LAKEPORT, Calif. – The life of a world traveler, family man and former Modesto City Council member – who had been present at one of the most tragic events in US history – ended quietly this week.
Henry “Andy” Anderson died Monday. He was 95 years old.
His son, Norm, said his father died peacefully in his sleep at his lakeside home in Lakeport.
“He had a long and wonderful life,” Norm Anderson said.
Anderson had traveled the world, been a member of the Modesto City Council, had a long and happy marriage, and raised two sons.
However, Anderson – who had lived in Lakeport for the last three decades – became well-known locally for his membership in an elite club: He was a member of the Pearl Harbor Survivors Association.
With Anderson's passing, the once-thriving group of Lake County Pearl Harbor Survivors has been reduced to just one, 89-year-old Bill Slater of Lakeport.
Henry Edward Anderson Jr. was born Aug. 27, 1918, in Sacramento to Ruth and Henry Anderson. His father had served in the US Army in Europe during World War I.
At age 6, Henry Anderson traveled to Europe with his mother, and family said he had fond memories of France and Italy.
He attended school in San Francisco and spent summers on the family ranch in Rio Vista. He completed high school at Lowell High and then attended U.C. Davis.
Anderson joined the Navy in 1938, and was a 23-year-old first class seaman aboard the USS Tennessee on the morning of Sunday, Dec. 7, 1941, when the Japanese attack on the naval base took place.
“We didn't have any idea that we were going to be attacked,” Anderson told Lake County News in a 2008 interview.
Anderson recalled having just finished breakfast and gone on an errand for supplies when a Japanese bomb hit the Tennessee's second turret – one of two hits the ship would take that day.
A large chunk of shrapnel created by the explosion went right through the seat where Anderson had been sitting at breakfast a short time earlier.
He kept the chunk of shrapnel with him as a keepsake for the rest of his life.
“Just going over it in my mind, it was quite a day,” Anderson said.
While being a Pearl Harbor survivor was a big part of Henry Anderson's life, it was just one aspect of many, said his son.
When the USS Tennessee returned to the states and arrived in Bremerton, Wash., at the end of the war for repairs, Anderson was introduced to Maryrona Buhring, the sister-in-law of one of his shipmates.
The young Miss Buhring, who had attended college at Northern Montana State College, had moved from her home in Havre, Montana, to work in the shipyards and was staying with her sister when the USS Tennessee arrived.
She and Henry Anderson would marry at Port Orford, Wash., a few months later.
Over the years Anderson would drive truck for Diamond Match Lumber Co. and work at his own business, the Builders Exchange, which was a blueprint service for contractors in Modesto.
“It was a pretty good business,” Norm Anderson said. “He and my mom worked at it together.”
Norm Anderson was born while his parents lived in Modesto, and they would spend just over a decade there, during which time Henry Anderson served on the city council.
From there the family moved to Castro Valley, where Henry Anderson worked for a year and a half for the Contractors State License Board, before moving on to a series of building inspector jobs that took him to Livermore, Mill Valley, Novato, Petaluma and, finally to the city of Napa, where he retired at the age of 57.
His son said Anderson continued doing commercial building inspection jobs, with his final job being the inspection of what is now the Umpqua Bank building on 11th Street in Lakeport.
The Andersons moved to Lake County in the early 1980s. Henry Anderson had reportedly enjoyed vacationing in the county as a child.
Norm Anderson said his parents lived in various places around Lakeport, even building their own home at one point, before settling in at Pier 1900 on S. Main Street.
Henry enjoyed the outdoors. He loved to collect rocks – and had a large rock collection to show for it – and also took his sons fishing and camping.
He also enjoyed traveling around the United States with Mary and often visited relatives in Montana. The couple purchased a home in Yuma, Ariz., and were snowbirds for many years, Norm Anderson said.
In recent years, Henry Anderson had slowed down physically but he kept an active interest in the community.
He was a benefactor of Westside Community Park and also was a donor to Sutter Lakeside Hospital programs, including making a $10,000 donation to assist with purchasing a mobile medical unit.
In 2011, Anderson received the Stars of Lake County “Spirit of Lake County” award.
Norm Anderson said his father had always remained in fairly good health until recently. Henry Anderson's health prevented him from attending the Pearl Harbor commemoration in Lakeport last month.
“His mind was kind of slipping away,” said Norm Anderson, noting that his father had been bedridden for the last few weeks, with caregivers and Hospice Services of Lake County staff being of great help.
Just a few days before his father died, Norm Anderson had returned from a trip to Arizona.
“I think he was kind of waiting for me to get back here so he was comfortable leaving,” Norm Anderson said.
Mary Anderson died in 2011. Over the last couple of weeks of his life, Henry Anderson had seemed to be communicating with his wife, his son said. “In his mind he's been with her.”
Norm Anderson said he is planning to take his father's ashes to the same place in the Bear Paw Mountains in Montana where he scattered his mother's ashes, so they can be together again.
Henry Anderson is survived by son Norm and wife, Toni, of Lakeport; son, Terry and wife Toni of Los Cruces, N.M.; and three grandsons, Perry, Porter and Clayton.
A memorial service will be held at Jones Mortuary, 115 S. Main in Lakeport, at 10 a.m. Friday, Jan. 10.
Email Elizabeth Larson at
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