Academy

A nine-year, $250 million project to renovate Bancroft Hall, the Naval Academy's sprawling dormitory, was declared complete yesterday at a ribbon-cutting ceremony inside its ornate central rotunda. Workers refurbished the Beaux Arts building's original interior, stripped out toxic materials such as lead and asbestos, modernized mechanical and electrical systems, and installed 1,600 miles of wires to equip the dorm with a high-tech computer data network. "Today is not just the completion of a renovation of a building - today is the completion of the soul of our naval service," Col. John R. Allen, the commandant of midshipmen, said at the morning ceremony.

Lockheed Martin Corp. will donate $25,000 to the U.S. Naval Academy Foundation to help support the school's Center for the Study of Military Ethics, foundation officials said yesterday. Founded in 1998, the center's goal is to enhance ethical training at the academy through "education, research and reflection." The academy superintendent, Vice Adm. John R. Ryan, said the gift will "help raise the bar of excellence" among students and "create an environment for midshipmen that is stimulating and challenging."

A Navy officer assigned to the Naval Academy collapsed and died yesterday afternoon after a 1.5-mile run for a physical readiness test at the Annapolis campus, the academy announced. He collapsed on Farragut Field, one of the academy's athletic fields, about 1 p.m. and was pronounced dead at Anne Arundel Medical Center. The junior officer -- whose name was not divulged -- had just finished a semiannual physical test, said an academy spokesman. It was the second death in a week and half at the academy.

A record low number of Naval Academy freshmen decided to leave the academy despite the rigorous "plebe summer" this year, school Superintendent Vice Adm. John R. Ryan told the academy's Board of Visitors yesterday. Ryan said that 67 of about 1,220 freshmen inducted in July left, compared with an annual average of 80 to 100 plebes. Based on those figures, plus an increase in applications from high school students and progress in the school's initiative to renovate deteriorating buildings, Ryan said the state of the academy is "excellent."

WASHINGTON -- The House of Representatives passed legislation yesterday that would allow the Naval Academy to stop operating its historic dairy farm in western Anne Arundel County.The waiver, part of the $268.2 billion defense budget, was sponsored by Maryland Reps. Democrat Steny H. Hoyer and Republican Wayne T. Gilchrest, a team trying to help the academy end a quirky, money-losing venture. Set up in 1911 to provide safe milk to midshipmen after a typhoid scare, the farm costs the academy $1.1 million a year to operate, resulting in an annual loss of $250,000.

WASHINGTON -- Sen. Barbara A. Mikulski yesterday questioned top U.S. Naval Academy leaders about why problems with sexual harassment have persisted at their institution despite numerous investigations and recommendations over the past 15 years. "This seems like deja vu all over again," Mikulski, a Maryland Democrat, said at a meeting of the academy's Board of Visitors, a supervisory group made up of members of Congress and presidential appointees. Citing a 1990 incident in which a woman midshipman was handcuffed to a urinal and photographed by male mids, Mikulski asked the academy to review how past recommendations have been implemented, and which attempts to make the academy a more hospitable place for women have worked better than others.

The U.S. Naval Academy is moving ahead with plans to turn the bulk of its 862-acre dairy farm in Gambrills into a golf course.Academy officials have decided to award an architectural contract to create a concept drawing of a golf course at the 83-year-old farm, which provides milk, cream and juices to the 4,100 midshipmen.But Lt. Cmdr. Paul Weishaupt, an academy spokesman, said the academy is working with local officials and civic groups on possible uses for the property, and there has been no final decision on a golf course.

Annapolis officials yesterday rescinded a threat to suspend sewer service to the Naval Academy and agreed to continue negotiating a billing dispute with the school.City Attorney Paul G. Goetzke said city officials would meet with the Department of the Navy to discuss the academy's complaint that it was overbilled $357,000 when a problem in a sewage pipe falsely inflated meter readings.The city council denied the academy a $150,000 settlement last month, and the Navy vowed to stop paying its full sewer bills unless the figures were revised.

The Naval Academy will break ground for a two-story visitor center at 2 p.m. on Oct. 26.The facility will be located on the south side of Halsey Field House and will replace the academy's 30-year-old visitors booth in a first-floor corner of Ricketts Hall.The $4.5 million building will include a gift shop and an 80-seat auditorium that will show a film about the life of the midshipmen and the history of the academy. The second floor will contain naval exhibits and an observation deck overlooking the City Dock and the school.

ANNAPOLIS -- America's latest conquering hero, U.S. Army Gen. H. Norman Schwarzkopf, told graduating midshipmen at the U.S. Naval Academy yesterday that Operation Desert Storm proved that great American leadership always emerges in times of crisis."