Joe Travers
Commander Martin J. "Joe" Travers, USN (Ret.), 90, died October 13 in Annapolis. He was born October 12, 1921, in San Francisco, CA, the youngest son of Harold Olsen and Martina Henehan of Seattle, WA. Joe graduated from Garfield High School in Seattle in 1939 and studied at the University of Washington for one year. In the summer of 1940, Mr. Travers matriculated at the U.S. Naval Academy with the Class of 1944. Due to the exigencies of wartime, the Class of 1944 was graduated in the spring of 1943. While at the Naval Academy, Joe ran track and earned two varsity letters on the Navy sailing team. After graduation, Ensign Travers was assigned to the U.S.S. Tennessee, a legendary battleship re-fitted after being hit at Pearl Harbor. As a gunnery officer, he had a front row seat for numerous island invasions beginning in the fall of 1943: Tarawa, Kwajalein, Eniwetok, Saipan, Guam, Tinian, Pelelieu and New Ireland. In the fall of 1944, the "Volunteer Battlewagon" joined with its sister battleships the California, Pennsylvania, West Virginia and Mississippi at Leyte Gulf in the Philippines to protect the U.S. invasion of the archipelago. Early on the morning of October 25, 1944, these battleships formed in battle line to block the effort by the Japanese navy to bring its fleet through Surigao Straits and attack the invasion beachhead. In a climax to the largest surface naval combat in history, the five battleships "crossed the T" of the Japanese fleet steaming through the Straits and thereby eliminated the Japanese surface naval threat in the Pacific. The Tennessee, with its new Mark V computer-aided fire control system, was able to fire 69 rounds of 14" and 16" shells in this last-ever battleship confrontation. Joe was assigned to the pre-commissioning crew of the new heavy cruiser the U.S.S. Oregon City in Newport, Rhode Island when the war ended. He received orders to flight training and, after graduation in 1947, was assigned to a PBM seaplane squadron (VP-46) on Saipan. In addition to assisting data gathering on typhoons and atomic bomb detonations in the Pacific, his squadron tracked Soviet submarines. His squadron was detached to Tsingtao on the Shantung Peninsula in China and, after the Communist revolution, returned to the United States. After a tour at the Pentagon, seconded to the Air Force to assist in strategic targeting plans, and studying Portuguese and French at George Washington University, Joe went to Morocco on an intelligence assignment. He met Mary while in Morocco and they were married after he was transferred to Pensacola, FL to teach aspiring naval aviators. Lt. Travers transitioned to jets in the T-33 "Shooting Star" at NAS Chase Field in Beeville, TX. In 1961, Lt. Cdr. Travers deployed to the western Pacific with the U.S.S. Midway carrier group as part of an electronic counter measures ("ECM") squadron (the VAW-13 "Zappers") based in Guam. During that time, he flew night intercept missions along the DMZ in Vietnam in adapted AD Skyraiders. After a tour back at NAS Chase Field as the executive officer of an F-9 Cougar training squadron, Joe accepted the blandishments of the Office of Naval Intelligence and took the job of Naval Attachè to Iran and Iraq. After a crash course in Farsi and military diplomacy, and a brush up on the latest in airborne photo reconnaissance, Cmdr. Travers transferred to the U.S. Embassy in Teheran, where he and his family spent four years. Cmdr. Travers' tour in Iran included a great deal of travel in the Middle East. In addition to regular trips throughout Iran and Iraq, he spent time in Greece, Syria, Jordan, Bahrain and Lebanon. In 1966, he drove from Beirut to Jerusalem via Damascus. In 1968, he and Mary drove a 1965 Chevrolet from Teheran to Islamabad and back, by way of Herat, Kandahar, Kabul, Mazar-i-Sharif, the Khyber Pass and Lahore. On this remarkable trip, they drove north of the Hindu Kush through the Salang Tunnel, up to the Amu Darya (Oxus River) and saw the Soviet watch towers on the other side of the river. They visited the magnificent Buddhas at Bamian and the eerie ruins of Balkh in ancient Bactria. In June 1969, Cmdr. Travers retired from the Navy and went into business in Osseo, MN as President of Paulson Manufacturing, Inc. Paulson made a variety of agricultural machinery, including a wide array of front-end hydraulic loaders and the innovative "jabber fork" for lifting round hay bales. He sold the company in 1983 and moved with Mary to Annapolis. They spent many years thereafter traveling the world. He and Mary drove through Kenya from Mombasa to Maralal and camped at the foot of Mt. Kilimanjaro. They wandered through Zaire, Uganda and Ethiopia. In 1987, they performed another epic automobile tour through the Iron Curtain from Frankfurt through East Germany to Pomerania and Gdansk, and back via Dresden and Meissen to Munich. While in Annapolis, Joe taught sailing at the Annapolis Sailing School. He raced his Rainbow Red Hot in numerous events, and won a second place in the Rainbow National competition. He and Mary spent many pleasant times at their house in Antigua, from which they piloted their cruising sailboat Merrily in numerous Antigua Race Weeks and throughout the Caribbean. His remarkable linguistic skills, far-flung adventures and extensive learning were a delight to his family and friends. He enjoyed reciting poetry and singing melodic ballads with his grandchildren. He is survived by his wife of 56 years, Mary; stepson, Adam Hartmann and his wife Stephanie Blume of Gainesville, FL; stepdaughter, Mary Champion of Fair Oaks, TX; son, Peter and his wife Georgia of Princeton, NJ; and eight grandchildren. A funeral service will take place at the United States Naval Academy Chapel at 10 a.m. on Friday, October 21, followed by inurnment at the USNA Columbarium. A reception at the USNA Officers' Club near the Chapel will follow. Funeral arrangements have been made through the John M. Taylor Funeral Home in Annapolis.