Charlestown Navy Yard

This guide to Charlestown Navy Yard centers on October 15, 1953, when fire broke out deep in the aircraft carrier Leyte's port catapult room while she sat mid-conversion at the Boston Naval Shipyard, and flames rolled twenty-five feet above the hangar deck. It follows the nearly five-hour fight to put it out, the thirty-seven names now engraved on a small bronze plaque near the pier, and the blackout the Navy clamped on the story while FBI agents and naval intelligence officers combed the wreckage, unable to rule out sabotage. The ship had passed a full inspection only days before.