HAPPY BIRTHDAY ON AUG. 4! DeCA honors 235 years of Coast Guard service by continuing to deliver commissary benefit they’ve earned

NOTE: To see a DeCA video related to this release, click here. 

FORT LEE, Va. – The Defense Commissary Agency (DeCA) takes pleasure in commemorating the 235th birthday of the United States Coast Guard on Aug. 4. 

“As we honor the Coast Guard’s anniversary, we want all our Coast Guardsmen – active duty, reservists, retirees and their family members, as well as disabled veterans and their caregivers – to know we celebrate them every day by delivering the commissary benefit they’ve earned,” said Navy Command Master Chief Mario Rivers, senior enlisted advisor to the DeCA director. 

“At DeCA our mission is to provide the highest quality product at the lowest price possible to help our eligible Coast Guard patrons boost their financial and food security with at least 25 percent savings on their purchases,” he said.

The Coast Guard traces its history back to the U.S. Revenue Cutter Service, which Congress established on Aug. 4, 1790. 

Secretary of the Treasury Alexander Hamilton championed the creation of a system of cutters to collect revenue for the fledgling nation. He authorized 10 cutters to enforce customs laws and combat smuggling. The Revenue Cutter Service safeguarded the nation’s financial interests by collecting customs duties and preventing illegal trade. The cutters also played a vital role in maritime safety, search and rescue.

From 1790 to 1798 the Revenue Cutter Service was the country’s only naval force once the Continental Navy disbanded after the Revolutionary War. The United States Navy wasn’t established until 1798. 

A separate entity known as the Life-Saving Service was also established along the coasts and were dedicated to rescuing mariners in distress. 

In 1915, Congress merged the Revenue Cutter Service and the Life-Saving Service to form the modern U.S. Coast Guard. This act solidified the Coast Guard’s role as a military force, broadening its responsibilities to include maritime safety, law enforcement and national defense.  

The service’s history with commissaries is quite different from the other military services because there weren’t many stores supporting the Coast Guard. When DeCA was created in 1991, only one of the more than 400 military commissaries functioned on a Coast Guard installation. Since then, that installation has closed, and only one other Coast Guard store has been added to DeCA’s rolls.

Another major difference in the Coast Guard’s commissary operations is that the service was never part of the Department of Defense (DOD). What started as the Revenue Cutter Service later assimilated the Lighthouse Service, the Steamboat Inspection Service, the Bureau of Navigation and the Lifesaving Service. As time progressed, the Coast Guard was assigned to either the Treasury, Commerce or Transportation departments.

With such a pedigree, it’s not surprising the Coast Guard retailers did business differently than those in DOD. By the 1980s, its exchanges and commissaries were run by its Non-Appropriated Fund Activity Management Division in Washington, D.C. With DeCA’s in 1991, the office was renamed the Coast Guard Exchange System.  

Most of the Coast Guard’s grocery sales were not accomplished in what the other services would have called commissaries. The majority of resale commissaries on Army, Navy, Air Force and Marine Corps installations were stand-alone operations, separate and distinct from the exchanges, even when located in the same shopping mall.

Coast Guard grocery operations usually consisted of a section inside an exchange operation. This was the format for many Coast Guard stations over the years, including Aquadilla, Puerto Rico; Cape Cod, Massachusetts; Cape May, New Jersey; Cleveland, Ohio; Elizabeth City, New Jersey; Miami/Opa Locka, Florida; Mobile, Alabama; Port Angeles, Washington; North Bend, Oregon; Portsmouth, Virginia; St. Petersburg, Florida; Traverse City, Michigan; Warrenton, Oregon; and Yorktown, Virginia. 

Only two Coast Guard “Comstores” resembled the standalone operations of their military counterparts, and both eventually joined DeCA. The first was located at the U.S. Coast Guard Support Center on Governors Island, New York, just a short ferry ride from lower Manhattan. 

In 1806, the Army started reconstruction on a post named Fort Jay on Governors Island that was renamed Fort Columbus, beginning more than 155 years of an Army presence there. There was probably an Army commissary there as of 1867, as soon as legislation made it possible, but the earliest documented store on the dates from 1934. Its replacement, built in 1948, would remain in business for 48 years. 

In 1966, the installation transferred to the Coast Guard. The commissary did not change much during 21 years of Coast Guard management, but within a few months of the Navy Resale Services Support Office assuming responsibility for the store in May 1987, the line items in the store doubled from 2,700 to 5,500. Nine years later, the military drawdown at the end of the Cold War claimed Governors Island, and the installation and its commissary closed in August 1996. 

The remaining commissary on a Coast Guard installation is at the U.S. Coast Guard Integrated Support Command Kodiak, Alaska, in the Aleutian Islands. Historically, the base belonged first to the Army and then to the Navy, which gave up the island to the Coast Guard in 1971.

By 1960, the station apparently had a commissary with the Coast Guard opening the present store in 1985. A decade later, the DOD and Transportation Department (which had assumed control of the Coast Guard in 1967) agreed to have DeCA assume operational control of the Kodiak store, since the commissary agency already had six stores in Alaska. This occurred on Oct. 1, 1995.

            In 2003, the Coast Guard officially aligned under the Department of Homeland Security. However, in times of war, or on direction of the president, the Coast Guard functions as part of the Navy. As such, the Coast Guard has served in all of the United States’ major conflicts including Afghanistan and Iraq.

-DeCA-

About DeCA: The Defense Commissary Agency operates a worldwide chain of commissaries providing groceries to military personnel, retirees, disabled veterans and other authorized patrons and their families in a safe and secure shopping environment. Commissaries provide a military benefit, saving authorized patrons thousands of dollars annually on their purchases compared to similar products at commercial retailers. The discounted prices include a 5-percent surcharge, which supports the costs of building, modernizing and sustaining commissary facilities. A core military family support element and valued part of military pay and benefits, commissaries contribute to family readiness, enhance the quality of life for America’s military services and their families, and help recruit and retain the best and brightest men and women to serve their country.