Olympia Assurance Exterior Paint: How Excellent Is It?

While most happy to hear the story of the Olympia; you skipped over She is docked here in Philadelphia, PA! 🤔 It is part of the Independence Seaport Museum on the city’s Delaware Riverfront along side the submarine Becuna. These days sadly, most tourists rather go across the river to Camden, NJ and visit the more impressive USS New Jersey. Leaving the Olympia under visited and underfunded. 😞

In the early 2000s I occasionally volunteered on the Olympia with some friends. We played in a Civil War-type brass band and it was just a quick change of uniform to become late 19th century seabees. In 2007 the History website made a documentary about the Spanish American War, and a large majority of the scenes on a ship (Spanish or American) were filmed on Olympia, right there in Philadelphia at Penn’s Landing. Careful shots, excessive use of a smoke machine, etc to block out the city when filming above deck. We vols were used as background characters in plenty of scenes, but I got a brief close-up cameo playing the bugle at one point. My one Warhol moment I suppose.

For some reason when you were mentioning the Olympia’s sheer number of guns, from the 8 inch guns down to the personal weapons like rifles and revolvers, made me think of the Engineer from TF2. “…How am I going to stop some big mean mother hubbard from tearing me a structurally superfluous new behind? The answer…use a gun. And if that don’t work, use more gun.”

When I was about 12 years old, I built Revel plastic models of the Great White Fleet. Even at that age, I recognized just how beautiful and elegant these ships were and it began my life long love of cruiser class warships. Around the same time, I built models of the USS San Francisco, Baltimore, Atlanta, and the HMAS cruiser Melbourne, and a dozen others that sat on shelves in my bedroom. I’m happy that the Olympia has not been scraped. I’d love to see her once she has been fully restored. Many years later, I began collecting historical photographs largely from Northern California. I found a dozen photographs of the Great White Fleet’s visit to San Francisco Bay around 1910. They really were beautiful ships.

Thank you for the article Drachinifel. If you are in the Philadelphia area I would love to give you a tour of both the Olympia and the Becuna. I am a docent and do repairs on both craft. A couple points you may not of had space for she was designed to be a flagship so that is why she carried such a large assortment of small arms. It is also why she has a larger than normal officer country. Also her 8″ guns are replicas, but the 5″ are of the same type used at the time of her WWI service. I think they came from the Colorado. She is more an example of 1917 than 1898, but I still love her. Lastly she was an electronics wonder as she had early wireless, well before most of the navy and had sonar to use in her anti submarine patrols in The Great War. Add in her service in the Russian Civil War and bringing home the remains of the Unknown Solider she is one of the most important pieces of physical history in the United States. Thank you again.

I visited this ship many years ago in Philadelphia and loved it! I later bought and built a model of it, and everyone who saw it commented on the colors with a white hull and tan superstructure. It was as striking looking as the real ship! We should all be glad that such an ancient and important ship still exists!

Current condition is much improved. You can see it from the bridge over Delaware river on I-95 across from BB New Jersey closer to the bridge. Was told on the tour the turret on stern has the real guns in it. The bow is just a couple pipes, but they look right. Also when it was in storage one of it’s engines magically vanished. The remaining engine is on the tour. The interior looks like a cross between sail and steam era. Probably my favorite ship

The family went on a Summer vacation tour in 1959, partly to pick up the full sized Plymouth station wagon, but mostly to visit wartime buddies who’d served with the 442nd Regimental Combat Team in Italy and France. We stopped by to see the U.S.S. Olympia, before going on to naval academy in Annapolis. The ship was a magnificent sight back then, with a number of visitors to see this Spanish-American War command ship. It should have the same status as Admiral Togo’s battleship “MIkasa,” but there are other, more modern museum ships.

I thoroughly enjoyed perusal this informative and interesting article. I loved the snarky comments about the “battleships that run aground in their own waters club”; the exclusive club with a membership that apparently includes several American warships, ouch! Good thing the narrator was clearly British, since the Royal Navy about only organization with the respect and credibility to engage in that sort of “trash talk” without inviting scorn. 🙂 Literally nice work, the quality of the article editing and well scripted narrative are second to none. Thanks for contributing.

While the ship was considered heavily armored, the reality was, that it wasn’t. For lack of a better term, the secondary gun deck could be considered all or nothing. 6″ at each gun but nothing in-between those shields, and no significant bulkheads between gun mounts. So a shell hitting between the shields could enter and takeout several gun crews. Not a real problem with solid shot, but if HE is used, big problem. I’ve toured her a couple of times, and it is worth going there. I hope the repairs go well so the engineering spaces are available again for tours.

Here’s another site with information about USS Olympia: historynet.com/uss-olympia-symbol-of-a-sea-change.htm What struck me as interesting was the position of the officer’s wardroom and the captain’s stateroom in the extreme stern of the ship. Back in the days of wooden ships and iron men, the stern was always “officer country” with the enlisted crew berthed anywhere else there was space for them, which was convenient for the captain since the ship’s steering, tiller or wheel, was within a few feet of where he slept and dined. However, in Olympia, the pilothouse is two or three decks higher and about 150 further forward than the captain’s quarters. This could not have been convenient. Another notable feature of Olympia is the location of her 5″ rifles, which live in the same spaces as used by the crew as their living space. The guns are intermingled with the crew’s mess tables, just as in an 18th-century ship-of-the-line. I also noticed that the crew slept in hammocks rather than bunks, just like in the RN right through to the end of WWII. Traditions die hard in the Navy. A number of British warships that saw service in 1939-1945 started their lives with stern walks, a feature that should only belong on 16th-century galleons. Even Nelson’s Victory didn’t have a stern walk. I fail to see what a 20th-century RN admiral would do with a stern walk except get very wet and develop tinnitus. It least Olympia didn’t bother with such a silly appurtenance.

I’ve been on board her several times. It’s really incredible comparing her construction to the many more preserved ships from the interwar years and World War II. Lots of fine woodwork and the board room is gorgeous. You can actually stand on foot prints that allegedly mark the spot where Dewey uttered his famous words.

I had a very old DOS computer naval gunfire simulator called Action Stations! that I ran on an original PC-XT running under DOS 3.3, as vaguely recall now. It was one of the better naval warfare game that used the mathematics from the USN Maneuver and Fire Rules papers from the interwar period right up until the end of WWII. You could thus use fire control protocols from right after then end of WWI onward. I think the game was published in 1989 or 1990 and was loaded on a grand total of three double density floppy disks. It was fiendishly difficult, but you could simulate the results of something like a Texas class battleship engaging the IJN Kirishima using the fire control tools from 1925 right up to the Iowas fighting the Yamato in 1945. One of the criticisms of the game was the hit percentage was too high but the author (whose name I’ve completely forgotten) stated he had to “fudge” the results for a typical eight hour engagement or a single ship wasn’t likely to ever achieve a hit probability of more than 5% during an interwar game. Thus, you always attacked with every ship you could lay your hands on or engagements would always end with both sides breaking off the engagement due to battle damage and each expending all their ammunition. It wasn’t until the advent of radar GFCS and mechanical firing computers that the 5% hit probability ever got substantially higher. It was a great game that allowed you and other players to fight each other in a much more sophisticated form of the old Battleship board game.

Thank you Drac for this article We have a Krupp Naval Rifle from the unprotected Cruiser Castilla In Our Park . The other 2 from that ship are on State house lawn In Montpilier, Vt, Dewey,s home town . Krupp 15-cm sk L/35 Naval Rifle of 1890 . At Mt Hope we also have a 6 pounder Nordenfelt from that Battle ? Guns were brought here thru efforts of Hon Oscar F .Wiliams U.S consul at Manila during the Battle . He was on the Olympia during the Battle . It was nice seeing this article showing the other ships listed on our Plauqe .

UK did not quake in advance of war in 1776 or 1812 and paid a terrible price to the pitiful American naval forces, mostly privateers – the loss of 1500 – 2000 civilian vessels from 1812-peace – despite the UK’s so-called mastery of the seas. The seas are wide. There was no rapid communication to coordinate ant-raiding vessels. No need to refuel – only restock widely available food and water = much better days for commerce raiding

The US is like one of the only countries with a vast array of preserved warships and for some reason there is no federal program to actually maintain them. Like seriously why is the maintenance of these ships always left up to citizens? It’s really hard for those groups to scrape together the money needed to provide maintenance or permanent mooring so like some sort of federal program should take over to make sure that these ships are kept in good condition. Like surely we can agree that they have a vast historical and educational value.

The problem with the Olympia and the USS Texas was the steel hulls, they did use nickle, but unlike modern steels, they were very prone to rusting out. Inside the ships there are many nooks and crannies that are inaccessible so if water leaks in, the spaces can’t dry out, and no one knows about the leaks until it’s too late. While riveting gives a very tight seal when new, as the metal deteriorates, the leaking becomes worse. This is why the Texas is being moved into a permanent dry dock of sorts, but the money for the Olympia isn’t available. One of the reasons WW2 battleships like the New Jersey are in such good shape is that they had air conditioning and an excellent ventilation system, plus there are almost no hidden spaces for water to collect in.

Very interesting, I really like ships of this transitional era. My only complaint, and it has nothing to do with the material presented here is, why are ships and for that matter locomotives too, always illustrated pouring out great clouds of black smoke? Anyone that has ever fired a steam engine, be it land-locked or marine, knows that gigantic clouds of smoke just indicates wasting fuel. Also, in a warship, it means that the ship is visible to the enemy from a much greater distance. The battleship Texas, which you have already done a very good episode on, actually has periscopes in the boiler rooms through which the engineers could view the top of stacks, to make sure they weren’t showing smoke. I assume other steam powered warships had them, as well, but the Texas is the only warship boiler room that I’ve been in, personally.

Another great vid. A similar ship, Japan’s Mikasa is moored in cement. Sounds strange but it won’t detoriate. Keeping Museum ships in the water is a losing proposition. Better to construct a huge open area, and put them up on mounts where folks can appreciate the entire vessel. Mounts are not crazy – when these ships are in dry dock they sit on mounts. Heck, the Titanic sat on mounts and demonstrates how well you can sit a ship out of water.

Well, let’s be fair to the isolationist mindset. Militarily, the navy was always a force to annoy an enemy and buy time. The issue was that at the time, the US was almost entirely self sufficient. Sure most luxury items were foreign. But food, water, coal, steel, and wood were all plentiful and more than sufficient to maintain the US economy for years. By the 1880s, almost every American war had been fought on land and more importantly, American land, and the concept was as it had always been, to break the enemy on land through onslaught and raids. Using light infantry on rough terrain and a massive artillery corps to pound any formations from distance. The US only maintained a navy just because everyone else had one, so the US should have one too.

Imagine a battle between two protected cruisers, the Olympia, USN CP-10, or whatever they might have used vs the Aurora of the Imperial Czars Navy, whatever they called it, and what might have been it’s side letters and number, CP-11. Assume both reality crew performance, and equal optimal crew performance. LoL

“Only fifteen rounds fired each.” Yep, slow-firing 1880s-style breech loading mechanisms. This is what Olympia’s real shortcoming was as a fighting ship: she lacked a QF main or secondary armament and, yes I know what you’re all shouting at me. “But Giv” I hear you cry, “The Veinticinco de Mayo, built by Armstrong of Elswick almost contemporaneously with the Olympia and subsequently sold to Argentina, was only armed with the same sort of slow breech-loading 8.2-inch* main and 4.7-inch* secondary guns! (*In her case)” But, dear reader, while that may be true (and it is), the ‘Mayo’ was actually launched a full year before Olympia was laid down! And by the time the American cruiser was in the water, Elswick had turned out the next version of their fast second-class cruiser for Argentina, in the form of the Nueve de Julio – and she had an armament of Quick-Firing guns! Four 6-inch and eight 4.7-inch… actually the same battery as the related Yoshino (Japan’s star warship of the Battle of the Yalu), and she was in commission a full year before Olympia. I mean, yeah, if you want to say that USS Olympia was super-powerful because 8-inch guns in turrets, that’s fine. But did I mention the Yalu? What did we learn there, kids? Well, a few lessons actually, but chief among them was QF guns make a mess of things with armour on the vitals and you really need to learn lessons like that. Frankly, what made the Olympia look so damn good (and she wasn’t exactly bad, now) was the fact that two navies fighting each other in 1898 were still at about the same tech level as the Beiyang Fleet was four years earlier when it got a kicking from the very 1890s-spec Japanese.

“The British (naval officers in Hong Kong) liked the Americans too much to take their money at any odds on such a hopeless adventure (attacking Manilla bay).” (The Lonely Ships, Life and Death of the US Asiatic Fleet”). Drachinifel fails to mention that the Spanish also had: three 5in guns on El Fraile rock in the website, three 6in guns on Corregidor, three 7in guns on Punta Gorda and two 6in gunsPunta Lasisi. In addition to all of this firepower, the websites into Manilla Bay were mined. No cake walk.

‘Survive’ may be a bit generous when describing Olympia. She is taking something like 3 TONS of water per day. She is being kept afloat by the loan of pumps and a grant from the local electric company to run them! Something like 60% of her is not able to be accessed by the public due to the danger of her collapse. There have been several plans to remove her woodwork (including Dewey’s flag cabin), for salvage. Westinghouse has about 20 ‘volunteer’ electricians who spend time aboard trying to get/keep her electric lighting and systems working. Her birth is as the end of an abandoned road, without maintenance, or repairs which leads to a equally dis-repaired pier, without lighting, which limits visitation to day light only hours. I was on the U.S.S. Olympia foundation’s web site mailing list but grew tired of their constant pleadings for funds.

The United States built a lot of warships during the Civil War. After that war America was distracted by Manifest Destiny, settling the West, and spending the bulk of its military funds on the Army. The Navy went without a new warship for nearly 20 years. After the Debacle at Samoa (Google this folks its interesting) America finally started to build a new steel navy which produced just barely enough warships to defeat the Spanish a decade later.

I appreciate your articles and your hard work, and here comes the but… It has been over a hundred years since Britannia ruled the waves. Plus the fact and it is a fact she never will again. So you should back off the Arrogant pompous tone, that I originally contributed to English conceit. You’re childish Diggs at other nations makes it obvious that you’re living in a painful, painful, time warp. ⚓

I wish my government would give more funding to museum ships. Here in South Carolina on the coast we have the USS Yorktown, USS Laffey, and USS Clamagore. The Laffey and Yorktown are the big attractions there but I heard a volunteer say they struggle with funding and the poor Clamagore looks to be sent out to sea and sunk has a reef. Her hull is badly badly rusted. Also the SS United States which is laid up in PA. She deserves a better fate as Americas flag ship during her day and the largest ocean liner we ever built and to this day holding the title as the fastest ocean liner decades after she has been out of service. 🙁

With the USS Olympia docked in Philadelphia as a museum ship and the USS New Jersey docked across the Delaware River in Camden, also as a museum ship, visitors are given a unique opportunity to tour both a predreadnaught warship and also a dreadnaught. Amazing that there is but 50 years separating the two. Unfortunately you failed to acknowledge the role the USS Olympia played in support of the American troops, the Polar Bear Expedition, against the Bolsheviks in Russia, 1918 to 1919.

I remember in the 1990’s there was a huge campaign, even having a special set in the History website. (Back when they did history, remember those days?) to find funding. I learned a few years ago they finally got enough and was very pleased. I love old ships and planes (Not so much cars.) and was happy one of the oldest US ships still around. (Not THE oldest, one of the oldest) and am glad it has found someone to save it. The idea of this ship being sunk would be a tragedy. There are dozens of WWII museum ships, but except for the Olympia and a Japanese ship from the Russo-Japanese war it’s one of the only 19th century ships like it around.

The spanish battleship force in Philipines was a complete ruin in maintenance, but not at all useless ships. If they were well maintained, with their engines repaired, and using good quality ammunitions, only with a proper location in Manila port, more heavily defended than Cavite, will show to the american Dewey force a very different face.

I’ve been on the Olympia. Had time back in roughly 2004 to hang out and take the full tour after going to see the USS New Jersey directly across the river from her. It was truly amazing the difference between the two in engineering. Olympia is just like one or two big rooms inside. Almost no bulkheads. New Jersey… all over the place. If you get a chance, its truly a great way to spend a day or two.

In 1898 the guns of predreds could fire more accurately than their rudimentary sights would allow them which meant you had to get close and overwhelm your victim with both heavy and medium gun firepower and in some cases, you even had to use your anti-torpedo boat guns against your opponent. The New Steel Navy, fortunately, had the financial and logistic support to provide quality guns and ammunition to their ships. The bankrupt Spanish in 1898 did not. The Americans won so decisively at Manila Bay and Santiago by overwhelming their opponents with brute sustained firepower. Not a criticism at all, that is what was needed to win if you wanted to minimize your own casualties. Modern naval gunnery was not quite developed yet but the lessons were learned and each pre-dred engagement of the era showed increased accuracy and range between the opponents and heavier guns.

She’s still an impressive sight, I see her almost daily. I live right outside of Philly, so I’m fortunate enough to see quite a few ships regularly. The Olympia(the Becuna is blocked and not visible from my vantage point), the New Jersey(BB-62) and the JFK(CV-67). There’s a whole slew of other random ships, not all easily discernible for a naval novice, not all markings remain or remain visible from my vantage point.

She’s a mighty handsome vessel. I heard that when word of the Spanish-American war reached the Far East Squadron and they were ordered into action, most of the captains had their carpenters remove all of the handsome internal woodwork originally installed, but Captain Gridley did not. Removing the woodwork was a per-emptive fire suppression preparation, but this way, he ended up leaving us with an extra bit of the past to see.

Just learned that the Olympia was chosen to carry the body of the Unknown Solider from France (WWI) for eventual placement in the Tomb of the Unknowns along with the Marine Honor Guard that accompanied the body. Wood from the deck of the Olympia has been used to fashion grips for two of the pistols that the Sentinels carry while on guard duty at the tomb.

Olympia was the first ship I was ever on, back in about 1970. At the ripe old age of 5, she was a wonder to me and amazed me. I still have a model of her sitting in my classroom. I am very happy to hear that there is some actual effort to save her – when I last visited her about 5 years ago she was in the process of sinking according to the “crew” working aboard and was a very, very sad sight. Does anyone know where donations can be made to help in her preservation? Is there any kind of GoFundMe attempt to raise money for drydocking? Thanks for the excellent history on this fine and historic ship! Well done!

if you are ever in Phila, go on the tour. i spent a career in the navy, and this was a step back in time to a more primitive era. trivia: the real point of the Spanish war was coaling stations for the fleet, Puerto rico, cuba, guam, and the phillipines. the Maine was just a bonanza propanda opportunity.

I worked on this ship 15-20 years ago. The people who were in charge thought she may have the record for the longest time between drydocking. It’s a shame they can’t get the money. They said the hull was dangerously thin back then. She is definitely sitting in a hole in the mud and will have to be dredged to get it out