USS Effingham Reunions

Those Effingham people planned a lot of reunions. Really. A lot of them. They even succeeded a couple of times. 

Dad kept a file folder of paperwork relating to planning for reunions of the USS Effingham men and their attempts to have the ship memorialized for its service. Most are routine and not very interesting, though a few are worth pointing out for their significance to Dad.

USS Indianapolis

The sinking of the Indianapolis in 1945 was an important event for him. He saved these two articles from 1999 and 2000 that add some personal reminiscences to the facts of the ship’s history.

Best and Worse Times on the Effingham

He describes here his best and worst moments on board the Effingham, the worst being the accidental explosion of the USS Serpens with the loss of 245 men, virtually its entire roster. His best memory was returning to San Francisco from Okinawa in April 1945.

Although he doesn’t say so here, this may be because it was when he and Mom drove home to Milwaukee two months before she had Jim. The ‘Yosemite National Park (June 1945)‘ album contains 15 pictures taken on the trip.

Although he seems to have wanted to attend a reunion, it doesn’t appear that he did.

The Rest of the Correspondence

One of the best developments to come out of these attempts by shipmates to re-connect was that Dad struck up a friendly correspondence with Joe Benziger, one of his fellow Pharmacist Mates aboard the Effingham, with whom he exchanged a number of letters.

The complete set of pictures about the reunions is below.