Farragut Naval Training Station filled with memories

The community Hall in Sandpoint, Idaho, took on a national function in 1942. The YMCA leased the hall from the city for $1 a year to be used as a USO club for the sailors stationed at the Naval Training Station in Farragut, Idaho.

With a population of about 42,000, Farragut was the largest town in Idaho, and its close proximity to Sandpoint impacted the city in many ways. The high wages offered, as high as a dollar an hour, drew people from Sandpoint to Farragut. The cute girls of Sandpoint drew many of the men of Farragut to Sandpoint.

The Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor on Dec. 7 1941, was the causal factor for the need for more training facilities in the United States. The great losses of the U.S. fleet were known nationwide and men flocked to enlist in the Navy.

In June 1942, more than 40,000 men joined the Navy. Numbers like this made it a necessity for more training facilities and, in March 1942, the news that Lake Pend Oreille had been chosen was released. The Walter Butler Company of St. Paul, Minnesota was chosen to construct the station.

In May 1942, President Franklin D. Roosevelt named the new site in Idaho "Farragut" after the famous Union Admiral David G. Farragut. It was Admiral Farragut who said during the raid of Mobile Bay, "Damn the torpedoes, full speed ahead."

The training station was to have six training units designed for 5,000 men. After a unit was completed the training started while the next unit was under construction.

The station also had a school area designed for 5,000 personnel. The hospital eventually had 2,000 beds dedicated to caring for the Farragut trainees and staff.

A housing project for 300 Navy families was built; there were also five dormitories, officer's quarters, an auditorium, a recreational building, and two chapels on the base.

Add to this the auxiliary buildings necessary to maintain a station of more than 30,000 people and it is easy to see why Farragut was Idaho's largest town.

As each unit was completed it was named in honor of navy men who had been killed in action and who had received the Congressional Medal of Honor. They were, Captain Mervyn Bennion, Seaman 1st Class James Ward, Lt. Commander John C. Waldron, Rear Admiral Norman Scott, Chief Watertender Oscar Peterson, and Commander Howard Gilmore.

Thousands of men and women trained at the United States Naval Training Station at Farragut, and over the years many "old salts" have returned to renew friendships made long ago.

Farragut is not the same as they knew it. The brig is the only building still standing, but as these men and women stand in what is now a state park; they see what others cannot see. Through their memories, they can see the Farragut of the war years and remember what it was like, both good and bad.

This year (2006) marked the end of the scheduled re-unions at Farragut but one old sailor expressed the sentiment of many others when he said, "As long as my mind and body hold out — I will return each year."