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S2c John Jeffris Reece
John Jeffris Reece was born Oct. 14, 1923 in Cleveland, Texas northeast of Houston to C. C. Wright, a laborer, and Ada Jeffris Wright, a homemaker.
It isn’t clear what became of the father, but the mother died in 1929. Jeff, as he was known, and his sister, Martha, were adopted by a great-aunt, Nettie Jeffris Reece, a widowed chiropractor living in Brush, Colorado 80 miles northeast of Denver.
Jeff left Brush in 1936 and spent two years in Greenland, Colorado 40 miles south of Denver.
His sister died of an insect bite in 1939 and is buried at the Brush cemetery.
Jeff enlisted in the Navy in Colorado in November 1940 and went aboard the U.S.S. Arizona the next January.
He was a seaman second class when he was killed in the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor, Dec. 7, 1941.
A cenotaph for Mr. Reece is at the Brush cemetery.
Sources: Special thanks to Steve Rohde of the Brush Area Museum & Cultural Center for providing much of this information. Other sources include: The Brush News-Tribune; Census; Navy muster rolls.