laststandonzombieisland

How about this great period Kodachrome of the New Mexico class battleship USS Idaho (BB-42) steaming through the Panama Canal with her glad rags flying, en route to the U.S. east coast for epic Navy Day celebrations in October 1945.

National Archives 80-G-K-6572

Commissioned in March 1919, she came too late for the Great War. Idaho only managed to escape being at her traditional home on Pearl’s Battleship Row on December 7, 1941, by being transferred to the Neutrality Patrol in the Atlantic just six months before the Japanese attack.

Headed back to the Pacific, Idaho earned seven battle stars for her World War II service and was present in Tokyo Bay when Japan formally surrendered on 2 September and was ordered to the East Coast on 7 September, carrying 600 veterans stateside in addition to her crew.

Tough as a two-dollar steak, off Okinawa alone, Idaho fired 2,338 14-inch shells, 6,487 of 5-inch, and another 4,647 of 40mm in NGFS.