By the turn of the century, working relationships with the scientific community — 

 small as it then was — had been established by all agencies with ocean-oriented missions. 

 Industry, too, had a stake in the modest but active programs of these agencies, espe- 

 cially the fishing and shipping interests. Furthermore, strong international ties had 

 been established between marine scientists in the United States and Europe. 



Following World War I, the Navy, the Coast Guard, the Fish Commission, and the 

 Coast and Geodetic Survey continued their essentially descriptive work at sea. Never- 

 theless, there was concern on the part of the recently established National Research 

 Council (NRC) of the National Academy of Sciences (NAS) that the marine sciences 

 in the United States lacked sufficient scientific leadership. In contrast to Europe, where 

 marine scientists enjoyed wide government support and recognition, the United States 

 had few institutional facilities for training and developing leadership in oceanography. 

 Recognizing this need, the National Research Council established its first Committee 

 on Oceanography (NASCO), in 1927, to consider the role of the United States in a 

 worldwide program of oceanographic research. The Committee report had a major 

 impact upon the scientific community and was instrumental in obtaining — from phil- 

 anthropic sources — funds for endowing institutions on both coasts, and for constructing 

 a ship and a few shore facilities. 



During the 1930's, such oceanographic laboratories as the Scripps Institution of 

 Oceanography and the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution became the centers 

 of scientific excellence which were to serve the United States so well during World 

 War II. Then, for the first dme, investigations were pressed by the Federal Govern- 

 ment in an effort to apply oceanography to the solution of urgent defense problems. 

 The small nucleus of oceanographers trained in the 1930's was augmented by scientists 

 from other disciplines, many of whom remained associated with the marine sciences 

 after the war. 



Following World War II, oceanographic programs in the Office of Naval Research, 

 the Naval Hydrographic Office (now the Naval Oceanographic Office), the Bureau 

 of Ships, the Bureau of Commercial Fisheries, and the newly established Atomic Energy 

 Commission expanded to meet the growing problems of the marine environment. At 

 the same time, the government continued to support oceanographic research at uni- 

 versities and research institutions. By 1949, the National Academy of Sciences again 

 became concerned over the relative growth of the marine sciences in the United States. 

 A second Committee on Oceanography was appointed. Rather than urge a greatly 

 expanded effort, the Academy's 1951 report stressed the necessity of regaining the 

 balanced program of basic research that had characterized oceanography in the years 

 before the war. Coming as it did in the first year of the Korean conflict, the report failed 

 to stimulate effective action. However, in 1951, the National Science Foundation (NSF) 

 made its first grant in the field of oceanography, and by 1954 a significant percentage 

 of the grants in NSF's Environmental Biology and Earth Sciences Programs had been 

 made in oceanography. 



A third NAS/NRC Committee on Oceanography was established in 1957. At that 

 time the U.S. was spending less than $35 million annually for studies of the ocean out 

 of a national basic research budget of well over $1 billion. Three Federal agencies with 

 oceanographic programs (Atomic Energy Commission, Bureau of Commercial Fisheries, 

 and the Office of Naval Research) requested the Committee to identify the national 

 requirements for oceanographic research and to propose a ten-year program for their 

 accomplishment. It was apparent from the Academy's deliberations that the traditional 

 concept of "oceanography" as basic science had changed since the 1930's. While em- 

 phasizing oceanography as an interdisciplinary science, the NASCO panels addressed 



