Tuckahoe, 1935
WYT / WYTM 89
Any of various plants or plant parts used by Native Americans as food, especially the edible rootstocks of certain arums or the sclerotium of certain fungi.
Builder: Charleston Navy Yard, Charleston, South Carolina
Length: 110' 6"
Beam: 24'
Draft: 12' 6"
Displacement: 290 tons
Cost: $236,000
Commissioned: 30 January 1935
Decommissioned: 14 November 1968
Disposition: Transferred to DHEW
Machinery: 1 General Electric motor connected to 2 General Electric generators driven by 2 McIntosh Seymour 6-cylinder diesel engines; 800 SHP
Performance & Endurance:
Max: 12.0 knots
Cruising: 10.0 knots; 1,500 mile range
Complement: 16 (1938)
Armament: None (peacetime); 2 x 20mm/80; 2 depth charge tracks (1944)
Electronics: MR-3A (1961)
History:
Tuckahoe was one of four 110-foot Calumet-class tugs that entered Coast Guard service in the mid-1930s. They were designed for light-icebreaking and fire-fighting as well as traditional tug operations. The design proved to be so successful that the next three subsequent classes of tugs constructed for Coast Guard service closely followed the Calumet-class design.
Tuckahoe was initially stationed at Charleston, South Carolina and transferred to New Orleans, Louisiana in 1940, where she served until 1946. She was used for customs boardings, law enforcement, and search and rescue. At the outbreak of World War II, she was assigned to the Gulf Sea Frontier and remained based at New Orleans. She rescued nine survivors from the tanker Portrero del Llamo on 14 May 1942. On 18 May 1942 she assisted in towing the torpedoed tanker William C. McTarnahan.
In 1946 she was transferred to New York, New York. On 24 May 1957 she assisted a sightseeing boat aground off the Statue of Liberty. On 11 November 1965 she assisted in fighting a fire on board the Liberian tanker Joan in Bayonne, New Jersey. On 16 June 1966 she assisted following the collision between the tankers Texaco Massachusetts and the Alva Cape in Newark Channel. On 8 July 1966 she helped fight a fire at the Hess Oil Plant in Perth Amboy, New Jersey. On 25 December 1967 she helped fight a fire on the Norwegian M/V Dianet in New York Harbor. On 18 October 1968 she assisted following the collision between the tanker Samuel H. Herron and the sludge barge Newton Creek in New York Harbor.
She was decommissioned on 14 November 1968 and was then transferred to the Department of Health, Education and Welfare on 16 April 1969.
Sources:
Cutter History File. USCG Historian's Office, USCG HQ, Washington, D.C.
Donald Canney. U.S. Coast Guard and Revenue Cutters, 1790-1935. Annapolis, MD: Naval Institute Press, 1995.
Robert Scheina. U.S. Coast Guard Cutters & Craft of World War II. Annapolis, MD: Naval Institute Press, 1982.
Robert Scheina. U.S. Coast Guard Cutters & Craft, 1946-1990. Annapolis, MD: Naval Institute Press, 1990.
U.S. Coast Guard. Record of Movements: Vessels of the United States Coast Guard: 1790 - December 31, 1933. Washington, DC: U.S. Government Printing Office, 1934; 1989 (reprint).