Patriots Point Naval and Maritime Museum

The USS Yorktown dominates Charleston Harbor from the Mount Pleasant shore, and that's the point. The Essex-class carrier — commissioned in 1943, built in 16½ months, nicknamed "The Fighting Lady" — earned 11 battle stars in the Pacific before recovering the Apollo 8 astronauts in December 1968. Alongside her sits the destroyer USS Laffey, which survived a kamikaze assault at Okinawa that should have sunk her. Together they account for nearly a million square feet of ships, aircraft, and exhibits. The museum attracts more than 300,000 visitors a year — and earns it.