BASES -- Summary-Earlier Era                                                          [p8 of 14]  

FORMER MILITARY INSTALLATIONS  (First half of the 20^th Century) -- Continued

FORT GRANT (1914-1979) (Army/Pacific side)--Flamenco, Perico, Naos, and Culebra islands  (formerly known as the Fortified Islands)

Fort Grant was constructed 1914-1917 as the principal Coast Artillery fortification for defending the Pacific entrance to the Panama Canal. It was named in honor of General Ulysses S. Grant, United States Army and President of the United States (1969-1877), who in 1852, as a captain with his company of the Fourth Regiment transited the isthmus of Panama enroute from New York to their new duty station at San Francisco, California.

Eight heavily fortified batteries (four on Flamenco island, three on Naos, and one on Perico) were constructed and heavily armed with 21 of the most powerful guns then available – six 14-inch rifles, two 6-inch rifles, twelve 12-inch mortars, and one 16-inch rifle. (At that time, the 16-inch rifle was the heaviest caliber weapon in the world.) The effective ranges of these big guns were 8 miles to 14 miles. Thus, by the time of World War I, Fort Grant was the most powerful defense complex in the world. Similar defense fortifications were constructed on the Atlantic side during the same period.

Those eight batteries and two batteries constructed at Fort Amador (connected by a causeway) were manned by nine companies of Coast Artillery.

All 21 guns at Fort Grant were dismounted and withdrawn from Panama 1943-1948 and the sites abandoned. The islands were transferred to Panama on October 1, 1979.

Fort Grant-History 

Flamenco-New Uses

Perico-New Uses

Naos-New Uses

Culebra-New Uses

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William H. Ormsbee, Jr.  2005