S.S. Lane Victory - 1945 Merchant Marine Ship Located in San Pedro, California

[@richardhawkinson3020]

During the Vietnam War years, I frequently saw Victory ships on Hood Canal making ammunition runs to and from Bangor. I wonder if the Lane Victory was one of the vessels I saw going by.

[@ScottBentona]

Hi Richard: The Lane Victory was involved in three wars. She participated right at the very end of World War II, and then Korea where she is credited for rescuing 7,010 North Koreans from the Chinese invasion and was able to evacuate them safely, and she was involved in Vietnam, so chances are that, yes, this very well could have been one of the Merchant Marine ships you saw if she was reloading supplies at Hood Canal.

[@richardhawkinson3020]

@@ScottBentona The Red Oak Victory could have been another one. Thanks for the information!

[@ScottBentona]

@@richardhawkinson3020 - You're welcome. Thanks for commenting. There are very few Victory ships left. Many were sunk, and many others were mothballed and scrapped. On the Lane Victory they have many many of the Victory ship names onboard in the holds I saw that are no longer present (maybe as many as 20 of them). I was actually over at that ship today for several hours as I'm preparing for the longer walk & talk I'm going to do and continuing to do my research. SS Red Oak Victory, it turns out, is also a museum you can go visit in Richmond, CA, if you don't know. Next time I'm in the Bay Area, I am definitely going to go visit that ship. Here is the website link in case you are interested in taking a look: redoakvictory.us

[@richardhawkinson3020]

@@ScottBentona I would love to visit one of the Victory ships. I visited the Liberty ship John W Brown some years ago. I was really fascinated by the engine. It was a great experience. It is great that these pieces of history are being preserved. I was lucky to have seen Victory ships in operation even if I only saw them at a distance.

[@ScottBentona]

@@richardhawkinson3020 - I haven’t gone to see if there are ant Liberty ships around to go visit, but I’ll do a little research when I’m done with Lane Victory and see if there’s a Liberty museum. I did see there is another Victory museum in Tampa, Florida called American Victory that says it’s operational, so there’s another opportunity there as well. www.americanvictory.org/