As the calendar turns toward its 50th year, the aircraft carrier Midway is sailing toward an active retirement as the floating San Diego Aircraft Carrier Museum docked on the south side of Navy Pier on San Diego Bay.

The transition has tugged the flattop from mothballs in Bremerton, Wash., to a port call for spruce up in Oakland to North Island for the new year. From there, the Midway is scheduled to travel across San Diego Bay with several restored Naval aircraft aboard on Jan. 10.

That last tug also is a reward to supporters and donors who have financed and pulled strings for a dozen years to bring the Midway here. While there should be a flotilla of small craft in the bay to view the trip, anyone donating $1,000 or more by Jan. 5 will get two tickets to be aboard the nearly 1,000-foot-long, 4-acre carrier, says Scott McGaugh, chairman of the museum’s marketing committee.

“We anticipate having special events and possibly organized group tours beginning in April,” McGaugh says.

The grand opening will be June 5 and 6, the anniversary of the Midway’s namesake battle that was the turning point in the Pacific in World War II. The Midway was commissioned Sept. 10, 1945, in Newport News, Va., and decommissioned in San Diego in 1992.

The Midway’s flight deck has had different looks over the years: (clockwise, from top left) on air wing drills while approaching Vietnam in 1971; on a 327-day deployment in 1973; arriving in Pearl Harbor during the 18 years it was based in Yokosuka, Japan; and on its final mission following the 1991 eruption of Mt. Pinatubo in the Philippines.

Rear Adm. (Ret.) Mac McLaughlin is the Midway’s new chief operating officer. The museum anticipates as many as 700,000 visitors the first year, generating $50 million in economic impact.

Private financing and contributions are paying for the $5 million renovation, tug and operation of the Midway, which is as tall as the existing warehouse on Navy Pier.

The Port of San Diego acquired the pier for $1 from the Navy and has undertaken $10 million in improvements with most the funding from an $8 million state grant. The port expects to recoup its investment through pier parking fees and a portion of museum concession sales.

For information, visit www.midway.org or call (619) 702-7700.