Lucky Bag Yearbook

From the 1944 Lucky Bag:

Alfred George Elpern

The Smoky City was his home port, but visions of Nevada’s sage-brush and sand lingered on. After two years of college at the University of Nevada, Al began his career at the Academy. Sleep was his most enjoyable pastime, but he found enough time for battalion crew and basketball. Al’s ability to grasp a subject easily gave him plenty of time for pleasant sleep. Dragging was another highlight for him; with first class year came the chance to display his golfing ability, and he spent afternoons at the course. To him academics were “sheer fruit,” and his natural ability will carry him to success.

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The Class of 1944 was graduated in June 1943 due to World War II. The entirety of 2nd class (junior) year was removed from the curriculum.

Loss

Alfred was lost on September 4, 1947 when the aircraft he was piloting crashed while attempting to land in Rhode Island.

Other Information

From Reno Gazette-Journal:

Navy Officer’s Death Is Learned

Details of the death on Sept. 4 of Lt. Alfred G. Elpern, USN, were received here this week. The officer was on a night flight over Rhode Island in one of the navy’s fastest planes when the instrument lights went out, and he met death in attempting to land.

Lt. Elpern, 27 years old, was a former student at the University of Nevada where he was a member of Sigma Nu fraternity. He was appointed to the U. S. Naval Academy by Rep. James G. Scrugham, and was graduated in 1943. His war service included the invasions of southern France and Sicily.

His widow is the former Mary Margaret Mason of Reno, a graduate of the University of Nevada, and they had been living at Westerly, R. I. His father, A. P. Elpern, formerly was sales manager of the Johnson Chevrolet Co. in Reno.

From researcher Kathy Franz:

Alfred lived in Pittsburgh in 1935. His stepfather Albert divorced his first wife and married Alfred’s mother Jeanne Braden in Reno in 1936. Alfred went to school at Reno high school, but then the family moved to Santa Rosa, California. Alfred graduated from a Sacramento high school. He was also in Boy Scouts and played in a tennis league.

He was the only Marysville youth who took the civil service exam being offered in behalf of Senator McAdoo for West Point and Annapolis at the Sacramento post office on October 8, 1938. Alfred then attended the University of Nevada’s Mackay School of Mines for two years.

At the Naval Academy he was Editor in chief of the Plebe Log.

In 1944, his mother and step-father moved back to Pittsburgh. She heard “Tuscaloosa” on the radio and panicked that Alfred’s ship was sunk.

Alfred and Mary were married in February 10, 1945, and their son Jeffrey James was born April 6, 1946.

Alfred’s father George Braden was a traffic manager at wholesale canned foods company in 1930 Pittsburgh.

He is buried in Pennsylvania.

Alfred married Mary Margaret Mason in April 1945. The article mentioned he was then a naval aviator and earlier “took part in three major operations in the liberation of France.”

He was also survived by a four-year-old son. (Information from his granddaughter via email on May 19, 2020.)

Photographs

From a photo of the University of Nevada tennis team

From the Reno Gazette Journal on March 20, 1945