The Wackiest Ship in the Army

The Wackiest Ship in the Army is an American 1960 Eastmancolor CinemaScope comedy-drama war film directed by Richard Murphy and starring Jack Lemmon, Ricky Nelson, and Chips Rafferty. It was filmed at Pearl Harbor and Kauai. The story is a dramatized, fictionalized account of a real ship known as the USS Echo. It was a sailing vessel that originated in New Zealand and became part of the United States Navy during World War II. Plot In 1943, U.S. Navy Lieutenant Rip Crandall, an expert yachtsman in civilian life, is based at Townsville, in Australia. He is surprised to be assigned command of a sailing ship, the USS Echo, a unique ship in the Pacific Fleet. The only crew member who knows how to work a ship with sails is eager young Ensign Tommy Hanson, who cost Crandall a yacht race with a mistake before the war. Crandall tries to refuse this dubious command but Lieutenant commander Vandewater, Hanson and Crandall's former sailing buddy, wears down his resistance. Vandewater points out Crandall's poor fitness report and advises that, if he doesn't take this command, he will never get another. Hanson takes Crandall out drinking with some of the men so he will bond with them and feel guilty about abandoning them.