As summer approaches, our calendar certainly fills up! We have had a great time at numerous parades and events throughout the state. Every year, we start around St. Patrick’s Day in March, culminating in a final Veteran’s Day finale! A huge thanks to our dedicated volunteers, who donate their weekend hours to helping bring our model and banners around to continue to spread the word of our exciting project!
As we do every year, we will be attending the oldest continuous Fourth of July Celebration in the nation in the Bristol Parade – come by and say hi!
Where We Are Now
OK, the Bad News:
The old Navy leadership (under the previous administration) did not approve our access to Pier 2 in Coddington Cove before they left office. Our JFK effort is stalled until we get the chance to appeal.
The Good News:
We can appeal! BUT… we cannot appeal to a new Secretary of the Navy until one is appointed. We have not come so close to our goal just to turn back now, but we must be patient.
What We Are Doing in the Meantime
Our utmost priority is securing a berthing location for the USS JFK. Yet while we are in limbo waiting for a chance to file our appeal (and/or possibly identify another suitable location), we are focusing our efforts on saving aircraft to one day display on the ship. This summer we are working to retain as many of the Quonset Air Museum (QAM) aircraft and historical artifacts in Rhode Island as possible. That material, plus the five aircraft we already own and all the Navy memorabilia we have collected over the years, deserves a proper home.
A land-based home for the Hall of Fame, its aircraft and many other historic naval and aviation artifacts would become a valuable adjunct as we continue to pursue our aircraft carrier project.
Our team has been working on preserving naval and aviation history in Narragansett Bay since 1998, and taking on this new challenge is simply an extension of those efforts. We have focused on this rescue effort while awaiting guidance from the new administration on the USS JFK project.
We promise to keep you posted as soon as there are any developments!
A New Online Store, New Stuff!
We have launched a new ship store! Along with the usual JFK hats and shirts, you can now also get aviation prints, high-quality 8×10 photos of Big John at sea, Cold-War silk aviator maps, and much more!
Check out the store now.
This is appalling that the cno takes the time to take cv67 off donations list when he should be concerned in building a navy we were promised how dare he do this without explanation what are our options now