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USS Potomac
The USS Potomac, AG-25, was
originally known as the USCGC Electra, and was/is the former
presidential yacht of Franklin Delano Roosevelt, who used it from
1936 until 1945, when he passed on. This is one of the three still
surviving presidential yachts, preserved in the Oakland, California
harbor, and was a decoy in 1941, while Roosevelt was attending a top
secret meeting to create the Atlantic Charter. It was built by the
Manitowoc Ship Building Company in Manitowoc, Wisconsin to become
the United States Coast Guard Cutter Electra. In 1936, she was
converted into a presidential yacht and commissioned for the navy.
During the following years, she was used a lot by the President, for
political meetings and fishing trips. In 1939, Great Britain's King
George VI and Queen Elizabeth sailed on the Roosevelt's yacht to
visit Mount Vernon, the former home of George Washington. In August
of 1941, Roosevelt left the nation's capital on board the yacht,
traveling to New London's naval submarine base. Afterwards, it
sailed to Appogansett Bay for fishing and entertaining the Crown
Princess of Norway, Martha. Finally it anchored in Menemsha Bight in
Vineyard Sound, where the USS Augusta, a heavy cruiser, lay anchored
also, and in the wee hours of the morning of August 5, the yacht
moved alongside the cruiser, where the President and his party
boarded it. The Augusta then headed to Newfoundland for a top secret
meeting with Churchill, at its highest speed. In Newfoundland,
Roosevelt and Churchill agreed on the principles of the Atlantic
Charter, agreed on the principles of the Allied partnership of the
second World War and set the stage for the creation of the United
Nations in the post-war peace. During that time, the President's
flag had continued to be flown on the Potomac, as she crawled along
the cape at Cape Cod and out into the Atlantic Ocean. One of the
secret servicemen, who like about the President's size and had his
mannerisms, wheeled about the yacht, hoping to deceive any spies
that might be watching his movements. The daily press releases about
the President, left the yacht so that all the world thought
Roosevelt was having a wonderful holiday on his yacht. When he
passed on, the yacht was returned to the Coast Guard in November of
1945. From 1946, she was with the Maryland Tidewater Fisheries
Commission and then sold to Warren G. Toone in 1960, where he used
the yacht to ferry people around Puerto Rico and the Virgin Islands.
Elvis Presley purchase the Potomac in 1964, for $55,000, eventually
offering it to the March of Dimes, who said they couldn't do it.
Giving it to the St. Jude's Children Hospital in Memphis, they sold
it as a fundraiser, getting $75,000 for it that same year. Sadly, in
1980, it was seized in a drug smuggling operation in San Francisco,
towed to Treasure Island, where it sank. Two weeks later, the US
Navy managed to refloat her and she was sold to the port of Oakland
for $15,000 and completely refurbished. She calmly sits a the Jack
London Square in Oakland and is open for tours and cruises.
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