IG report says naval history ‘in jeopardy’

The Navy’s historical command, a chronically underfunded institution tasked with the safekeeping of the Navy’s innumerable treasures, is beset with preservation problems and internal strife, a recent report by the naval inspector general has found.

The problems are impairing the Navy’s efforts to record and share its history with the fleet and the public, the report found; it calls for a “blue ribbon panel of eminent historians” to address the issues.

One of the most pressing findings is that historic collections of photographs, paintings and artifacts are endangered because of poor facilities, namely broken or nonexistent temperature and humidity controls in the three sprawling repositories controlled by Naval History and Heritage Command, based at the Washington Navy Yard, D.C.

Nearly all of the history command’s 230,000 square feet of storage area is unsuitable for these artifacts, the IG report found. This has prompted the command to relocate its sensitive items, such as parts of its photo collection, although it isn’t clear where they will be moved.

The command’s “storage and preservation activities require temperature and humidity controls that are uniquely demanding and almost entirely unmet,” according to the report. “Consequently, the history and heritage of the United States Navy is in jeopardy.”...