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Pleasure boating emerged as an American sport in the 1930s - for those who could afford it. Improvements in small, gasoline-powered engine technology let companies like Chris-Craft and Dodge mass-produce boats that the upper middle class, at least, could buy in considerable numbers. By the end of the decade, despite the pressures of the Great Depression, over three hundred thousand motorboats and four thousand sailing yachts with auxiliary power were registered in the United States.
Presiding over this armada, at least in theory, was the U.S. Coast Guard. The service's mission included the enforcement of federal laws and safety standards relating to recreational watercraft, but statistical reality eroded the Coast Guard's ability to carry out that mandate. Budget cuts had reduced the service's manpower to about ten thousand officers and enlisted men. Few of those personnel were stationed on inland waterways (where the majority of pleasure boats operated), and most the Coast Guard's energy was siphoned off by its other duties.
The 1915 act creating the Coast Guard described it as "an armed service," but it differed from the Army and the Navy in at least one fundamental respect: The Coast Guard had no peacetime reserve. The idea of creating one had surfaced occasionally (the oldest reference to such a concept dates from 1851), but the federal government had never acted on it.
In the summer of 1934 a yachtsman named Malcolm Stuart Boylan planted the seed that eventually sprouted as the U.S. Coast Guard Auxiliary. Boylan had just been elected commodore of the newly-created Pacific Writers' Yacht Club, which was about to undertake a cruise from its home in Los Angeles to Catalina Island. Boylan asked a Coast Guard acquaintance, LTCDR C.W. Thomas of the cutter Hermes, to inspect the club's boats before their departure.
Another of the Hermes's officers, LT F.C. Pollard, made the trip to Catalina on board Boylan's yacht, and the two men had a long discussion about the relationship between the Coast Guard and the boating community. On August 23, 1934, Boylan sent Pollard a letter outlining a basic concept for a Coast Guard reserve: ...A Coast Guard Reserve would be an excellent thing to perpetuate its traditions, preserve its entity and, more particularly, to place at the disposal of CG officers, auxiliary flotillas of small craft for the frequent emergencies incident to your...duties. A copy of Boylan's letter made its way to Washington, and to the desk of CDR Russell Waesche, an aide to the Commandant of the Coast Guard. Waesche saw merit in the idea, but it languished for some five years.
In 1936 Waesche was promoted to rear-admiral and appointed Commandant. He was a forceful, energetic man, and the creation of a Coast Guard reserve became one of his favorite projects. With the backing of the Secretary of Commerce, the Secretary of the Navy, and several influential Congressmen, RADM Waesche finally was able to gain Congressional approval for the concept.
The Coast Guard Reserve Act of 1939, passed on June 23 of that year, created an institution that was unique in the federal government. The new Reserve was to have four broadly-defined purposes:
In the interest of (a) safety to life at sea and upon the navigable waters, (b) the promotion of efficiency in the operation of motorboats and yachts, and (c) a wider knowledge of, and better compliance with, the laws, rules, and regulations governing the operation and navigation of motorboats and yachts, and (d) facilitating certain operations of the Coast Guard, there is hereby established a United States Coast Guard Reserve...which shall be composed of citizens of the United States and its Territories and possessions...who are owners (sole or in part) or motorboats or yachts....
The Army and Navy Reserves were conceived as readily-available sources of trained manpower in the event of war; many Army and Navy Reservists were World War I veterans. The new Coast Guard Reserve was to be a civilian organization. Members were not to hold military ranks, wear uniforms, receive military training, or "be vested with or exercise any right, privilege, power, or duty vested in or imposed upon the personnel of the Coast Guard." Reservists were invited to place their boats at the disposal of the Coast Guard "in the conduct of duties incident to the saving of life and property and in the patrol of marine parades and regattas" - with the understanding that each such boat would be commanded by a regular Coast Guard officer or petty officer.
Nor were Coast Guard Reservists to be considered government employees. Apart from a provision that "appropriations for the Coast Guard shall be available for the payment of actual necessary expenses of operation of any such motorboat or yacht when so utilized" (i.e., the Coast Guard would pay for the gas), it was expected that the Reserve would cost the government no money whatsoever.
The basic unit of the new organization would be the flotilla, consisting of ten or more boats and presided over by an elected civilian with the title of Flotilla Commander, with a Vice Commander and a Junior Commander to assist him. Five or more flotillas would compose a division, with an elected Division Captain, Vice Captain, and Junior Captain at its head. The Coast Guard's administrative structure was divided into fourteen districts, corresponding to the naval districts established by the Navy Department. The Reserve Divisions within each district would be administered by civilian officials called the District Commodore and Vice Commodore. The Coast Guard would administer the Reserve through a regular officer with the title Chief Director of the Reserve, whose office would be in Washington. He would be assisted by fourteen District Directors.
The idea of a civilian reserve organization was new, and no one could have been blamed for being skeptical about it. Initial membership benefits consisted of the right to buy a Coast Guard Reserve ensign (a blue rectangular flag bearing the Coast Guard emblem in white, with "United States Coast Guard Reserve" in the ring around the shield) and a lapel pin. The response in both the Coast Guard and the civilian boating community was, however, remarkably enthusiastic. By June of 1940 CDR Merlin O'Neill, the first Chief Director, and his District Directors had enrolled twenty-six hundred men and twenty-three hundred boats in the Coast Guard Reserve. With the support of ADM Waesche, Coast Guard bases began offering training courses for reservists. Those who passed the courses were appointed to three "reserve grades": Senior Navigator, Navigator, and Engineer.
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