Historic Landmarks

 

  Please search the image and resource galleries at the bottom of the page for images, articles, documents and publications detailing Coast Guard Landmarks (lighthouses, stations, units, etc)

 

Life-Saving Service & Coast Guard Stations

 

  

Coast Guard Air Stations

In March 1920 the Coast Guard's first air station was established at Morehead City, North Carolina, when the service took over the abandoned naval air station and borrowed four Curtiss HS-2L flying-boats and two Aeromarine Model 40s from the U.S. Navy.  However, funds were not provided to support the operation and the station was closed.  During 1925 LCDR C. G. von Paulsen, USCG borrowed a Vought UO-1 seaplane from the U.S. Navy and, operating from Squantum, Massachusetts and later Ten Pound Island in Gloucester Harbor, he demonstrated the potential of aviation in combating the smuggling of whiskey.

With an appropriation of money by Congress for the purchase of five aircraft-three Loening OL-5 amphibians and two Chance Vought UO-4's--the first to be owned by the service, these were flown from air stations established at Ten Pound Island, Gloucester, Massachusetts, and Cape May, New Jersey.  From that point Coast Guard aviation continued to grow and stations were established around the country.


 

 Light Stations

 

Visit the National Park Service Maritime Heritage Program's website for a searchable inventory of Historic Lighthouses and Light Stations:

https://www.nps.gov/maritime/inventories/lights.htm 

 

   

                                          


Aviation Stations

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 Air Stations (alphabetical):

      AIRSTA Annette

AIRSTA Arlington

AIRSTA Astoria

AIRSTA Atlantic City

AIRSTA Barbers Point

AIRSTA Biloxi

AIRSTA Borinquen

AIRSTA Brooklyn

AIRSTA Cape Cod

AIRSTA Cape May

AIRSTA Charleston

AIRSTA Chicago

AIRSTA Clearwater

AIRSTA Corpus Christi

AIRSTA Detroit

AIRSTA Elizabeth City

AIRSTA Houston

AIRSTA Humboldt Bay

AIRSTA Kodiak

AIRSTA Los Angeles

AIRSTA Miami

AIRSTA Mobile

AIRSTA New Orleans

AIRSTA North Bend

AIRSTA Port Angeles

AIRSTA Sacramento

AIRSTA St Augustine

AIRSTA St Petersburg

AIRSTA Salem

AIRSTA San Diego

AIRSTA San Francisco

AIRSTA Sangley Point, RP (The Republic of the Philippines)

AIRSTA Savannah

AIRSTA Sitka

AIRSTA Traverse City

 

 Other Coast Guard Aviation Units:

      Air Detachment Argentia, Newfoundland

Air Detachment Bermuda

Air Detachment Buffalo, NY

Air Detachment Cleveland, OH

Air Patrol Detachment El Paso, TX

Air Detachment Guam

Air Detachment Kaneohe, Hawaii

Air Detachment Naples, Italy

Air Facility Charleston, SC

Air Facility Glenview, IL

Air Facility Long Island, NY (Gabreski Field)

Air Facility Norfolk, Norfolk Naval Air Station, VA

Aviation Station Morehead City, NC

Aviation Station Ten Pound Island (Gloucester), MA 

Aviation Training Center Mobile, AL

Aircraft Repair and Supply Center Elizabeth City, NC

Aviation Technical Training Center, Elizabeth City, NC

Aircraft Program Office, Grand Prairie, TX

Aircraft Program Office, Little Rock, AR

Aircraft Program Office, Marietta, GA

FOL (Forward Operating Location) Barrow, Alaska

FOL Cold Bay, Alaska

FOL Cordova, Alaska

FOL Kotzebue, Alaska

Helicopter Interdiction Squadron (HITRON), Jacksonville, FL

SAR Detachment Adak

SAR Detachment Midway

SAR Detachment Sangley Point

SAR Detachment Wake

Image Gallery
Resources
Summary of the Development of Early Motorized Lifeboats for the USLSS and USCG; by Tim Dring, Historian with the U.S. Lifesaving Service Heritage Association and volunteer with USCG Historian's Office.
Development of Early Moto...
A photo gallery of historic images of STA Point Judith, Rhode Island
Point Judith LBS
Photo Gallery of STA Point Judith, Rhode Island
Point Judith LBS
STA Green Hill Rhode Island
Green Hill LBS
The plan to mobilize the Coast Guard to operate as part of the Navy during World War I, including Mobilization Plans No. 1 & No. 2.
1917 USCG Mobilization Pl...
U.S. Coast Guard Maritime Short Range Aids to Navigation Strategic Plan, 2007
Maritime Short Range ATON...
"The Coast Guard Operates Through Communications: The Smallest of the Nation's Armed Forces Depends on Electrical Communications to Direct and Coordinate Its Many and Varied Duties and Responsibilities." By Admiral Joseph F. Farley, USCG.

Reprinted article from Bell Telephone Magazine, Winter 1946-47
USCG Communications History
A 1950 letter from JOC Alex Haley to the C.O. of Barnegat Lifeboat Station about Sinbad, the famous mascot from CGC Campbell who retired to the station to live out his final days in peace.
JOC Alex Haley & CG M...
History publication entitled "Guardians of the Eighth Sea [;] A History of the U.S. Coast Guard on the Great Lakes, 1790-1976."
USCG GREAT LAKES HISTORY,...
Newsletter for CG Air Station "Borinquen Beacon"; Volume 2, No. 7 (September 14, 1977); PDF copy provided by AMTCM Stanley C. deVegter, CMC, AIR STATION BORINQUEN, 2020.
Borinquen Beacon, 1977
Barber's Point Lighthouse Keeper's action report of events at the light station during and after the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor.
Barbers Point Light Stati...
USCG Air Station Borinquen's newsletter entitled "Borinquen Beacon", Volume 2, No. 7, September 14, 1977
CGAS Borinquen Beacon (1977)
WOMAN’S WORK: FEMALE LIGHTHOUSE KEEPERS
IN THE EARLY REPUBLIC, 1820-1859
by
Virginia Neal Thomas
A Thesis Submitted to the Faculty of Old Dominion University
in Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for the Degree of
MASTER OF ARTS
HISTORY
OLD DOMINION UNIVERSITY
December 2010
Women's Work - Female...
Civil-Service Regulations for the Lighthouse Service, 1928 (Washington, DC: United States Department of Commerce, Lighthouse Service/USGPO), Adopted December 7, 1927 Effective July 1, 1928
1928 - Civil-Service Regu...
United States Light-House Establishment, Instructions to Light-Keepers, July, 1881, By Authority of the Light-House Board (Washington, DC: USGPO, 1881).
1881 - Instructions to Li...
Scan of a 1799 report on the lighthouses of the U.S.
1799 Lighthouse Report
Headquarters' Circular No. 126 of 16 October 1936 -- Coast Guard Doctrine
1936 Coast Guard Doctrine
United States Coast Guard Regulations, CG-300, 1955
1955 USCG Regulations (CG...
Regulations for The United States Coast Guard, 1940

USGPO
1940 Regulations For The ...
Moments in CG History from 1790-1990, a publication in commemoration of the 200th Anniversary of the "Birth" of the Coast Guard.
Moments In History, 1790-...