub was the Nautilus, which entered service in 1954 and was decommissioned in 1980. Nearly all subsequent nuclear powered attack subs, or SSNs, were named after fish. The larger ballistic missile carrying SSBNs were named after famous Americans like Alexander Hamilton and Thomas Jefferson. In 1984 an SSN was named after Admiral Rickover, the man behind the nuclear submarine program. Rickover was still alive when his namesake submarine entered service. Rickover was the first to be so honored. In 1974 Carl Vinson, a member of Congress had a ship named after him, but he died before the ship was commissioned. So far 21 US Navy ships have been named after people still alive. The navy had banned that practice in 1969 but in 1974 President Nixon revived the practice. Most recently a SSN was named after the still living former President Jimmy Carter, who was scheduled to serve on one when his father died and he left the Navy to take over his family’s business.
https://www.strategypage.com/htmw/htmoral/articles/2025031302825.aspx#gsc.tab=0
