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Photo # NH 101229-KN:  USS Pennsylvania in about 1905-1908.  Color-tinted postal card.

Online Library of Selected Images:
-- U.S. NAVY SHIPS --

USS Pennsylvania (Armored Cruiser # 4, later CA-4), 1905-1931. Renamed Pittsburgh in 1912

USS Pennsylvania, name-ship of a class of six 13,680 ton armored cruisers, was built at Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. Commissioned in March 1905, she operated off the U.S. Atlantic Coast and in the Caribbean until September 1906, when she departed for service in Far Eastern waters. A year later, Pennsylvania arrived in California to begin a decade of duty along the Pacific coasts of North and South America. A cruise to Peru and Chile in 1910 was followed by temporary aviation service early in 1911. On 18 January of that year, after she had been fitted with a wooden landing platform aft, civilian aviator Eugene Ely landed his Curtiss biplane on board, the first time an airplane had set down on a warship's deck.

Pennsylvania was in reserve at the Puget Sound Navy Yard between mid-1911 and mid-1913, during which time she was fitted with a "cage" foremast. She was renamed Pittsburgh in August 1912, in order to make the name Pennsylvania available for the planned Battleship # 38. The cruiser operated off the Mexican west coast during the mid-"Teens", a time of great instability in that nation. In 1917-1918, after the United States entered World War I, she was flagship of a squadron of armored cruisers that patrolled off South America in both the Pacific and the Atlantic. Several months after the end of the conflict, in June 1919, Pittsburgh began a two-year deployment to European waters. When the Navy implemented its hull number system in mid-1920, she was designated CA-4. Between 1922 and 1926 Pittsburgh was again in the eastern Atlantic and the Mediterranean as flagship of Commander, U.S. Naval Forces in Europe.

After an overhaul in mid-1926, which included removing some of her boilers and her forward smokestack, Pittsburgh steamed to the Far East to become flagship of the Asiatic Fleet. Her activities in that region included putting armed landing parties ashore during the 1927 civil war in China and paying visits to ports in Southeast Asia and the Dutch East Indies. USS Pittsburgh left the Western Pacific in April 1931, arriving back on the U.S. East Coast in late June. Decommissioned in July, she was used in weapons tests later in the year and sold for scrapping in late December 1931.

This page features selected views of USS Pennsylvania (Armored Cruiser # 4, later CA-4), which was renamed Pittsburgh in 1912, and provides links to other images related to her.

For more pictures of and concerning this ship, see:

  • USS Pennsylvania (Armored Cruiser # 4, later CA-4) -- On Board & Miscellaneous Views; and
  • Eugene Ely's Flight to USS Pennsylvania, 18 January 1911


    If you want higher resolution reproductions than the digital images presented here, see: "How to Obtain Photographic Reproductions."

    Click on the small photograph to prompt a larger view of the same image.

    Photo #: NH 101229-KN (color)

    USS Pennsylvania (Armored Cruiser # 4)

    Photograph taken circa 1905-1908, and published on a color-tinted postal card by Edward H. Mitchell, San Francisco, California.

    Courtesy of Commander Donald J. Robinson, USN (Retired), 1983

    U.S. Naval Historical Center Photograph.

    Online Image: 99KB; 740 x 490 pixels

     
    Photo #: NH 105574

    USS Pennsylvania
    (Armored Cruiser # 4)

    Anchored off New York City, 1905.
    Photographed by C.C. Langill, New York.

    Collection of Warren Beltramini, donated by Beryl Beltramini, 2007.

    U.S. Naval Historical Center Photograph.

    Online Image size: 62KB; 740 x 560 pixels

     
    Photo #: NH 85296

    USS Pennsylvania
    (Armored Cruiser # 4)

    Anchored at Oyster Bay, New York, during the Naval review there, 4 September 1906. Published on a stereograph card by the Keystone View Company, 1906.

    Courtesy of Commander Donald J. Robinson, USN(MSC), 1977

    U.S. Naval Historical Center Photograph.

    Online Image: 101KB; 635 x 675 pixels

    A stereo pair version of this image is available as Photo # NH 85296-A

    Online Image of stereo pair: 68KB; 675 x 355 pixels

    Note:
    See Photo # NH 85296 (extended caption) for the text which accompanied the original photograph.

     
    Photo #: NH 50062

    USS Pittsburgh
    (Armored Cruiser # 4)

    At Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, circa 1917-1918.

    Courtesy of Lieutenant Commander Ellis M. Zacharias, USN, 1931.

    U.S. Naval Historical Center Photograph.

    Online Image: 74KB; 740 x 555 pixels

     
    Photo #: NH 50051

    USS Pittsburgh
    (Armored Cruiser # 4)

    In a floating drydock at Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, circa 1917-1918.

    Courtesy of Lieutenant Commander Ellis M. Zacharias, USN, 1931.

    U.S. Naval Historical Center Photograph.

    Online Image: 80KB; 740 x 580 pixels

     
    Photo #: NH 105195

    USS Pittsburgh
    (Armored Cruiser # 4)

    At the Portsmouth Navy Yard, Kittery, Maine, 27 May 1919.
    Panoramic photograph, taken by Crosby, 11 Portland Street, Boston, Massachusetts.

    Courtesy of the Naval Historical Foundation, Crosby Collection.

    U.S. Naval Historical Center Photograph.

    Online Image size: 87KB; 1200 x 550 pixels

     
    Photo #: NH 50352

    USS Pittsburgh
    (Armored Cruiser # 4)

    In a harbor in the Adriatic Sea area, circa 1919.

    U.S. Naval Historical Center Photograph.

    Online Image: 75KB; 740 x 425 pixels

     
    Photo #: NH 72265

    USS Pittsburgh (CA-4)


    Alongside a wharf, probably in a European port, circa 1920.

    Collection of Rear Admiral Paulus P. Powell, USN.

    U.S. Naval Historical Center Photograph.

    Online Image: 88KB; 740 x 525 pixels

     
    Photo #: NH 95655

    USS Pittsburgh (CA-4)


    In a Mediterranean Port, circa 1923-1926.
    Panoramic photograph.

    Courtesy of Robert M. Ramsey, 1981.

    U.S. Naval Historical Center Photograph.

    Online Image: 57KB; 740 x 325 pixels

     
    Photo #: NH 720

    USS Pittsburgh (CA-4)


    Underway at sea, circa 1926-1931, as refitted for service as Asiatic Fleet flagship.
    Note the dense smoke from her boiler fires.

    U.S. Naval Historical Center Photograph.

    Online Image: 83KB; 740 x 575 pixels

     
    Photo #: NH 95119

    USS Pittsburgh (CA-4)


    In the Wangpoo River, off Shanghai, China, circa 1927.
    Note the different elevations of the 8"/45 guns of her forward turret.

    Courtesy of Penland Dixon, 1983.

    U.S. Naval Historical Center Photograph.

    Online Image: 72KB; 740 x 535 pixels

     
    Photo #: NH 92515

    USS Pittsburgh (CA-4)


    Underway, circa 1929.

    Courtesy of William P. Healey, 1979.

    U.S. Naval Historical Center Photograph.

    Online Image: 75KB; 740 x 435 pixels

     
    Photo #: NH 51997

    USS Pittsburgh (CA-4)


    Anchored off Shanghai, China, circa 1930-1931.

    U.S. Naval Historical Center Photograph.

    Online Image: 83KB; 740 x 595 pixels

     
    Photo #: 80-G-405490

    USS Pittsburgh (CA-4)


    The decommissioned ship being used in bomb tests, 8 October 1931.
    This photograph shows the explosion of the first 500-pound bomb in the test series.

    Official U.S. Navy Photograph, now in the collections of the National Archives.

    Online Image: 88KB; 740 x 615 pixels

    Reproductions of this image may also be available through the National Archives photographic reproduction system.

     


    For more pictures of and concerning this ship, see:

  • USS Pennsylvania (Armored Cruiser # 4, later CA-4) -- On Board & Miscellaneous Views; and
  • Eugene Ely's Flight to USS Pennsylvania, 18 January 1911


    If you want higher resolution reproductions than the digital images presented here, see: "How to Obtain Photographic Reproductions."


    Return to Naval Historical Center home page.

    Page made 24 December 2002
    New image added 12 April 2008