She is a massive beast. Laid down in 1940 at the Philadelphia Navy Yard, the USS New Jersey (BB-62) eventually stretched nearly three football fields long. She didn't just sit in harbor. During World War II, her nine 16-inch guns hurled 2,700-pound shells at Japanese fortifications across the Pacific, shielding carriers and tearing up islands like Saipan and Okinawa. Admiral William F. Halsey even made her his flagship. But the Navy wasn't done. They brought her back for the Korean War to hammer targets at Wonsan, using those massive guns to shatter enemy supply lines. She kept coming back.
Actually, she became the only active battleship in the world during the Vietnam War. In 1968, she patrolled the gunline off the DMZ, firing thousands of rounds to save besieged Marines. Firepower like nothing else. Then, in the 1980s, the Reagan administration modernized her with Tomahawk cruise missiles and Phalanx defense systems. She proved her worth again by shelling militia positions in the mountains of Lebanon. By the time they decommissioned her for the final time in 1991, she had earned 19 battle stars. That makes her the most decorated battleship in American military history. A floating fortress.
Today, she sits on the Delaware River waterfront in Camden, just across the river from where workers first laid her keel. She isn't just some old boat rusting away. The National Register listing honors her not just for her combat record, but as a masterpiece of mid-century naval engineering. Think about the sheer physics of moving 45,000 tons of steel armor at over thirty knots. It's mind-boggling. Now, visitors walk her teak decks, peering into the cramped crew bunks and staring up at those massive, empty gun barrels. She is a physical link to a vanished era of big-gun naval warfare.
