DEPARTMENT OF THE NAVY -- NAVAL HISTORICAL CENTER
901 M STREET SE -- WASHINGTON NAVY YARD
WASHINGTON DC 20374-5060
Cruise Books
The Navy does not stock or sell copies of ships' cruise books.
Cruise books, usually similar in general content and format to high
school or college yearbooks, are not official publications. They are compiled
by the officers and men of a ship, unit, or station for private distribution
and customarily published by a local job printing firm. Like school yearbooks,
they are usually paid for by subscription from crew members or from proceeds
of the ship's store.
A ship or station may frequently keep a set of its own cruise books.
The Navy Department Library in the Naval Historical Center has a collection
of cruise books, as do the New York Public Library and the library of the
Naval War College, Newport, Rhode Island. For a list of World War II cruise
books, and libraries that they can be examined at, see: Mawdsley, Dean L.
Cruise Books of the United Sates Navy in World War II: A Bibliography,
Washington: Naval Historical Center, 1993, OCLC 27035864.
World War II cruisebooks are unavailable for loan. Duplicate post-World
War II cruise books from the collection of the Navy Department Library can
be borrowed through interlibrary loan for in-library use only. Due to possible
copyright violations, often fragile book conditions and a small staff, the
Navy Department Library does not provide photocopies of cruise books.
Because of their scarcity, locating and purchasing a specific cruise
book can be extremely difficult. You may wish to contact a dealer specializing
in out-of-print naval and military books or ask a local antiquarian/used
book dealer to conduct a book search for the desired volume.
22 April 1996