Floyd Kelly Jr. Collection
Scope and Contents
The Floyd Kelly Jr. Collection, 1938 – 2008, consists primarily of illustrations by Mr. Kelly Jr., correspondence either from or to Floyd Kelly Jr, the Twelfth edition of the Bluejackets Manual, pamphlets gathered throughout Floyd Kelly Jr’s military service, color and black-and-white photographs featuring servicemen and military vessels, postcards from throughout the Asiatic-Pacific theatre, poems, certificates awarded to Floyd Kelly Jr, and a scrapbook compiled by Floyd Kelly Jr with a focus on his military career. Additionally, several publications are included within this collection, including two issues of the magazine Bureau of Naval Personnel Information Bulletin, and newspapers from Japan, Farragut, Idaho, and Shanghai. This collection contains materials related to Floyd Kelly Jr.’s personal life and military service with the United States Navy and the USS Napa (APA-157).
Dates
- Creation: 1938 - 2008
Creator
- Kelly, Floyd Jr., 1925-2011 (Person)
Conditions Governing Access
This collection is open for reseach.
Folders 17 and 25 contain sensitive material that has been redacted. The original copy has been removed to box RE0001. Contact the archivist for more information.
Conditions Governing Use
Permission to publish material from this collection in any form must be obtained from the National Museum of the Pacific War, Center for Pacific War Studies.
Biographical / Historical
Floyd Kelly Jr., 1925 – 2011, was born to Mr. and Mrs. Floyd Kelly on September 21, 1925, in Prince, Utah. Mr. Kelly was drafted into the United States Navy on September 9, 1943. During his service within the US armed forces, Mr. Kelly Jr. served at the following military stations: Navy Recruitment Station Denver, Colorado; Naval Training School Farragut, Idaho; Naval Training Station School Chicago; Naval Training Station College Del Monte, California; Naval Training Center in San Diego, California; and Landing Craft School in the Pacific. After his extensive schooling, Floyd Kelly Jr. S 2/c served on board the USS Napa (APA-157) and on an amphibious vehicle as a radio technician.
Floyd Kelly Jr. was honorably discharged from the United States Navy on April 2, 1946, with full honors and reaching the rank of Seaman 1st Class. The only known medal award to Mr. Floyd Kelly Jr. is the World War II Victory Medal for his service in the Asiatic-Pacific Theatre. After his honorable discharge from the United States Navy, Mr. Floyd Kelly Jr. became a civil engineer and worked for the United States Department of Agriculture.
In 1981, Floyd Kelly Jr. married his wife, Eva Laros Kelly, and they spent 30 years married. On January 27, 2011, United States Navy Reserve Seaman 1st Class Floyd Kelly Jr. passed away in his home at the age of 85 and was buried at the Veterans Memorial Cemetery of Western Colorado.
Extent
0.5 Linear Feet (This collection contains 18 full 1/2" tab legal-size folders and one oversized folder housed within one archival banker's box and one oversized box. )
Language of Materials
English
Japanese
Chinese
Abstract
The Floyd Kelly Jr. Collection, 1938 – 2008, consists of illustrations drawn by Mr. Kelly Jr., a book, letters, pamphlets, color photographs, black-and-white photographs, postcards, poems, certificates, newspapers, and a scrapbook. This collection contains materials related to Floyd Kelly Jr.’s personal life and military service with the United States Navy and the USS Napa (APA-157).
Arrangement
The Floyd Kelly Jr. Collection contains 18 Full 1/2” tab legal-size folders, one oversized folder housed within one archival-sized box, and one oversized box totaling 0.45 linear feet. This collection has been intellectually separated into 3 series and organized into the following arrangement: I. Military Service, II. Correspondence and Illustrations, III. Publications. Four (4) Full 1/2” tab legal-size folders have not been sorted into a series for this collection.
I. Military Service. Contains 6 Full 1/2" tab legal-size folders totaling less than 0.1 linear feet. This folder contains materials collected during Floyd Kelly Jr’s time serving with the United States Navy and the United States Naval Reserve.
II. Correspondence and Illustrations. Contains 7 Full 1/2" tab legal-size folders totaling less than 0.1 linear feet. This folder contains correspondence and illustrations that Floyd Kelly Jr. has collected during his life. Most of the correspondence within this series includes materials sent from Floyd Kelly Jr to his parents in Grand Junction, Colorado. The illustrations within this series are primarily pencil sketches drawn by Floyd Kelly Jr.
III. Publications. Contains 4 Full 1/2" tab legal-size folders totaling less than 0.1 linear feet. This folder contains materials officially published by a private company or the United States Navy.
Immediate Source of Acquisition
Jesse Snelson donated these materials to the Center for Pacific War Studies on October 2, 2015.
Separated Materials
3D artifacts have been separated from this collection, including the following accessioned items: one hand fan that depicts a scene in Japan comprising of a bridge, home, and trees; one blood chit attributed to Floyd Kelley Jr. that includes an American Flag; a Chinese Nationalist Flag, Chinese writing, and an anchor emblem, “USN Shanghai China”; one unofficial patch with a black-and-white embroidered Chinese dragon; one can of boot polish container that reads “Quintone Boot Polish” and “Iwo Jima”; two souvenir rings collected by Mr. Floyd Kelly Jr. One of the rings features a Chinese Dragon and the other ring reads, “Manila, PI 45”; one heavily worn Republic of China coin with crossed flags and Chinese characters. The coin reads, “The Republic of China Ten Cash,” and one commemorative coin from the Golden Gate Bridge exhibition in 1940. The iconography of the Golden Gate Bridge, the San Francisco-Oakland Bay Bridge, and Treasure Island is featured on the coin. The accession numbers for this finding aid will start at 2015.092.009 and continue in sequential order. For more information on these separate materials, contact the archivist.
Processing Information
This collection was processed by Jacob Pritsker in November 2024.
Subject
- USS Napa (APA-157) (Organization)
- USS Los Angeles (CA-135) (Organization)
- United States. Navy. Naval District, 12th (Organization)
- Farragut Naval Training Station (Idaho) (Organization)
- Title
- Floyd Kelly Jr. Collection
- Status
- Completed
- Description rules
- Describing Archives: A Content Standard
- Language of description
- English
- Script of description
- Latin
- Edition statement
- The first edition of this finding aid was created by Jacob Pritsker.
Repository Details
Part of the Center for Pacific War Studies / National Museum of the Pacific War Repository
328 E. Austin St.
Fredericksburg Texas 78624 United States of America
archives@nimitzfoundation.org