 Welcome to All Hands Update, I'm Petty Officer Tony Rosa. The modern-day submarine force, with its state-of-the-art boats and highly-trained sailors, owes its existence at least in part to a homemade wooden craft built in the 1770s. Connecticut inventor David Bushnell created the egg-shaped design called the Turtle. The Turtle's operator worked the hand crank that propelled the vessel and the hand pump that submerged and surfaced the craft. A year into the Revolutionary War, Bushnell wrote to George Washington to ask if the Turtle could be of some use in defending New York City's harbor. Although the Turtle didn't work as well as planned, Bushnell planted the seed that a submersible could be a viable instrument of war. More than 100 years after the Turtle, the U.S. submarine force was established in 1900, and only 50 years after that, the Navy launched its first nuclear-powered submarine USS Nautilus. Today's submarine fleet plays a vital role in the Navy's global presence and nuclear deterrence.