USS Bowfin Submarine Museum & Park.

If there was one thing i hated about Hawaii, this museum was one of the things. The only thing good about it was that it was cold in there which was nice to get away from the heat. It was really dark in there and we had a foreign tour guide that just talked the WHOLE time. There was really never a time where he stopped talking. It was kind of annoying, but we were all bored by like the first 5 minutes and wanted to leave, but again it was something we had to do on the trip so we just had to suck it up. When he was talking some of us would wander off and take pictures with the mannequins beside the planes which we weren't supposed to do, but we did it anyways. I think we were there for about an hour until we left because we were all soooo bored. There was a little souvenir shop so we screwed around in there for a bit too. We pretty much just learned about the war and how the planes worked. I was never really interested in history so it just wasn't something that I enjoyed during that trip.


Outside Article:

The USS Bowfin Past and Present

USS Bowfin is fortunate that she did not end up as scrap metal or as target practice for another military ship. BOWFIN is one of only fifteen U.S. WWII submarines that survived this dreaded fate. Today, USS Bowfin Submarine Museum & Park, home to the historic USS Bowfin, is a reality because of the hard work and dedication of individuals from both the military and the civilian communities. Her story and the story of the U.S. Submarine Force, past and present, lives on ...
In early 1972, World War II submariner and Pearl Harbor survivor ADM Bernard A. "Chick" Clarey (CINCPACFLT) and RADM Paul L. Lacy (COMSUBPAC) approached the Secretary of the Navy about acquiring BOWFIN as a memorial to the U.S. Submarine Force at Pearl Harbor.

With the assistance of Hawaii Senator Daniel Inouye, the acquisition was secured. She was then towed to Pearl Harbor's Naval Inactive Ships Maintenance Facility.

In 1978, a non-profit organization, the Pacific Fleet Submarine Memorial Association (PFSMA), was formed and chartered. On 3 August 1979, they formally acquired BOWFIN from the U.S. Navy. This acquisition was made possible through an act of Congress passed on 10 August 1956. This act authorized the Secretary of the Navy to transfer by gift or otherwise, on terms prescribed to him, any obsolete vessel of the Navy to any U.S. non-profit organization who would promise to restore and preserve the vessel at no cost to the U.S. government and its taxpayers. There were also other conditions that had be observ

ed in accordance with receiving BOWFIN. One condition mandated that no part of the submarine may be activated for the purpose of nav igation or movement of the submarine under her own power. Another condition stipulated that BOWFIN must be maintained in a manner that would not be a discredit to the U.S. Navy or to the proud heritage of the submarine.

Later that month, the submarine was towed to Pier 39, near downtown Honolulu, where a group of volunteers from the civilian and military community alike, eagerly assisted in cleaning and restoring BOWFIN after years of neglect. The Dillingham Corporation did much of the preliminary restoration work as many Navy League memb

ers worked hard to secure the necessary funds to support the project. Meanwhile, PFSMA continued to search for a suitable permanent mooring site.
In December 1980, BOWFIN was moved to her present day location at Pearl Harbor, next to the Arizona Memorial Visitor Center -- a fitting location for the submarine that had been launched a year after the attack on Pearl Harbor and nicknamed "The Pearl Harbor Avenger." BOWFIN became the centerpiece of the new "Bowfin Park." On 1 April 1981, BOWFIN officially began her new career as a "museum ship," and welcomed her first visitors on board. By 1985, over one million visitors had walked on her decks, learning about what life was like for the submariners of WWII. In 1986, BOWFIN was named a National Historic Landmark by the U.S. Department of the Interior.