Jerry Johnson

I joined the Navy in May 1948 and went aboard the Corry about July 1948, I signed up for a three year hitch but got extended to four years due to the Korean war. I worked in the fire room for the first two years then got the job of “oil king” I will always remember the engineering officer stopping me on deck and asking me to ship-over because they were going back to Europe and I was the only one who knew all the valves and so on, he said he knew I was interested in electronics and he would see that I got moved to the Sonar department, I said no and sometimes wish I had said yes, not because of the Sonar but other things. We spent the first two years in Pensacola chasing an aircraft carrier, they were learning to take off and land on the carrier, when they missed we would pick up the pilot. That happened about twice a week. After that we went to Europe several times, the best trip was when we took a load of midshipmen across the North Atlantic to Sweden, then France, Italy and a few other places.

(Jerry says “In the large home page 1950 photo, I am the first guy in the top row on the left. I’ve changed a little since then, gained a little weight.” We are proud to have Jerry up front. He maintained our original website for some 15 years.)

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