the Maritime Commission began a crash shipbuilding program utilizing every available resource. The experienced shipyards built complicated vessels, such as warships. New shipyards, which opened almost overnight around the country, generally built less sophisticated ships such as the emergency construction Liberty ships. By 1945 the shipyards had completed more than 2,700 "Liberty" ships and hundreds of Victory ships, tankers and transports. The official song of the Maritime Service and Merchant Marine is "Heave Ho! My Lads, Heave Ho!". It was written by Lieutenant Jack Lawrence (a co-writer of "All or Nothing at All" and English language lyricist of "Beyond the Sea" who ultimately served as the president of ASCAP) while he was assigned as the bandleader of the Sheepshead Bay Maritime Service Training Station in Brooklyn, New York. During his stint in the Maritime Service, Lawrence met his longtime companion, psychologist Walter David Myden. Former training centers and schools All of these new ships needed trained officers and crews to operate them. The Coast Guard provided much of the advanced training for merchant marine personnel to augment the training of state merchant marine academies. The Maritime Commission requested that the Coast Guard provide training in 1938 when the Maritime Service was created. The Maritime Service established several training centers throughout the United States: Port Hueneme, California (1941–1942) Avalon, California (1942–1945) Sheepshead Bay, Brooklyn, New York (1942–1954) Hoffman Island, New York (1938–1945) Government Island, California (1938–1943) Gallups Island, Massachusetts (1940–1945) Huntington, New York They also established two officers' candidate schools: Fort Trumbull, Connecticut (1939–1946) Alameda, California (1943–1954) Training ships manned by the Coast Guard included the maritime-commissioned American Mariner. Licensed and unlicensed merchant marine personnel enrolled in the service. The ranks, grades, and ratings for the Maritime Service were based on those of the Coast Guard. Training for experienced personnel lasted three months; while inexperienced personnel trained for six months. Pay was based on the person's highest certified position in merchant service, and new students received cadet wages. American citizens at least 19 years old, with one year of service on American merchant vessels of more than 500 gross tons, were eligible for enrollment. Coast Guard training of merchant mariners was vital to winning the war. Thousands of the sailors who manned the new American merchant fleet trained under the watchful eyes of the Coast Guard. The Coast Guard only continued the administration of the Maritime Service for ten months after