Talk:Great White Fleet

Heading
Nicely detailed itinerary given, but what was the President's purpose for the fleet, and what was its historical significance? Did it symbolize the emergence of the US as a world power? Surely there are some TR quotes or documents to explain this.

According to a High School history book I had, it is written that congress would refuse to fund the Great White Fleet, and Teddy Roosevelt said that if they don't fund the fleet home, it will remain on the other side of the world.24.60.124.8 23:08, 30 June 2006 (UTC)

Civil War Era Sailors
If I am not mistaken, Farragutt had ceased active duty and his step-brother David Dixon Porter was in charge of the naval forces in both battles of Ft. Fisher. Any comments before I change this? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 72.72.89.133 (talk) 22:46, 10 January 2008 (UTC)
 * Please cite a reliable source. -- Donald Albury 03:39, 11 January 2008 (UTC)
 * Shelby Foote's The Civil War a Narrative, vol. III: Red River to Appomattox pg 724 (Farragut's end of War Service and his declining of the Ft. Fisher expedition) pp715-721 (Porter and the first expedition)pp 741-747 (Porter and the second expedition) —Preceding unsigned comment added by 72.85.136.125 (talk) 01:16, 14 January 2008 (UTC)
 * That should do it. -- Donald Albury 13:52, 14 January 2008 (UTC)

Problems
This article has a few problems, not the least of which is the title. The Great White Fleet (GWF) is, at best, a popular media term for, collectively, the ships of the USN of this era. More accurate terms for the battleships participating in this cruise would be the "Battle Fleet" or the "North Atlantic Squadron." Even worse, the GWF is not limited to the world cruise, i.e., it existed before and after this specific operation. So, the article should at least be titled, "The World Cruise of the Great White Fleet," or more correctly, "The World Cruise of the Battle Fleet" (probably the most accurate and correct title from the period literature) or "The World Cruise of the North Atlantic Squadron" (may not be strictly correct as there may have been some non-battleships in the squadron that didn't make the voyage).

Although I didn't alter (or don't even know if its possible) the overall title, I did correct one misconception that might arise from the comment later on in the article that Alabama and Maine were left on the west coast when the rest of the fleet departed. The ships (actually I think it was only Alabama that broke down) were quickly repaired and soon left together to complete their own circumnavigation of the globe - so they weren't the "hanger queens" (okay, an aviation term) that one might be led to believe from this article. The source for this update is the venerable DANFS entries for the two - I don't know how to introduce a reference, but hopefully the interested reader who might get this far will have no troubles in locating the citations on the web. In many ways, the trip of Alabama and Maine on their own little globetrotting journey is just as remarkable as that of their sisters. J. M. Deur 20:13, 14 January 2008 (UTC) —Preceding unsigned comment added by 70.148.60.151 (talk • contribs)


 * Changing the name of an article is a 'Move', which requires a registered account, and should normally be done only after a consensus is reached to do so. If you could copy the URLs here, we could work on it. -- Donald Albury 00:16, 15 January 2008 (UTC)


 * Actually, I have a "registered account" but don't bother to use it usually. You can consensus away, but you'll find that the above comments are pretty much correct - in actuality, I'm always somewhat amused when this GWF term is applied to the North Atlantic Squadron as there was some banana company in South America that referred to its fleet of white banana boats during this period as the Great White Fleet. Anyway, to introduce a baseball analogy, referring to the North Atlantic Squadron as the GWF is somewhat akin to referring to the NY Yankees as the Bronx Bombers. -- J. M. Deur 03:46, 15 January 2008 (UTC)
 * Without citations to reliable sources, it ain't likely to happen. Please name some sources. -- Donald Albury 14:46, 15 January 2008 (UTC)
 * Sure, the standard academic history is Reckner's "Teddy Roosevelt's Great White Fleet: The WORLD CRUISE OF THE AMERICAN BATTLEFLEET, 1907 - 1909" or how about a classic period reference, Roman Miller's "Pictorial Log of the BATTLE FLEET CRUISE AROUND THE WORLD." Do these titles strike a chord? You don't even have to crack the books open to see what these boys are calling this operation. Say, how does the ever reliable Arlington National Cemetery refer to this operation in their obits? Bet there's a lot of references to the Great White Fleet - no, sorry - look at the obit for VAdm Arthur Bryon Cook, who sailed around the world in USS Georgia: http://www.arlingtoncemetery.net/abcook.htm. If y'all care to look, it describes his service as "turret officer during the Around the World Cruise of the Battle Fleet (sound familiar?)," not "turret officer of the Great White Fleet." Why? because the former was the proper, historical description for the operation and the collection of ships that took part in it. Now as for reliable sources and Wikipedia, go take a look at the Battle of Santiago de Cuba article - the only reference is something called "A Dirty Little War by A. Bagosy." I challenge anyone to find a copy of this book - no copies for sale on Amazon, ABE, Eurobuch, etc. no copies in the Library of Congress or listed on WorldCat. Yet, its described as a B article by Wiki' standards, so much for "reliable sources." Okay, time to go take my medicine. -- J. M. Deur 17:20, 15 January 2008 (UTC)
 * Sorry, I don't buy it. The fleet is famous as the Great White Fleet.  Would you look up Dr. Seuss as Theodore Geisel or John Wayne as Marion Morrison?  Also, I'd have to check, but didn't the North Atlantic Sqaudron and the "Battle Fleet" exist both before and after the cruise?  Since the article is based on the cruise you would be making something specific much to broad.  —Preceding unsigned comment added by 72.72.124.15 (talk) 19:07, 15 January 2008 (UTC)
 * Sorry you don't buy it whoever you are, but your analogy doesn't hold. The North Atlantic Squadron was the name of the unit - it was the name that the U.S. Navy applied to it - Great White Fleet is a nickname applied by the press. What does this have to do with John Wayne's assumed stage name,i.e., the name that he, his agent, or his studio (don't know which) assumed for publicity purposes)? In fact, I'd suspect that was his "official" name registered with the actor's union. Indeed, as noted earlier, the only self-applied application of the Great White Fleet title is the banana boat fleet of the United Fruit Co. Applying what you're saying above here, the unit that circumnavigated the world should be called, ta da, the North Atlantic Squadron since that is its actual designation and the name that the Navy itself used (just as John Wayne is John Wayne's actual screen name) in reports, etc. The analogy that I provided above is accurate - this is akin to calling the Brooklyn Dodgers the Bronx Bombers. As to your last comment, the proposed change to the title was to "World Cruise of the Battle Fleet" or at least "World Cruise of the Great White Fleet." As long as the ships were painted in that white and buff scheme, they were commonly called the GWF (saving time), so this article's title is too general (as well as sloppy in refering to something by its nickname rather than its actual name) as it stands which is where this thread started. In any case, made a couple of minor edits to at least introduce the idea that GWF is a nickname, not the actual name, and to introduce the actual name, the Atlantic Fleet (apparently North Atlantic Squadron was supersided by the time of the fleet's departure). jmdeur 13:40 3 April 2008 (UTC)
 * I agree that the article should be moved to an article with the heading of the formal name of the expedition if it can be found. Colloquial names and nicknames should still link to that main article, but the formal title should be whatever the formal designation of the voyage was.  That said, the US Navy's official website refers to the voyage as the "Cruise of the Great White Fleet" http://www.navy.mil/gwf/thejournybegins.htm.  A much older source, the NYT article contemporaneous to the cruise refers to it as the "Winter Cruise of the North Atlantic Squadron" http://query.nytimes.com/mem/archive-free/pdf?res=9A07E0D91130E132A25755C1A9679D946097D6CF... However, most modern sources at least on the internet seem to refer to the North Atlantic Squadron specifically as the Great White Fleet including the US navy, so its probably legit to call it as such--but it should be clarified in the title the article refers to the cruise, not to the fleet itself.  —Preceding unsigned comment added by 129.74.86.15 (talk) 05:32, 27 April 2008 (UTC)
 * Well, period USGPO publications concerning the cruise bear titles like "Information Relative to the Voyage of the United States Atlantic Fleet Around the World, December 16, 1907 to February 22, 1909." Shipboard publications during the cruise have titles like "List of Vessels and Roster of Officers of the Vessels of the U. S. Atlantic Fleet Making the Cruise to the Pacific Coast." One problem is that the "world cruise," while perhaps always Theodore Roosevelt's intent, was not the actual expressed intent of the cruise due to political problems he was having getting the funding for it - however, it's pretty clear that during the actual cruise, the official name for the collection of battleships was the "Atlantic Fleet" although some popular books and more recent scholarly works describe it as the "American Battlefleet." So, the title of this article should probably be something like the "World Cruise of the American Battlefleet" or "World Cruise of the U.S. Atlantic Fleet." At the very least, the title should be changed to the "World Cruise of the Great White Fleet," as any white-painted American warship of the period is usually identified as being part of the Great White Fleet whether they participated in the World Cruise or not (i.e., GWF is not a term reserved by the press, public, etc. to the World Cruise). Finally, I'm a bit surprised that the references for this article have nothing to do with the subject - look like mainly references for the Russo-Japanese War which occurred a few years earlier and didn't involve the American Navy (although Theodore Roosevelt mediated the peace treaty for which he rightly received the Nobel Peace Prize, the first President to do so). At the very least Reckner's "Teddy Roosevelt's Great White Fleet: The World Cruise of the American Battlefleet, 1907 - 1909," Hart's "The Great White Fleet: Its Voyage Around the World, 1907-1909," and Wimmel's "Theodore Roosevelt and the Great White Fleet: American Sea Power Comes of Age" should be listed - the three general histories of the cruise published over the past 40 years or so. I just went ahead and rectified this, also adding the recent book edited by Michael Crawford of the NHC. - J. M. Deur 17:15 3 Aug 2008 (UTC)
 * Just a note that, per Layout, the References section should be reserved for publications actually used in writing (or revising) the article, and other publications that were not used in writing the article should go in the "Further reading" section. -- Donald Albury 17:56, 3 August 2008 (UTC)
 * I agree - I guarantee you won't find any information from this article in any of the Russo-Japanese War "references" that were about the only ones mentioned (other than the newspaper article which I also suggest has little informaton of merit) before I took the time to add the standard references on the Great White Fleet earlier today. Since I'm the one who added the corrections about the Great White Fleet being a nickname, not the official name for the battleship squadron that performed this cruise and the corrections on the Alabama and Maine's "solo" cruise, and since I got this information from the GWF books that I cited, I believe that covers your objection - now if you want to delete those Russo-Japanese War books, I'm fine with that - they really don't belong here. I guess in the future I should just refrain from trying to correct the general lack of scholarship observed on Wikipedia - signing off for good. J. M. Deur 19:21 3 Aug 2008 (UTC)

colour picture(s)?
With their hulls painted white except for the gilded scrollwork with a red, white, and blue banner on their bows, these ships would later come to be known as the Great White Fleet.

As colour (white with the accents as described above) plays a large role in name and display of the fleet, this article could use at least one colour picture, wether it's a painting, post card or even an early colour photo. Example: the USS Connecticut article contains a postcard with said battleship painted white, although the uploader estimates this picture as being from 1908. Does anyone have similar pictures from the great white fleet period? -- MiG (talk) 12:06, 22 February 2009 (UTC)


 * White hulls with buff upperworks was the standard paint scheme of the USN until 1914 (except for the gray "battle paint" applied during the Spanish-American War). The World Cruise ships didn't have a special paint job. Solicitr (talk) 19:27, 17 August 2009 (UTC)

Conflict with congress.
Once the plans for the cruise became public, not everyone was impressed. Some critics were worried that the Atlantic naval defenses would be weakened by taking away so many ships. Senator Eugene Hale from Maine, chairman of the Naval Appropriations Committee, threatened to withhold money for the cruise. But this didn't bother Roosevelt, who replied in his typically brusque and forthright fashion that he already had the money and dared Congress to "try and get it back."

Great White Fleet (16 Dec 1907 - 22 Feb 1909) Geo8rge (talk) 05:28, 9 February 2010 (UTC)

World Response
There is a lot of hyperbolic patriotic language in here. Did the world really take notice? Probably the biggest fleet visit to the Antipodes at the time, so the newspaper response there makes sense, but what did the Blue Water Powers think? What was German/English/French response to this challenge? Or did they just see it as a little joke--the little American displaying a bit of bravado for no particular reason? Did it change their attitudes towards the US Navy? I thought it was the conclusion of the first world war and the destruction of the German Imperial Navy, and the "Bled-White" French navy that saw the American emergence alongside the English and Japanese as world naval powers. This tour very well might have changed their opinions, but citations are needed to retain any of the language regarding international response.99.246.26.14 (talk) 06:00, 9 August 2010 (UTC)John


 * The Royal Navy certainly wasn't impressed - long range cruises were a relatively common occurrence for RN warships and all the vessels sent on the World Cruise had been thoroughly overshadowed by the RN's new Dreadnoughts - but I doubt the World cruise was particularly trying to impress them anyway and relations between the two navies were reasonably strong at this time. I've read that the Japanese took the opportunity to get a close look at the latest US warships and came away convinced they currently enjoyed a technical edge over the US state of the art, but the USN's ability to deploy relatively rapidly across the pacific was a surprise.  I've no idea of what the Germans and French made of the affair.  Getztashida (talk) 10:57, 25 May 2012 (UTC)

Purpose and Background
Surely, there must be more going on than " Roosevelt sought to demonstrate growing American military power and blue-water navy capability" and painting the ships white. Ekem (talk) 01:04, 22 February 2011 (UTC)
 * I made some additions in the text accordingly.Ekem (talk) 18:09, 24 February 2011 (UTC)

References needed
It's a good read, but there are FAR too few references cited, especially given a lot of the content. There are lots of anecdotal details (Japanese schoolchildren waving flags, etc) that should really be cited, if nothing else. 3 references for the amount of claimed factual information in this article is pretty insufficient. This was a notable moment in American History...I ocan guarantee someone, somewhere has written about it. I'm no historian, so I don't intent to edit the article, but it either needs references, or needs to be stripped down to the bare ground and rewritten with references. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 204.65.34.131 (talk) 19:31, 22 February 2011 (UTC)

Atlantic/Pacific
I'm wondering if there wasn't a bit of a misprint in the 'Background and purpose' section. it states that "In addition, specifically as Japan had arisen as a major seapower with the 1905 annilation of the Russian fleet at Tsushima, it sent a message to Tokyo that the American fleet could be deployed anywhere, even from its Atlantic ports, and would be able to defend American interests in the Philippines and the Pacific"

is there any question that the US could sortie from the eastern seaboard? or did the author mean 'even from its Pacific ports'.

thoughts before I edit this?Lambeth1661 (talk) 19:04, 14 June 2011 (UTC)


 * As the Panama Canal had not been completed at the time, I think there was a point in demonstrating that U.S. Navy ships based on the Atlantic coast could indeed deploy to the Pacific if needed. -- Donald Albury 13:29, 15 June 2011 (UTC)

Fair enough. :) I'll leave my paws off of it then. Lambeth1661 (talk) 16:34, 15 June 2011 (UTC)

Revisionist Article
Hello... I am a professor of American Studies and I also teach AP US History- I taught my students the underlying reason for the "white fleet" as had been historically established for the past half a century as a way to show the Japanese that after they beat the Russians, whites are better. That is why he circled around the pacific islands, etc. This idea that the reason was to demonstrate our strength is revisionism plain and simple. My students told me they saw no mention of it on Wikipedia, so I came here.

Please revise the article accordingly.

Lucille Roatur, PhD — Preceding unsigned comment added by 24.190.8.109 (talk) 19:38, 15 November 2011 (UTC)


 * Think you have it backwards - the idea that the sole reason was to impress the Japanese of the superiority of Whites is the revisionist view. It also doesn't make too much sense - why did the fleet sail around the globe if the goal was to impress the Japanese alone - they could have just gone to Japan, sail around it, and gone home. Frankly, Roosevelt wanted to demonstrate to all powers that the Americans had arrived on the scene - be it the Japanese, British, Germans, Australians, etc. - so it was not limited to the Japanese. It is pretty clear from the comments at the time that other powers, like the British (who were the dominant naval power in the world of the time), were indeed impressed by this display and understood its significance to the world order, not just some sort of white supremacy display for the Japanese. Go to Australia and you'll see how important the visit of the American Battle Fleet was to their subsequent development of a navy. BTW, I have a Ph.D. too - it doesn't mean you are infallible, as your comment above demonstrates. I would be far more concerned why your students are looking to Wikipedia for information - you hopefully are telling them that it is completely unreliable, being the equivalent of some sort of high school study group project.  — Preceding unsigned comment added by 68.50.92.159 (talk) 00:11, 3 August 2015 (UTC)
 * I think that you need to find and add some sources to back up your contention if you want that added to the article. You know, do some research, rather than operating off the usual Dunning–Kruger effect.--Sturmvogel 66 (talk) 00:56, 3 August 2015 (UTC)

File:Great White Fleet return2.jpg to appear as POTD soon
Hello! This is a note to let the editors of this article know that File:Great White Fleet return2.jpg will be appearing as picture of the day on February 22, 2012. You can view and edit the POTD blurb at Template:POTD/2012-02-22. If this article needs any attention or maintenance, it would be preferable if that could be done before its appearance on the Main Page so Wikipedia doesn't look bad. :) Thanks! — howcheng  {chat} 22:31, 20 February 2012 (UTC)

Coal
"contract 38 ships to supply the fleet with the 125,000 pounds of coal it would need" Should be tons? http://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?q=cache:wehx8sd1FLYJ:https://etd.ohiolink.edu/!etd.send_file?accession%3Dkent1258055271%26disposition%3Dinline%2BRoosevelt++38+ships+to+supply+the+fleet+with+the+125,000++coal+Great+White+Fleet&client=ubuntu&channel=fs&hl=en&&ct=clnk page 56/52 2601:600:8500:B2D9:D96:9C25:3F2F:4225 (talk) 14:04, 25 September 2015 (UTC)

External links modified
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 * Added archive https://web.archive.org/20120206062241/http://www.history.navy.mil:80/faqs/faq42-1.htm to http://www.history.navy.mil/faqs/faq42-1.htm

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Anti-Japanese Riots in San Francisco
In 1905, the San Francisco School Board segregated Japanese students from other students. This was an embarrassment to the Roosevelt Administration since this was a local action. The Japanese government protested and the school board reversed its policy. Roosevelt wanted to, among other things, demonstrate that the US could not be intimidated.

These are the cites I used in an article I wrote in 2001. "1907," Webster's Guide To American History, (Springfield, MA: G. & C. Merriam Co., 1971), p. 355; "Ports of Call," Great White Fleet website, (www.greatwhitefleet.org)

David Wilma — Preceding unsigned comment added by Ediza8 (talk • contribs) 19:25, 20 March 2016 (UTC)

Wireless fitout for each vessel
G'day Guys I did a quick cut and paste of a work-in-progress new section in History of broadcasting in Australia on the 1908 visit to Australia by the Great White Fleet. Wireless was a precursor to the establishment of broadcasting in Australia. The visit of the GWF to Australia was a major driver to the eventual relaxation of licensing regulation for wireless experimenters (1910) and the establishment of a network of coastal stations in Australia (1911). The mix of different wireless systems deployed by the USN clearly demonstrated inter-operability of all the systems. My edit was reverted with a quick note "too much detail". Personally I believe the detail is warranted in this article, but I will let the matter rest until the primary subsection in History of broadcasting in Australia is much more fully developed. At that time I will again enter the material here and await reaction. But perhaps everyone with an interest in this GWF article could consider whether it should be extended along these lines.--Samuel.dellit (talk) 11:47, 8 May 2018 (UTC)
 * That's way too much detail for something that can easily be summarized along the lines of "the visit of the GWF was a major driver to the eventual relaxation of licensing regulation for wireless experimenters (1910) and the establishment of a network of coastal stations in Australia (1911). The mix of different wireless systems deployed by the USN clearly demonstrated inter-operability of all the systems." or somesuch. See WP:SUMMARY. Just remember that any changes need to be cited properly.--Sturmvogel 66 (talk) 14:23, 8 May 2018 (UTC)
 * The stated reference was . How does an article get beyond Start class if everything is summarised so heavily?
 * See Fusō-class battleship for an FA-class ship article, forex. Or just select one of the many articles on Featured articles.
 * Yes, lovely article, just needs a paragraph about its wireless telegraphy equipment to be complete (refer "List of Radio Stations of the World" by Hart & Short)! Thanks for your feedback--Samuel.dellit (talk) 21:25, 8 May 2018 (UTC)
 * Sadly, that information isn't generally available for almost all ships.--Sturmvogel 66 (talk) 21:48, 8 May 2018 (UTC)
 * Yes it is, tell me what ships you are interested in.--Samuel.dellit (talk) 23:50, 8 May 2018 (UTC)
 * I'm not really interested, but thanks anyway.--Sturmvogel 66 (talk) 00:00, 9 May 2018 (UTC)

You left out San Diego!
Hey, friends - I don't know where you got your itinerary information, but it's incomplete: you missed a stop! The Fleet visited San Diego - its first U.S. port of call - before going on to San Francisco. It was here from April 14 to 18, 1908.

Well, actually, I see that the Fleet also visited Los Angeles, Santa Barbara and Santa Cruz. Is this the result of an article consensus, to include only "major" cities under some definition? Or is it the result of some kind of (uncited) reference?

If it can't be added to the table, the various cities could still be named in the introductory section to "First Leg" as was done with the Washington State ports of call in the Second Leg.

Thanks for any input. --MelanieN (talk) 20:13, 1 August 2018 (UTC)

general article feedback

 * Sections called "Background" are usually used for table-setting. Here I expected a discussion on the situation before the events of the article. Instead this section starts off with the general information about the article.
 * The "concerns and preparations" section begins with Roosevelt's stated intent. That should go in the section named "...purpose"!
 * The fleet composition section does not provide a clear and concise overview of which ships were actually included. The discussion on how far it travelled and how impressive it was should be moved elsewhere.
 * Voyage and "General fleet itinerary" both discusses where they went. Instead have one single section discussing the travels and its ports of call. Move discussion about command structure elsewhere.
 * The subheader "itinerary" is then repeated under "first leg". It should be the other way round, with First leg being a subsection under Itinerary.
 * Ships is a top level section header but should be subsumed under first leg. The second and third legs are better dispositioned.
 * The final three headers should be collected under a single Impact header.

CapnZapp (talk) 20:34, 8 March 2021 (UTC)

136 great white fleet folded Brochure spring/summer carrabean to west indies
Missing 1936 great white fleet folded Brochure caribean and west indies 2601:192:C17F:DCF0:5D51:5F46:4BF5:78DA (talk) 13:52, 16 December 2021 (UTC)