Mitchell Succeeds Dunn as NHF President  At the Naval Historical Foundation 2012 Annual Meeting, Vice Admiral Robert Dunn, USN (Ret) stepped down after 14 years as President. He will be succeeded by Rear Admiral John Mitchell, USN (Ret), who has served on the NHF Board for the past 2 years, and who was voted in as President at the annual Board Meeting.
Rear Admiral Mitchell served in the Navy from 1964 to 1994, retiring as the Director, Strategic Systems Programs. He has a B.A. and B.S. in Electrical Engineering from Rice University as well as an M.S. in Physics from the Naval Postgraduate School. He began his career on board USS Columbus (CG 12) operating her Tartar and Talos Missile Batteries. Missile systems defined his career, as he was involved with the Polaris, Poseidon, and Trident programs. After retirement from the Navy, he worked for Bechtel National, Inc., rising to the position of Senior Vice President. While with Bechtel, he served as Deputy Director of the Los Alamos National Laboratory, in various General Manager positions for the Nevada Test Site, Y-12 HEU Plant, and the Yucca Mountain Project. He has served on the boards of prestigious institutions such as Pantex Plant, Savannah River Plant, Idaho National Laboratory, Bettis National Laboratory, and Charles Stark Draper Laboratory.
Vice Admiral Dunn succeeded Admiral James Holloway as President of the Naval Historical Foundation in 1998. A 1951 graduate of the U.S. Naval Academy, he left active service as the top naval aviator, Deputy Chief of Naval Operations for Air Warfare, responsible for establishing materiel requirements and setting policies for the training, operations, management and personnel throughout the Navy's aviation establishment. During his navy career Vice Admiral Dunn commanded a large number of organizations, large and small, with extensive time airborne including combat in Vietnam. Most of his flying was in carrier based jet attack and fighter aircraft but he is also a designated helicopter pilot and has flown single and multi-engine props and turboprops and sailplanes. He has commanded a carrier squadron, a carrier air wing, a large amphibious ship, the aircraft carrier Saratoga and a carrier battle group. He has provided strong leadership for the Naval Historical over the past 14 years, including the launching of the Cold War Gallery, the Navy's first new exhibit gallery in 40 years. Recently, he led a fundraising drive with his USNA 1951 classmates that raised $51,000. We thank him for his service with the Foundation, and wish him well as he continues to research aviation safety issues, and writes book reviews for the Washington Times.
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ADM Holloway Lecture Highlights Exhibit Ribbon Cutting The Naval Historical Foundation 2012 Annual Meeting was held on Saturday, 23 June, and featured the debut of a brand new exhibit for the Cold War Gallery. Admiral James Holloway, USN (Ret), christened the new exhibit with a riveting firsthand account of the 1972 battle in Haiphong Harbor that is memorialized in the new "Into the Lion's Den" exhibit. This display tells the story of four U.S. Navy warships steaming into Haiphong Harbor in 1972 to shell North Vietnamese shore positions. They came under attack by enemy shore batteries, as well as Russian built North Vietnamese PT boats. With the help of two A-7 Corsair II Navy jets, the PT boats were destroyed, and the four ships exited the harbor safely after completing their mission. Admiral Holloway was on board the cruiser USS Newport News as Commander Seventh Fleet, and personally called in the air support that helped ensure their safe departure. At the NHF meeting, a crowd gathered around the exhibit, and Admiral Holloway shared the exciting story of the battle. Following his remarks, he cut the ribbon on the new exhibit. When the "Start" button on the exhibit was pushed for the first time, the deck of the exhibit began to shake and rattle from simulated naval gunfire, while the portholes of the reconstructed cruiser bridge lit up with flashes from the 8" and 5" guns. The audio portion of the exhibit featured recorded footage from the 1972 battle, as well as newly recorded audio clips from Admiral Holloway himself. Many thanks go out to the donors and friends who brought this exhibit to life! 
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NHF Recognizes Two Volunteers of the Years
At the 2012 NHF Annual Meeting held on 23 June, two outstanding volunteers were recognized for their contributions towards our mission: Preservation, Education, and Commemoration of Naval History. Captain Roger Jones, USN (Ret), and Charles Bogart, were nominated and approved as the 2011 Naval Historical Foundation Volunteers of the Year. Both have been instrumental in the NHF Naval History Book Reviews program. The program was launched in 2011, and depends upon the hard work of volunteer reviewers drawn from the ranks of our membership. Naval History Book Reviews is published monthly by email (see archives here) and we are also republishing the reviews on our website.
For a list of our previous recipients of the Volunteer of the Year award, visit our Volunteer page.
We thank them both for their diligent efforts on our behalf!
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Three Alaska Students Awarded NHF National History Day Prize
In an energetic National History Day ceremony at the University of Maryland's Comcast Center in mid-June, three middle school students from Alaska were awarded the Naval Historical Foundation's Captain Kenneth Coskey Award for Naval History scholarship. The 2012 NHD theme was "Revolution, Reaction, Reform in History", and the three young girls, Hallie Whitmore, Challis Debenham and Mia Keyser of Romig Middle School, Anchorage, developed a 10 minute documentary entitled "The Trials of Truth: The Amistad Revolution." The award was presented by NHF Digital Historian Dave Colamaria, and included National History Day medals for all three students, as well as a $500 award sponsored by the Foundation.
The NHF National History Day prize is named for retired Navy Captain Ken Coskey, a Vietnam War combat aviator and Prisoner of War, and former Executive Director of the Naval Historical Foundation from 1987-1999. Judging of the award is conducted by the organizers of National History day. Please visit our Prizes and Awards page to see a list of the previous recipients of the annual award, dating back to 1999.
We thank the girls for their hard work and congratulate them on their award, and agree wholeheartedly with Mia that "the National History Day Competition is both fun and educational; it puts the fun back into history!"
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Guest Bloggers on Naval History Needed!
We hope by now that you're following the NHF blog at www.navyhistory.org/blog. We put a lot of time and effort into bringing you the latest news from NHF and the naval history community. As our audience continues to grow, we'd like to put out a call for guest bloggers. We're looking for historians and authors who are willing to contribute occasional short stories on naval history. This could be an interesting incident or finding from your research, or a new look at a well known story.
We're open to a wide range of ideas, and look forward to hearing from you. Any content you decide to publish with us will be posted under your name in order to establish authorship. We request that any submissions be rigorously researched and fact-checked, and we can support online footnotes if desired. We may also be able to help out with photo research and scanning to support the story.
Our hope is that both new graduate students of history, as well as established historians, will take advantage of this electronic forum to reach a new audience. Those interested should contact Dave Colamaria at dcolamaria@navyhistory.org.
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Recent Stories from the NHF Blog We continue to update our blog with weekly stories, book reviews, and news updates. Here's a highlight of some of the stories we've shared at www.navyhistory.org. Additionally, if you have an interesting story about naval history, a museum ship, or a naval museum, please let us know, and we'll consider it for publication on the blog! If interested, please contact David Colamaria at dcolamaria@navyhistory.org with your story idea.
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