Built over the course of two years in Newport News, Virginia, the battleship USS Indiana was formally launched by Mrs. Lewis C. Robbins, IU alumna and daughter of then-Indiana governor Henry Shricker, on the 21st day of November, 1941 before a crowd of 10,000 people. A delegation of more than 500 Hoosiers made the trip in two special 16-car trains to witness the Indiana’s christening. The launch was labeled “perfect” by veteran shipbuilders. Few suspected how soon the USS Indiana would be called into action and how important her role would come to be.
Sixteen days later, Japan mounted its attack on Pearl Harbor and assured the United States’ entry into World War II. With the Navy’s fleet severely damaged, the USS Indiana was quickly put through her initial trials and commissioned by late April 1942, when she immediately embarked to the South Pacific to protect naval aircraft carriers and support American advances. Able to hit speeds of more than 27 knots, carrying more than 1,000 sailors, and ultimately armed with 128 guns ranging from 20 millimeters to 16 inches, the USS Indiana was one of the Navy’s fastest and most powerful ships to serve in the war.
The ship went on to earn nine battle stars for her critical role in successful campaigns in the Marianas and Marshall Islands, Iwo Jima, Okinawa, and beyond. More than 5,600 men served aboard the Indiana during World War II, helping her fend off kamikaze attacks and even riding out a typhoon during her many trips across the Pacific for the ship’s various defensive and offensive operations, with crew ultimately participating in the Japanese surrender at Tokyo Bay aboard the USS Missouri (BB-63) in 1945. The Indiana then returned to the United States and was stationed on the west coast before being placed in service on reserve in 1946 and finally decommissioned in 1947.
In 1962, the Navy struck the USS Indiana from its official list. The following year, she was sold for scrap, with key relics being salvaged for displays throughout the country.
Indiana University received the mainmast and accompanying 40 millimeter turrets as a gift from the Navy in 1966, meant to “stand as a memorial for the sons and daughters of the state of Indiana who have so gallantly served our nation.” Dedicated that year by Elvis Stahr, then president of IU and previously Secretary of the Army, these artifacts have been on display at Memorial Stadium ever since.
Nearly 50 years later, on September 7, 2013, Indiana University welcomed another addition to its USS Indiana installation: the prow of the ship. The journey of the Indiana’s prow to campus began in 2012, when a Bloomington resident spotted it gracing the parking lot of Spenger’s Fresh Fish Grotto, a seafood restaurant in Berkeley, California. Through alumni support and private donations, as well as the generosity of the Spenger family, IU was able to obtain the prow and transport it to campus. It has been completely refurbished, and like Memorial Stadium, which was named in honor of our nation’s veterans, the prow provides a significant reminder of the heroic actions of those who have served our country under the most difficult circumstances. (To get a sense of how the size of the prow compares to the size of the ship, please see the USS Indiana under construction photo in the gallery.)
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