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Monday, January 17, 2011
Model of USS New Mexico Going on Display Took More Than 30 Years To Build
By Charles D. Brunt
Copyright © 2011 Albuquerque Journal
Journal Staff Writer
During the waning days of World War I, it took the New York Navy Yard just 18 months to build the USS New Mexico, a sleek, 624-foot-long battleship that survived two kamikaze strikes in the Pacific during World War II.
In contrast, it's taken Albuquerque modelers Cecil Whitson and Keith Liotta more than 30 years to complete a model of the ship — precisely scaled to 1/96th the size of its namesake — a labor that has lasted about as long as the actual battleship itself.
Later this month, the product of the modelers' painstaking efforts will go on display at the New Mexico History Museum in Santa Fe as part of the museum's new exhibit, "A Noble Legacy: The USS New Mexico."If you're envisioning those plastic ship models packed inside a Revell kit that you can glue together in an afternoon or two, forget it: This is an exacting, 7-foot long, 2-foot high, entirely hand-crafted replica of the battleship — officially known as the USS New Mexico (BB 40) — that is as much a work of art as it is a miniaturized memorial.
"Once I saw this thing and realized the scope of it, I was a little overwhelmed," Liotta said as he began final assembly of the ship in the garage of his Northeast Heights home.
Every item on the ship, from the observation airplanes catapulted from its fantail to its anchor chains, is made by hand from plastic, wood or metal.
The anchor chain, for example, started out as a thin sheet of plastic.
"Each link was cut to shape, drilled out, the links split, linked together and glued back together," Liotta said. "And there's like 2 feet of it."
Hair-thin wire coils replicate the recoil mechanisms on each of the New Mexico's 80 tiny anti-aircraft guns. The crane used to retrieve observation planes is reproduced in exact detail, right down to the number and shape of each individual support beam.
The model's camouflage paint scheme, which uses shades of blue, gray and black, depicts what the ship looked liked for about six months in 1944 during the naval battle in the Pacific.
"It (the paint scheme) was designed to disorient enemy submarines as to the shape, direction and distance of the ship, which made it harder to target," said Liotta, a former Navy firefighter who served aboard the aircraft carrier USS Midway and the super-carrier USS Kitty Hawk.
"The problem was, it also made the ship easier to see at long distances." Because of that shortcoming, the New Mexico was soon repainted in its original gray.
History in 1/96th scale
The model's genesis rests with Cecil Whitson, a former Sandia National Laboratories engineer, New Mexico history buff and modeling hobbyist who felt compelled to preserve the history of the USS New Mexico which, when construction began on Oct. 14, 1915, was the most advanced battleship in the U.S. fleet.
Liotta said Whitson began collecting copies of the ship's plans in the 1960s. When computer-aided design software became available, Whitson converted the ship's paper schematics into a digital format that allowed him to determine the exact dimensions of every component of the ship, from its railings to its four, 10-foot diameter propellers. Whitson started building his model in the late 1970s and worked on it sporadically for more than three decades.
After suffering a debilitating stroke in 2004, work on the nearly complete model was dead in the water — much to the chagrin of Whitson's friend and former co-worker, Harry Davidson.
Davidson, a walking encyclopedia on aviation history and the driving force behind the model aircraft displays at the Albuquerque International Sunport, sought out fellow members of the Albuquerque Scale Modelers for help in completing Whitson's project, and soon focused on Navy veteran Liotta.
"Initially, I was just giving into Harry so he could quit asking me about it," Liotta quipped. "I had no idea what I was getting into. I was thinking I was going to get a model that someone had been working on that you could hold in your hands. I had no idea about the span of time and the history behind the build. But after meeting Cecil and seeing what he had done, I was a believer. I knew then I had to help."
For the past several months, Liotta has been researching, cleaning, painting and assembling the thousands of intricate parts to complete Whitson's model.
A Pacific workhorse
The USS New Mexico (BB 40), the first of two Navy vessels to bear the title, was launched on April 13, 1917, and commissioned on May 20, 1918 — one month before the signing of the Treaty of Versailles, which marked the end of World War I.
The ship was refurbished between 1931 and 1933 and was ported at Pearl Harbor as World War II approached. Seven months before the Japanese attacked the Hawaiian port, USS New Mexico was sent to join the Atlantic Fleet, where it patrolled the eastern seaboard. After the attack on Pearl Harbor, the battleship was ordered back to the Pacific.
On Jan. 6, 1945, during the invasion of Luzon in the Philippines, USS New Mexico was hit by a kamikaze suicide bomber. The explosion killed the ship's commanding officer, Capt. Robert W. Fleming, and 29 other crewmen. Eighty-seven crewman were injured.
Five months later, on the evening of May 12, 1945, the ship was attacked by two kamikazes as it approached its anchorage in Okinawa. One kamikaze dropped a bomb on the ship, and the other crashed into it. Fifty-four crewman were killed and 119 wounded.
By the end of the war, USS New Mexico and her crew had been awarded six battle stars. The ship was anchored in Tokyo Bay on Sept. 2, 1945, when the Japanese surrendered aboard the USS Missouri.
The USS New Mexico was decommissioned on July 19, 1946, and was sold for scrap in November 1947 for $381,600. One of the few remaining remnants of the ship, its helm, is installed in the Naval Sciences building at the University of New Mexico. One of its two bells sits on the mall between UNM's Zimmerman Library and the Student Union Building; the other is in the state Taxation and Revenue building in Santa Fe, said Dick Brown, chairman of the USS New Mexico (SS 779) Commissioning Committee.
Museum bound
Whitson and Liotta's replica will be the centerpiece of "A Noble Legacy: The USS New Mexico," an exhibit at the New Mexico History Museum on the Santa Fe Plaza that opens Jan. 23 and runs through May 9. The exhibit will include items related to the newest ship to bear the state's name, the USS New Mexico (SSN-779), a $2.5 billion Virginia-class nuclear submarine that was commissioned 10 months ago.
At the exhibit's 1 p.m. opening, Cmdr. George Perez, the sub's commanding officer, and Brown will talk about the New Mexico in the museum's auditorium.
"The sailors who served onboard New Mexico (BB-40) are truly deserving of the recognition this exhibition provides," Perez said in a museum news release. "Their legacy will continue to serve both the state and the nation onboard New Mexico (SSN-779) for decades to come."
The exhibit also fulfills Whitson's longtime dream of providing a tangible remembrance of the thousands of sailors who served aboard the original USS New Mexico.
"My part in this is a very, very minor thing compared to what Cecil put into it," Liotta said.
"Seeing the work, the craftsmanship, the detail and the heart Cecil had put into this ... my mission became to see it through."
If you go
WHAT: Opening of museum exhibit, "A Noble Legacy: The USS New Mexico" that pays homage to the World War II battleship that bore the state's name.
WHEN: 1 p.m. Jan. 23.
WHERE: New Mexico History Museum, 113 Lincoln Ave., next to the Palace of the Governors on the Santa Fe Plaza.
COST: Free to New Mexico residents.
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