Lucky Bag Yearbook

From the 1940 Lucky Bag:

THOMAS MICHAEL RODDY

Tom

Wrestling 3, 2; Baseball 4; Soccer 2; Boat Club 2, 1; Quarterdeck Society 4, 3, 2, 1; Newman Club 4, 3, 2, 1.

Tom proudly claims Boston (and more distantly, Ireland) as places of previous residence. Evidences of both appear frequently — the former in a broad accent and the latter in a love of Irish ballads and a yearly shamrock from the old country. Boston Latin School and Boston College gave him a background of the classics and high ideals which have remained with him. Tom’s greatest source of entertainment is conversation. An avid reader of editorials, his hobby is current events, especially international affairs. Secret belief — that the world lost a good prosecuting attorney in exchange for a naval officer.

Loss

Tom was lost in USS Juneau (CL 52) during the Naval Battle of Guadalcanal on November 13, 1942.

Other Information

From researcher Kathy Franz:

Thomas graduated from Dearborn Grammar and Boston Latin in 1935. He had one year at Boston College.

Thomas’ wife was the former Grace Bixby. Thomas’ brother QM William A. Roddy, age 20, USNR, was killed in action in the Atlantic on May 29, 1944. Their brother Rev. James P. Roddy was the celebrant at his pro-burial mass. There were four other brothers, Lt. Luke J., 33, USNR; Frank and Charles, seminarians; and John, Navy Yard employee. They had one sister, Marie. Parents were Luke and Mary Roddy.

His wife was listed as next of kin.

Thomas is remembered at the Manila American Cemetery and Memorial.

Photographs

From the Lucky Bag

From his high school yearbook

From The Boston Globe on June 1, 1936

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.