USS Investigator (AGR-9)

USS Investigator (AGR-9/YAGR-9) was a Guardian-class radar picket ship acquired by the U.S. Navy in 1956 from the “mothballed” reserve fleet. She was reconfigured as a radar picket ship and assigned to radar picket duty in the North Atlantic Ocean as part of the Distant Early Warning Line.

Liberty ship built in Florida
Investigator (YAGR-9) was launched by J. A. Jones Co., Inc., Panama City, Florida, as Liberty Ship Charles A. Draper 9 January 1945; sponsored by Mrs. E. L. Cills; and delivered 24 January 1945 to Polarus Steamship Co., Inc.

World War II service
The ship carried replacement aircraft and cargo until the end of the war and entered the James River National Defense Reserve Fleet 26 October 1945.

1957-1965 radar picket duty
After a brief period of service in 1947, she entered the Reserve Fleet at Mobile, Alabama, and was acquired by the Navy 2 July 1956. Renamed Investigator, she was converted to Navy use at Charleston Naval Shipyard and commissioned there 16 January 1957, Lt. Comdr. J. H. Mehus in command. Equipped with the latest in air search and tracking systems, the ship conducted her shakedown training in the Caribbean and departed Guantanamo Bay for her new home port, Davisville, Rhode Island. Investigator began her operational pattern of three- to four-week cruises in the North Atlantic Ocean as the seaward extension of the Continental Air Defense Command's air early warning system. Operating with search aircraft, she could detect, track, and report aircraft at long ranges, and could control high speed U.S. interceptor aircraft and direct them to targets.

The ship was reclassified AGR-9 effective 28 September 1958. She continued radar picket station duties for the Continental Air Defense Command, detecting and tracking inbound airborne objects and controlling jet interceptor aircraft until decommissioned 29 March 1965.

Decommissioning
Her name was struck from the Navy List 1 April 1965. She was transferred the same day to the U.S. Maritime Commission and entered the Maritime Hudson River Defense Reserve Fleet, New York, where she remained until sold for scrap in Spain, 15 May 1971.