by Max Marbut
Staff Writer
The effort to bring the guided missile destroyer USS Charles F. Adams to Jacksonville is full speed ahead, said Dan Bean, president of the Jacksonville Naval Ship Museum, Friday at a meeting of the Downtown Council of the Jacksonville Regional Chamber of Commerce.
Bean, a partner at Holland & Knight and a former U.S. Navy surface warfare officer, is leading the nonprofit organization that’s raising money and support for bringing the retired vessel to a berth Downtown to serve as a floating naval museum.
Bean was recruited for the effort by the Jacksonville Historic Naval Ship Association because of his service in the U.S. Navy, which includes serving aboard the Adams after he graduated from Vanderbilt University on an ROTC scholarship.
“It was the first ship I ever stepped on,” said Bean.
The Adams was stationed at Mayport Naval Station for 25 years and was one of the first vessels to arrive for the blockade mission 90 miles south of Key West in 1962 during the Cuban Missile Crisis, said Bean.
He said there are 35 naval warship museums in the country, but the Adams in Jacksonville would be the first in Florida.
The association plans to use the vessel as a naval warfare museum, a conference and meeting center and a hospitality destination. Bean said the ship, when berthed on a pier to be constructed on the Southbank east of the Acosta Bridge, would be a tourist attraction that would bring thousands of people Downtown each year.
The destroyer was donated to the organization by the federal government and is in storage at the Navy’s Inactive Ships Program facility in Philadelphia.
The association plans to have the vessel towed to Jacksonville. Bean said the cost to bring the ship here is $3 million and the group also needs to raise $6 million to construct the pier on the Southbank for the 437-foot destroyer.
“It won’t be a skyline-changer. It won’t block out the sun like an aircraft carrier would,” said Bean.
In addition to being a tourist attraction and a tribute to the significant active duty and retired military population in Northeast Florida, bringing the Adams to Jacksonville would serve another purpose.
“It’s not just about saving the Adams. It’s about having something else to do Downtown,” said Bean.
“You name the holiday, we can have an event. The possibilities are endless,” he said.
With a projected 120,000 annual visitors, Bean said the museum would have an economic impact of $3 million-$5 million. The museum would create 25-30 direct jobs and 75 indirect jobs, such as caterers and event, parking and museum display development staff.
The museum also would enhance Downtown’s hotels, restaurants and entertainment businesses, said Bean.
The first step was convincing the Navy to donate the ship. The next step was taken in October when the City Council approved an ordinance supporting the creation of the floating museum.
The next step, said Bean, is to raise $3 million in corporate and private donations to have the ship towed to Jacksonville to begin the process of converting it to a museum.
Depending on the time frame, Bean said after refurbishment, the Adams could be temporarily berthed at the Shipyards property along East Bay Street during construction of the pier.
The association is planning a fundraising drive in August and a gala to raise funds in the fall. Bean said Gov. Rick Scott, who served aboard an Adams class destroyer when he was in the Navy, has agreed to be the keynote speaker at the gala.
On Thursday, Scott was presented with a model of the USS Glover by the association in Tallahassee. It was made in honor of the governor’s 29 months of service as a radar man on the USS Glover beginning in 1971.
The model was informally unveiled during Scott’s recent visit to the association’s Visitor Center at the Jacksonville Landing.
At that time, Scott invited the association to Tallahassee for a formal presentation.
The model will be on display in the state Capitol.
For more information about bringing the Adams to Jacksonville, visit www.Adams2Jax.org.
356-2466