Proclamation 3289—National Maritime Day, 1959

Whereas the United States has long fostered and encouraged the development and maintenance of a strong Merchant Marine; and

Whereas this is the year in which the N.S. Savannah, the world's first nuclear-powered merchant ship, will be launched upon the high seas; and

Whereas this ship provides another visible sign of the determination of the American people to devote the power of the atom to the furtherance of peaceful trade and to the progress of humanity; and

Whereas the Congress, by a joint resolution approved May 20, 1933 (48 Stat. 73), designated May 22 as National Maritime Day, in commemoration of the departure from Savannah, Georgia, on May 22, 1819, of the S.S. Savannah on the first transoceanic voyage by any steamship, and requested the President to issue a proclamation annually calling for the observance of that day:

Now, Therefore, I, Dwight D. Eisenhower, President of the United States of America, do hereby urge the citizens of the United States to honor our Merchant Marine on Friday, May 22, 1959, National Maritime Day, by displaying the flag of the United States at their homes or other suitable places; and I direct the appropriate officials of the Government to arrange for the display of the flag on all Government buildings on that day.

I also request that all ships sailing under the American flag dress ship on National Maritime Day in tribute to the American Merchant Marine.

In Witness Whereof, I have hereunto set my hand and caused the Seal of the United States of America to be affixed.

DONE at the City of Washington this twenty-seventh day of April in the year of our Lord nineteen hundred and fifty-nine, and of the Independence of the United States of America the one hundred and eighty-third.

DWIGHT D. EISENHOWER

By the President:

CHRISTIAN A. HERTER,

Secretary of State