Robert Seabury
Veteran for November 2009
On the summer morning of June 4, 1925, Robert Seabury made his first appearance in the little town of Pisgah in Northwestern Iowa. As others in his generation Robert's formative years took place during the Great Depression. At 17 Robert traveled to Ames, Iowa, where he attended Iowa State University until he made the decision to quit school and join the Navy in May 1943.
In 1945, after being commissioned as a Naval Officer, Robert was sent to San Francisco to board a ship which would transport him to Samar Island in the Philippine Islands. Following the Philippine liberation, Robert was ordered to Okinawa to prepare for the invasion of Japan.
On October 4,1945, after the war had already ended, Robert's ship was still anchored at Okinawa when Guam Weather Central spotted a typhoon of what they considered to be weak intensity. Louise, as the typhoon was named, was following a fairly predictable path to the Northwest, and expected to pass between Formosa and Okinawa and on into the East China Sea. However, Louise suddenly began to veer sharply to the right and head north for Okinawa. That evening as the storm approached directly south of Okinawa it slowed to six knots and greatly increased in intensity. As a result the storm which struck during the afternoon hours of October 9, 1945, has seldom been paralleled in fury and violence. Robert remembers waves as high as 75 feet and almost one mile apart which threatened to destroy the ship. Nearby ships were being destroyed with all on board lost to the sea. Many were blown ashore and cast onto the beach in a mass of wreckage. Distress signals had to be ignored as Robert and the crew battled to save their own ship. Sometimes members of the crews who had to abandon ship were taken aboard other ships; more often they made their way ashore and spent the miserable night huddled in caves trying to hide from nature's wrath; still other lost their lives.
After surviving the typhoon, Robert was sent to Inchon, Korea, then to Tsingtao, China. Later his ship was decommissioned in New Orleans and Robert headed home to Iowa where completed his education at Iowa State University. Upon his graduation Robert moved to Texas where he sold cemetery lots before moving into the construction business and eventually real estate.
Robert has remained in Wichita Falls for the last 60 years where he has been active in assisting the growth and progress of his adopted home. Robert says his faith in God, his three wonderful children (two boys and a girl) and his lovely wife, Jeannie, have made him what he is.
