[Congressional Record Volume 153, Number 40 (Thursday, March 8, 2007)]
[Extensions of Remarks]
[Pages E488-E489]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                REMEMBERING CAPTAIN WILLIAM R. ANDERSON

                                 ______
                                 

                          HON. JOHN S. TANNER

                              of tennessee

                    in the house of representatives

                        Wednesday, March 7, 2007

  Mr. TANNER. Madam Speaker, I rise today in memory of William R. 
Anderson, a well-decorated Navy Captain and former Congressman from the 
state of Tennessee, who died late last month at the age of 85 and will 
be laid to rest at Arlington National Cemetery.
  Anderson was a decorated World War II submarine combat veteran and in 
1958 captained the Nautilus, the first nuclear submarine, and a crew of 
115 on a mission under the North Pole. For the feat, the first of its 
kind, the Nautilus submerged in the Pacific Ocean, traveled beneath the 
polar ice cap and resurfaced four days later in the North Atlantic.

[[Page E489]]

President Eisenhower awarded Captain Anderson the Legion of Merit for 
``foresighted planning, skilled seamanship and thorough study of the 
Arctic Area.''
  After he retired from the Navy, Anderson was elected as a Democrat to 
Congress from a district west of Nashville, a portion of which I now 
have the honor of representing in this chamber. During his tenure in 
Congress, from 1965-1973, he was a principled leader unafraid of 
speaking up for what he felt was right and questioning what he strongly 
felt were abuses of power by some in Washington.
  Madam Speaker, I hope you and our colleagues will join me in 
remembering a distinguished former Member of this House of 
Representatives and a military hero, U.S. Navy Captain William R. 
Anderson; thanking him for his service to our nation; and expressing 
our sympathy to his family for their great loss.

                          ____________________