Thread by @HandMissals

Thanks to this awesome theme chosen by @USNatArchives, I pulled together a brief thread of neat Catholic maritime historical vignettes

Check it out! 🧵

1⃣ First Mass on a submerged nuclear sub, 1958

#ArchivesUnderTheSea
#CatholicSeafarers
🌊🚢⚓️⛪️📚

2⃣ Rev. John Francis Laboon, SJ appointed as first naval chaplain for a US nuclear missile submarine, 1959

#ArchivesUnderTheSea
#CatholicSeafarers
🌊🚢⚓️⛪️📚

3⃣ Christmas Midnight Masses aboard Polaris nuclear submarines, 1962

#ArchivesUnderTheSea
#CatholicSeafarers
🌊🚢⚓️⛪️📚

4⃣ 12 American nuns rescued from Japanese-occupied Bougainville by the submarine USS Nautilus, 1943

#ArchivesUnderTheSea
#CatholicSeafarers
🌊🚢⚓️⛪️📚

5⃣ Invention of 'Donnelly buoyancy boxes' thought to produce "unsinkable" ships to break German U-boat threat, 1918.

#ArchivesUnderTheSea
#CatholicSeafarers
🌊🚢⚓️⛪️📚

6⃣ During "Operation Hideout", the USS Haddock was submerged for 60 days and the crew exposed to high levels of CO2 as a physiological test. A priest boarded via underwater tube every Sunday to say Mass, 1953.

#ArchivesUnderTheSea
#CatholicSeafarers
🌊🚢⚓️⛪️📚

7⃣ These Catholic submarine chaplains were stationed at the US Submarine Naval Base in New London, Connecticut (part of the Diocese of Norwich).

#ArchivesUnderTheSea
#CatholicSeafarers
🌊🚢⚓️⛪️📚

Ok, I think that's a wrap on this @USNatArchives #ArchivesHashtagParty. Thanks for following along!

Come back next week for a very special maritime hand missal on #MissalMondays!