Similar in silhouette but designed to be an enlarged and improved USS Hornet, the Bon Homme Richard was the "Cadillac" of the American carrier fleet and known to her sailors as the "Biggest Dick in the Pacific" (or "Deck" when among polite company, with knowing looks from fellow crewmembers). She was built on the hull of the canceled 'large cruiser' Hawaii with a 100-foot section added amidships to bring her to just over 900 feet long. The then-radical idea of a canted flight deck was tried out to allow simultaneous take-offs and landings. From abaft amidships the flight deck was extended to port to form an 8-degree angle with the keel, and deck-edge elevators appeared for the first time on any carrier. The success of the installation led to the eventual fitting of a canted deck to the proposed Midway-class CVB's. With war breaking out, the total number of flight decks put to sea was more important than time-consuming alterations, so the axial-deck 'model A' Essex-class took precedence over other envisioned BHR-class ships.

BHR and Lexington turned back a Japanese landing attempt at Guadalcanal by having BHR constantly operating both carriers' new F6F Hellcat fighters while Lexington attacked the troop convoy with the combined squadrons of new Helldiver dive bombers. BHR was damaged and on fire forward, but still used her canted after deck for limited operations. Japanese reconnaisance planes had rescued a downed American pilot and he had told them the BHR could both land on and fly off aircraft simultaneously. Word of this reached Imperial Japanese Navy Headquarters and resulted in the novel concept of the catamaran carrier Nibai. Repaired just in time for the big Central Pacific drive, BHR was sunk in the massive carrier battles for the Marianas by 'Grace' torpedo bombers from the IJN Shinano. Bon Homme Richard remains the only angled-deck carrier ever sunk by enemy action.