USNS Pope being cut up for scrap

[Jim Sheppard]

I was under the impression the Pope had been cut up for scrap in 2005. I "Assumed" this since the Texas Tech Website had photos of the ships canvas bunks on their Vietnam Archives pages and mentioned they took the photos before the ship was scapped. It turns out there were years of "Prep" before the ship could be taken to Texas from San francisco....In fact, the Pope made it's last vovage this past July and I found these great links describing the whole deal:

Part 1: http://maritimematters.com/2010/05/passage-on-the-u-s-n-s-general-john-pope/

Part 2: http://maritimematters.com/2010/05/passage-on-the-u-s-n-s-general-john-pope-part-two/

Part 3: http://maritimematters.com/2010/05/passage-of-the-pope-part-three/

Fantastic shots of the Pope passing through the Panama Canal on it's way to Brownsville, Texas: http://www.travelserver.net/travelpage/ubb-bin/ultimatebb.cgi?ubb=get_topic&f=16&t=000483

Finally, these last two photos are of the Pope as it sits at Esco Marine, Inc. in Brownsville, TX...awaiting it's final dismantling. A Sad end to a ship that served this country in three wars.
http://www.travelserver.net/travelpage/aspgallery/pictures/Ad_3500_6.jpg
http://www.travelserver.net/travelpage/aspgallery/pictures/Ad_3500_7.jpg

In that last photo, you can see that side hatchway open...I do bvelieve that's the one we exited and entered through...and I vividly remember the drunks trying to negotiate the gang plank in Okinawa!

All of the above has been captured to Adobe Acrobat .pdf format files for our Association Archives.

[pt9243]

Man these photos are great. The ship looks so antique it's hard to imagine it carried so many troops over it's storied career. I'm honored to have sailed on her.
Pete Tovar

[bongson]

Jim,
About 6 months ago I attended a garage sale that advertised "100's of books" for sale. He had quite a collection of military history, so he and I got into a conversation about various books, and eventually our own military history. He was a medic with 1/5 Marines in Korea. He led me into his basement (where there were 1000 more books on racks-including the largest collection of books about baseball I've ever seen) and proceded to show me his war memoirbelia. He had the front page of the San Francisco Examiner dated 10-16-54, the U.S.S. John Pope sails under the Golden Gate Bridge returning from Korea. That was his "ride" home from the war.
Jack