This early 1950s color and black and white mixed reel of home movies capture activities of the United States Navy aboard the USS Antietam (CV/CVA/CVS-36), an Essex-class aircraft carrier which served during the Korean War (TRT: 26:18).

Homemade opening titles: “USS Antietam in Korea Presents” (0:10). A Sikorsky H-5 or HO3S helicopter (UP-28) lifts off from the carrier’s flight deck. Flight crews assemble around Grumman F9F Panther jet fighter planes. Elevators lift two aircraft from hangars to the flight deck (0:21). A yellow tug moves a F9F Panther (408). A wide shot shows Antietam’s conning tower. Pan to reveal the Sikorsky helicopter at rest. Airmen gather, preparing for flight (1:17). Four fighter planes fly in formation. A grey tug moves a propeller-driven Douglas A-1 Skyraider (2:05). A Skyraider taxis, with wings folded. A Sikorsky helicopter approaches (2:30). A Panther makes a landing, a wire catching its tail hook. A craft with a damaged rudder is examined (2:49). Two planes in flight at a distance. Another panther lands. The conning tower in closeup. A man speaks on a radio (3:22). A fighter plane takes off using a catapult. Skyraiders taxi. A passing destroyer (4:01). Skyraider landings. A radar antennae rotates near the topmast platform, a tug in closeup and from across the deck (5:10). Anti-aircraft guns and canons. A naval pilot poses and walks toward the camera. Aircraft assemble (6:07). A Skyraider and pilots elevator down to a hangar from the flight deck. Helicopters. A passing Battleship (6:48). Planes flying in formation. A sunset landing. A Skyraider’s nose tips forward (7:13). Black and white footage begins (7:50). A Vought F4U Corsair makes a crash landing, smashing a wing into the carrier in slow motion. Another crash landing from a head-on angle and the resulting wreckage. The pilot emerges as a crowd gathers (8:11). Another calamitous landing shows a fighter plane veering off the flight deck and into the ocean. Pilots line the deck (9:03). Airmen race to meet a helicopter in slow motion. They return, carrying a pilot on a stretcher (9:53). Another crash landing into the water below. The steaming plane sinks. A medical airlift via helicopter (10:34). A perfect landing by a F9F Panther. Panthers assemble en masse. Hazy skies and an extended, slow motion landing montage (11:32). A closeup view of a landing reveals a F4U Corsair’s tailhook catching the Antietam’s wire. The plane, marked VF-837 flies for the “Black Knights.” (16:31). An extended slow motion sequence of Panther tailhooks follows (16:56). An undercranked fast-motion closeup on a Sikorsky H-5 and surrounding pilots at work as they transport a Panther, making way for another to take its place via elevator (25:35).

The Antietam was commissioned in early 1945, was recommissioned for the Korean War in 1951 and earned two battle stars during the conflict (1950-1953), with Captain George J. Dufek in command. She deployed for combat in four cruises with Task Force 77 (TF 77) off the coast of the Korean peninsula, returning in between assignments to Yokosuka, Japan. The craft was fitted with a port sponson in 1952, which made it the world’s first angled-deck aircraft carrier.