Sat
Aug 19 2017
08:02 pm
Wreck of the USS Indianapolis found
By: R. Neal

U.S. Navy:

A team of civilian researchers led by entrepreneur and philanthropist Paul G. Allen has announced they have found the wreck of the World War II cruiser USS Indianapolis (CA 35), which was lost July 30, 1945.

This is a significant discovery considering the depth of the water in which the ship was lost - more than 18,000 feet. Around 800 of the ship's 1,196 Sailors and Marines survived the sinking, but after four to five days in the water - suffering exposure, dehydration, drowning, and shark attacks - only 316 survived.

The wreck was located by the expedition crew of Research Vessel (R/V) Petrel, which is owned by Allen, 5,500 meters below the surface, resting on the floor of the North Pacific Ocean.

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bizgrrl's picture

A story from 2015 of the

Submitted by bizgrrl on Sat, 2017/08/19 - 10:30pm.

A story from 2015 of the living survivors of the USS Indianapolis.

At least one of the survivors was only sixteen when the ship sank. What an ordeal. Such amazing and strong men.

Midori Barstow's picture

USS Indianapolis and Knoxville connection

Submitted by Midori Barstow on Sun, 2017/08/20 - 9:57am.

Saved from 2012 Knoxnews article by Sam Venable:


Sam Venable: The 'other' Roger Tory Peterson

By Sam Venable

Sunday, July 29, 2012

First of two parts.

Sixty-seven years ago tomorrow, America lost the most famous wildlife artist you never heard of.

Earl O. Henry was a Knoxville dentist. His office was in the Medical Arts Building. At the start of World War II, he was a member of the Naval Reserve. By 1942, he was on active duty, ultimately serving as dental officer on the USS. Indianapolis.

On July 30, 1945, shortly after the Indianapolis dropped off key components for the atomic bomb at Guam, it was torpedoed by a Japanese submarine.

The ship went down in 12 minutes. Of 1,199 on board, only 317 survived. This tragedy still holds the dubious honor of being the single greatest loss of life at sea in U.S. Navy history.

Among the hundreds of casualties was Lt. Cmdr. Henry, whose skills as a dentist were surpassed only by his ability to paint.

As a youngster in Knoxville, Henry's love of birds was sparked by drawings that came in packages of baking soda. He immersed himself in taxidermy and painting, both largely self-taught. He joined the Tennessee Ornithological Society, rising to president. He trekked all over the "new" Great Smoky Mountains National Park, viewing birds and memorizing more than 60 of their calls.

Simply stated, here was a walking, whistling, brush-wielding genius who happened to fill teeth Monday through Friday.

One of his many outdoor friends, the late Bob Burch of the old Tennessee Game and Fish Commission, once relayed this high praise to me: "If Earl had survived the war, his name would have been as familiar to bird and art lovers all over the world as Roger Tory Peterson's."

His only child, Earl O. Henry Jr., a retired banker in Nashville, never laid eyes on his father. He was born six weeks before the Indianapolis was sunk.

But thanks to his father's reputation in dental and wildlife circles, the younger Henry may well "know" his dad better than the children of surviving veterans.

"I'm blessed to have learned so much about him," he told me via telephone.

During his short life, Henry created approximately 45 bird paintings, mostly as gifts to family and friends.

Yet his legacy lives on and is available to the general public through prints and note cards available at (link...). The Web site includes much more history of this amazing man than I could write in five columns, let alone two.

His collection of more than 80 mounted birds has been donated to Ijams Nature Center. Every year, his professional life is recalled at the Earl Henry Memorial Dental Clinic.

Not bad work for a kid from Knoxville who died at sea, 33 years young.

Midori Barstow's picture

Kyle C. Moore

Submitted by Midori Barstow on Sun, 2017/08/20 - 10:59am.
(in reply to Midori Barstow)

Second of two parts.


Sam Venable: A chance discovery from 1933

By Sam Venable

Tuesday, July 31, 2012

Second of two parts.

On Aug. 6, 1933, a story about Earl O. Henry, an amateur naturalist about to begin his dental practice, appeared in the old Knoxville Sunday Journal.

Its snappy headline read: "Mounting Birds Is Not Stuffy Business."

The piece was authored by Kyle C. Moore, a Journal staff writer and photographer who later worked for The New York Times and the public information office of TVA.

The article detailed Henry's lifelong interest in ornithology, taxidermy and bird painting.

But, as Moore noted in his story, the 21-year-old Henry — a graduate of Knoxville High School and the University of Tennessee's College of Dentistry — soon would be giving up his passion for taxidermy for a very practical reason:

"People don't want a dentist who has been handling birds working on their teeth."

By that time, Henry had amassed a collection of 134 species. He had a federal permit to collect in Tennessee, Mississippi and Arkansas. His skills at capturing birds on paper and in lifelike mounts already were being recognized in scientific and art circles.

They still are.

The Henry family has donated more than 80 of these mounts to Knoxville's Ijams Nature Center. Plans are being formulated to display them. In addition, selected prints and note cards of his work are available at (link...).

As I related in Sunday's column, Henry quite likely would have become one of America's premier wildlife artists had he not been killed, at age 33, in World War II. A Navy lieutenant commander, he was the dental officer aboard the USS Indianapolis when it was sunk by a Japanese submarine July 30, 1945.

On that fateful day 67 years ago, there was another lieutenant commander who went down with the Indianapolis. He was an administrative officer named Kyle C. Moore.

Yes, the same Kyle C. Moore who had written the story about Earl Henry 12 years earlier.

Earl Henry Jr., a retired Nashville banker born six weeks before his father's death, knew his dad and Kyle Moore were friends on the ship.

In fact, he has visited many times with Moore's widow, Katherine D. Moore, 96, who lives in West Knoxville and in 1991 published a book about her husband's life, "Goodbye, Indy Maru: A Navy Wife Remembers."

But, amazingly, neither family was aware of the Journal story until it surfaced in 2007.

"My uncle found it while going through some old papers in Kentucky," said Henry Jr.

"How incredible is it that the author and subject of that article both were from Knoxville, both were lieutenant commanders on the same ship and both were killed the same day?"
Scripps Lighthouse © 2012 Scripps Ne

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