USS Silversides (SS-236)

Moored along the Muskegon lakeshore, USS Silversides (SS-236) represents one of the most effective American submarines to survive from the Pacific war. This Gato-class boat, laid down at Mare Island Navy Yard in 1940 and commissioned days after Pearl Harbor, went on to become one of the top-scoring U.S. submarines in World War II, with 23 confirmed sinkings and more than 90,000 long tons of enemy shipping destroyed. Her record earned a Presidential Unit Citation for cumulative patrol performance and twelve battle stars, and that combat pedigree underpins her value as a museum ship rather than mere curiosity. The intact pressure hull, conning tower, and wartime configuration offer an unusually direct look at early-war U.S. submarine design and the cramped industrial architecture that made extended patrols possible. As a National Historic Landmark, Silversides also anchors a broader waterfront of preserved naval craft in Muskegon, where individual components—torpedo rooms, control spaces, and bridge arrangements—allow close study of how a front-line submarine actually functioned during the most intense phase of the undersea campaign.