In the middle of the Second World War, the United States hid two aircraft carriers in Lake Michigan. They trained…

In the middle of the Second World War, the United States hid two aircraft carriers in Lake Michigan. They trained nearly 18,000 carrier pilots in the cold freshwater. Hundreds of aircraft crashed during that training. The cold water preserved them, and most are still down there. This is the story of Lake Michigan in the Second World War..🧵1/4

🧵 2/4 By 1942 the United States needed thousands of carrier pilots, and every fleet carrier the Navy had was already at sea fighting the Japanese. There was nowhere to train new men in the open ocean, and German U-boats were sinking shipping along the American coast, which made inland training far safer. The Navy needed somewhere protected. Somewhere far inland. Somewhere a submarine could never reach. They chose Lake Michigan. Two coal fired paddle wheel passenger steamers were converted into aircraft carriers. USS Wolverine had been a luxury liner called the Seeandbee. USS Sable had been the Greater Buffalo. They remain the only side wheel propelled aircraft carriers in American naval history. Both sailed from Chicago's Navy Pier and worked off Naval Air Station Glenview, just north of the city. From those wooden flight decks, American pilots learned to land on a moving carrier in calm freshwater before being sent to face the Japanese in the Pacific.

🧵 3/4 Nearly 18,000 pilots qualified on the Lake Michigan carriers between 1942 and 1945. They flew Hellcats, Corsairs, Avengers, Wildcats and the Dauntless dive bombers that helped win the war. One of the young aviators who earned his carrier qualification on those decks was a future president, George H W Bush. It was dangerous work. The decks were 32 feet shorter than a fleet carrier's. The wind on the lake was often too calm to get heavy aircraft off. There were more than 200 accidents. 128 aircraft went into the water, and eight pilots were killed. Free French aviators trained there. So did Norwegians in exile. When the war ended the Navy decommissioned both ships and scrapped them. The programme closed and was largely forgotten. The aircraft stayed on the bottom of the lake.

🧵 4/4 Then in the 1980s a Chicago company called A and T Recovery went looking for them. What they found astonished naval historians. The cold freshwater had preserved the aircraft like a time capsule. Tyres still inflated. Leather seats still soft. Oil still in the crankcases. Painted markings still readable. Nearly 40 have been recovered. They are restored and displayed today at the National Naval Aviation Museum in Florida, the Air Zoo in Michigan, and at Midway Airport in Chicago. Most of the SBD Dauntless dive bombers you can see in American museums came off the bottom of Lake Michigan. Dozens more are still down there. Each one represents a young American pilot who walked away from a crash eighty years ago and went on to fight in the Pacific. There is probably no other stretch of water in the world holding as many American naval aircraft from the Second World War. This was the story of Lake Michigan in the Second World War. I post a story like this every single day. Most people never see them. Follow so you don't miss the next one.