CDR John B. Dana, US Navy, Retired (1932-1988) Naval Aviator, Patrol and Early Warning Pilot. Operations Officer, XO and CO of Quonset squadron VXE-6 supporting Operation DeepFreeze in Antarctica. Thailand-based test pilot for USAF infrared recon missions over Ho Chi Minh Trail. First manager of the Quonset Industrial Park, 1974-1985.
Captain Archibald H. Douglas, USN (1885-1978) Captain Douglas graduated from the Naval Academy in 1908. He was designated as a Naval Aviator in June of 1918, and saw combat duty in France with the Northern Bombing Group. His aviation career included actions in two World Wars and command of three different aircraft carriers. He first […]
Over the past 22 years, long-time Warwick resident and Navy Korean War veteran Stanley R. Essex, Jr., has virtually single-handedly restored two wrecked warbirds to magnificent display condition: a WWII-era Navy Hellcat fighter for the Quonset Air Museum, and the F9F Panther jet known as the “Ted Williams Airplane” for the Rhode Island Aviation Hall […]
Jack Everling enlisted in the Navy V-5 program in 1945, but did not get to flight school until 1947–and thanks to severe cutbacks in Navy flying did not get his wings until 1949. He flew Skyraiders in combat in Korea–102 missions off the USS Princeton; then in 1955 became the first Air Department officer aboard […]
Woonsocket native and lifelong Rhode Island resident CDR Paul G. Farley, USN (Ret) (1917-1993) survived the sinking of the battleship USS Oklahoma at Pearl Harbor and went on to earn two Distinguished Flying Crosses and five Air Medals while flying 600 combat hours in the Pacific.
Colonel Patrick D. Fleming, USAF (USN) (1917-1955) – this former Jamestown resident and 1941 Annapolis graduate was a World War II Hellcat ace and a Navy test pilot who went to flight school in 1943. He received night fighter training at Quonset, where he met his wife-to-be Neville, daughter of retired Navy Commander Owen Bartlett […]
Wisconsin-born Frank Fox met his bride Jane while stationed at Quonset late in World War II, and thereafter considered Rhode Island his home. He earned a Navy Cross in the Battle of Philippine Sea when his Avenger torpedo bomber scored a direct hit on the Japanese carrier Zuikaku, helping send her to the bottom. In […]
Vice Admiral Peter Garvin, US Navy, is President of the National Defense University in Washington, DC. An Annapolis grad, he is a career Naval Aviator who served until August, 2024 as President of the US Naval War College in Newport. “It is an honor to serve my teammates. It is the shared mission, the family […]
Russ, an East Greenwich resident since 1965, served in the Navy from 1944 to 1969. During his flying career he landed on 21 different carriers; he also served on the USS Wasp for two years and USS Lake Champlain for one year. He flew F8F Bearcats with fighter squadron VF-19, and later transitioned to jets […]
Captain Adolphus W. Gorton, US Navy (Ret), (1897-1989), was born January 29, 1897 in Pawtuxet, a direct descendant of the Gortons who founded the City of Warwick. He graduated from Moses Brown and entered Dartmouth in 1916, but left to join the American Volunteer Motor Ambulance Corps in France. He sailed abroad on May 5, […]
Long-time Wakefield resident LCDR John “Jack” Greenwell, USN (Ret) (1922–2011) earned the Navy Cross, our nation’s second-highest military decoration, for dive-bombing and sinking a Japanese cruiser in April, 1945. Although he was born and raised in the Philadelphia area, Greenwell lived in Rhode Island for the better part of his life. He was a standout […]
Theodore Phinney Grosvenor (1897-1985), was born in Providence, the scion of one of the first families of Rhode Island, operators of the Grosvenordale Mills. After graduating in 1916 from St. George’s School in Newport, he entered Harvard that fall, joining ROTC. He enlisted in the Navy on March 23, 1917, with the intention of going […]
Lieutenant Commander Paul Gurnon, USN (Ret.) may be the only living Rhode Islander to have a geographical feature named after him. In recognition of his overall service in Antarctica, the US Geologic Survey named a section of Marie Byrd Land after him – Gurnon Peninsula. Gurnon enlisted in the Navy before Pearl Harbor in 1941, […]
Captain James R. Henderson USN (Ret) (1924 – 2010) retired from Quonset Point Naval Air Station in 1975 after a 32-year Navy career that started in 1942 and spanned three wars. He flew more than 10 different aircraft and served in torpedo and anti-submarine squadrons on 12 different aircraft carriers. He served as Landing Signal […]