USS Recruit, also known as the Landship Recruit, was a wooden mockup of a dreadnought battleship constructed by the United States Navy in the Manhattan borough of New York City, as a recruiting tool and training ship during the First World War. Commissioned as if it were a normal vessel of the U.S. Navy and manned by a crew of trainee sailors. The New York Times reported at the time that the “Landship” had helped the U.S. Navy recruit 25,000 men into the service—625 times the size of her own crew.
After spending over two years in Union Square, the Landship Recruit was decommissioned and dismantled for moving to Coney Island’s Luna Park, where the Navy intended to maintain it as a recruiting depot following its success at its Union Square location. Recruit had its colors struck on March 16, 1920, and preparations began for the move. However, the ultimate fate of Recruit after its move is undetermined.
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