WASHINGTON — The U.S. Navy is naming a ship after embellished Alaska Native veteran Solomon Atkinson of Metlakatla.
Atkinson, who died in 2019, was one of many first Navy SEALs. He was deployed to Korea and accomplished three excursions in Vietnam, for which he was awarded a Bronze Star and Purple Coronary heart. Amongst his many acts of service, Atkinson additionally skilled astronauts Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin in underwater weightless simulations.
The Navy introduced plans Monday to call a future Navajo-class towing, salvage and rescue ship — that are historically named for outstanding Indigenous individuals and tribes — after Atkinson.
“Atkinson’s achievements as a SEAL have left behind a permanent legacy, not simply within the Particular Warfare Neighborhood, however with our nation’s astronauts as effectively,” Navy Secretary Carlos Del Toro mentioned in an announcement. “I’m happy to make sure that his title will lengthen globally to all who views this nice ship.”
Atkinson was born in Metlakatla in 1930 and raised in Alaska’s solely federally acknowledged Indian reservation. Earlier than enlisting within the Navy in 1952, he labored as a industrial fisherman. After his retirement from the Navy as a Chief Warrant Officer 4 in 1973, Atkinson based the primary veterans group on Annette Island and served as mayor of Metlakatla, amongst different roles locally.
The Navy named Atkinson’s widow, Joann Atkinson, and daughters Michele Gunyah and Maria Hayward as sponsors of the vessel. In that function, they are going to keep a relationship with the ship and crew.
Joann Atkinson mentioned the information that the Navy deliberate to call a ship after her late husband was “utterly overwhelming.”
“I nonetheless have not come down off the clouds,” she mentioned.
“I simply want he was right here to obtain, however I do know he is trying down on us proper now,” she mentioned of her husband. “And he is in all probability simply smiling. He had probably the most lovely smile.”
Caitlin Steinberg is an archivist chronicling Atkinson’s life for a e book and the chief director of Operation Inexperienced Faces, a nonprofit that preserves SEALs’ oral histories from the Vietnam Warfare.
Steinberg known as the duty of preserving Atkinson’s story “intimidating” as a result of it spans so many historic occasions. In an interview, she outlined Atkinson’s experiences making ready for the Cuban missile disaster, coaching astronauts, serving within the Vietnam Warfare and being in Washington, D.C., throughout 9/11.
“His life is stuffed with such extraordinary circumstances that may solely be described as both destiny or unimaginable coincidence,” she mentioned.
Alaska Republican Sen. Dan Sullivan acknowledged Atkinson as “Alaskan of the Week” in a 2017 U.S. Senate flooring speech. Sullivan knew Atkinson and known as him “a legendary Alaskan and an American hero” in an announcement.
“You’d by no means hear Sol brag about his accomplishments and illustrious profession as a result of Sol was — as many of the greats are — a really humble man,” Sullivan mentioned.
Hayward, Atkinson’s daughter, thanked the Navy for honoring Atkinson. She mentioned in an announcement that her father embodied the Tsimshian custom of “akadi lip a’algyaga sm’ooygit,” which loosely interprets to “a chief by no means speaks for himself.”
“By all of his time as a U.S. Navy UDT and SEAL, in addition to a pacesetter of veterans and Native Alaskans, Sol lived this ethos,” she mentioned. “And, right here immediately, within the shadow of Sol’s dying, he holds to it nonetheless.”
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