The USS Saratoga association that brings together current and former crewmen of the four ships that bore that name recounts an event with the first Saratoga, the flagship of the U.S. fleet at Lake Champlain, engaging a larger British fleet that sailed down from Canada. During the battle, a cannonball tore through the deck of the Saratoga, into the quarters of a sailor who kept a pet rooster. Freed, the rooster perched himself on the rail of the ship and began crowing. The sailors took that for a good omen, and fought on to victory at Champlain. Three more Saratoga ships were launched, the last two being aircraft carriers, the most powerful ships in the modern navy.

On this day, October 8, in 1955, the last of the Saratoga ships, a Forrestall-class carrier, launched for New York Naval Shipyard in New York City. At over 1,000 feet in length with a crew of around 3,800 men, the Saratoga was a floating fortress.

Most of the ship’s early years were spent with the Sixth Fleet in the waters close to the Middle East, a volatile region at a volatile time. A political coup in Syria and the hijacking of a Trans World Airlines flight to the country, as well as the Soviet Union’s military maneuvers in the area led to the Sixth Fleet’s “show of force”. By 1970 the Saratoga sailed for Vietnam, where over a two week period in September her planes flew 800 sorties against the enemy.