USS Beaver (AS-5) — a steel-hulled, single-screw, freight and passenger steamer built in 1910 at Newport News, Virginia, by the Newport News Shipbuilding Co. for the Union Pacific Railroad Company — was purchased from the San Francisco & Portland Steamship Co. on 1 July 1918; given the classification Id. No. 2302; converted to a submarine tender at the Mare Island Navy Yard; and commissioned there on 1 October 1918, Lieutenant Commander James A. Logan in command.