Robert Henry Dawson Jenkins was born Sept. 26, 1921 at Dallas, Texas to William W. Jenkins, a laborer, and Sallie Van Deman Jenkins, a homemaker. She died of a heart problem when the boy was 10.

Robert attended Technical High School in Dallas for two years. The 1940 Census showed him living with his father. Robert was a Western Union telegraph messenger, while his father was a laborer for a Works Progress Administration road project — a Depression-era federal jobs program. Between them, they earned $1,306 in 1939.

The son enlisted in the Navy on Dec. 4, 1940. He was a seaman second class on the U.S.S. Arizona when he was killed in the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor, Dec. 7, 1941.

Sources: The Dallas (Texas) Morning News; Texas birth and death certificates; Census; Navy enlistment records and muster roll. This profile was researched and written on behalf of the U.S.S. Arizona Mall Memorial at the University of Arizona.