Northeastern Wisconsin ship names
The first USS Milwaukee swept for mines during the Civil War. The USS Bayfield transported troops to Normandy for the Allied invasion of Europe. The crew of the USS Suamico watched from offshore as an American flag was raised on Iwo Jima.
The USS Green Bay — commissioned by the Navy in Long Beach, Calif., on Saturday — is the latest in a long list of ships to bear the names of Wisconsin cities, counties and tribes.
Until the end of the 1950s, the Navy followed a traditional policy in its naming: Battleships were named after states, aircraft carriers after famous battles or previously famous ships, cruisers after cities, destroyers after famous officers and submarines after fish, said Jack Green, a consultant for the Naval History and Heritage Command.
"Ship-naming policy in the last 30 years had undergone changes. It's frankly a little grayer," Green said. Although the secretary of the Navy is responsible for the decision, the Naval History and Heritage Command, local groups and veterans' groups often make suggestions.
Political considerations make a difference. With the Navy's presence limited to the coasts, often it's good public relations to connect ships to more land-locked communities.
"Unless you live along a sea coast, you don't see the Navy," Green said. "By naming ships after states that don't have a shoreline, it gives people in the interior more of an identity with the Navy."
Traditionally, the communities would pay for the formal silverware used by the officers in the wardroom of the ships. The ships also display the seal of the community they are named for to help solidify the connection, Green said.