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From Near Extinction to Rebirth: The Coast Guard’s First Reorganization
—A federal efficiency drive nearly erased the Revenue Cutter Service. Instead, Sumner Kimball and Ellsworth Bertholf turned crisis into a merger that joined cutters with lifesaving stations, created the modern Coast Guard in 1915, and forged a military service ready for World War I.
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Alexander Hamilton and the Coast Guard as a U.S. Military Service
—From Hamilton’s “few armed vessels” to cutters and LEDETs in modern war zones, a small revenue force evolved into a full-fledged armed service that has answered every call from the age of sail to the Global War on Terrorism.
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Rear Admiral Frederick Billard — commandant, commander, warrior, educator and mastermind of rapid expansion
—Billard oversaw the largest and fastest peacetime expansion in Coast Guard history.
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Dobbins and Knapp—Frontier Mariners, Naval Officers, and Revenue Cutter Masters
—The worst place for an American to be in the spring of 1812 was anywhere along the Canadian border—it was like a winding stretch of gunpowder ignited on one end.