S1c Harry Anderson

Harry Anderson was born July 25, 1920, in New York.

By 1930 he was living in Lynwood, then a town of about 7,000 near Los Angeles, with his mother, Mary Chamberlain, and step-father, Douglas Chamberlain.

Harry was still living with them and two younger half-siblings when the spring 1940 Census was conducted. He’d completed one year of high school and worked 52 weeks in 1939, earning $624 at an unidentified job. But he’d been out of work for two weeks by April 1940 and was seeking new employment. He found it on July 25, 1940, when he enlisted in the Navy.

Mr. Anderson was a seaman first class on the U.S.S. Arizona when he was killed in the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor, Dec. 7, 1941.

Sources: Census; Navy muster roll. Navy photograph. This profile was researched and written on behalf of the U.S.S. Arizona Mall Memorial at the University of Arizona.