USS Salmon (SSR/SS/AGSS-573), a Sailfish-class submarine, was the third ship of the United States Navy to be named for the salmon, a soft-finned, gamy fish which inhabits the coasts of America and Europe in northern latitudes and ascends rivers for the purpose of spawning.
Salmon was laid down on 10 March 1954 by the Portsmouth Naval Shipyard of Kittery, Maine. She was launched on 25 February 1956 sponsored by Mrs. Albert M. Bontier, widow of Commander A. M. Bontier who was lost when submarine Sea Wolf (SS-197) was sunk during a war patrol in the South Pacific early in October 1944, and commissioned on 26 August 1956 with Lieutenant Commander Robert R. Hale in command.