Two Best Warships To Be Built For Us.

New York Times 100 years ago today, July 13, 1913:
Constructors Preparing to Lay Keel of a Sister Ship of the Pennsylvania.
MOST POWERFUL IN WORLD
Five Other Ships Under Way, of Which the New Texas Is Nearest Completion.
    The naval constructors at the New York Navy Yard in Brooklyn are busy completing the arrangements for the laying of the keel of the battleship, No. 39, which is to be a sister ship of the new Pennsylvania, and which with that ship will share the honor of being the world's biggest and most powerful, both offensively and defensively, superdreadnought ever constructed.
    The keel of the newest superdreadnought will be laid down on the ways vacated several months ago by the New York, now nearing completion alongside the cob dock in the navy yard. The new ship will not be known long as No. 39. In a few weeks the Navy Department will announce its permanent name, which, it is believed, will be either the Arizona, the New Mexico, or the North Carolina.

31,400 Tons Displacement.
    When completed the new dreadnought will displace 31,400 tons, which means that it will be a vessel twice as big as the famous old around-the-world flagship Connecticut, more than 11.000 tons greater than the dreadnoughts Delaware and North Dakota, and almost 6,000 tons bigger than the mighty Wyoming, the new flagship of the Atlantic Fleet.
    No. 39 will be 608 feet long:, 97 feet wide, and will have a speed that must reach a maximum of twenty-one knots an hour. More than 1,100 officers and men will be required to man it, and it will be fitted to burn oil as well as coal. Its engines will be of the latest improved turbine type. It will cost, exclusive of armor and armament, about $7,435,000. When ready for commissioning it will have cost the Government about $16,000,000. ¡
    The armament will consist of twelve 14-inch guns mounted in turrets, all of which can be fired in a single broadside either to port or starboard; four submerged torpedo tubes that will be supported by a torpedo defense battery of twenty-two 5-inch guns, in addition to a battery of guns of smaller calibre.
    In the construction of No. 39 more than 1,000 skilled mechanics will be employed, and it is the hope of the naval constructors to have her ready for launching some time in the late Spring or early Summer of next year. It will probably be about three years before the new ship will be ready to take her place in the first division of the Atlantic fleet. Naval Constructor John E. Bailey, U.S.N., who had charge of the construction of the New York, will also be the directing head of the construction corps in charge of the new ship.

Texas Nearing Completion.
    Of the new dreadnoughts now in process of construction the Texas is nearest completion, the latest report showing that she is more than 90 per cent. finished. The sister ship, the New York, is 84 per cent finished; the Nevada is 37.1 per cent., the Oklahoma 33 per cent. and the Pennsylvania, the sister of No. 39, about 2 per cent, on its way.
    The Navy Yard will be visited and inspected to-morrow by the Committee on Naval Affairs of the House of Representatives. Chairman Padgett will head the visiting Congressmen, among whom will be Congressmen Gregg, of Texas, Talbot of Maryland, Hobson of Alabama, Macon of Arkansas, Estopinal of Louisiana, Riordan of New York, Turnbull of Virginia, Tribble of Georgia, Buchanan, of Illinois, Bathrick of Ohio, Lee of Pennsylvania, Foss of Illinois, Witherspoon of Mississippi, Hensley of Missouri, Kopp of Wisconsin, Butler of Pennsylvania, Roberts of Massachusetts, Loud of Michigan, Bates of Pennsylvania and Browning of New Jersey.
    The committee will come to New York on the Presidential yacht Mayflower and after inspecting the big plant in Brooklyn will proceed to Newport, Boston and other Eastern cities to inspect the Government plants at those ports.