USCGC McLane (WMEC-146)

Moored along the Lake Michigan shoreline at Muskegon, USCGC McLane (WMEC-146) represents an unusually long-lived example of the Coast Guard’s 125-foot Active-class patrol boats. Commissioned in 1927, McLane belonged to a class originally developed for Prohibition-era offshore patrols, built to a modest budget yet known for rugged construction and surprising endurance. Re-engining in the late 1930s increased power and speed without altering the original engine beds, a telling illustration of interwar naval engineering pragmatism that still interests technically minded visitors. During the Second World War she operated under U.S. Navy control, conducting patrols in Alaskan waters, a reminder of how small cutters bore much of the routine, hazardous work of coastal defense and antisubmarine vigilance in remote seas. Her later redesignation as a medium endurance cutter in 1966 reflects the evolving doctrine of the Coast Guard during the Cold War. Preserved today near other historic vessels at Muskegon, McLane offers a compact case study in how one hull could adapt across decades of shifting missions, technologies, and organizational structures within the maritime services.