United States Naval Academy history

Lieutenant William Harwar Parker, CSN, class of 1848, and instructor at USNA, joined the Virginia State Navy, and then went on to become the superintendent of the Confederate States Naval Academy.

The present name was adopted when the school was reorganized in 1850 and placed under the supervision of the chief of the Bureau of Ordnance and Hydrography.

The first class of naval academy students graduated on 10 June 1854.

Later that year in August, the model of the USS Somers experiment was resurrected when USS Constitution, then 60 years old, was recommissioned as a school ship for the fourth-class midshipmen after a conversion and refitting begun in 1857.

Almost immediately the three upper classes were detached and ordered to sea, and the remaining elements of the academy were transported to Fort Adams in Newport, Rhode Island by the USS Constitution in April 1861, where the academy was set up in temporary facilities and opened in May.

The midshipmen and faculty returned to Annapolis in the summer of 1865, just after the war ended.

In 1868, the figurehead from USS Delaware, known as "Tecumseh" was erected in the yard.

Class rings were first issued in 1869.

In 1871, color competition began, along with the selection of the color company, and a "color girl."

John H. Conyers of South Carolina was the first African-American admitted on 21 September 1872.

Three cadets were dismissed as a result, but the abuse, including shunning, continued in more subtle forms and Conyers finally resigned in October 1873.

The third class physically hazed the fourth class so ruthlessly that Congress passed an anti-hazing law in 1874.

In 1878, the academy was awarded a gold medal for academics at the Universal Exposition in Paris.

And then in 1879, Robert F. Lopez was the first Hispanic-American to graduate from the academy.

In 1890, Navy adopted the goat mascot after winning its first football game with Army.

In 1905, Isherwood Hall, containing the Department of Marine Engineering, was constructed.

The academy built a modern hospital in 1907, the fourth in sequence, on what is today called "Hospital Point."

In 1910, the academy established its own dairy farm.

Over 100 officers applied for aviation duty prior to August 1911.

They were considered as passed midshipmen until 1912, when graduates were first sworn in as officers.

Navy flight training moved to NAS Pensacola, Florida, in January 1914.

He died on 26 March 1915 and is buried on Hospital Point.

In 1918, the great flu pandemic of 1918 infected about half the brigade (1,000 out of 2,000 men); ten midshipmen died.

At the 1920 summer Olympics men's 8+ rowing competition in Brussels, the Navy Academy rowing men's 8+ (The Wonder Crew) won the gold medal.

In 1925, the Midshipmen Drum and Bugle Corps was formally reestablished.

In 1926, "Navy Blue and Gold", composed by organist and choirmaster J. W. Crosley, was first sung in public.

In the fall of 1929, the Secretary of the Navy gave his approval for graduates to compete for Rhodes Scholarships.

In 1939, the first Yard patrol boat arrived.

In 1940, the academy stopped using Reina Mercedes as a brig for disciplining midshipmen, and restricted them to Bancroft Hall, instead.

In April 1941, superintendent Rear Admiral Russell Willson refused to allow the school's lacrosse team to play a visiting team from Harvard University because the Harvard team included an African-American player.

A total of 3,319 graduates were commissioned during World War II. Doctor Chris Lambertsen held the first closed-circuit oxygen SCUBA course in the United States for the Office of Strategic Services maritime unit at the academy on 17 May 1943.

In 1945, A Department of Aviation was established.

During the century of its existence, roughly 18,563 midshipmen had graduated, including the class of 1946.

On 3 June 1949, Wesley A. Brown, the sixth African-American to enter the academy, became the first to graduate, followed several years later by Lawrence Chambers, who became the first African-American graduate to make flag rank.

The 1950 Navy fencing team won the NCAA national championship.

The Navy eight-man rowing crew won the gold medal at 1952 Summer Olympics in Helsinki, Finland.

In 1955, the tradition of greasing Herndon Monument for plebes to climb to exchange their plebe "dixie cup" covers (hats) for a midshipman's cover started.

In 1957, the moored training ship Reina Mercedes, ruined by a hurricane, was scrapped.

The Navy–Marine Corps Memorial Stadium, funded by donations, was dedicated 26 September 1959.

In 1961, the Naval Academy Foreign Affairs Conference was started.

The 1962 fencing team won the NCAA national championship.

The academy started the Trident Scholar Program in 1963.

Professor Samuel Massie became the first African-American faculty member in 1966.

On 4 June 1969, the first designated engineering degrees were granted to qualified graduates of the Class of 1969.

In 1972, Lieutenant Commander Georgia Clark became the first female officer instructor, and Doctor Rae Jean Goodman was appointed to the faculty as the first civilian woman.

In 1979, the traditional "June Week" was renamed "Commissioning Week" because graduation had been moved earlier to May.

In May 1980, Elizabeth Anne Belzer (later Rowe) became the first woman graduate.

In 1982, Isherwood, Griffin, and Melville Halls were demolished.

On 23 May 1984, Kristine Holderied became the first woman to graduate at the head of the class.

On 29 January 1994, the first genderless service assignment was held.

In August 2007, Superintendent Vice Admiral Jeffrey Fowler changed academy policy to limit liberty, required more squad interaction to emphasize that "we are a nation at war."

In 2017, hospital functions were moved across the Severn.