U.S. Coast Survey steamship sinks off New Jersey coast with heavy loss of life

In the early morning dark, the U.S. Coast Survey steamer Robert J. Walker collided with a schooner in heavy weather twelve miles off the Absecom Light near Atlantic City on the New Jersey coast.  The 133 foot vessel sank quickly and twenty of her sixty man crew were lost.  The Coast Survey was a predecessor of the U.S. Coast Coast and Geodetic Survey and this loss of life remains the greatest the agency has ever suffered.  (By John Osborne)