FRANK M. ROBINSON, LTJG, USN

Frank Robinson '36

Date of birth: September 8, 1914

Date of death: March 17, 1941

Age: 26

Lucky Bag

From the 1936 Lucky Bag:

Frank Mason Robinson

Springfield, Massachusetts

"Punchie"

Meet Frank—he's different! He is a voracious reader of P.G. Wodehouse, an ardent movie fan, and a devotee of hill billy music but his specialty is chow. The call of the sea is deeply rooted in Punchie and he spends most of his Sept. leave cruising and knocking about on the water. Aside from his love of things nautical, Frank also has a decided bent toward athletics. He puts his whole heart into any undertaken sport and this combined with an inherent sense of sportsmanship make him hard to beat. Punchie is ambitious and conscientious but at the same time cheerful and easy going, so the struggles of academies have not weighed heavy on him. '36 gives to the Navy a fine man and an excellent officer.

Class Football 3, 1; Boxing 3, 2, 1. N.A.; Tennis 4; Two Stripes

Frank Mason Robinson

Springfield, Massachusetts

"Punchie"

Meet Frank—he's different! He is a voracious reader of P.G. Wodehouse, an ardent movie fan, and a devotee of hill billy music but his specialty is chow. The call of the sea is deeply rooted in Punchie and he spends most of his Sept. leave cruising and knocking about on the water. Aside from his love of things nautical, Frank also has a decided bent toward athletics. He puts his whole heart into any undertaken sport and this combined with an inherent sense of sportsmanship make him hard to beat. Punchie is ambitious and conscientious but at the same time cheerful and easy going, so the struggles of academies have not weighed heavy on him. '36 gives to the Navy a fine man and an excellent officer.

Class Football 3, 1; Boxing 3, 2, 1. N.A.; Tennis 4; Two Stripes

Loss

Frank was lost on March 17, 1941 when his plane collided with another and crashed into the sea off the coast of Hawaii. He was flying with Torpedo Squadron (VT) 5.

Other Information

From Find A Grave:

Frank Mason Robinson, eldest child of Cmdr. Hugh Burton Robinson (USN Ret.) and Marion Willett Mason, b. of record Sept. 8, 1914 at Springfield, Mass. He was named after his maternal grandfather, Frank B. Mason.
Like his two-year younger brother Hugh Marston Robinson, Frank graduated from the Severn School, class of 1932, a Naval Academy preparatory school in Severna Park, Maryland. Frank was subsequently a graduate of the U.S. Naval Academy, Class of 1936, with the rank of Ensign. In 1940 he was designated Naval Aviator #6463 and rank of Lieut. J.G. stationed at a Naval Air facility near Warrington, Florida.
By April 1940 at age 25, Frank had married an unidentified 22 year old Eleanor from Berkeley, CA. Unfortunately, on Mar. 17, 1941 during a flight near the Hawaiian Islands, he as the pilot of one aircraft was killed in a mid-air collision with another aircraft. From military researcher Mike Weeks:

On 17 March 1941, two TBD-1's (carrier-based torpedo planes) operating from the aircraft carrier USS YORKTOWN (CV-5) collided near Hawaii. Six servicemen perished, with only two bodies being recovered, that of the pilots, LTJG F. M. Robinson, USN, and ENS K. L. Berry, USNR.

Frank Mason Robinson was an 11th generation descendant of Rev. John Robinson (1576-1625) and Bridget White, the former the pastor at Leiden, Holland of the core 1620 Mayflower pilgrims who founded the Plymouth Colony in present-day Massachusetts. Frank was also a 12th generation descendant of 1620 Mayflower passenger Edward Fuller. Whether at his death Frank left children is presently unknown.

From the Class of 1936's "Golden Lucky Bag," published in 1986 (via Marianne Bradley, daughter of LCDR John Ellis '36, USN (Ret.)):

Mrs. Frank M. (Eleanor) Robinson
2060 Beverly Plaza, Apt. 057
Long Beach, California 90815
Children: Ann Egermayer.
On graduation, Frank's initial assignment was in Northampton where he served for two years before moving to the Staff, Commander Scouting Force in Indianapolis as a Communications Watch Officer. While on this duty he married Eleanor Choroske of Long Beach, California. Frank went to flight training at Pensacola in June 1939 and won his wings the following May.
In July 1940, Frank reported to the Fleet Air Detachment at San Diego for instruction in torpedo planes, following which he was assigned to Torpedo Squadron 5 (VT-5) in Yorktown, based in Pearl Harbor. When not on the carrier, the squadron flew from the Naval Air Station, Ford Island, conducting daily gunnery and bombing practice and other operational flights. On one of these flights in the early months of 1941, Frank's plane was hit by another aircraft joining up in formation and both planes were lost with all personnel killed.
Frank had been a fine classmate with a fluent command of the French language as a result of living abroad during his early schooling. His quiet good humor and diplomatic demeanor won him a host of friends. He is survived by his widow, Eleanor and a daughter. His brother, Captain Hugh M. Robinson, USN (Ret) (USNA '38) resides in Arlington, Virginia, and his mother, Mrs. Hugh B. Robinson is living at Vinson Hall in McLean, Virginia.

Frank is buried in Arlington National Cemetery.

Navy Directories & Officer Registers

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.