USS Arkansas (BB-33)

Arkansas was admitted to the Union as the 25th state on 15 June 1836. The French Jesuit missionary and explorer Father Jacques Marquette and his confreres recorded the term Arcansas as the plural of the word they transliterated as akansa , an Algonquian name for the Quapaw Native American people.

The third Arkansas (Battleship No. 33) was laid down on 25 January 1910 at Camden, N.J., by the New York Shipbuilding Co.; launched on 14 January 1911; and sponsored by Miss Nancy L. Macon of Helena, Ark., daughter of Representative Robert B. Macon (D., Ark.). While Arkansas carried out her builder’s trials and entered Penobscot Bay, Maine, she struck a rock on 4 June 1912. The mishap occurred just as she passed Two Bush Island outside the harbor of Rockland, and the rock gashed the hull for a length of nearly 45-feet abaft the bow on the port side, under the second engine room. Sailors manned pumps to dewater the flooded compartment so that inspectors could check the damage, and she subsequently resumed her trials. Investigators exonerated Capt. Charles A. Blair of Bath, Maine, the harbor pilot, and Capt. Roy C. Smith retained command of the ship. Arkansas was commissioned at the Philadelphia [Pa.] Navy Yard on 17 September 1912, Capt. Smith in command.

The new battleship fitted out until 6 October 1912, and then (8–15 October) took part in a fleet review by President William H. Taft and Secretary of the Navy George von L. Meyer in the North [Hudson] River off New York City on the 14th, and that day the chief executive briefly bordered her. Arkansas steamed back downriver and across Long Island Sound for a torpedo outfit at Newport, R.I. (16–21 October). On the 21st the ship tested her torpedoes in Narragansett Bay, returned to Newport the following day, and completed repairs and took on stores at New York Navy Yard (23 October–24 November). Arkansas next (25–26 November) began her shakedown cruise to Hampton Roads, Va., and shifted berths there while awaiting further orders through the end of the month. She then (1–3 December) carried out gunnery trials off Tangier Island in Chesapeake Bay, and returned to Hampton Roads to prepare to again take on board the chief executive.

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From the Dictionary of American Naval Fighting Ships, compiled by the Naval History and Heritage Command (Arkansas III (Battleship No. 33)). A work of the United States Government, in the public domain.