LCDR. Robert S. Brown

1917 - 2022

LCDR. Robert S. Brown "Bob" died peacefully in his sleep on August 6, just a few weeks before his 105th birthday. He retired from a 30-year Naval career and settled in Rancho Bernardo in 1965, where he lived in his home for 57 years.
Born in 1917 and raised in Needles, California, Bob enlisted in the Navy shortly after graduating from Needles High School in 1935. His ship was stateside when the United States entered World War II, but it quickly sailed to the Pacific where he spent the remainder of the war and was in Tokyo Bay when Japan surrendered. Bob worked in communications, sending messages by Morse Code and doing advanced cryptography. (Over 70 years later at 102 he immediately began tapping out messages when presented with a code machine!) He served on several ships during his career including the USS Cincinnati, USS Colorado, USS Astoria and USS Galveston. Most of his work was on shore duty assignments stateside as well as in France, Japan and Hawaii. His talent for fixing things came in handy for post-retirement jobs in plumbing and appliance repair.
In October 2021, Bob was the oldest of 92 veterans to go on Homor Flight from San Diego to Washington, D.C. During the celebrations Thomas Cox, Chief of Counterintelligence for the Pentagon and a graduate of Needles High School 51 years after Bob, presented him with a flag which had flown over the Pentagon.
Throughout his life, Bob remained very physically active. During his late 90s, he continued swimming laps and playing golf (at one time his handicap was 8). He was still square dancing with The Promenaders a few months ago, and he and his personal trainer met three times a week where they counted exercises in French, Japanese and Spanish as well as English.
In 1939, Bob, an only child from the California desert married Olive (Tots) Johnson, one of 11 siblings, from snowy South Dakota. Together for 61 years, Tots died in 2000. In 2004, he married Allegeria Evans who predeceased him in 2013. Bob and Tots had two daughters, Evonne Hammond of Long Island, NY and Sally Holmen of Valley Center, three grandchildren--Kristin Timpone (Minden, NV), Rick Frisby (Escondido, CA) and Savanna Holmen (Ft. Worth, TX), and six great-grandchildren.
Bob was also blessed with three angels who helped him continue to live in his home for the last six years (Magdalena Wolf, his caregiver in chief, Lisa Taylor, his personal trainer, and Frank Martinez, his night watchman).
A military memorial service will be held on September 22nd at 9:00 a.m. at Fort Rosecrans to be followed at 11:30 a.m. by a luncheon at Cocina del Charo in Escondido.