JOHN H. LOHM, LT, USN
John Lohm '41
Lucky Bag
From the 1941 Lucky Bag:
JOHN HARRISON LOHM
Clarksburg, West Virginia
A native of the hills of West Virginia, "Vitch" was never much interested in education, but due to the normal parental influence he had to put up with such. His career was planned as a lawyer. Due to some quirk of fate, however, he chose the sea. After a year at Marion Military Institute, he found himself duly sworn in as a midshipman. He's a rather quiet sort of fellow and picks his own friends. One could say he's a radical in a moderate sense of the word. At least he has his own ideas and is known for carrying them out. People that don't know him could term him cynical. He's not self-centered but unless approached for an opinion, he refuses to let another's troubles bother him. Although considered a hard sort among the plebes, nothing suits him more than being his own boss. He likes glamorous haircuts, Washington, and good times, the latter which he promotes with his favorite words, heard in many a distant port, "Let's have a party."
Water Polo 4; Outdoor Rifle 4, 3, 2; Log Exchange Editor.
The Class of 1941 was the first of the wartime-accelerated classes, graduating in February 1941.
JOHN HARRISON LOHM
Clarksburg, West Virginia
A native of the hills of West Virginia, "Vitch" was never much interested in education, but due to the normal parental influence he had to put up with such. His career was planned as a lawyer. Due to some quirk of fate, however, he chose the sea. After a year at Marion Military Institute, he found himself duly sworn in as a midshipman. He's a rather quiet sort of fellow and picks his own friends. One could say he's a radical in a moderate sense of the word. At least he has his own ideas and is known for carrying them out. People that don't know him could term him cynical. He's not self-centered but unless approached for an opinion, he refuses to let another's troubles bother him. Although considered a hard sort among the plebes, nothing suits him more than being his own boss. He likes glamorous haircuts, Washington, and good times, the latter which he promotes with his favorite words, heard in many a distant port, "Let's have a party."
Water Polo 4; Outdoor Rifle 4, 3, 2; Log Exchange Editor.
The Class of 1941 was the first of the wartime-accelerated classes, graduating in February 1941.
Loss
John was lost when his Curtis SB2C-4E Helldiver crashed during training off the coast of Hawaii. The other person aboard was also lost.
Other Information
From researcher Kathy Franz:
John graduated from the Marion Military school in Alabama. In 1935, he lived in Garrett County, Maryland.
After graduation from the Naval Academy and until April, 1943, John served in combat on destroyers in the Atlantic area, taking part in the Casablanca invasion. He went to flight training and returned to overseas duty a month before his death.
John married the former Rita Gilligan, on April 9, 1942, in the St. John the Baptist church, Charleston, South Carolina. This was “shortly after the Army and Navy two-year ban on marriages of West Point and Annapolis graduates was lifted.” (per The Morning Call, Allentown, Pennsylvania, June 12, 1945.)
His parents were Albert, an attorney, and Genevieve; brother was Lt. Thomas A. Lohm of the Naval Reserves. In 1942, his father worked for the National Labor and Relations Board in Washington, D. C.
He is buried in Arlington National Cemetery. John was survived by his wife, who later remarried (per now-defunct 1941 class website).
The "Register of Commissioned and Warrant Officers of the United States Navy and Marine Corps" was published annually from 1815 through at least the 1970s; it provided rank, command or station, and occasionally billet until the beginning of World War II when command/station was no longer included. Scanned copies were reviewed and data entered from the mid-1840s through 1922, when more-frequent Navy Directories were available.
The Navy Directory was a publication that provided information on the command, billet, and rank of every active and retired naval officer. Single editions have been found online from January 1915 and March 1918, and then from three to six editions per year from 1923 through 1940; the final edition is from April 1941.
The entries in both series of documents are sometimes cryptic and confusing. They are often inconsistent, even within an edition, with the name of commands; this is especially true for aviation squadrons in the 1920s and early 1930s.
Alumni listed at the same command may or may not have had significant interactions; they could have shared a stateroom or workspace, stood many hours of watch together… or, especially at the larger commands, they might not have known each other at all. The information provides the opportunity to draw connections that are otherwise invisible, though, and gives a fuller view of the professional experiences of these alumni in Memorial Hall.
April 1941
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