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Matsuo Trading Co. Inc. Yokohama Japan USS LEXINGTON (CVT-16)


Salvage Sailor
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Salvage Sailor

Aloha Everyone,

 

I've seen this patch a few times over the years and now can give it a positive ID as to the Japanese manufacturer - Matsuo Trading Co. Inc. Yokohama, Japan

 

The patch commemorates the 300,000th arrested landing aboard the Blue Ghost in 1972 when she was "Training pilots for the Fleet" (and the skies above Hanoi), which means she made 100,000 of those landings between 1967 & 1972. If you estimate the math, that's between 70 and 100 landings per day, every day, around the clock over 5 years.

 

From her service history

 

Into 1969, Lexington operated out of her home port, Pensacola, as well as Corpus Christi and New Orleans, qualifying student aviators and maintaining the high state of training of both active-duty and reserve naval aviators. Her work became of increasing significance as she prepared the men vital to the Navy and Marine Corps operations over Vietnam, where naval aviation played a major role. Lexington marked her 200,000th arrested landing on 17 October 1967, and was redesignated CVT-16 on 1 January 1969. She continued as a training carrier for the next 22 years until she was relieved by Forrestal, and Lexington was decommissioned and struck on 8 November 1991

 

It would seem that Matsuo Trading had quite a few items to offer to Vietnam era servicemen beyond patches. Anyone else have any Matsuo Trading items?

CV 16 CVT 16 USS LEXINGTON Matsuo Trading 001.jpg

CV 16 CVT 16 USS LEXINGTON Matsuo Trading 002.jpg

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