Artifacts: USS Ranger 1960 Yearbook Ports Okinawa, Hong Kong, Philippines, and SF

The Ranger's tour went to Okinawa.

They visited Hong Kong.

The carrier went to the Philippines. 

Finally, the Ranger headed back home for a warm welcome.

This is a bit of downer, but the yearbook ends with a remembrance of the crew members who died on the cruise.

These are the end pages showing the ship's full tour.

This also brings us to the end of these posts.  This book was a really tremendous artifact to have had.  After taking the pictures, I did give it to a co-worker.  She thought her father would be interested in it, as he was a sailor during this time period.  She reported back that he was enraptured looking at the book.  At one point, he did serve on board the Ranger on another tour.  He said he'd try to find a way to find Seaman Rhodes or his family with his veteran's contacts to pass it along. 

Artifacts: USS Ranger 1960 Yearbook Ports Japan

Much of the Ranger's tour was spent around Japan.

Artifacts: USS Ranger 1960 Yearbook Ports San Francisco, Hawaii, and Guam

The yearbook finished with a scrapbook of the tour's ports of call.  Regrettably, this was mostly just pictures, but the guys on the carrier weren't there as tour guides after all.

The tour started in San Francisco. 

They stopped at Hawaii.

And made a quick stop at Guam.

Artifacts: USS Ranger 1960 Yearbook Air Group Nine Squadrons

Finally, we present the aircraft squadrons aboard the Ranger for this tour.

First up are the big boys, or "Whales" as they called them.  The plane is the  Douglas A-3D Sky Warrior.  It was a carrier-borne strategic nuclear-capable bomber.  This was before sub-based nukes became more prevalent.

The main daytime interceptor for the carrier was the Vought F-8 Crusader flown by the Red Lightning squadron.

This was the squadron that the owner of the yearbook served in.  Stanley Rhodes is in the top left picture.  I was lucky I found him.  There's also a note he put on the next page that one of his pilots was killed flying into a mountain in Japan.

These was also a reconnaissance version of the Crusader used by another unit.

The McDonnell F3H Demon was the nighttime/all-weather interceptor for the carrier.

The Ranger carried two squadrons of Douglas A-4 Skyhawks.  The Skyhawk was an amazingly capable little plane.  It could engage in air-to-air combat, function as a bomber (nuclear-capable even), and act as a fuel tanker.  The Skyhawks were used by the Blue Angels and I saw them perform in person.  This squadron was the Blue Blazers.

This squadron was the Shrikes.

Lastly, we have the Spads.  The Douglas A-1 Skyraider was indeed a prop plane in the jet age.  It was mainly a tactical ground attack bomber, but could also drop torpedoes and act as a fuel tanker.  This was the Sky Knights squadron.

A variant Spad functioned as an airborne radar unit.

Artifacts: USS Ranger 1960 Yearbook Air Group Nine Pictures

Alright, here we go.  The reason for aircraft carriers is to serve as a seaborne airfield.  In this case, there are over 70 aboard.  There are small fighters, large bombers, and even prop planes in its complement.  We'll start off with some pictures of the planes in action.