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USS Sequoia (presidential yacht)
Encyclopedia
Herbert Hoover
Herbert Clark Hoover was the 31st President of the United States . Hoover was originally a professional mining engineer and author. As the United States Secretary of Commerce in the 1920s under Presidents Warren Harding and Calvin Coolidge, he promoted partnerships between government and business...
to Jimmy Carter
Jimmy Carter
James Earl "Jimmy" Carter, Jr. is an American politician who served as the 39th President of the United States and was the recipient of the 2002 Nobel Peace Prize, the only U.S. President to have received the Prize after leaving office...
, who had it sold in 1977. The ship was decommissioned under Roosevelt and lost its "USS" status at that time, but by popular convention is still often used. NorshipCo, a Norfolk-based shipbuilder and dry-docking company, repossessed the yacht after its owners, Presidential Yacht Sequoia Foundation, failed to pay the $3 million it cost to renovate the vessel. In June 2000, it was sold off via auction on Bid4Assets
Bid4Assets
Bid4Assets, established in 1999, was the first online real estate auction website to operate in the United States. Bid4Assets auctions distressed real estate and personal property for private investors and the federal government. It serves the United States Marshals, the U.S. Department of Treasury...
. In November 2004 it was sought for repurchase by the U.S. government but today remains privately owned by Gary Silversmith, who has owned it since September 2000.
The yacht is 104 feet long, with a wooden hull, and was designed by John Trumpy Sr., a well-known shipbuilder. It includes a presidential stateroom, guest bedrooms, a galley and dining room, and was at one time retrofitted with an elevator for Franklin D. Roosevelt
Franklin D. Roosevelt
Franklin Delano Roosevelt , also known by his initials, FDR, was the 32nd President of the United States and a central figure in world events during the mid-20th century, leading the United States during a time of worldwide economic crisis and world war...
(Johnson had it removed and replaced with a liquor bar).
The ship was designated a National Historic Landmark
National Historic Landmark
A National Historic Landmark is a building, site, structure, object, or district, that is officially recognized by the United States government for its historical significance...
in 1987.
Construction
The Sequoia started out as the Sequoia II, a private yacht built for $200,000 in 1925/1926 at a Camden, New JerseyCamden, New Jersey
The city of Camden is the county seat of Camden County, New Jersey. It is located across the Delaware River from Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. As of the 2010 United States Census, the city had a total population of 77,344...
shipyard. It was built for Richard Cadwalader of Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, who sold it to William Dunning, the president of the Sequoia Oil Company in Texas.
U.S. government service
The Sequoia was purchased in 1931 by the United States Department of CommerceUnited States Department of Commerce
The United States Department of Commerce is the Cabinet department of the United States government concerned with promoting economic growth. It was originally created as the United States Department of Commerce and Labor on February 14, 1903...
, for Prohibition
Prohibition
Prohibition of alcohol, often referred to simply as prohibition, is the practice of prohibiting the manufacture, transportation, import, export, sale, and consumption of alcohol and alcoholic beverages. The term can also apply to the periods in the histories of the countries during which the...
patrol and decoy duties. Bootleggers would see what they thought was a rich-man's yacht and boat over to offer to sell illegal liquor, and then undercover police would arrest them. Herbert Hoover
Herbert Hoover
Herbert Clark Hoover was the 31st President of the United States . Hoover was originally a professional mining engineer and author. As the United States Secretary of Commerce in the 1920s under Presidents Warren Harding and Calvin Coolidge, he promoted partnerships between government and business...
, an avid fisherman, had decommissioned the presidential yacht the in 1929 as an economy measure, and borrowed the Sequoia from the Commerce Department as an unofficial yacht during the last two years of his presidency. Hoover was not personally a supporter of prohibition and drank while on the yacht.
In 1933, it was transferred to the United States Navy, where it was commissioned and given its USS status, serving officially as the presidential yacht for three years, until replaced by the . It was decommissioned as an official Navy vessel under Roosevelt during WWII, supposedly because Churchill would not drink liquor on a Navy boat, and it remained decommissioned since. From 1936 through 1969 the Sequoia then became the yacht of the Secretary of the Navy. During this period the Sequoia was used by presidents and other high-ranking government officials. From 1969 through 1977 the yacht was dual-use for the Navy and executive branch officials including the president.
At Jimmy Carter
Jimmy Carter
James Earl "Jimmy" Carter, Jr. is an American politician who served as the 39th President of the United States and was the recipient of the 2002 Nobel Peace Prize, the only U.S. President to have received the Prize after leaving office...
's direction, the U.S. government sold it at auction in Manalapan, Florida
Manalapan, Florida
Manalapan is a town in Palm Beach County, Florida, United States.-History:United States President Benjamin Harrison granted George H. K. Carter a homestead in 1889 on the yet unnamed land...
on 25 March 1977, for $270,000, as a symbolic cutback in Federal Government spending (annual cost to the U.S. Navy was $800,000) and to help eliminate signs of an "imperial presidency".
Notable events aboard the Sequoia include:
- Herbert HooverHerbert HooverHerbert Clark Hoover was the 31st President of the United States . Hoover was originally a professional mining engineer and author. As the United States Secretary of Commerce in the 1920s under Presidents Warren Harding and Calvin Coolidge, he promoted partnerships between government and business...
sailed her to FloridaFloridaFlorida is a state in the southeastern United States, located on the nation's Atlantic and Gulf coasts. It is bordered to the west by the Gulf of Mexico, to the north by Alabama and Georgia and to the east by the Atlantic Ocean. With a population of 18,801,310 as measured by the 2010 census, it...
. - Dwight Eisenhower loaned her to Queen Elizabeth IIElizabeth II of the United KingdomElizabeth II is the constitutional monarch of 16 sovereign states known as the Commonwealth realms: the United Kingdom, Canada, Australia, New Zealand, Jamaica, Barbados, the Bahamas, Grenada, Papua New Guinea, the Solomon Islands, Tuvalu, Saint Lucia, Saint Vincent and the Grenadines, Belize,...
during her state visit to the U.S. - John F. KennedyJohn F. KennedyJohn Fitzgerald "Jack" Kennedy , often referred to by his initials JFK, was the 35th President of the United States, serving from 1961 until his assassination in 1963....
held strategy meetings during the Cuban Missile CrisisCuban Missile CrisisThe Cuban Missile Crisis was a confrontation among the Soviet Union, Cuba and the United States in October 1962, during the Cold War...
, and had his last birthday party on the yacht. - Richard M. Nixon negotiated the SALT I arms treaty with Leonid BrezhnevLeonid BrezhnevLeonid Ilyich Brezhnev – 10 November 1982) was the General Secretary of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union , presiding over the country from 1964 until his death in 1982. His eighteen-year term as General Secretary was second only to that of Joseph Stalin in...
and Anatoly DobryninAnatoly DobryninAnatoly Fyodorovich Dobrynin was a Russian statesman and a former Soviet diplomat and politician. He was Soviet Ambassador to the United States, serving from 1962 to 1986 and most notably during the Cuban Missile Crisis. He was appointed by Nikita Khrushchev....
, and later made the decision to resign the presidency. - Gerald FordGerald FordGerald Rudolph "Jerry" Ford, Jr. was the 38th President of the United States, serving from 1974 to 1977, and the 40th Vice President of the United States serving from 1973 to 1974...
conducted Cabinet meetings. - Ronald ReaganRonald ReaganRonald Wilson Reagan was the 40th President of the United States , the 33rd Governor of California and, prior to that, a radio, film and television actor....
met all 50 state governors at the gangplank. - George H. W. BushGeorge H. W. BushGeorge Herbert Walker Bush is an American politician who served as the 41st President of the United States . He had previously served as the 43rd Vice President of the United States , a congressman, an ambassador, and Director of Central Intelligence.Bush was born in Milton, Massachusetts, to...
met with Chinese premier Li PengLi PengLi Peng served as the fourth Premier of the People's Republic of China, between 1987 and 1998, and the Chairman of the Standing Committee of the National People's Congress, China's top legislative body, from 1998 to 2003. For much of the 1990s Li was ranked second in the Communist Party of China ...
.
And some seem to be legends:.
- Franklin D. Roosevelt and Dwight Eisenhower planned European war strategy.
- Harry S. TrumanHarry S. TrumanHarry S. Truman was the 33rd President of the United States . As President Franklin D. Roosevelt's third vice president and the 34th Vice President of the United States , he succeeded to the presidency on April 12, 1945, when President Roosevelt died less than three months after beginning his...
decided to bomb HiroshimaHiroshimais the capital of Hiroshima Prefecture, and the largest city in the Chūgoku region of western Honshu, the largest island of Japan. It became best known as the first city in history to be destroyed by a nuclear weapon when the United States Army Air Forces dropped an atomic bomb on it at 8:15 A.M...
(the decision was made during the Potsdam ConferencePotsdam ConferenceThe Potsdam Conference was held at Cecilienhof, the home of Crown Prince Wilhelm Hohenzollern, in Potsdam, occupied Germany, from 16 July to 2 August 1945. Participants were the Soviet Union, the United Kingdom, and the United States...
).
Controversy
On May 25, 1973 the NBC Evening News reported that 28 Marines and 18 sailors handling the Sequoia were transferred and reassigned from Camp DavidCamp David
Camp David is the country retreat of the President of the United States and his guests. It is located in low wooded hills about 60 mi north-northwest of Washington, D.C., on the property of Catoctin Mountain Park in unincorporated Frederick County, Maryland, near Thurmont, at an elevation of...
due to marijuana offenses.
After decommissioning
She had a number of owners over the next 25 years, due in part to the expenses associated with the maintenance of a wooden-hulled vessel. Some owners sought to offer Sequoia for charter, others were non-profit groups seeking to maintain her for historical or other reasons.The Presidential Yacht Trust, a non-profit organization, acquired her in 1980 and sponsored an eight-month, 6,000-mile "comeback" tour, but this group went bankrupt three years later. The vessel lay derelict for nearly a decade. Around 2000, Japanese buyers had a contract to purchase the vessel, due to some connections the ship has with Japanese history, but a private American buyer, Gary Silversmith, stepped in and made a counter-offer before the Japanese contract was signed. It was purchased for $2 million in September 2000, after a shipyard had her renovated at a cost of over $3 million. Sequoia underwent additional restoration, and was available for private charters for $2500 per hour in 2003. In November 2004, Congress voted to appropriate $2 million to repurchase the Sequoia, but it remains under private ownership. As of 2010 she was docked at the Gangplank Marina in Southwest Washington, D.C.
See also
- List of official vehicles of the President of the United States, which includes the other presidential yachts