Yes, it's true. History lesson: In the early to mid 90's, the Naval Academy stopped teaching celestial navigation. It was also no longer required for the enlisted navigation ratings. The logic was that with the advent and refinement of GPS, celestial navigation was no longer needed.
The officers and junior enlisted rejoiced. Those of us who were old school just shook our heads. You need look no further than that; the "blueberry" camos, which are the dumbest thing I've ever seen (hey, let's make a sailor that falls overboard look just like the ocean!); and the decision, since reversed, to do away with Navy ratings, to understand just how stupid Navy leadership can sometimes be. But I digress...
In 1998, after it had been proven that the GPS constellation could be spoofed; jammed; or just outright rendered useless by a skilled adversary...back came celestial navigation. With the shutdown of the Loran-C system, the U.S. does not have a land-based long range navigation system. There is talk about e-Loran, which would be very similar to Loran-C, but the USCG does not have the money (yet) to spool it up.
And those of us who remember how to shoot stars / planets and do sight reduction are suddenly the "go-to guy" for those young bucks trying to learn it now. Although many a civilian open ocean sailor...a ton of them, in fact...learned and still use celestial nav in their open ocean sailings.
So back to the sextant. Wise decision to keep it in the family. If you do decide to let a museum have it, do it on some type of "long term loan", so that you can reclaim it if you ever decide to.
Keep the paperwork, the scope, and the case. All of those combine to make that a very, very nice piece of history.
FWFS.