Based on the Coast Guard Historian’s timeline, https://www.history.uscg.mil/research/chronology/
With inspiration from Mike Kelso

December 15

The Mobile Point Lighthouses prior to the American Civil War. They were destroyed during the Battle of Mobile Bay.

1835  The superintendent of the lighthouse system wrote to Winslow Lewis, “I perceive by a Mobile paper which I received this morning that the Mobile Point light has been fitted by you as a revolving light” similar to the nearby Pensacola lighthouse.  “I am very sorry that you have done so.” Lewis was a contractor who – almost by himself a virtually controlled the administration of the lighthouse system.  The incident helped cause a Congressional investigation that ultimately created a modern lighthouse system in this country.

1839  Near Gloucester, Massachusetts, a storm from the southeast caught and dragged ashore or drove to sea over fifty vessels.  An eyewitness wrote: “From one of the beach to the other, nothing could be seen but pieces of broken wrecks; planks and spars…ropes and sails…flour, fish, lumber…soaked and broken…”  The local fishermen manned two boats, the Custom House boat and the newly launched Revenue Cutter Van Buren (commissioned December 2, 1839) and “fearlessly risked their lives for the safety of their fellow creatures” and brought many safely to shore.

15 December 1943, New Britain. Landing craft approach the inhospitable shores near Arawe, where American troops forced a landing at dawn in one of the most daring amphibious assaults yet undertaken in this area. Completely overwhelming the Japanese defenders they seized the entire Arawe Peninsula within three hours. Note the number identifying the landing craft had been whited out by the censor. Photo credit: Harold George Dick

1943  Coast Guardsmen participated in the landings made on Arawe Peninsula, New Britain.

1944  Coast Guardsmen participated in the landings made on Mindoro, Philippine Islands.

Argo Merchant sinking

1976  The Liberian-flagged 644-foot tanker Argo Merchant, with 7.5 million gallons of oil on board, grounded on a shoal 28 miles southeast of Nantucket.  Coast Guard helicopters from AIRSTA Cape Cod rescued her 38-man crew.  CGCs Sherman and Vigilant responded, along with other vessels, but heavy weather prevented the containment of the spill.  The tanker broke in two on December 21.

December 16

USRC Gallatin; “U.S. Coast Guard survey schooner GALLATIN photographed in 1855
Gallatin was a 73-foot topsail schooner that displaced 112 tons. She was built by the New York Navy Yard and entered Revenue service in 1830. She was ordered to Charleston, SC, on 16 November 1832 to enforce federal tariff law and suppress the “nullification proceedings” adopted by the State of South Carolina. She was transferred to the Coast Survey in 1840 and returned to Revenue service between 1848 to 1849 and then returned to the Coast Survey. She was captured by Confederate forces early in the Civil War and served the South as a privateer. This is the earliest known photo of a Revenue cutter although by the time this photo was taken she had already transferred permanently to the Coast Survey.

1831  Secretary of the Treasury John McLane ordered Revenue cutters to conduct “winter cruises.”  The USRC Gallatin became the first cutter “directly authorized by the government to assist mariners in distress.”

The crash site of the United Airlines DC-8, United 826, in Park Slope, Brooklyn

1960  A United Airlines DC-8 with 84 passengers on board collided with a TWA Super Constellation carrying 44 in mid-air over the New York City area. There were 134 fatalities including all aboard the two aircraft and six on the ground. Coast Guard helicopters, working with the aircraft of the Army, Navy and New York Police Department, transported the injured to a nearby hospital.  Coast Guard vessels also searched the New York harbor area.  The debris they picked up was used by the Civil Aeronautics Board in its determination of the cause of the mishap.

The crash site of the TWA Super Constellation, TWA 266, in Miller Field, Staten Island.

Based on the Coast Guard Historian’s timeline, https://www.history.uscg.mil/research/chronology/
With inspiration from Mike Kelso

December 13

LORAN STATION IWO JIMA

1965  The Treasury Department received “official word” to commence a project to build a number of LORAN stations throughout Southeast Asia in support of the escalating U.S. efforts in the Vietnam War.  The LORAN project was code-named “Tight Reign.”

South Korean Navy P-3CK

2014  Coast Guard search and rescue crews were relieved by Republic of Korea assets in their search for 26 crewmembers from the fishing vessel 501 Oryong that capsized November 30, 2014, near Chukotka, Russia, in the Bering Sea. The Coast Guard completed more than 24 searches covering more than 4,576 square miles utilizing two cutters, two helicopters, and multiple airplanes.  Coast Guard crews will continue to partner with the Republic of Korea to provide search and rescue planning support.  Two Republic of Korea Navy P-3 Orion aircraft joined the search for survivors on December 6, 2014. The Republic of Korea vessel Sam-Bong arrived at the 501 Oryong’s last known position and began their investigation.  The Coast Guard offered to assist the Kamchatka Border Guard Directorate and the Republic of Korea with their search for survivors and deployed the following assets: CGCs Munro, Alex Haley, HC-130s from Air Station Kodiak, and two SAR planners from Juneau deployed to Anchorage to work with South Korean Navy P-3 aircrews.  The Republic of Korea reported the 501 Oryong, with 60 crewmembers, was hauling in its catch when a wave hit and flooded the vessel’s storage chambers with seawater.  Good Samaritans rescued eight crewmembers, but one died of complications, 26 bodies were recovered, and 26 crewmembers were reported missing.

December 14

1846  Revenue Captain Alexander Fraser protested in a report to Congress against “unjust imputations” made against the Service for its involvement in the failure of the first steam cutters.  He also requested the authority to employ medical aid on cutters and to provide pensions for personnel disabled in service.

1854  Congress authorized the appointment of the first lifeboat station keepers at $200 per year each and superintendents for Long Island and New Jersey serving under Secretary of Treasury who “may also establish such stations at such lighthouses, as, in his judgment, he shall deem best.”

Sea otters. Photo taken under U.S. FWS permit #MA-043219. (Ryan Wolt)

1911  President William Howard Taft proclaimed the Convention entered into between the United States, Great Britain, Japan, and Russia for the preservation of the fur seal and the sea otter.  As this treaty prohibited entirely the killing of seals, and sea otters, on the part of the four nations concerned, in the North Pacific Ocean and Bering Sea, it was necessary that the movements of the Revenue Cutter fleet that enforced the agreement “correspond generally” to the progress of the seal herd in its annual northern migration.  During the 1912 season the following cutters were assigned: Rush, Manning, McCulloch and Tahoma.  This was the first regular patrol in enforcement of the regulations issued pursuant to the International Convention proclaimed on December 14, 1911.  Prior to that date Revenue Cutter vessels enforced the regulations of the Paris Tribunal of arbitration decreed August 15, 1893 for the preservation of the fur seal.  The patrol of the North Pacific Ocean and Bering Sea was first inaugurated in 1895 for the enforcement of the provisions of the Act of Congress approved April 6, 1894.  The cutters Rush, Bear, Corwin, Grant, and Perry were the first cutters assigned to carry out this patrol which commenced in 1895.

1996  The 735-foot M/V Bright Field collided with the New Orleans Riverwalk, causing substantial damage and injuring over 100 people.  Coast Guard forces responded.

Based on the Coast Guard Historian’s timeline, https://www.history.uscg.mil/research/chronology/
With inspiration from Mike Kelso

1899  A Treasury Order entrusted the Bureau of Navigation “with the duty of examining and disposing of petitions for the remission of fines, penalties, and forfeitures under the laws relating to navigation, vessels, steamboat-inspection, and passengers.”

UF-1 Albatros

1959  At the request of the Russian Embassy, the crew of a US Coast Guard UF-1 amphibious aircraft removed an ill Russian seaman from the merchant ship Jana in the Bering Sea.  The plane, with an interpreter and a doctor aboard, landed in a blinding snow storm at Dutch Harbor, where the patient was transferred to a hospital.

USCGC Westwind

1981  The icebreaker CGC Westwind departed her homeport of Milwaukee for the Caribbean.  She was assigned to relieve a high-endurance cutter on a counter-drug patrol.

1996  Two Coast Guard HH-60 helicopters with support from an HC-130, all from AIRSTA Elizabeth City, rescued the seven crewmembers of the 67-year old schooner Alexandria when she went down in a fierce storm 50 miles southwest of Cape Hatteras.

Based on the Coast Guard Historian’s timeline, https://www.history.uscg.mil/research/chronology/
With inspiration from Mike Kelso

December 8

1904 An Executive Order extended the jurisdiction of the Lighthouse Service to the noncontiguous territory of the Midway Islands.

Finnish vessel SS Kurikka at anchor (CG photo)

1941 Coast Guardsmen seized all nine Finnish vessels that were in U.S. ports and placed them in “protective custody” to “prevent the commission of any acts of sabotage” on orders from the Navy Department.  Twenty-four hours later the Coast Guard removed the crews from each of the vessels. (The Finns were allied with Germany against the Soviets.) This action was ordered soon after the break in diplomatic relations between Great Britain and Finland.  The following Finish vessels were seized: SS Olivia, at Boston, Massachusetts; SS Kurikka, SS Jourtanes, and SS Saimaa at New York, New York; SS Advance, at Philadelphia, Pennsylvania; SS Aagot and SS Marisa Thorden at Baltimore; SS Aurora, at Newport News, Virginia; and SS Delaware, at Galveston, Texas.

1983 Four cutters arrived off of the island of Grenada to replace U.S. Navy surface forces conducting surveillance operations after the U.S. invaded the island earlier that year.  The cutters involved were Cape Gull, Cape Fox, Cape Shoalwater, and the Sagebrush. (A USNI story about the mission here.)

JUNEAU, Alaska (Dec. 19, 2004)–An over-flight photo taken Dec. 19 show the bow and stern sections of the 378-foot freighter Selendang Ayu near Skan Bay. Unified Command photo

2004 The 738-foot freighter Selendang Ayu grounded and broke in two December 8, 2004, offshore of Spray Cape, Unalaska.  Fighting extremely adverse conditions, helicopter crews from Kodiak and the CGC Alex Haley, working with the crew of Haley, rescued all but six of the sailors.  AST3 Aaron Bean earned the Meritorious Service Medal and AMT3 Gregory Gibbons the Distinguished Flying Cross.  During the rescue high waves caused the crash of a Coast Guard HH-60J. Six of MV Selendang Ayu’s crew died in the crash.

Based on the Coast Guard Historian’s timeline, https://www.history.uscg.mil/research/chronology/
With inspiration from Mike Kelso

December 7

Contemporary painting of a Revenue Marine cutter, which may be of either the Massachusetts (1791), or its replacement, the Massachusetts II. Description from the United States Coast Guard website: “This painting purports to illustrate the first cutter named Massachusetts but it incorrectly shows the cutter flying the Revenue ensign and commission pennant, which were not adopted until 1799, well after the first Massachusetts had left service. Nevertheless, the illustration does show those characteristics typical of most of the first few generations of Revenue cutters: a small sailing vessel steered by a tiller, with low freeboard, light draft, lightly armed, and usually rigged as a topsail schooner.”

1793  The first Revenue Cutter Service court martial occurred on this date aboard the cutter Massachusetts.  The offender, Third Mate Sylvanus Coleman of Nantucket, was summarily dismissed from the service for “speaking disrespectfully of his superior officers in public company…insulting Captain John Foster Williams [the commanding officer] on board, and before company…for keeping bad women on board the cutter in Boston and setting a bad example to the men by ordering them to bring the women on board at night and carrying them ashore in the morning…” and for writing an order in the name of the commanding officer.

1830  President Andrew Jackson announced an ambitious plan to add a large number of lighthouses to the federal system, with a total of 51 more lighthouse keepers.  In explanation, he supported the practice of offsetting the costs of keeping aids to navigation on the coasts, lakes and harbors “to render the navigation thereof safe and easy” since “whatever gives facility and security to navigation cheapens imports; and all who consume them are alike interested in whatever produces this effect.  The consumer in the most inland State derives the same advantage…that he does who lives in a maritime State.”

USCGC Taney at Honolulu tied up at Pier 4 in Honolulu Harbor, Hawaii, circa 1940
VIRIN: 220509-G-G0000-002.JPG Photo source: USCG Historian’s Office

1941  The Imperial Japanese Navy launched a surprise attack on Pearl Harbor and surrounding Army Air Force airfields in Hawaii.  Stationed in Honolulu were the Coast Guard’s 327-foot cutter Taney, the 190-foot buoy tender Kukui, two 125-foot patrol craft, Reliance and Tiger, two 78-foot patrol boats, and several smaller craft.  At the time of the attack, Taney lay at Pier Six in Honolulu Harbor, Reliance and the unarmed Kukui both lay at Pier Four and Tiger was on patrol along the western shore of Oahu.  All were performing normal duties for a peacetime Sunday.  After the attack commenced Tiger conducted anti-submarine sweeps outside of Pearl Harbor and Taney opened fire on Japanese aircraft that appeared over Honolulu Harbor.

USCGC White Alder, lost now 56 years ago

1968 CGC White Alder sank after colliding with M/V Helena near White Castle, Louisiana.  Seventeen Coast Guard personnel were killed.

Alice Theresa Jefferson graduated from Stoneham High School in 1940. She then attended Regis College before entering the Coast Guard. In 1943, during World War II, she became a member of SPARs and eventually she was promoted to Commander, the highest rank for a female officer at the time. 

1973 The first female enlistees were sworn into the regular U.S. Coast Guard, Y1/c Wanda May Parr and Y2c Margaret A. Blackman, at a ceremony held in Yorktown, VA.  On that date as well CWO Alice T. Jefferson became the first woman commissioned officer to be sworn into the regular U.S. Coast Guard.  Jefferson was sworn in by Admiral Chester Bender, Commandant, at a ceremony held at Coast Guard Headquarters.

President Ronald Reagan and President-elect George Bush meet with Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev on Governor’s Island, December 1988

1988 The Coast Guard hosted an international summit between Soviet President Mikhail Gorbachev, President Ronald Reagan, and President-elect and then-Vice President George H. W. Bush on Governors Island.  The summit occurred after Gorbachev had addressed the United Nations.  In planning his trip to the UN, Gorbachev requested a meeting with Reagan and the White House selected the Coast Guard base at Governors Island as a meeting site since it was a secure military installation in the middle of New York harbor and just minutes away from the United Nations.  The leaders met for lunch at the LANTAREA commander’s [VADM James Irwin] home.  The summit was characterized as “just a luncheon” and the meeting was the last time President Reagan and Gorbachev would meet during Reagan’s remaining term.

USCGC Kukui (WLB-203) raising the Strauss Rock Buoy, South Shelter Island, Southeast Alaska 24 August 2019. Photo by Gillfoto.

2014 CGC Kukui returned from a 46-day law enforcement patrol where they exercised bilateral agreements and enforced fisheries regulations across the Pacific.  The 50-person crew participated in several significant regional operations to further enhance U.S. and international efforts in the protection of the ecologically and economically valuable fish stocks of the Pacific Ocean and participated in a number of multi-national operations, including Operation Kuru Kuru, which was a multinational operation orchestrated by the Pacific Islands Forum Fisheries Agency.  Kukui exercised the Tongan bilateral agreement by embarking a Tongan ship rider to patrol that nation’s EEZ.  Kukui crewmembers spent patrol time searching for potential EEZ incursions by vessels not transmitting their location or status in accordance with applicable fisheries regulations.  Another leg of their patrol included domestic fisheries boardings in the American Samoa EEZ and high seas boardings under the authorities established by the Western Central Pacific Fisheries Commission.

The USCGC Oliver Henry (WPC 1140) crew arrives in Manus, Papua New Guinea, on Aug. 14, 2022, from Guam as part of a patrol headed south to assist partner nations in upholding and asserting their sovereignty while protecting U.S. national interests. The U.S. Coast Guard is participating with partners to support the Pacific Islands Forum Fisheries Agency-led Operation Island Chief and the larger Operation Blue Pacific through patrols in the Western Pacific in August and September 2022. (U.S. Coast Guard photo by USCGC Oliver Henry)

2022 CGC Oliver Henry (WPC 1140) completed a local patrol off Guam and the Commonwealth of the Northern Mariana Islands from 28 November to 7 December 2022, including the first-ever 154-foot Fast Response Cutter port visit to Tinian.  The objectives of the patrol included: supporting MSST Honolulu, validating Tinian as a port of free call for future USCG ship visits, and conducting community engagements in CNMI. During the patrol, Oliver Henry’s crew assisted MSST Honolulu’s boarding team in conducting law enforcement operations resulting in seven recreational safety boardings, four uninspected passenger vessel boardings, and two commercial passenger vessel boardings. The purpose of these boardings was to ensure the material condition of the vessels, the suitability and compliance of required equipment, and any required credentials. The team issued four warnings for safety infractions. The team went on to conduct interagency law enforcement operations with Tinian’s Department of Public Safety – Boating Safety Division for two additional recreational safety boardings. The cutter’s crew also teamed up with CNMI Customs & Biosecurity officers and Tinian DPS – BSD officers for two Subject Matter Expert Exchanges to share best practices and learn from each other. While in Saipan and Tinian, the crew held three community events, including hosting 68 students from the Tasi to Table Non-Profit Organization dedicated to engaging youth on fishing methodologies, boating safety, environmental stewardship, and supporting mental health and the Tinian Typhoon Sports Association.