Photos show the USS Sequoia, the US presidential yacht once known as the 'floating White House'
YURI GRIPAS/AFP via Getty Images
- From 1932 to 1977 US presidents had a private yacht named USS Sequoia at their disposal.
- Aboard the Sequoia, presidents hosted foreign leaders and held glamorous parties.
- The boat was sold by the government by order of President Jimmy Carter in 1977.
From Air Force One to armored cars like "the Beast," the president of the United States tends to travel with a degree of style and fanfare.
Until the 1970s, perhaps the ultimate option was the US presidential yacht, a ship maintained for their exclusive use and known as the "floating White House."
On board, presidents hosted foreign leaders, held glamorous parties, and escaped the cares and clamor of Washington, DC.
President Jimmy Carter sold the yacht at auction in 1977 as part of his efforts to rein in the opulence of the presidency.
Take a look inside the last-ever presidential yacht, the USS Sequoia.
Al Fenn/The LIFE Picture Collection via Getty Images
The yacht, named after Sequoyah, a leader of the Cherokee Nation, measured 104 feet long. In its heyday, it had elegant cabins of mahogany and teak with brass finishings.
The US government bought it from a Texas oil tycoon in 1931 for $200,000, and it was soon reserved for use by presidents.
The vessel was berthed at Washington Navy Yard, a short drive from the White House.
AP
Hoover was so enamored of the Sequoia he even used a picture of it on his 1932 Christmas card.
However, at a time when many Americans were suffering from unemployment and poverty due to the Great Depression, the card drew criticism from political opponents.
Tom Williams/Roll Call/Getty Images
In the president's bedroom cabin, the presidential seal decorated the wall above the bed and the bedspread.
Tom Williams/Roll Call/Getty Images
It was ideal for hosting family gatherings, or meetings with foreign leaders and their staff.
Tom Williams/Roll Call/Getty Images
President Harry Truman added the piano to the salon after becoming president in 1945.
Lyndon Baines Johnson later added a drinks bar.
AP Photo
President Franklin Delano Roosevelt, who used a wheelchair for much of his presidency, had an elevator installed so he could access each deck.
According to legend, he also decommissioned the vessel so he and Prime Minister Winston Churchill could enjoy alcoholic drinks on deck while they planned their strategy in World War II.
At the time, no alcohol was permitted on US Navy vessels.
The vessel was intended as a place presidents could use as a private retreat, and there are no official records of its guests. As a result, rumors have long circulated about what took place on board.
AP Photo, File
In June 1973, President Richard Nixon hosted Soviet leader Leonid Brezhnev on the Sequoia, where the two negotiated the SALT-1 nuclear arms treaty.
It was Nixon who embarked on more trips on the boat than any other president, taking more than 100 in total.
During the Watergate crisis, he used the boat as a refuge.
Nixon told his family of his intention to resign the presidency over dinner on the Sequoia before retiring to the boat's saloon to drink scotch and play "God Bless America" on Truman's piano, CBS News reported.
Robert Knudsen/John F. Kennedy Presidential Library and Museum
On May 29, 1963, President John F Kennedy celebrated his 46th birthday aboard the Sequoia.
Among the guests for the dinner-party cruise were actors David Niven and Rat Pack member Peter Lawford, who was married to Kennedy's sister.
His brother Bobby Kennedy, the attorney general, was among the family who attended, alongside select members of Washington high society.
Guests described the event to The Washington Post as a raucous party, with French cuisine, flowing Champagne, and the president even making a pass at the wife of a party guest, a prominent journalist.
The birthday party was to be his last. Seven months later, Kennedy was assassinated on an official visit to Dallas.
LBJ presidential library
Johnson would use a projector to watch Western films on board the ship.
He also used the Sequoia as a retreat to cajole potential allies and formulate policy.
On board, he hosted members of Congress whom he lobbied over his landmark civil rights bill and strategized with officials as the US became further mired in the Vietnam War.
The LIFE Picture Collection via Getty Images
"Of course, he can get on a plane and go to Florida or anywhere else, but that requires throwing the machinery into motion," Kissinger told Newsweek in 2012. "But here, he just can say at 5 o'clock: 'I'm going to the boat, I'm taking four or five people. And you don't have to call it a meeting and you don't have to prepare the papers.'"
The Washington Post/The Washington Post via Getty Images
When Carter took office in 1977, he sought to make good on his election pledge to strip the White House of the trappings of an "imperial presidency."
With running costs totaling $800,000 a year, the Sequoia had to go.
The New York Times reported it sold to a private buyer, Thomas Malloy, for $286,000, or almost $1.5 million in today's money, when adjusted for inflation. Malloy turned the boat into a tourist attraction.
Later, Carter revealed that selling the vessel was a decision he came to regret.
"People thought I was not being reverent enough to the office I was holding, that I was too much of a peanut farmer, not enough of an aristocrat, or something like that. So I think that shows that the American people want something of, an element of, image of monarchy in the White House," he told the JFK presidential library in a 2011 interview.
Aaron Jackson/AP
After its sale, the presidential yacht had a succession of owners.
It was designated a National Historic Landmark in 1987, spent the '90s in a shipyard, and ran chartered cruises until 2014.
However, the Sequoia fell into disrepair in subsequent years amid a legal battle over its ownership. It sat decaying in a Virginia dry dock, overrun by raccoons.
Its current owner, investor Michael Cantor, began restoring the vessel in 2019 and plans to house it at the Richardson Maritime Centre in Maryland when the work is complete, Boat International reported.
