USN photo from the Rick Larson Collection, now in the private collection of Ric Hedman.
S-1 sliding down the ways at the Bethlehem Quincy shipyard (formerly Fore River Shipbuilding), Quincy, MA. on October 26, 1918. The tube at the tip of the bow is a towing fairlead hawsepipe. The two port side torpedo tube shutter doors can be seen, and at the bottom underneath the retracted bow planes is the boat's mushroom anchor. Despite flying the U.S. flag on the aft flagstaff, the boat is not yet in commission, and would not be until June 5, 1920.
S-18 moored alongside the Electric Boat owned engine repair barge Isaac L. Rice, June 2, 1922. S-18, like all of the EB design S-boats, was experiencing severe engine problems that had her sitting immobile alongside this barge in Groton, CT. for nearly four years. EB and the Navy was struggling with finding a solution to the vexing and severe torsional vibrations that the NELSECO 8-EB-15 engines were experiencing. Eventually a solution was found and the S-18 was finally commissioned on April 3, 1924.
