Military Veterans

On October 24^th of 1942, during his junior year at Kansas University, James B. McKay, Jr. enlisted in the United States Navy.  He entered active duty on July 1, 1943 while training at Oberlin College in Ohio.  Leaving there, he trained at Plattsburg, NY, and ended the nine months with amphibious training at Camp Bradford in Norfolk, VA.  He was commissioned lieutenant on the tank landing ship, LST-953, which served in the Asiatic-Pacific Theater during WWII.  Upon leaving Hingham, Massachusetts, the ship commenced an east coast shakedown on November 12, 1944 to join the LST Flotilla 21, already at Pearl Harbor. Three months of intensive training exercises preceded LST-953's April 1945 voyage to Guam. After a series of supply missions in the southern Marianas, she arrived at Okinawa in the War Zone on June 26 to help facilitate mop-up operations with the Marine Corps troops. From a distance, the crew witnessed the mushroom cloud from the bombing of Nagasaki on August 6, 1945.  The day Japan announced acceptance of surrender terms(September 2, 1945), LST-953 returned to the Marianas. The ship carried elements of the Second Marine Division to Nagasaki on September 24 for the occupation of Japan.  On October 24, the ship transported the US Army’s 24^th Infantry Division to Matsuyama.  She then returned to San Diego to conclude her Pacific duty.  Jim arrived at San Francisco, California at the Officer Separation Center on August 27, 1946 and returned home after completion of his active service to pursue his education to become an attorney and go into partnership with his father, J.B. McKay, Sr. in El Dorado (McKay and McKay Attorneys at Law). 

Much of the information regarding the service history of the LST-953 was taken from Wikipedia.

Lieutenant

World War II—1942 - 1946

South Pacific