The Informer: LC was almost the home of a US naval base
Published 4:42 am Saturday, February 15, 2025
The area along the Industrial Canal and its turning basin, pictured on May 28, 1985, was the favored location for a U.S. Navy base. In the foreground along Big Lake Road is Crowley Maritime Corp. Part of the Reynolds Aluminum Co. facility is show in the upper right. (American Press Archives)
Construction on Naval Station Lake Charles began in early 1987 but didn’t get much further than the land-clearing phase. (American Press Archives)
A "Sailors Make Good Neighbors" banner is hung between lampposts in front of the Calcasieu Marine National Bank. (American Press Archives)
(American Press Archives)
Gloria Gossett celebrates the fact that her son, Dwayne Guillory, is stationed aboard the U.S.S. Kansas while she rides with family friend Bethany Istre. (American Press Archives)
Dan Vidrine announces the winning design — created by R.W. Vincent Elementary fourth-grader Dustin Catrambone — for the billboard advertising campaign contest to encourage the Navy to come to Lake Charles. (American Press Archives)
In 1981, President Ronald Reagan announced his plan to increase the U.S. Navy fleet strength to 600 ships. With that plan came another, in which the Navy would build additional bases on the Pacific and Atlantic coasts, as well as the Gulf of Mexico.
Then-Navy Secretary John F. Lehman Jr. said all Gulf ports — including Lake Charles — would be in competition to house a new surface force of roughly 15 ships.
Competition was keen as ports from Brownville, Texas, to Key West, Fla., prepared packages to offer the Navy in order to be a home port for an estimated 10,000 sailors and their families.
The new division was set to include the U.S.S. Wisconsin, a battleship and sister ship of the New Jersey, as well as various cruisers and destroyers, Lehman said.
“The packages (to be presented) will include land availability, the financing of family housing, the cost of utilities, and an optimum environmental situation,” he said.
For every billion dollars spent by the Navy, it means 27,000 direct jobs for an area and 12,000 secondary jobs, according to an Oct. 19, 1984, article in the American Press.
The city of Lake Charles went all out in its campaign to woo the Navy.
Businesses around town lent their support with slogans such as “Our Favorite Color is Navy Blue,” “We Want the Navy to Drop Anchor Here,” and “Navy, Join Us. We’d Like Your Company”dotting their marquees.
Another sign read “Merrill Lynch is Bullish on the Navy.”
During the campaign, the American Press handed out “Welcome Navy!” T-shirts; the tourism bureau distributed 800 “Sailors Make Good Neighbors” window stickers; and 2,100 yard signs were passed out by Hyatt Co.
“Louisiana: A Home for A HomePort”-themed postcards were also given to residents to send to U.S. lawmakers. Near the return address section was written “We’re Louisiana! People with down-home appeal and top brass ideals, safe neighborhoods, good businesses, a heritage, friends, a homeport, that’s a real home!”
Lake Charles school children also sent the Navy crayon drawings depicting how the sailors would be welcomed.
In 1984, two resolutions by the Southwest Louisiana Building and Construction Trades Council guaranteed the U.S. Navy that construction of a naval base in the city would not be delayed by picketing, work stoppages or other difficulties by the council or its member locals, which at the time represented 15 craft unions.
“The resolutions suggested that since labor and business are now in a period of ‘unprecedented harmonious relations’ both factions should work to expand that harmony for new economic growth in the interest of all segments of the community,” an Oct. 26, 1984, American Press article reads.
Also in that edition, U.S. Rep. Bob Livingston of New Orleans said he was “so impressed” with the Lake Charles area’s efforts to attract the Navy base and that he wished “his own city would be as aggressive in its efforts to get the proposed base.”
“I think that Lake Charles has done a heck of a job,” he told the newspaper. “That’s the kind of attitude and the approach frankly that the Navy is really looking at to see whether or not they are going to be warmly accepted by the community.”
When Navy representatives visited the area Oct. 30-Nov. 1, 1984, 200 American flags greeted them along Prien Lake Road and Lake Street and a commercial jingle made by 10 area musicians who donated their time was played on area radio stations as they toured the town.
Gov. Edwin Edwards told the American Press on Oct. 30, 1984, that he knew of no other community on the Gulf Coast that was as deserving as Lake Charles for the Navy and that of all the state’s deep-water ports, he endorsed Lake Charles as the place for the Navy to locate.
“I am very optimistic and very sure this will be the new home port for the Navy,” then-Lake Charles Mayor Paul Savoie said. “We have offered them everything they could possibly want. Basically, we are waiting for the announcement.”
Ultimately, the Navy decided five ships would be home-ported in Louisiana — two mine warfare vessels and an oiler in Lake Charles and two fast sealift ships in the New Orleans area.
Construction on Naval Station Lake Charles began in early 1987 but didn’t get much further than the land-clearing phase. In the end the funds for the Navy’s building program were not available. The Base Realignment and Closure Commission recommended closing the base in 1988 amid cutbacks. In April of 1990, Defense Secretary Dick Cheney extended a moratorium on most military construction and announced the construction at four homeports would be candidates for rescission. The incomplete naval station in Lake Charles was among them.
Naval Station Lake Charles was dropped from the program and closed by 1991.
