USS ANTIETAM

The USS Antietam was built at Philadelphia’s Navy Yard and commissioned in January 1945. The ship was named for the 1862 Battle of Antietam during the American Civil War. She was in route to the Pacific war zone when Japan surrendered in August 1945. After serving the next few years in the Pacific, she came back to the US and decommissioned in 1949.

Two years later, with the Korean War escalating, she was brought back and recommissioned in January 1951. She served a single deployment to Korea in late 1951 into early 1952. Later in 1952, the ship was the first US Navy aircraft carrier to get the new angled flight deck. She became the blueprint for that type of modernization on the rest of the carrier fleet.

In October 1952, she received a new classification as an attack carrier (CVA-36). The next year, that classification changed again to CVS-36 to reflect her new assignment for anti-submarine aircraft carrier. From 1955 through 1957, Antietam made cruises with the Sixth Fleet into the Mediterranean. After that, she was sent to Pensacola, Florida, to serve as a flight-training carrier. Her last duty there was in October 1962. In May 1963, she was formally decommissioned.