Russell Allan Whitworth - USN EMCM

Remembering Dad on his birthday: October 17, 1925 to October 17, 2008

The way I remember hearing it was that my Mom, Jeannine, first saw Russ on a small motorized Navy launch in Norfolk, Virginia and was captivated by his pearly smile and ample hair.

Married in a Virginia church in 1950? 51? Perhaps in Dahlgren?

Sent to war as an electrician on the crew of a minesweeper off coast of Korea. Served on minesweepers in Korea, destroyers in Virginia and later submarine duty in Hawaii on the SS-487 Remora and SS-480 USS Medregal (pictured).

Returned to Jeannine who had moved to China Lake, California where Allan was born in 1952. But Jeannine had moved and left no forwarding address while Russ was at sea.

He never told me, but Granny (Jeannine's mother) suggested he had hired an investigator to find me and exercise visitation rights. The family was reconciled together when I was about three. In my third or fourth year, in Norfolk's Ben Morrell housing, he showed me how to make a box kite out of balsa and newspaper and coax it high into the air.

My sixth birthday in 1958 was in Albany, California, on Albany Hill. Dad bought me an opened faced spinning rod and a rubber plug. We practiced in the street for hours.

Often drove with Dad in his '56 Chevy while he listened to baseball games on the radio, took me to work and introduced me to the man’s breakfast of sunny side eggs. Eww, but if Dad likes them they must be good. He taught my 1st grade Sunday school class each Sunday after helping me tie a proper necktie. I was baptized that year after friendly interrogation by Rev. Odegaard

I started first grade in Oakland, California. Once Dad came in dress blues to our class to tell us all about submarines. Another day my dad came home covered in blood from helping extricate a passenger from an auto accident on our street. He was so very strong and calm in such a scary situation.

Injured in a church toboggan accident, Russ was assigned to a Navy carpenter shop and didn't have to go to sea until his leg healed. It was 1959 and brother Dan was born. We took turns heating bottles of formula in a sauce pan. Dad created a scale model hunting knife out of two different types of wood. I was fascinated by this hand made treasure.

In May 1960 we sailed into to Pearl Harbor. Outside of a Waikiki motel (transient quarters) all three of us stood at night on the street with neighbors watching sputnik fly over. Dad was stationed aboard the submarine USNS Medregal. Away at sea sometimes, he was often home enough to take me to the dispensary to have my ear stitched up after crashing a borrowed bike and to buy me a new Schwinn and teach me how to adjust and fix it.

We stored canned water and had Fallout Air Raid drills under our second grade desks during the Bay of Pigs. Still all seemed well in our world when Dad and Mom were near.

I have memories of Dad taking us aboard the submarine, having dinner with the crew, watching reel-to-reel movies in the galley. Walked out of our front door to watch President Kennedy's motorcade go by in 1962.

Helping build the roof and rooms of the First Baptist Church of Pearl Harbor, Dad showed me how to start a saw and cut straight in wood and metal. And how to apply Band-Aids and remove splinters with a match and a needle. Church events, potlucks and Wednesday night services with songs called from audience echo in my memory.

Then my Mother and the Chaplain had a private meeting with Dad. The result was that Dad joined AA and this time a divorce was averted. Thanks again, Dad! The wilder songs he sang in the Chevy on weekends diminished but he seemed happier.

From 1962 to 2008, he faithfully participated in the AA fellowship, a total of 46 years. His sphere of friendships range from counseling guests in the brigs or stockade, a Japanese Navy veteran, to local pioneers of Las Vegas, - sharing with many more working people in between, from all cultures, races and walks of life.

In fifth grade we experienced November 23, 1963 and days thereafter in front of the black and white TV: All 3 channels were full of the same story of Kennedy, speculation, music, Oswald and Ruby. For the world, it was a time of confusion and uncertainty. But for two boys, eleven and four in a happy family it was a great time enjoying Hawaii with cats, bugs, lizards, Cub Scouts and going to school barefoot.

Remember Dad laughing at the Flintstones final scenes and at Jackie Gleason's show. And fishing with Dad at a secret spot near Pupukea known only to Dad - and an army squad doing live fire exercises. Remember leaving suddenly.

In Pearl Harbor in 1965, after nearly 20 years in the Navy, Dad planned his final tour of duty. Mom took the bus to Honolulu regularly and was fascinated by the local ladies chatting in Japanese. She started attending a Japanese conversation class and made flash cards for us to practice with. One day Dad asked my mom, "would you like to go to Japan?" I thought they were going on a vacation and leaving me behind. Instead it was a 3 year tour in Kyushu, "so that we could learn about another country." It was the beginning of the Vietnam conflict. Dad chose the extra expense to live outside of the US Navy base in a Japanese neighborhood in which we were illiterate and unashamed curiosities.

Brother Walter Robert was born in 1966 in Sasebo Navy Hospital. At one point we were all bedridden with a flu so severe that I vaguely remember Dad crawling weakly on his hands and knees to each of us with water and medicine.

Despite riots in Japan, Chicago, and Los Angeles Dad took us on long drives and hikes in the Japanese countryside, usually carrying Dan on his shoulders or Robert in his arms.

Each time we got lost he quickly proved that his sign language, a dirt road and a pointed stick were better communication tools than my Japanese dictionary and childish Japanese.

I thank God for Dad's quiet and steady insistence to give his sons every good lesson in life at great personal expense with no immediate reward from myself or others in his family that he loved, so very often without a hint of thanks or appreciation in return.

Sorry Dad to grow up so late, to too often ignore your painfully acquired wisdom... And thank you for your many prayers for us while we were oblivious. I am honored to follow in your footsteps even a little. I have been so increasingly blessed by your life, but now seem so diminished by your death.

Hope to see you, share more memories, and race you around one of heaven's golden blocks.

Love,

Allan

Rick Travis

Robert Whitworth

Greg Whitworth

Dan Whitworth

Allan Whitworth

N Whitworth

T Whitworth

M Whitworth

B Whitworth

J Whitworth

Behold, I will send you Elijah the prophet before the coming of the great and dreadful day of the LORD:
And he shall turn the heart of the fathers to the children, and the heart of the children to their fathers, lest I come and smite the earth with a curse.