continuing role in the preparation of the Nautical 

 Almanac and as the national center for determina- 

 tion of time.^ The Hydrographic Office did not 

 continue Maury's work in oceanography, an activ- 

 ity which was not revived until recent years. It 

 attempted a survey of the Pacific, but this was 

 halted because continuing funds were not appro- 

 priated. This was one of the reasons why the Na- 

 tion was without adequate charts for our opera- 

 tions in the Pacific campaign of World War II.'''' 



For the period from 1864 to 1914, departmental 

 histories available at the Naval Historical Center 

 provide very little information on basic research 

 activities which affected naval materiel. In fact, 

 there is a dearth of histories of the U.S. naval 

 shore establishment prior to the beginning of 

 World War II. Dupree summarizes the situation 

 prevailing up to 1914: 



Profound as (the) changes were for naval war- 

 fare, they seldom proceeded directly from sci- 

 entific research on the part of the Navy Depart- 

 ment, but rather were wholesale borrowings 

 from abroad, especially from the British.'*^ 



This much is known: the Navy scrapped most 

 of its Civil War steam fleet after the war.f"? and 

 by 1881, only wooden unarmored ships remained, 

 none of them fit for warfare.''** Finally, in 1883, 

 three steel cruisers were authorized, but our in- 

 dustry had to learn how to make suitable steel 

 plates, a problem solved in England 7 years ear- 

 lier. Therefore the larger castings and forgings for 

 the armament had to be imported in 1885. In 1890, 

 three coastal battleships were authorized and they 

 formed the backbone of the Navy which prevailed 

 over the Spanish fleet in 1898.69 



During this period of rebirth, the Navy had the 

 good fortune to produce one of the world's great- 

 est naval architects, David W. Taylor, whose 

 Speed and Power of Ships, published in 1910, is 

 still a classic. 



Most of the main battery guns and shells for the 

 new naval ships were manufactured at the Wash- 

 ington Navy Yard, which was made the Navy's 

 center for ordnance production in 1884 and trans- 

 ferred to the management of the Bureau of Ord- 

 nance (BuOrd) in 1886. This country was incap- 

 able of making large steel forgings suitable for 

 gun tubes or armor prior to about 1890. 



"Ibid., pp. IX.'i-l86. 



«lbid.. p. 187. 



w-lbid.. p. .W4. 



''■'Ibid., p. 126. 



f^Alden. pp. 407-408. 



'■'^Ibid.. pp. 410-411; Singer, Charles et al. (eds.), A History 

 of Technology. Vol. V (Oxford University Press: London. 

 I9-S8), p. 37.t. 



The Bureau of Ordnance, faced with this short- 

 age, financed many experiments in the alloying 

 and treatment of steel suitable for Navy pur- 

 poses, and an impetus was given this industry 

 which brought it to the foremost position 

 among similar industries throughout the 

 world.™ 



The U.S. Navy had no propulsion laboratories 

 until the Engineering E.xperiment Station (EES), 

 authorized in 1903, was opened in Annapolis "to 

 test and determine the suitability of certain steam 

 machinery for use in naval vessels. "7i This was 

 followed by the Naval Boiler and Turbine Labora- 

 tory in Philadelphia a few years later. These were 

 almost exclusively testing laboratories until World 

 War 1. 



Radio communication was so potentially valua- 

 ble to the Navy that it received special attention. 

 To eliminate total reliance on industry for testing 

 as well as research, the U.S. Naval Radio Tele- 

 graphic Laboratory was established in 1908; it 

 utilized facilities at the National Bureau of Stand- 

 ards in Washington, D.C. In addition to testing, 

 this laboratory conducted basic research on prop- 

 agation and transmission of radio signals, and 

 developed, for example, the Austin-Cohen formu- 

 la for propagation over ionospheric paths. Basic 

 research in physics was also involved in the de- 

 velopment of improved circuits, measuring appa- 

 ratus, and the vacuum tube. When war became 

 imminent all these groups were augmented; in 

 addition, the U.S. Naval Radio Laboratory in 

 Great Lakes, III., under A. Hoyt Taylor, conduct- 

 ed basic research on such topics as propagation at 

 very low frequencies (20 to 75 kHz). During the 

 war several of these groups were combined under 

 Dr. Taylor at the Naval Air Station in Anacostia, 

 D.C, under the title U. S. Naval Aircraft Radio 

 Laboratory (NARL). The research conducted in 

 this laboratory produced few pertinent results 

 during the war, but it became a nucleus in the 

 formation of the Naval Research Laboratory 

 (NRL).72 



Navy— World War I 



By 1914 the Navy had only small research pro- 

 grams in radio and in hydrodynamics. But in 1915, 



■"•Peck, Taylor, Round Shot to Rockets (U.S. Naval Institute; 

 Annapolis, 1949), pp. 184, 200. Hereinafter referred to as Peck. 



""Welcome to the U.S. Naval Engineering Experiment Sta- 

 tion" (EES; Annapolis, c. 1964), p. 20. 



^-Gebhard. LA., Evolution of Naval Radio-Electronics and 

 Contributions of the Naval Research Laboratory (NRh: Wash- 

 ington, D.C, 1976). pp. 1-21. Hereinafter referred to as Geb- 

 hard; Taylor, A. Hoyt. TTie First 25 years of the Naval Re- 

 search Laboratory (Dept. of the Navy; Washington. D.C, 

 c. 1948), p. 1.3. Hereinafter referred to as Taylor. 



COMPARATIVE ANALYSIS AND HISTORICAL TRENDS 331 



