Remembering the Maine

“Remember the Maine, to Hell with Spain!”

1898
The USS Maine was anchored in Havana Harbor in February 1898 when a huge explosion sank the battleship, killing 266 of its 350 crewmen. The Maine had been sent to Cuba to protect American persons and property purportedly endangered by the island country’s struggle for independence from Spain. The conflict had been ongoing since 1895.

“Remember the Maine, to Hell with Spain!”
USS Maine – before

William Randolph Hearst’s New York Journal had been agitating for military action. Lurid stories about alleged Spanish atrocities in Cuba sold newspapers. Hearst dispatched famed artist Frederic Remington to report. Remington found little to report. “Everything quiet. There is no trouble here. There will be no war. Wish to return,” he cabled to his employer in 1897. Hearst responded, “You furnish the pictures and I’ll furnish the war.”

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