P-557

It is a shame many of these things were not preserved in the national interest rather than vanishing into private collections.
 
That boat has a very colorful past. In addition to it's military service, It appeared in at least one film, " Lucky Lady" with Burt Reynolds. It may also have been in the T.V. series, '"McHale's Navy', and under the name Gary Linn was busted for drug smuggling.
After being seized with a few tons of marijuana aboard, it was sold at Customs auction. That is how it came to be in the hands of the owners mentioned in the posting.
 
It is a shame many of these things were not preserved in the national interest rather than vanishing into private collections.
At the end of the war a large number of PT Boats were burned in the Philippines, as they weren't worth the cost to bring back to the States.
 
New Zealand did the same with its Mosquito's at the end of WW2, there are a number of photos of them being chopped up for firewood.

http://rnzaf.proboards.com/thread/17333/mosquito

Now we spend millions of dollars to rebuild them and they draw crowds by the tens of thousands to see them fly again, I guess there is something in the saying "you don't know what you've got until it's gone".

 
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