Navy Veteran Thomas Perich stood inside the pilot house of the Battleship Texas on Tuesday morning, looking out at Galveston Bay.
"This is kind of the soul of the ship right here," Perich said.
The pilot house is one of Perich's favorite parts of the ship, alongside the bow, where the anchors are.
"I put a lot of anchor chain out when I was on my other ship. So, I’m partial to that," Perich said.
Perich serves as the chairman of theTexas Battleship Foundationboard, which is making headway on an $85 million restoration effort to save the vessel. The Battleship Texas is over a century old and a veteran of both World Wars. She is the world’s last surviving ship of her kind.
Officials with the Battleship Texas Foundation hope to open the ship to the public by the end of 2027. It would be the first time the vessel will be open to the public since 2019.
"As a Navy man and as a Galveston native, I think it is just incredible that we’ve gotten to this point so that we will be, in our opinion, a world-class museum for the people to come from all over the country and all over the world to see this ship ... it’s downright inspirational," Perich said.
Crews are finishing a 32,000-square-foot wood deck and will soon start painting the inside of the ship to get the vessel ready for visitors to come aboard once again. Other repairs to the ship include major structural work, restoring watertight integrity and reinstalling historically accurate antennas and lights.
"All this expense and all the effort, all the labor that has gone into the ship and saving it, is worth it because of what the ship represents. It represents the American spirit; it represents the service and sacrifice of two, three generations of Americans who fought World War I, World War II, supporting democracy, defending democracy," said Travis Davis, vice president of ship operations with the Battleship Texas Foundation.
Before the Battleship Texasmoved to the Gulf Copper Shipyard in Galveston in 2022for repairs, it was moored at the San Jacinto Battleground site in La Porte.
"When we had the ship at San Jacinto, it really hadn’t had any work done in decades. We had 45 pumps pumping water off the ship every day. Not thousands of gallons, thousands of tons. It was leaking like a sieve," Perich said.
Perich said a few years later, the ship looks dramatically different both from the inside and the outside.
"The ship is just a night-and-day improvement from what it was at San Jacinto," Perich said.
Eventually, the Battleship Texas will bemoored at Pier 15, which is about one mile away from where it sits now, to serve as a floating museum for the public to come aboard and explore.
Officials hope that with Galveston being the new home of the Battleship Texas, the vessel will garner more visitors. Davis called docking in Galveston a full-circle moment since the battleship came to the island 112 years ago to receive her ceremonial silver service.
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