 Connecticut was laid down on 10 March 1903 and launched on 29 September 1904 by the Brooklyn Navy Yard. She was sponsored by Miss Alice B. Welles, granddaughter of Gideon Welles, Secretary of the Navy during the American Civil War. A crowd of over 30,000 people attended the launch, as did many of the Navy's ships. The battleships Texas, Massachusetts, Iowa, Kearsarge, Illinois, Alabama, Maine, and Missouri were at the ceremony, along with the protected cruisers Columbia and Minneapolis and the auxiliary cruiser Prairie.
