New Midwayites – Welcome to Midway Brochure

New Midwayites - Welcome to Midway

Below are some pages out of a Welcome to Midway Island brochure. Named “New Midwayites – Welcome to Midway”, the brochure is missing one page from the bird ID section and the section about “Special Information to Submariners” was never included. It’s likely that the brochure was made prior to the sub base shutdown and issued afterward so that section was omitted.  Continue reading “New Midwayites – Welcome to Midway Brochure”

Memories of Midway Island By CDR. Richard G. Rieken, USN Ret.

CDR. Richard G. Rieken, USN Ret.

MEMORIES OF MIDWAY ISLAND By CDR. Richard G. Rieken, USN Ret.
(As told to his wife Edie in 1997)

After a seven-month training cruise on the USS HORNET CVS-12 through WestPac to China, Japan and the Philippines, Dick’s next assignment took him to Midway Island for a year, ‘way out on the northwest end of the Hawaiian string, over a thousand miles from Honolulu. Continue reading “Memories of Midway Island By CDR. Richard G. Rieken, USN Ret.”

Gooney Bird Monument

The Missing Gooney Bird

Gooney Bird Monument – 1972

The year was 1972 and Midway Island had just created the Battle of Midway Memorial Park. The park displayed a panoramic mural depicting the battle, two huge guns that were once stationed at emplacements built to defend the island against a Japanese attack during World War II and several memorial plaques commemorating  the historical significance of the island and to the men who died fighting to defend it. But the centerpiece would end up being a 11-foot tall “Mahogany Albatross”, a wooden gooney bird called by many the “Giant Gooney”.

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The Story of Koral Kings at Midway Island

Koral Kings Dive Club Midway Island Sign

Ronald W. Hynes Story of the Koral Kings

In Early 1959, having volunteered for a tour of duty on an island referred to as Naval Air Station 3080; I arrived on Midway Island. My goad was a selfish one. I had enlisted in the Navy to do anything underwater. When boot camp was over, at Great Lakes, my entire company received orders to various Naval Air Training Centers. I knew that along with every island comes water – underwater. Continue reading “The Story of Koral Kings at Midway Island”