VANGUARD T-AG 194

Ship Name and Designation History

This section lists the names and designations that the ship had during its lifetime. The list is in chronological order.

Mission Buenaventura Class Fleet Oiler Keel Laid 26 August 1943 at Marinship Corp., Sausalito, CA Launched 25 November 1943 MISSION SAN FERNANDO (Tanker) Delivered to Naval Transportation Service 29 February 1944 Chartered by Pacific Tankers, Inc. for operation Returned to Maritime Commission 10 May 1946 Acquired by U.S. Navy 21 October 1947 for charter to Union Oil Co. MISSION SAN FERNANDO AO-122 Placed In Service for Naval Transportation Service (NTS) USNS MISSION SAN FERNANDO T-AO-122 Transferred to Military Sea Transportation Service (MSTS) 1 October 1949 Placed Out of Service 24 May 1955 Laid up in National Defense Reserve Fleet Struck from Naval Register 22 June 1955 Reacquired by U.S. Navy 21 June 1956 USNS MISSION SAN FERNANDO T-AO-122 Placed In Service with MSTS Operated under charter to Marine Transportation Lines Placed Out of Service 4 September 1957 Laid up in National Defense Reserve Fleet Reacquired by U.S. Navy 28 September 1964 Converted to Missile Range Instrumentation Ship (AGM) MUSSEL SHOALS (T-AGM-19) Renamed and reclassified 1964 while undergoing conversion USNS VANGUARD T-AGM-19 Renamed to VANGUARD on 1 September 1965 Placed In Service with MSTS 28 February 1966 USNS VANGUARD T-AG-194 Reclassified Miscellaneous Auxiliary (Navigational Test Launch Ship) (T-AG-194) September 1980 Placed Out of Service (Date unknown) Struck from Naval Register 13 December 1999 Laid up in National Defense Reserve Fleet Scrapped on 5 November 2013 at Marine Metal Inc. recycle slip in Brownsville, Texas

 

Naval Covers

This section lists active links to the pages displaying covers associated with the ship. There should be a separate set of pages for each name of the ship (for example, Bushnell AG-32 / Sumner AGS-5 are different names for the same ship so there should be one set of pages for Bushnell and one set for Sumner). Covers should be presented in chronological order (or as best as can be determined).

Since a ship may have many covers, they may be split among many pages so it doesn't take forever for the pages to load. Each page link should be accompanied by a date range for covers on that page.

1. USNS Vanguard T-AGM-19 / T-AG-194 Covers Page 1     (1965-1971)

 

Postmarks

This section lists examples of the postmarks used by the ship. There should be a separate set of postmarks for each name and/or commissioning period. Within each set, the postmarks should be listed in order of their classification type. If more than one postmark has the same classification, then they should be further sorted by date of earliest known usage.

A postmark should not be included unless accompanied by a close-up image and/or an image of a cover showing that postmark. Date ranges MUST be based ONLY ON COVERS IN THE MUSEUM and are expected to change as more covers are added.
 
>>> If you have a better example for any of the postmarks, please feel free to replace the existing example.

 

Postmark Type --- Killer Bar Text	Postmark Date	Thumbnail Link To Postmark Image	Thumbnail Link To Cover Image

 

USPO Machine cancel Cape Canaveral FL

1969-05-26

N/A

VANGUARD T-AGM-19. Apollo 10 support ship.

 

Ships Marking

1973-08-17

As VANGUARD T-AGM-19. Skylab 1973, support ship in Argentina.

 

Other Information

USNS VANGUARD received the following awards during her Naval career - Navy Battle "E" Ribbon (2 awards) and the National Defense Service Medal.

 

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