Lucky Bag Yearbook

From the 1924 Lucky Bag:

WALTER CHESTER DEY, Jr.

Chet

YOU can spot this guy for miles. His method of locomotion, while peculiar, is effective and, what is more important, it gets him there. Moreover, any man who invariably wears a smile on his face is bound to get along with his fellow-sufferers. “Chet” is all this.

A girl in every port, but the “cherie” in Trinidad robbed him of his usual sang-froid. Further details are withheld. His best defense against both D. O.’s and girls is a misleading look of curious innocence, so easily assumed that they usually take pity on him.

“Now, what’s up?”

“Why, Dey, of course.” Having finally attained the Fourth Deck, he finds that he’s left most of his gear down on the Ground Deck. “Dey coming, sir.”

Loss

Walter was lost when the seaplane he was aboard crashed into San Diego Bay on August 23, 1937.

From researcher Kathy Franz:

Early reports indicated the plane was flying at nearly 100 miles per hour when her hull crashed into the rotting hulk of the old whaling ship Narwhal. She nosed over and landed in eight feet of water. The men who died were knocked unconscious and drowned. It took a powerful floating crane and high tide to lift the 13-ton plane out of the water.

Other Information

He earned his wings as naval aviator #3624 on March 20, 1930.

From researcher Kathy Franz:

Walter graduated from Lincoln high school in 1920 and was president of the Hi-Y’s.

He was appointed to the Naval Academy by Senator Charles McNary.

In 1926, he married Caroline Muir. Their son Walter was born April 11, 1927 and died December 14, 2003.

In 1910 Portland, Walter’s father was manager of a creamery, and his mother was Lucia. In 1920, his father was manager of a creamery in San Francisco, and his stepmother was Edna.

His wife was Caroline, and his sons were Walter Jr and James. Son Walter was born in California in 1927, and James in Washington, D.C., in 1929. In 1930 the family lived in Palmetto Beach, Florida; in 1935, San Diego, and in 1940, his widow and children lived near other naval officers in Coronado, California.

Walter’s Find A Grave page is here.

Related Articles

William Freshour ‘31 and Ford Wallace ‘31 were also lost in this crash.

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.