Sixteen Year Old Sub Vet

At just sixteen years old, Timothy A. Boone of Muskegon, Wisconsin, returned home a wounded veteran of the Pacific submarine war. With three broken ribs, burns, and a cast on his arm, Boone limped off the front lines of World War II not with fanfare, but with the quiet resolve of someone who had seen too much, too soon. The Navy had tried to say he was too young. He insisted otherwise. After slipping past the red tape, training hard, and deploying into the teeth of the Pacific theater, Boone found himself on the wrong end of a Japanese depth charge attack during a tense submarine patrol between Saipan and the Philippines. His actions—gunning topside and surviving the brutal concussion of an underwater barrage—earned him an honorable discharge and a quiet seat at the table of submarine legends, though he wasn’t done yet. Not by a long shot.

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The Divine Devilfish

The Honolulu Star-Advertiser ran the story on June 10, 1955. There it was in black and white, plain as day: Commander Stephen S. Mann, U.S. Navy, was taking over Submarine Squadron 72. It might have just been another quiet military personnel notice to most folks reading their morning coffee over the paper, but for the men who served with Mann, it carried the weight of experience and the quiet authority of a man who had faced death and kept his boat afloat.

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