Морская верфь Маре-Айленд: История и развитие базы на Тихом океане.

The Mare Island Naval Shipyard (MINSY) was the first United States Navy base established on the Pacific Ocean. It is located 25 mile (40 km) northeast of San Francisco in Vallejo, California. The Napa River goes through the Mare Island Strait and separates the peninsula shipyard (Mare Island, California) from the main portion of the city of Vallejo. MINSY made a name for itself as the premier U. S. West Coast submarine port as well as serving as the controlling force in San Francisco Bay Area shipbuilding efforts during World War II. The base closed in 1996 and has gone through several redevelopment phases. It was registered as a California Historical Landmark in 1960, Upon reaching San Francisco, Ewing and the other ship assigned to the survey, Massachusetts, were hampered from progress due to desertions of their crews to the gold fields, including a mutiny when crew members rowing into the city from Ewing threw an officer overboard in an attempt to desert. They managed to survey the Mare Island Strait They returned to San Francisco in the spring of 1850 with the coastal survey of northern California beginning on 4 April 1850 and continued up to the mouth of the Columbia River. On 1 August 1850, while still in Oregon, McArthur purchased a 1/16 interest in Mare Island for $468.50 across the Napa River from the settlement of Vallejo. The Navy purchased the original 956 acres (387 ha) of MINSY on 4 January 1853. McArthur's family share (he had died a few months after purchasing an interest in Mare Island) was $5,218.20. Marines first arrived for duty in 1862 under the command of Maj Addison Garland, who was the first officer to command the Marine barracks on the island. Mare Island Naval Shipyard also took a commanding role in civil defense and emergency response on the West Coast, dispatching warships to the Pacific Northwest to subdue Native American unrest. MINSY sent ships such as Wyoming south to Central America and the Panama Canal to protect US political and commercial interests. Some of the support, logistics and munition requirements for the Spanish–American War were filled by Mare Island. MINSY sent men, materiel and ships to San Francisco in response to the fires following the 1906 earthquake. Arctic rescue missions were mounted as necessary. Ordnance manufacturing and storage were two further key missions at MINSY for nearly all of its active service, including ordnance used prior to the American Civil War. In 1911, the Marine Corps established two West Coast recruit training depots first at Mare Island, the second at Puget Sound, Washington. Mare Island eventually became the West Coast's only recruit training facility when the Puget Sound operation consolidated to the San Francisco Bay Area in 1912. Instructors trained recruits there until 10 August 1923, when they relocated to the Marine Corps Recruit Depot San Diego. The Marine Barracks Mare Island remained.

In July 1917, MINSY was the site of a major explosion that killed six people. On July 9, a gunpowder magazine containing 127,600 pounds of black powder blew up, damaging a number of surrounding buildings, and leaving a mystery as to what had caused it. Suspicion settled on an identified German agent and possible saboteur, Lothar Witzke, but the investigation proved inconclusive and the official verdict was that the cause was unknown. Stephen C. Ruder has suggested in a 2022 article that it may not have been an act of German sabotage but suicide by a civilian, Neil Damstedt, who was the principal victim and only individual inside the magazine at the moment of explosion. MINSY saw major shipbuilding efforts during World War I. MINSY holds a shipbuilding speed record for a destroyer that still stands, launching Ward in just 17 1/2 days in May–June 1918. Mare Island was selected by the Navy for construction of the only US West Coast built dreadnought battleship, California, launched in 1919. Several pre dreadnought battleships had previously been launched at San Francisco and Seattle. Noting the power of underwater warfare shown by German U boats in World War I, the Navy doubled their Pacific based submarine construction program at Puget Sound Naval Shipyard by founding a submarine program at MINSY in the early 1920s.

During this period, the Marines stationed at MINSY fielded a college football team which competed against teams in the Pacific Coast Conference and other military service football teams. After the United States entered WWI during April 1917, many college athletes joined or were drafted into the military. Enrolments diminished at universities around the country, with many schools cutting back their sports programs as a result. Consequently, military academies and training bases established football teams composed mostly of college players who had been recruited for service. This was further encouraged by officials who considered football to be excellent war training, with its themes of leadership, teamwork, and discipline. The 1917 Mare Island Marines football team strung together an impressive first season, going 8–0, shutting out six opponents, winning the 1918 Rose Bowl against the Camp Lewis 91st Division football team, and outscoring all of their opponents by a combined total of 200 to 10. This was despite only 500 Marines being stationed at the base when the team was formed. The 1918 Mare Island Marines football team fielded an entirely new roster, which achieved a similar level of success as the previous year. They finished the season with a 10–1 record, losing only in the 1919 Rose Bowl to the Great Lakes Navy Bluejackets.

Base facilities included a hospital, ammunition depot, paint and rubber testing laboratories, and schools for firefighters, opticians, and anti submarine attack during World War II. MINSY reached peak capacity for shipbuilding, repair, overhaul, and maintenance of many different kinds of seagoing vessels including both surface combatants and submarines. Up to 50,000 workers were employed. Mare Island even received Royal Navy cruisers and destroyers and four Soviet Navy subs for service.

Mare Island Naval Shipyard expanded to over during its service life and was responsible for construction of over 500 naval vessels and overhauling thousands of other vessels. Though it remained a strong contender for continued operations, MINSY was identified for closure during the Base Realignment and Closure (BRAC) process of 1993. Naval operations ceased and the facility was decommissioned on 1 April 1996. The California Conservation Corps, Touro University California, and numerous commercial and industrial businesses are currently leasing property aboard the former naval shipyard. In May 2000, the Navy completed the transfer of a former housing area called Roosevelt Terrace using an "economic development conveyance"; a method to accelerate the transfer of BRAC facilities back to civilian communities for their economic benefit. The Navy is also transferring property at the shipyard to other government agencies such as Fish and Wildlife Service refuge, a Forest Service office building, an Army Reserve Center, a Coast Guard communications facility, and a Department of Education school.

The shipyard was featured by Huell Howser in California's Gold Episode 704. Scenes from the 2018 science fiction film Bumblebee were filmed in the industrial section of Mare Island, most notably the dry dock slipways. In 2015 FIAT shot an automobile commercial along the industrial waterside, including a chase scene on the old coal shed loading platform.