A relatively unsophisticated nautical-instruction facility known simply as “the Naval School” opened mostly unceremoniously October 10th, 1845, on ten acres of riverfront land formerly occupied by an Army post named Fort Severn. According to the Maryland state handbook Maryland Scenic Rivers: The Severn, the fortification was one of several built in the area during “renewed tension with Britain” that began in 1808 and culminated in the War or 1812. Situated on a small peninsula called Windmill Point, its structure “was more substantial than the earlier Revolutionary-era forts. It had a circular brick rampart and a ten-gun battery.”
Healthy and Secluded
Conceived as a successor to the Philadelphia Naval Asylum School and smaller instructional institutions in New York City, Boston, and Norfolk, Virginia, Annapolis had been chosen for its “healthy and secluded” location. It was thought such an atmosphere would “shield midshipmen from the temptations and distractions that necessarily connect with a large and populace city.”
The Academy’s roster of graduates over the past century and three quarters includes 1 president of the United States, 3 Cabinet members, 21 ambassadors, 26 members of Congress, 5 state governors, 5 secretaries of the Navy, 73 Medal of Honor recipients, and 54 astronauts. The names bestowed on the buildings throughout the Yard also provide a who’s who of notable graduates. Naturally, the structure heralded as the largest dormitory in the world is named for founder Bancroft. And the entire list includes such legendary naval leaders and thinkers as Nimitz, Halsey, King, Sampson, Maury, Mitscher, Preble, Dahlgren, Rickover, and Lejeune, to name a few.
Wide-Reaching Events
For this story, we solicited Thomas J. Cutler, who holds the Gordon England Chair of Professional Naval Literature at the U.S. Naval Institute, to share his thoughts on the historical significance of the Naval Academy. He is eminently qualified on the subject, having been author of the second edition of the late Professor Jack Sweetman’s The U.S. Naval Academy: An Illustrated History, as well as author or editor of 26 other books, including A Sailor’s History of the U.S. Navy, The Citizen’s Guide to the U.S. Navy, and The Parent’s Guide to the U.S. Navy. We asked him what he considers to be the most wide-reaching events that took place at the Naval Academy over its long history.
“At the top of the list,” he told us, “would be the Civil War, when part of the faculty—including the superintendent, Franklin Buchanan—went south to fight for the Confederacy. Because of Annapolis’ dangerous proximity to Virginia, the Naval Academy packed up and relocated to Newport, Rhode Island, (with the midshipmen sailing there in the USS Constitution), where it remained until war’s end, eventually returning to the original site.”
Cutler’s list also includes:
- The arrival of [the remains of] John Paul Jones on July 1, 1905 and placement “in his magnificent crypt under the chapel since January 1913.”
- Bachelor’s degrees awarded for the first time in 1933
- Accelerated curriculum/graduations during World War II (to allow early graduation in response to the global crisis).
- Wesley Brown as the first African-American graduate in 1949
- The admission of women in 1976 (graduating with the Class of 1980)
Inside the ornate U.S. Naval Academy Chapel.
Midshipmen in Action
In January this year (well before the COVID-19 pandemic diverted his attention), Maryland Governor Larry Hogan kicked off the 175th anniversary year, presenting a citation at the historic Maryland State House to Academy Superintendent Vice Admiral Sean Buck. In his remarks before a small gathering of dignitaries and midshipmen, Hogan referred to the Academy, “just down the hill from here,” as “the crown jewel of Maryland’s capital city, Annapolis.” Vice Admiral Buck then went on to say that “one of our most treasured traditions is our friendship with the great city of Annapolis and our home state of Maryland.”
That “friendship” Admiral Buck noted has manifested itself in several different ways around this region and across the nation. Over the past 175 years, the Naval Academy has taken its “duty, honor, country” seriously, notably lending a hand wherever and whenever it may be needed, especially in this region.
Digging Out
One of the most tangible illustrations of Naval Academy midshipmen serving the civilian community is the Midshipman Action Group (MAG), established in 1992. The MAG has four core objectives: Outreach to Youth, In-Kind Giving, Supporting Our Veterans, and Green and Rebuilding Projects. Amid the pandemic in March, midshipmen took part during their far-from-normal spring break in service projects across the country. Most notably, in the Chicago area, ten midshipmen spent spring break assisting at a local school and homeless shelter, along with supporting science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) initiatives in the region.
Perhaps the most memorable of a host of helping hands the Mids have lent here in Annapolis took place more than a decade ago in February 2010. Volunteers from the Academy spread out across the city to help dig out from the record-setting snowfall, measured in feet, that crippled the entire East Coast that year.
Midshipman Penetekoso Peau, from Pago Pago, American Samoa (a South Pacific U.S. territory obviously not known for its snow accumulation), said, “In the city there were countless elderly folks who were not able to clear their driveways, folks who needed to get snow off their roofs…We volunteered out in the City of Annapolis because it was the right thing to do…” Peau, a nose guard on the Navy football team, added, “We all did this not just as a good deed, but because there were people in need, and this had to be done.” After graduating that May, Peau went on to serve as boatswain’s mate of the watch and deck supervisor on board the guided-missile destroyer USS Cole. He is now living in Odenton, Maryland.
After 175 years, it would be impossible to imagine Annapolis without the Naval Academy, nor vice-versa.
40 Years after the “First Class”
While we celebrate the founding of the Naval Academy, and in keeping with commemoration of the Year of the Woman, 2020 also marks the 40th anniversary of the first women graduates in 1980. In her book, Women in the Military: An Unfinished Revolution, (1982), retired Air Force Major General Jeanne Holm wrote that, after years of contentious debate, the law signed in 1975 by President Gerald Ford “required the services to admit women into their sacrosanct academies the following year.”
Exclusively for this story, we talked to Sharon Disher, an Annapolis resident and one of those Class of 1980 Naval Academy alumnae who broke through that sacrosanctity, writing the book First Class: Women Join the Ranks at the Naval Academy (1998).
Now, 40 years after graduation, what was it like to be one of the first women at the Academy?
Disher: Because no combat billets were open to women, we were limited in what we could do. I wanted to be a pilot my whole life. In February my senior year, they told me I was not physically qualified (NPQ). I was too short and I don’t have good depth perception. So I couldn’t fly. We women in 1980 were all NPQ for combat billets. It was crazy. We could fly non-combatant aircraft—like fuel tankers. Now, let’s see. If you were the enemy, what would you want to shoot down, one plane, or the tanker that fuels 50 planes?
After learning you couldn’t fly, what did you do?
Disher: The civil engineer corps recruited me because I was the first female systems engineer at the Academy. I had gone out on a destroyer for my first-class cruise—the first time they sent women on combatant ships for summer training. An ensign who hadn’t gone to the Academy, another female classmate, and I ended up going into the Civil Engineer Corps, so it was three women on a ship with 350 guys. After two months, I knew then that I didn’t want to do that. Anytime you walked through the mess decks, there were cat calls, and “Hey baby!” from the enlisted guys. And I was like, “Really?” Paving the way at the Academy was enough for me. So I was really lucky in the Civil Engineer Corps. I had great tours, and I had great people working with and for me.
Most were civilian contractors. And most of those were grandfatherly types. They just wanted me to succeed, as I oversaw multimillion-dollar construction projects. When I was 23, I was chief engineer of a 300-bed hospital. I had no idea what it meant to be in charge of a hospital—electrical systems, generators, operating rooms. I had this little division of 12 civilian guys who were electricians and carpenters and plumbers. They actually kept the whole thing running.
Over several years, I had three kids and a husband who was a submariner, and it just got to be too hard. Back then, we were told we could be super women and do it all. But we women thought we could have two of three things—a profession, a marriage, and children—not all three.
Was it all worth the effort?
Disher: I understood we were paving the way, and that we were going to get a lot of grief. Nobody wanted us there. I was 17, and I just wanted to serve. My dad was a 26-year career Air Force pilot, and I really loved the lifestyle…All three of my kids went to the Naval Academy, so we’re the first family to have all of our kids graduate from a military academy.
A lot of my female classmates have a hard time going back to the Naval Academy because of what we experienced there. But I tell them, what we did was worth it because of who have come after us. These women are so incredible and impressive and strong and dedicated and motivated. And they won’t put up with any garbage at all, like stuff that we would just try to let roll off.
Naval Academy plebes in June of 1976, which would become the first graduating class (1980) with women. Photo courtesy U.S. Naval Academy.
Women today call me all the time. I keep contact with my classmates and a lot of female midshipmen. Because I’m in Annapolis, I’m readily available, and I’m up to date on what’s going on. I think one the biggest compliments I ever got was just the other day from a woman in the Class of ’85, who said “You’re like our mother. I come to you when I need to be boosted up.” Truly, all the women in the Class of ’80 are like moms to the women who came after us.
*Author’s Note: According to Jennifer Erickson, director of Academy media relations, public affairs, at this writing, “We are unsure of our plans right now for an event in the fall, due to the changes with COVID-19…we aren’t able to provide any info on fall events for the 175th Anniversary at this time.”
Notable News Highlights of 1845
- The Naval School opens for classes in Annapolis
- James Knox Polk takes oath of office as 11th President of the United States
- U.S. Postal Service issues first postage stamps
- Henry David Thoreau moves to Walden Pond
- New York Yacht Club holds first regatta
- Edgar Allan Poe writes The Raven
- Patents granted for the first rubber bands, corrugated sheet-iron lifeboats, and the precursor of the adhesive bandage
- First baseball team established as the New York Knickerbockers
- HMS Erebus and Terror set sail to find the Northwest Passage—all hands lost
- Texas admitted to Union
- Scientific American publishes first issue
- A talking parrot is removed from funeral of former President Andrew Jackson “for swearing”
