In drydock after salvage. Wikipedia photo.
This picture above appeared 80 years ago today in the June 16, 1939, issue of Radio Guide. Shown is a Washington, D.C., family gathered around the radio, obviously clinging to every word of the news announcer. They are the family of William Isaacs, who was aboard the Navy submarine U.S.S. Squalus when it sank off the coast of New Hampshire on May 23, 1939, killing 26 crew members. The remaining 33 aboard (32 crew and one civilian) were rescued. The ship was initially in contact with a companion ship by telephone line to a buoy, and the men were rescued from 243 feet of water thanks to the McCann Rescue Chamber.
The ship was eventually salvaged, and went on to serve in the Pacific during World War II as the USS Sailfish. The ship was scrapped after the War, but the conning tower, shown here, was preserved after the war as a memorial at Portsmouth Naval Shipyard.
The family shown here eventually received good news, as Isaacs was one of the men successfully rescued from the sunken ship.
After the heroic 39-hour operation, 33 crew members returned home. The salvaging of the Squalus took 113 days; it was raised using compressed air tanks on Sept. 13, 1939. Twenty-five bodies were discovered inside; another was never found and was assumed dead.