Co-written by Suzi Lewis Pignataro and Coronado Scribe, Mary Beth Dodson, May 2015
Commander John “Jack” R. Lewis, active in both WW II and the Korean War, still lives in the Coronado home he built for his family in 1955.
As a boy, Jack could have belonged to Spanky and his gang. He was a rough and tumble kid, always looking for a neighborhood football skirmish or a boat to sail on the rivers and creeks of New Jersey. He loved water, and remembered with great fondness the beaches of Coronado, where, in 1926, his father moved the family for a brief period of time. Little did he know that 24 years later, the Navy would bring him back to that charming island, where he would settle his family a stone’s throw away from Glorietta Bay.
Jack was born on November 25, 1919 in a two-room apartment above his Grandmother Antonia Eisenbach’s hair salon on the border between Harlem and Hamilton Heights. His mother, Rose, was the only child of Prussian immigrants. His father, Henry Lewis, a veteran of the Punitive Expedition and WW I, was one of eight children born to a Welsh father and Prussian mother from Williamsbridge, New York, where the Lewis men were held in high esteem as Freemasons, builders, and deacons of the Emmanuel Baptist Church. At the time of his birth, Jack’s parents were clerks. Soon after Jack’s little sister Grace was born, Henry went to work for Prudential Insurance, eventually rising to Regional Manager for central and south New Jersey. The family lived for a time in Red Bank then settled on the Delaware River, outside the township of Burlington.
His grandmother Antonia moved to Cliffwood Beach, where she built a corner store with a speakeasy in the back, a room upstairs for tarot and tealeaf readings and, after Prohibition, a German-style restaurant and beer garden.
Jack was never academic. Sports were his life, and more than anything, he wanted to be a Physical Education teacher. Henry had higher aspirations for his only son, and in 1938 Jack enrolled as an Economics major at Rutgers University, where he balanced his studies with athletics and played quarterback on the football team. When it became apparent that the US was going to war, Jack decided to leave Rutgers and enlist as an officer, taking charge of his military career before the military had a chance to take charge of him. With his love of boats, the Navy was the logical choice. He attended Midshipman School aboard USS Illinois in New York City, graduating in 1941.
Jack’s first assignment was as Second Officer to a former Coast Guard cutter that had previously been partially submerged in the Cooper River in Camden, New Jersey. The Navy resurrected it as, in Jack’s words, “they didn’t have anything to start a war with.” The ship was outfitted with a dysfunctional machine gun on the bow, two depth charges “we couldn’t outrun,” and a crew of thirteen men and two officers supplied with WW I rifles and a Tommy gun that proved worthless. The crew’s job was anti-submarine warfare and survivor rescue between Atlantic City and Cape May. If they saw a German submarine, they were to report and pursue. Jack felt fortunate they never saw one, as the Coast Guard cutter was “a floating gasoline bomb.”
One day in January of 1942, while driving with friends down Burlington’s High Street, Jack spied a pretty blond walking arm in arm with her mother and announced to his pals, “That’s the girl I’m going to marry.” Two months later, Jack and Nancy Waitz eloped to Atlantic City.
From January to May 1942, Jack attended the Mine School in Yorktown, Virginia, learning the intricacies of three different types of mines. He learned magnetism and electricity from a Harvard professor named Morash and an MIT professor named Howard Aiken, later known for his pioneering work in computer sciences.
At the end of May, Jack was ordered to the Pacific from Virginia on a brand new minesweeper, the YMS 49. He served as Executive Officer, First Lieutenant, Gunnery Officer, Minesweeping Officer and eventually Commanding Officer.
It took the minesweeper three months to sail to Australia, including two weeks in dry dock after being hit by a hurricane off the South Carolina coast. The first ship of its kind commissioned for the Pacific Theatre, no one expected her to make it. But she did, and after a few repairs was put in charge of sweeping for Japanese mines from Brisbane to New Guinea.
In April of 1944, the YMS 49 was given the job of towing Patrol Torpedo (PT) boats to Thursday Island. The crew spent three months escorting landing ships from northern Australia to New Guinea.
“We experienced a lot of air attacks,” Jack remarked. “While escorting six Amphibious Landing Ships, we were attacked by 57 Japanese dive bombers, torpedo bombers and fighter planes. We shot down three Japanese aircraft after they put two of the ships out of commission.
“We were an escort and navigational guide for smaller amphibious ships. We met the Japanese head on at Tarawa, took fire, and rescued the survivors of a sunken coastal ship and one beach master and his party.”
The Japanese were dropping flares looking for them, so Jack had everyone down below as he stayed on the bridge for 48 hours, keeping them and the ship safe.
From August 1944 to June 1945, Jack was at Little Creek, Virginia, the last six months training crews on Amphibious Assault Ships.
There was a planned invasion of Japan slated for November of 1945. Jack trained in Houston to command a new amphibious assault ship designed to fire close range bombardment rockets. He was told that he and his ship would not survive the attack. In order to spare his young and homesick crew, he never told them what fate had in store for them. Victory over Japan (V-J Day) happened two weeks before they were due to ship out, and instead of sending his crew to their certain death Jack returned them to the safety of Norfolk, Virginia.
Jack had a brief office job at the Philadelphia naval shipyard before returning to his wife and to Rutgers University to complete his degree. Between 1947 and 1959, he and Nancy were blessed with four children: Nancy Bernice, Barbara Ann, Susan Maria and John Robert, Jr.
In September of 1950, Jack was recalled to active duty as Lieutenant Commander. He was ordered to the Naval Amphibious Base (NAB) Coronado, and was assigned to “Underway Training” to set up a program to train landing ships, high-speed transports and one submarine, with over 60 Marine Corps Recon teams. He also served as Operations Officer.
In March of 1953, Jack was sent to Korea as the Planning Control Officer of Amphibious Transport Squadron One. He and the squad sailed USS George Clymer to Hong Kong where the SEABEES were building a naval air base. They then took the US Army’s 25th Division from Sendai, Japan to Busan, Korea before the Peace Treaty was signed and they wouldn’t be allowed to bring any more troops. During this time, Jack was promoted to Commander.
When Jack retired from active duty in 1954, he and Nancy made Coronado their permanent home. He went to work for the Lee Mather Real Estate Company before establishing Jack Lewis Realty at 1212 Orange Avenue. As a Real Estate Broker, Jack built and owned a number of homes and apartment complexes, owned the Shoreland Motor Hotel and helped naval officers buy homes, which he then managed when the officers were transferred. In 1995, after a successful and satisfying 40 years, he retired.
Jack was active in community service in Coronado. He sat on the school board for 12 years and was its President. He was also President of the Rotary Club and was involved in the Boy Scouts and Pop Warner football. He and Nancy supported charities throughout San Diego County, many of which helped disadvantaged or ill children. Jack gave generously to the Humane Society, the San Diego Zoo and the San Diego Natural History Museum.
Jack’s work with the Navy League of the United States gained him nation-wide recognition. After serving successfully as President of the Coronado Chapter, Jack was voted to the National Board of the Navy League. He was active with a host of initiatives on a number of issues of vital interest to both the community and the military. He also actively recruited Coronado High School football players to go to Annapolis. In 1973, after receiving personal accolades from the Chief of Naval Operations, Jack was awarded a citation for Meritorious Public Service from Secretary of the Navy, John Warner.
In 1962, the family donated the Graham Memorial Presbyterian Church’s steeple bell in memory of Nancy Bernice, who’d passed away the previous year at age 14. Jack and Nancy also created the Nancy Lewis Award, which is given each year to an exceptional eighth grade girl at Coronado Middle School.
Jack’s wife Nancy passed away in 1988. In 1991, he married Ronnie Gray, the widow of a WW II Navy pilot.
Awards: Selective Service Medal, Navy Reserve Medal, American Defense Medal “Fleet”, American Campaign Medal, Asian Pacific Campaign Medal, WWII Victory Medal, Korean Defense Medal, Korea Service Medals(2).
Campaign Ribbons: WW II Navy Reserve, WW II American Defense, WW II Campaign (2), WW II Victory, WW II National Defense, WW II Navy Combat Action, Campaign Service, Korea Service, Korean War.
Jack has been a devoted father, grandfather and husband, a fun-loving friend, a man of great conviction and determination, and a pillar of his community. An exceptional role model for his children, he advised them: “Life is not about being popular, it’s about being decent and always doing right by others.” Known for his generosity and fairness, he would find work for any honest soul walking into Jack Lewis Realty looking for a job. Jack was an avid world traveler and even tried a few rounds of golf after retiring, eventually leaving it up to Ronnie to achieve greatness on the putting green.
Sources:
Interview from Rutgers University, 1997
Daughter, Suzi Lewis Pignataro
Bruce Linder, Coronado Historical Association
*Note: Jack Lewis’ bio can be seen at Fourth and H.
Next week’s Avenue of Heroes biography will be Lt Gen Francis Patrick Mulcahy
By Veteran’s Writer’s Group, Gail Chatfield, May 12, 2015.
