I invite you to help us commemorate a part of Mare Island's rich maritime and military history. It is a sad and yet triumphant story in which hundreds and maybe thousands of Mare Island shipyard workers played a role. The USS Wahoo (SS 238) was launched from Berth 19, February 14, 1942. She was surely WWII's most famous submarine. After 7 war patrols in the Pacific during 1942 and 1943, she was lost at sea with her crew of 80 men including Commander Dudley "Mush" Morton (our Morton Field is named in his honor) on October 11, 1943. It was tragic news for the country and, particularly for the families of the crew and those who just the year before had built her here at Mare Island Naval Shipyard. In July 2006 Russian dive crews located and photographed her in her final resting place in the Soya (La Perouse) Strait between Hokkaido Japan and the Russian island of Sakhalin in Russian waters.

On the 64th anniversary of her loss, October 11, 2007 a memorial for the families, friends and former crews of the Wahoo will be held at the USS Bowfin Submarine Museum & Park at Pearl Harbor, Hawaii. I invite you to attend one or all of the memorial services that we are planning at Mare Island on that same day. Whether you or a member of your family or a neighbor or friend worked at the base during that time, or if you have served as a submariner, or maybe you never knew the story of the Wahoo or have just forgotten, you are welcome to join us in paying our respects to her crew and their families.

I was myself, introduced to the story of the Wahoo by a former submariner who still works here on Mare Island. When he learned last summer that after a great deal of effort, her final resting place had been found, he excitedly showed me the underwater photos. I was deeply moved and vowed that I would help to honor the crew of the Wahoo and those who built her here. Like the other events we at Arc Ecology host on Mare Island, we believe that it is our special calling to help all of us remember the stories of Mare Island's past and to ensure the public's access to and enjoyment of the island, today. I know you and others share my belief. While I would love to represent our community in Hawaii in October, or encourage someone to go there on our community's behalf, what I feel is most important for us, is to hold a memorial service here.

I hope you will join us for the flag-raising in honor of Commander Morton and the crew of the Wahoo at Morton Field on Mare Island, October 11, 2007 at 1pm, followed by a service of music, history and memories at St. Peter's Chapel, 2-4pm. Immediately following the service a reception is planned next door at Quarters H and finally in the evening beginning at 5:30pm, join us as we lay a wreath in Mare Island Strait at Berth 6 where the Wahoo was moored for overhaul in her visits to Mare Island between patrols. On behalf of Arc Ecology, I invite you to join me in honoring not only the crew of the Wahoo, but all submariners and their families. There are many submariners who live in the region still, and who worked at the Shipyard. And, I know many family members of those submariners who are now "on eternal patrol", live in the region, too. Just as significantly, we aim to honor the countless "yard birds" who built and repaired the vessels that are forever in our collective hearts and memories. We will honor all of these good people.

My association with the Shipyard when it was an active Navy base was only as a volunteer, but I have learned to love this place and the people who toiled and served this country, here. I do believe that this community deserves the opportunity to remember and to embrace one of the sources of their justifiable pride in work well done over the past more than 150 years.

Together, we will create a memorial to celebrate the spirit of those who built and served aboard the Wahoo and other submarine boats. May the spirit of the Wahoo and her crew together with the thousands of other submariners "on eternal patrol" sense our embrace across the waters and may we never forget what lengths they and others who have gone before us went to, that we might enjoy freedom. And, just as importantly, this is an opportunity to send our collective desire for protection for those women and men who today are in harm's way.

My warmest regards,

Myrna Hayes, Coordinator
Wahoo Mare Island Memorial
On behalf of Arc Ecology