Traveling Inspection Staff (CG-5P-TI)Traveling inspection staff logo

Unit History:

The First Traveling Inspector was created by the Supervising Inspector-General of the Steamboat Inspector Service by 38 Stat. L. 454 on July 16, 1914 and was paid $2500 annually.rig1

Perhaps the best description of a Steamboat Inspection Service Traveling Inspector is from the Supervising Inspector-General general report of 1919 as follows:

It is more than necessary at this time with the expansion of the American merchant marine to see that absolutely uniform results shall be obtained, and there is no arm of the service that the Supervising Inspector-General may use with more effectiveness than these four traveling inspectors, whose work it is to travel among the different districts, aboard ships in all parts of the country, and to call at the offices of the local inspectors with a view to following up further the complaints made to the central office and which have been previously followed up by the local inspectors and by the supervising inspectors. I cannot speak too highly of the efficiency which must come to the service by the proper use of this valuable corps of traveling inspectors, and you may be assured that they are being used in the most effective manner, to the end that the high standard already reached by the Steamboat-Inspection Service may not only be maintained, but that that standard may be raised still higher.

In 1932 the steamboat inspection service merged with the Bureau of Navigation to become the Bureau of Marine Inspection and Navigation. In 1946 these duties were transferred to the Coast Guard.