Hawaii
Hawaii is the 50th and most recent state to have joined the United States, having received statehood on August 21, 1959. Hawaii is the only U. S. state located in Oceania, the only U. S. state located outside North America, the only one composed of islands. It is the northernmost island group in Polynesia, occupying most of an archipelago in the central Pacific Ocean; the state encompasses nearly the entire volcanic Hawaiian archipelago, which comprises hundreds of islands spread over 1,500 miles. At the southeastern end of the archipelago, the eight main islands are—in order from northwest to southeast: Niʻihau, Kauaʻi, Oʻahu, Molokaʻi, Lānaʻi, Kahoʻolawe and the Island of Hawaiʻi; the last is the largest island in the group. The archipelago is ethnologically part of the Polynesian subregion of Oceania. Hawaii's diverse natural scenery, warm tropical climate, abundance of public beaches, oceanic surroundings, active volcanoes make it a popular destination for tourists, surfers and volcanologists.
Because of its central location in the Pacific and 19th-century labor migration, Hawaii's culture is influenced by North American and East Asian cultures, in addition to its indigenous Hawaiian culture. Hawaii has over a million permanent residents, along with many visitors and U. S. military personnel. Its capital is Honolulu on the island of Oʻahu. Hawaii is the 8th-smallest and the 11th-least populous, but the 13th-most densely populated of the 50 U. S. states. It is the only state with an Asian plurality; the state's oceanic coastline is about 750 miles long, the fourth longest in the U. S. after the coastlines of Alaska and California. The state of Hawaii derives its name from the name of Hawaiʻi. A common Hawaiian explanation of the name of Hawaiʻi is that it was named for Hawaiʻiloa, a legendary figure from Hawaiian myth, he is said to have discovered the islands. The Hawaiian language word Hawaiʻi is similar to Proto-Polynesian *Sawaiki, with the reconstructed meaning "homeland". Cognates of Hawaiʻi are found in other Polynesian languages, including Māori and Samoan.
According to linguists Pukui and Elbert, "lsewhere in Polynesia, Hawaiʻi or a cognate is the name of the underworld or of the ancestral home, but in Hawaii, the name has no meaning". A somewhat divisive political issue arose in 1978 when the Constitution of the State of Hawaii added Hawaiian as a second official state language; the title of the state constitution is The Constitution of the State of Hawaii. Article XV, Section 1 of the Constitution uses The State of Hawaii. Diacritics were not used because the document, drafted in 1949, predates the use of the ʻokina and the kahakō in modern Hawaiian orthography; the exact spelling of the state's name in the Hawaiian language is Hawaiʻi. In the Hawaii Admission Act that granted Hawaiian statehood, the federal government recognized Hawaii as the official state name. Official government publications and office titles, the Seal of Hawaii use the traditional spelling with no symbols for glottal stops or vowel length. In contrast, the National and State Parks Services, the University of Hawaiʻi and some private enterprises implement these symbols.
No precedent for changes to U. S. state names exists since the adoption of the United States Constitution in 1789. However, the Constitution of Massachusetts formally changed the Province of Massachusetts Bay to the Commonwealth of Massachusetts in 1780, in 1819, the Territory of Arkansaw was created but was admitted to statehood as the State of Arkansas. There are eight main Hawaiian islands; the island of Niʻihau is managed by brothers Bruce and Keith Robinson. Access to uninhabited Kahoʻolawe island is restricted; the Hawaiian archipelago is located 2,000 mi southwest of the contiguous United States. Hawaii is the southernmost U. S. the second westernmost after Alaska. Hawaii, like Alaska, does not border any other U. S. state. It is the only U. S. state, not geographically located in North America, the only state surrounded by water and, an archipelago, the only state in which coffee is commercially cultivable. In addition to the eight main islands, the state has many smaller islets. Kaʻula is a small island near Niʻihau.
The Northwest Hawaiian Islands is a group of nine small, older islands to the northwest of Kauaʻi that extend from Nihoa to Kure Atoll. Across the archipelago are around 130 small rocks and islets, such as Molokini, which are either volcanic, marine sedimentary or erosional in origin. Hawaii's tallest mountain Mauna Kea is 13,796 ft above mean sea level; the Hawaiian islands were formed by volcanic activity initiated at an undersea magma source called the Hawaii hotspot. The process is continuing to build islands; because of the hotspot's location, all active land volcanoes are located on the southern half of Hawaii Island. The newest volcano, Lōʻihi Seamount, is located south of the coast of Hawaii Island; the last volcanic eruption outside Hawaii Island occurred
Philippines
The Philippines the Republic of the Philippines, is an archipelagic country in Southeast Asia. Situated in the western Pacific Ocean, it consists of about 7,641 islands that are categorized broadly under three main geographical divisions from north to south: Luzon and Mindanao; the capital city of the Philippines is Manila and the most populous city is Quezon City, both part of Metro Manila. Bounded by the South China Sea on the west, the Philippine Sea on the east and the Celebes Sea on the southwest, the Philippines shares maritime borders with Taiwan to the north, Vietnam to the west, Palau to the east, Malaysia and Indonesia to the south; the Philippines' location on the Pacific Ring of Fire and close to the equator makes the Philippines prone to earthquakes and typhoons, but endows it with abundant natural resources and some of the world's greatest biodiversity. The Philippines has an area of 300,000 km2, according to the Philippines Statistical Authority and the WorldBank and, as of 2015, had a population of at least 100 million.
As of January 2018, it is the eighth-most populated country in Asia and the 12th most populated country in the world. 10 million additional Filipinos lived overseas, comprising one of the world's largest diasporas. Multiple ethnicities and cultures are found throughout the islands. In prehistoric times, Negritos were some of the archipelago's earliest inhabitants, they were followed by successive waves of Austronesian peoples. Exchanges with Malay, Indian and Chinese nations occurred. Various competing maritime states were established under the rule of datus, rajahs and lakans; the arrival of Ferdinand Magellan, a Portuguese explorer leading a fleet for the Spanish, in Homonhon, Eastern Samar in 1521 marked the beginning of Hispanic colonization. In 1543, Spanish explorer Ruy López de Villalobos named the archipelago Las Islas Filipinas in honor of Philip II of Spain. With the arrival of Miguel López de Legazpi from Mexico City, in 1565, the first Hispanic settlement in the archipelago was established.
The Philippines became part of the Spanish Empire for more than 300 years. This resulted in Catholicism becoming the dominant religion. During this time, Manila became the western hub of the trans-Pacific trade connecting Asia with Acapulco in the Americas using Manila galleons; as the 19th century gave way to the 20th, the Philippine Revolution followed, which spawned the short-lived First Philippine Republic, followed by the bloody Philippine–American War. The war, as well as the ensuing cholera epidemic, resulted in the deaths of thousands of combatants as well as tens of thousands of civilians. Aside from the period of Japanese occupation, the United States retained sovereignty over the islands until after World War II, when the Philippines was recognized as an independent nation. Since the unitary sovereign state has had a tumultuous experience with democracy, which included the overthrow of a dictatorship by a non-violent revolution; the Philippines is a founding member of the United Nations, World Trade Organization, Association of Southeast Asian Nations, the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation forum, the East Asia Summit.
It hosts the headquarters of the Asian Development Bank. The Philippines is considered to be an emerging market and a newly industrialized country, which has an economy transitioning from being based on agriculture to one based more on services and manufacturing. Along with East Timor, the Philippines is one of Southeast Asia's predominantly Christian nations; the Philippines was named in honor of King Philip II of Spain. Spanish explorer Ruy López de Villalobos, during his expedition in 1542, named the islands of Leyte and Samar Felipinas after the then-Prince of Asturias; the name Las Islas Filipinas would be used to cover all the islands of the archipelago. Before that became commonplace, other names such as Islas del Poniente and Magellan's name for the islands San Lázaro were used by the Spanish to refer to the islands; the official name of the Philippines has changed several times in the course of its history. During the Philippine Revolution, the Malolos Congress proclaimed the establishment of the República Filipina or the Philippine Republic.
From the period of the Spanish–American War and the Philippine–American War until the Commonwealth period, American colonial authorities referred to the country as the Philippine Islands, a translation of the Spanish name. Since the end of World War II, the official name of the country has been the Republic of the Philippines. Philippines has gained currency as the common name since being the name used in Article VI of the 1898 Treaty of Paris, with or without the definite article. Discovery in 2018 of stone tools and fossils of butchered animal remains in Rizal, Kalinga has pushed back evidence of early hominins in the archipelago to as early as 709,000 years. However, the metatarsal of the Callao Man, reliably dated by uranium-series dating to 67,000 years ago remains the oldest human remnant found in the archipelago to date; this distinction belonged to the Tabon Man of Palawan, carbon-dated to around 26,500 years ago. Negritos were among the archipelago's earliest inhabitants, but their first settlement in the Philippines has not been reliably dated.
There are several opposing theories regarding the origins of ancient Filipinos. F. Landa Jocano theorizes. Wilhelm Solheim's Island Origin Theory postulates that the peopling of the archipelago transpired via trade networks originating in the Sundaland area around
Los Angeles
Los Angeles the City of Los Angeles and known by its initials L. A. is the most populous city in California, the second most populous city in the United States, after New York City, the third most populous city in North America. With an estimated population of four million, Los Angeles is the cultural and commercial center of Southern California; the city is known for its Mediterranean climate, ethnic diversity and the entertainment industry, its sprawling metropolis. Los Angeles is the largest city on the West Coast of North America. Los Angeles is in a large basin bounded by the Pacific Ocean on one side and by mountains as high as 10,000 feet on the other; the city proper, which covers about 469 square miles, is the seat of Los Angeles County, the most populated county in the country. Los Angeles is the principal city of the Los Angeles metropolitan area, the second largest in the United States after that of New York City, with a population of 13.1 million. It is part of the Los Angeles-Long Beach combined statistical area the nation's second most populous area with a 2015 estimated population of 18.7 million.
Los Angeles is one of the most substantial economic engines within the United States, with a diverse economy in a broad range of professional and cultural fields. Los Angeles is famous as the home of Hollywood, a major center of the world entertainment industry. A global city, it has been ranked 6th in the Global Cities Index and 9th in the Global Economic Power Index; the Los Angeles metropolitan area has a gross metropolitan product of $1.044 trillion, making it the third-largest in the world, after the Tokyo and New York metropolitan areas. Los Angeles hosted the 1932 and 1984 Summer Olympics and will host the event for a third time in 2028; the city hosted the Miss Universe pageant twice, in 1990 and 2006, was one of 9 American cities to host the 1994 FIFA men's soccer World Cup and one of 8 to host the 1999 FIFA women's soccer World Cup, hosting the final match for both tournaments. Home to the Chumash and Tongva, Los Angeles was claimed by Juan Rodríguez Cabrillo for Spain in 1542 along with the rest of what would become Alta California.
The city was founded on September 4, 1781, by Spanish governor Felipe de Neve. It became a part of Mexico in 1821 following the Mexican War of Independence. In 1848, at the end of the Mexican–American War, Los Angeles and the rest of California were purchased as part of the Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo, becoming part of the United States. Los Angeles was incorporated as a municipality on April 4, 1850, five months before California achieved statehood; the discovery of oil in the 1890s brought rapid growth to the city. The completion of the Los Angeles Aqueduct in 1913, delivering water from Eastern California assured the city's continued rapid growth; the Los Angeles coastal area was settled by the Chumash tribes. A Gabrieleño settlement in the area was called iyáangẚ, meaning "poison oak place". Maritime explorer Juan Rodríguez Cabrillo claimed the area of southern California for the Spanish Empire in 1542 while on an official military exploring expedition moving north along the Pacific coast from earlier colonizing bases of New Spain in Central and South America.
Gaspar de Portolà and Franciscan missionary Juan Crespí, reached the present site of Los Angeles on August 2, 1769. In 1771, Franciscan friar Junípero Serra directed the building of the Mission San Gabriel Arcángel, the first mission in the area. On September 4, 1781, a group of forty-four settlers known as "Los Pobladores" founded the pueblo they called El Pueblo de Nuestra Señora la Reina de los Ángeles,'The Town of Our Lady the Queen of the Angels'; the present-day city has the largest Roman Catholic Archdiocese in the United States. Two-thirds of the Mexican or settlers were mestizo or mulatto, a mixture of African and European ancestry; the settlement remained a small ranch town for decades, but by 1820, the population had increased to about 650 residents. Today, the pueblo is commemorated in the historic district of Los Angeles Pueblo Plaza and Olvera Street, the oldest part of Los Angeles. New Spain achieved its independence from the Spanish Empire in 1821, the pueblo continued as a part of Mexico.
During Mexican rule, Governor Pío Pico made Los Angeles Alta California's regional capital. Mexican rule ended during the Mexican–American War: Americans took control from the Californios after a series of battles, culminating with the signing of the Treaty of Cahuenga on January 13, 1847. Railroads arrived with the completion of the transcontinental Southern Pacific line to Los Angeles in 1876 and the Santa Fe Railroad in 1885. Petroleum was discovered in the city and surrounding area in 1892, by 1923, the discoveries had helped California become the country's largest oil producer, accounting for about one-quarter of the world's petroleum output. By 1900, the population had grown to more than 102,000; the completion of the Los Angeles Aqueduct in 1913, under the supervision of William Mulholland, assured the continued growth of the city. Due to clauses in the city's charter that prevented the City of Los Angeles from selling or providing water from the aqueduct to any area outside its borders, many adjacent city and communities became compelled to annex themselves into Los Angeles.
Los Angeles created the first municipal zoning ordinance in the United States. On September 14, 1908, the Los Angeles City Council promulgated residential and industrial land use zones; the new ordinance established three residential zones of a single type, where industrial uses were
Imperial Japanese Navy
The Imperial Japanese Navy was the navy of the Empire of Japan from 1868 until 1945, when it was dissolved following Japan's surrender in World War II. The Japan Maritime Self-Defense Force was formed after the dissolution of the IJN; the Imperial Japanese Navy was the third largest navy in the world by 1920, behind the Royal Navy and the United States Navy. It was supported by the Imperial Japanese Navy Air Service for aircraft and airstrike operation from the fleet, it was the primary opponent of the Western Allies in the Pacific War. The origins of the Imperial Japanese Navy go back to early interactions with nations on the Asian continent, beginning in the early medieval period and reaching a peak of activity during the 16th and 17th centuries at a time of cultural exchange with European powers during the Age of Discovery. After two centuries of stagnation during the country's ensuing seclusion policy under the shōgun of the Edo period, Japan's navy was comparatively backward when the country was forced open to trade by American intervention in 1854.
This led to the Meiji Restoration. Accompanying the re-ascendance of the Emperor came a period of frantic modernization and industrialization; the navy had several successes, sometimes against much more powerful enemies such as in the Sino-Japanese War and the Russo-Japanese War, before being destroyed in World War II. Japan has a long history of naval interaction with the Asian continent, involving transportation of troops between Korea and Japan, starting at least with the beginning of the Kofun period in the 3rd century. Following the attempts at Mongol invasions of Japan by Kubilai Khan in 1274 and 1281, Japanese wakō became active in plundering the coast of China. Japan undertook major naval building efforts in the 16th century, during the Warring States period, when feudal rulers vying for supremacy built vast coastal navies of several hundred ships. Around that time Japan may have developed one of the first ironclad warships when Oda Nobunaga, a daimyō, had six iron-covered Oatakebune made in 1576.
In 1588 Toyotomi Hideyoshi issued a ban on Wakō piracy. Japan built her first large ocean-going warships in the beginning of the 17th century, following contacts with the Western nations during the Nanban trade period. In 1613, the daimyō of Sendai, in agreement with the Tokugawa Bakufu, built Date Maru, a 500-ton galleon-type ship that transported the Japanese embassy of Hasekura Tsunenaga to the Americas, which continued to Europe. From 1604 the Bakufu commissioned about 350 Red seal ships armed and incorporating some Western technologies for Southeast Asian trade. For more than 200 years, beginning in the 1640s, the Japanese policy of seclusion forbade contacts with the outside world and prohibited the construction of ocean-going ships on pain of death. Contacts were maintained, with the Dutch through the port of Nagasaki, the Chinese through Nagasaki and the Ryukyus and Korea through intermediaries with Tsushima; the study of Western sciences, called "rangaku" through the Dutch enclave of Dejima in Nagasaki led to the transfer of knowledge related to the Western technological and scientific revolution which allowed Japan to remain aware of naval sciences, such as cartography and mechanical sciences.
Seclusion, led to loss of any naval and maritime traditions the nation possessed. Apart from Dutch trade ships no other Western vessels were allowed to enter Japanese ports. A notable exception was during the Napoleonic wars. Frictions with foreign ships, started from the beginning of the 19th century; the Nagasaki Harbour Incident involving HMS Phaeton in 1808, other subsequent incidents in the following decades, led the shogunate to enact an Edict to Repel Foreign Vessels. Western ships, which were increasing their presence around Japan due to whaling and the trade with China, began to challenge the seclusion policy; the Morrison Incident in 1837 and news of China's defeat during the Opium War led the shogunate to repeal the law to execute foreigners, instead to adopt the Order for the Provision of Firewood and Water. The shogunate began to strengthen the nation's coastal defenses. Many Japanese realized that traditional ways would not be sufficient to repel further intrusions, western knowledge was utilized through the Dutch at Dejima to reinforce Japan's capability to repel the foreigners.
Numerous attempts to open Japan ended in failure, in part to Japanese resistance, until the early 1850s. During 1853 and 1854, American warships under the command of Commodore Matthew Perry entered Edo Bay and made demonstrations of force requesting trade negotiations. After two hundred years of seclusion, the 1854 Convention of Kanagawa led to the opening of Japan to international trade and interaction; this was soon followed by treaties with other powers. As soon as Japan opened up to foreign influences, the Tokugawa shogunate recognized the vulnerability of the country from the sea and initiated an active policy of assimilation and adoption of Western naval technologies. In 1855, with Dutch assistance, the shogunate acquired its first steam warship, Kankō Maru, began using it for training, establishing a Naval Training Center at Nagasaki. Samurai such as the future Admiral Enomoto Takeaki were sent by the shogunate to study in the Netherlands for several years. In 1859 the
Motor Torpedo Boat
Motor Torpedo Boat was the name given to fast torpedo boats by the Royal Navy and the Royal Canadian Navy. The'motor' in the formal designation, referring to the use of petrol engines, was to distinguish them from the majority of other naval craft that used steam turbines or reciprocating steam engines; the capitalised term is used for the Royal Navy boats and abbreviated to "MTB". During the Second World War, the US Navy boats were called by their hull classification symbol of "PT", are covered under PT boat although the class type were still "motor torpedo boats". German motor torpedo boats of the Second World War were called S-boote by the Kriegsmarine and "E-boats" by the Allies. Italian MTBs of this period were known as Motoscafo Armato Silurante. French MTBs were known as vedettes lance torpilles. Soviet MTBs were known as торпедные катеры. Romanian MTBs were known as vedete torpiloare. After the end of the War in 1945, a number of the Royal Navy's MTBs were stripped and the empty hulls sold for use as houseboats.
MTBs were designed for high speed, operating at night, low speed ambush and manoeuvrability on the water. With no significant armour, the boats relied upon surprise and their agility at high speed to avoid being hit by gunfire from bigger ships; the British and Italian navies started developing such vessels in the early 20th century, shortly before the beginning of the First World War. Italian MAS boats were comparatively small, at 20-30 tons displacement. MAS 15 was the only motor torpedo boat in history to sink a battleship, the Austro-Hungarian vessel Szent István in 1918. British torpedo boats of the First World War were small at only around 15 tons and were known as Coastal Motor Boats. In the Second World War, British MTBs were operated by Coastal Forces. A similar size boat with a different role in the Second World War was the BPB 63 ft High Speed Launch used by the RAF; the last MTBs in the Royal Navy were the two Brave-class fast patrol boats of 1958 which were capable of 50 knots. Many boats designated MTBs.
A variety of designs were built. For instance, a 55 ft type, capable of 40 kn, was shown in 1930; the Vosper private boat was designed by Commander Peter Du Cane CBE, the managing director of Vosper Ltd, in 1936. She was completed and launched in 1937, she was bought by the Admiralty and taken into service with the Royal Navy as MTB 102. Length: 68 ft Beam: 19 ft 9 in Draft: 3 ft 9 in, Powerplant: 3 Isotta Fraschini 57-litre petrol engines Power: 3,300 hp Speed: 48 kn, 43 kn Crew: 2 officers, 10 men. Armament: Two 21 in torpedo tubes MTB 102 was the fastest wartime British naval vessel in service, she was at Dunkirk for the evacuation and carried Winston Churchill and Dwight Eisenhower when they reviewed the fleet before the Invasion of Normandy. They were based on the British Power Boat rescue craft and were designed for the Royal Air Force but reduced to 60 ft in length, they could achieve a maximum speed of 33 kn. The Royal Navy ordered their first in 1936; these entered service as MTB numbers 1 to 12 and 14 to 19.
In the early days of the war, they were painted with different numbers and photos distributed to the press to give the impression the Royal Navy had more than they did. One photo was sent to the American monthly Popular Science showing the number twenty-three. Although various boat lengths were produced by Vosper for the Royal Navy, the "70 ft" boat was produced from 1940; the design was produced with modifications as MTBs 31-40, 57-66, 73-98, 222-245, 347-362, 380-395 and 523-537. Using three Packard V1-12 marine engines, they were capable of around 37 kn. Early models carried two 21-inch torpedo tubes, two 0.50 in machine guns and two 0.303 in machine guns. They could carry four depth charges. Between 1943 and 1945, two Vosper designs appeared, the "Vosper Type I 73ft" and the Type II. Length: 73 ft Engine: 3 Packard 12M engines for a total of 4,200 hp Speed: 40 knots Range: 470 nmi at 20 knots Displacement: 47 t Armament: Four 18-inch torpedo tubes Oerlikon 20 mm cannon Two 0.303 in Vickers K machine guns Crew: 13 This design remained in use after the war.
Length 73 ft Engine 4,200 hp Speed 40 knots Range 480 nmi at 20 knots Displacement 49 t Armament Two 18-inch torpedoes QF 6 pdr Mark IIA 20mm Oerlikon Two 0.303 Vickers MG Crew 13 These boats were used by the Royal Canadian Navy 29th MTB Flotilla. Designed as Motor Gun Boats carrying a 6-pounder to engage enemy small craft, they were re-designated Motor Torpedo Boats. Scott-Paine Type G 70 foot boat. Manufacturer: British Power Boats, Hythe Displacement: 55 tons Overall length: 72 ft 6 inches Breadth: 20 ft 7 inches Draught: 5 ft 8 inches Maximum speed: 38–41 kn Armament: auto-loading QF 6-pounder gun Two 21-inch torpedo tubes.303 or.50 Vickers machine guns 20mm Oerlikon or 40 mm Bofors gun Powerplant - three Rolls-Royce or Packard 14M supercharged V-1
Fort Hancock, New Jersey
Fort Hancock is a former United States Army fort at Sandy Hook in Middletown Township New Jersey. The coastal artillery base defended the Atlantic coast and the entrance to New York Harbor, with its first gun batteries operational in 1896. Between 1874 and 1919, the adjacent US Army Sandy Hook Proving Ground was operated in conjunction with Fort Hancock, it is now part of Fort Hancock Memorial Park. It was preceded by the Fort at Sandy Hook, built 1857–1867 and demolished beginning in 1885; the Sandy Hook Light, built in 1764 and the oldest working lighthouse in the United States, is located on the grounds of Fort Hancock. The Sandy Hook area was first fortified as part of the third system of US fortifications. Construction on the Fort at Sandy Hook began in 1857 and ceased in 1867, with the fort serviceable though incomplete; this fort was never named, but since the area was named Fort Hancock in 1895 it is called by that name. It was sometimes locally called Fort Hudson. Two tower forts were proposed, but a much larger single fort was decided on instead.
The initial design of the fort was by then-Captain Robert E. Lee of the Army Corps of Engineers; the fort was designed as a five-bastion irregular pentagon, with two tiers of cannon totaling 173 guns on three seacoast fronts, with another 39 guns covering the landward approaches. As was common in Third System forts in the Northeast, it was built of granite. At some point, with the casemate tier of the three seacoast fronts complete, the fort was redesigned to speed its overall completion by eliminating the landward bastion and simplifying its neighboring bastions. Following the Civil War, it was determined that masonry forts were vulnerable to rifled guns, funding for their construction was cut off in 1867; the fort remained incomplete until 1885, when all of it was cannibalized to build the Sandy Hook Proving Ground, the new Fort Hancock, supporting structures such as a seawall. A small portion of one wall remains in place with four cannon ports. In 1874 the Sandy Hook Proving Ground was established as a weapons testing area for coast defense weapons.
This was organizationally separate from Fort Hancock. In 1890 construction began on the artillery batteries at Fort Hancock, named for Major General Winfield Scott Hancock in 1895; these resulted from the large-scale Endicott Program, which in 1885 proposed a new, comprehensive system of forts defending port cities. Fort Hancock was one of the first forts prototyped several weapon installations; the first batteries begun at Fort Hancock were Battery Potter and Battery Reynolds the "Gun Lift Battery" and the "Sandy Hook Mortar Battery", both of which were built with high walls all around for land defense, a feature not found in most subsequent US installations. Battery Potter Battery Potter was the prototype battery for the steam-hydraulic "gun lift" carriage; the Endicott Program centered on disappearing guns, which would remain concealed behind a concrete-and-earth parapet until raised to fire. Most of the weapons in the program were mounted on Buffington-Crozier disappearing carriages. However, early on there was doubt that this carriage could raise and lower a 12-inch gun.
The alternative developed for this was the gun lift carriage a barbette carriage mounted on a hydraulic elevator. A steam plant powered the hydraulic system. One advantage of the gun lift carriage not found in most US disappearing gun installations was 360° all-around fire. Battery Potter received its first gun in 1892 and was completed in 1894, but for some reason was not accepted for service until 1898 due to extensive testing; the gun lift system proved expensive to build and operate, as the steam plant had to be running continuously to provide pressure for elevator operation. Other early 12-inch gun installations were on simple non-disappearing barbette carriages until the M1896 Buffington-Crozier carriage was developed for the 12-inch gun. Although a few installations such as Battery Torbert at Fort Delaware were begun as gun lift batteries, these were completed with disappearing guns, Battery Potter was the only gun lift battery completed. In 1903 Battery Potter was named for a Civil War general.
By 1907 several additional batteries were built at Fort Hancock, with the construction of Battery Arrowsmith under way to cover its sector, Battery Potter was disarmed. Three spare gun lift carriages were modified as barbette carriages, designated Altered Gun Lift Carriage M1897, emplaced at Fort Flagler and Fort Worden in the Puget Sound area of Washington state. Battery Reynolds Battery Reynolds was a battery of 16 12-inch mortars in the "Abbot Quad" arrangement; this was designed to place the mortars as together as possible, in the hope of scoring multiple hits on an enemy ship by firing simultaneously. The battery had four pits in a square arrangement, with four mortars per pit in a square; the pits were separated by walls and were surrounded by a high concrete wall covered with earth for land defense. This arrangement was used at a number of Endicott forts; however reloading the mortars in each pit proved cumbersome, in forts the pits were arranged in a line with open backs. Initial constructionBy 1909 the following batteries were constructed: Facilities for planting and controlling an underwater minefield were built as well.
Battery Dyn
Harbor Defenses of New York
The Harbor Defenses of New York was a United States Army Coast Artillery Corps harbor defense command. It coordinated the coast defenses of New York City from 1895 to 1950, beginning with the Endicott program, some of which were located in New Jersey; these included both underwater minefields. The command originated circa 1895 as an Artillery District and became the Coast Defenses of Eastern New York and Coast Defenses of Southern New York in 1913. Circa 1915 the Coast Defenses of Sandy Hook separated from the latter command. In 1925 the commands were renamed as Harbor Defense Commands, in 1935 the Harbor Defenses of Eastern New York was entirely disarmed, although retaining the minefield capability; the New York and Sandy Hook commands and the Harbor Defenses of Long Island Sound were unified as the Harbor Defenses of New York on 9 May 1942. Giovanni da Verrazzano, an Italian working for France, is credited with being the first European to explore the New York City area, in 1524, he was followed the next year by a Spanish expedition led by the Portuguese explorer Estêvão Gomes.
In 1542 the French established a fortified trading post known as Fort d'Anormée Berge, in southern Manhattan on an island in a lake called Collect Pond. It is unclear. Dutch settlement of the area began with an expedition in 1609 by Henry Hudson, an Englishman working for the Dutch East India Company, for whom the Hudson River and other places are named. Other Dutch-sponsored explorers soon followed him, with a blockhouse/trading post in Manhattan by 1612. In 1614 Fort Nassau, a factorij or fortified trading post, was established at what is now Albany, New York; this was the first permanent Dutch settlement in the area, by the New Netherland Company as part of the colony of the same name. This colony was established to exploit the North American fur trade, grew over the next forty years with fortified settlements from the South River to what is now Rhode Island. In 1621 the Dutch West India Company took over management of New Netherland and other Dutch possessions in the New World. In 1624, after floods showed that Fort Nassau was untenable, it was replaced with Fort Orange.
In that year, Dutch settlement of what became New York City began with a colony on Noten Eylandt. The next year the colony moved to Manhattoes to establish New Amsterdam, settled since, built Fort Amsterdam to protect themselves. In 1653 the wall at what is now Wall Street was added for protection from potential English attack. In 1655 Peter Stuyvesant led an expedition that subjugated the New Sweden colony along the Delaware River, in that same year a raid by Indian allies of the Swedes in the "Peach Tree War" caused significant damage and loss of life in New Amsterdam and the surrounding area. In 1664 an English expedition arrived in what is now New York Harbor and demanded the colony's surrender. Stuyvesant felt the colony could not defend itself, regretting that his prior requests for troops and defensive resources from the Dutch West India Company had not been met, on 8 September he surrendered New Netherland to the English; the English renamed the city "New York" at this time and established the Province of New York from the former New Netherland establishing the Province of New Jersey the next year.
The colony was named for its nominal ruler, Duke of York, who became King James II of England. Fort Amsterdam was renamed Fort James in his honor. Lingering resentment over the takeover was a cause of the Second Anglo-Dutch War in 1665; this ended with the Treaty of Breda in 1667. In 1673, during the Third Anglo-Dutch War, the Dutch seized New York from the English, but the English regained the colony with the Treaty of Westminster that ended that war; the Signal Hill site on Staten Island at The Narrows known as Fort Wadsworth, was first fortified with a blockhouse by Dutch settler David Pieterszen de Vries in 1636. This blockhouse was destroyed in the Peach Tree War of 1655; the site is said to have been "continuously garrisoned" since another blockhouse was built in 1663 until the fort's closure in 1994, making it the oldest such site in the Thirteen Colonies until that time. The 1663 blockhouse survived at least through 1808. James II proved to be unpopular in England, he was deposed in the "Glorious Revolution" of 1688, being replaced by William and Mary.
Some of James' colonial governors were not replaced, some of these were unpopular in the colonies they governed. Shortly before James' overthrow New England, New York, New Jersey were combined as the Dominion of New England, with Edmund Andros as governor in Boston and Francis Nicholson as lieutenant governor in New York. In 1689 many of the locally recruited militia in both cities revolted as the Boston Revolt in April and Leisler's Rebellion at the end of May. Both Andros and Nicholson were imprisoned, the New England colonies re-established their governments. In Boston the rebellion was soon over, but in New York Jacob Leisler acted as de facto governor of the province for nearly two years; the French took advantage of the situation by raiding Schenectady with their Indian allies in February 1690, causing Leisler to divert most of his resources to an unsuccessful retaliatory expedition against New France. On 19 March 1691 the newly appointed royal governor Henry Sloughter arrived in New York and imprisoned Leisler and several of the rebellion's leaders.
Leisler and one other were executed on 16 May. The
