By Crystal Garcia
The Tribune-Star

Worthington— Linda City went to the cemetery as a child with her family every Memorial Day to remember her uncle, but it wasn’t the same as it was Saturday.

“I used to always ask my mother, ‘Why can’t we bring him home?’” she said. “It was always ‘because we don’t know where he is, he’s an unidentified.’”

The remains of City’s uncle, Fireman 3rd Class Alfred Eugene Livingston, were brought back Thursday to his hometown of Worthington. He was finally laid to rest Saturday at the Worthington Cemetery after about 65 years of being buried as an unknown.

On Jan. 14, 1941, he joined the U.S. Navy and arrived in Hawaii about nine months later.

Livingston was on board the USS Oklahoma when the ship was attacked and capsized in Pearl Harbor by a Japanese torpedo aircraft on Dec. 7, 1941.

“This is really exciting, we are just ecstatic,” City said about her uncle’s identification. “We really encourage other family members to try to get their loved ones home, too.”

Had it not been for the efforts of Ray Emory, 86, of Honolulu, Livingston may have never been identified.
Emory, a retired mechanical contractor and survivor of the USS Honolulu, began his quest to find the names of the unknown in 1990 after visiting the National Memorial Cemetery of the Pacific at Punchbowl and found many scattered gravesites marked “unknown.”

Since then, he’s been able to get at least 250 grave markers to carry a “Pearl Harbor Dec. 7, 1941,” inscription and in some cases the name of the ship that person served on, according to a 2005 article on Midweek.com.

In the last two or three years, Emory has been able to identify four unknowns, including Livingston.
“It’s one of those situations when you feel like you’ve got ahold of something you can’t let loose of,” Emory said about using his resources for these projects.

He said he felt this was something the government, VFW’s or American Legions could have taken on long ago, but when they didn’t, he took it on himself.

“No outside funding, no nothing, I just do it myself,” he said.

When Livingston’s body couldn’t be immediately identified after being pulled from the harbor, he was labeled as X-99 and buried at the Nuuanu Cemetery in Oahu, Hawaii, according to a Department of Defense memorandum.

His remains were exhumed in 1949, but for some reason, it was thought that he was abroad the USS Arizona. When he couldn’t be identified again, he was buried in Section B, Grave 258 of the Punchbowl.
There was not anyone with the Livingston name on the USS Arizona, Emory said, so in 2006 he contacted the Joint POW/MIA Accounting Command to explore the possibility that Grave 258 could be Alfred E. Livingston.

After comparing dental and skeletal structures, the remains were identified. Historical records show the unknown remains were treated with formaldehyde and/or paraformaldehyde, and Livingston’s coffin contained it.

Because of the presence of embalming chemicals on the remains, DNA testing would be problematic, according to the memorandum.

Although Emory had been corresponding with Livingston’s family members for about a year, Friday was the first time they met in person.

They have shown him a lot of gratitude, he said.

“Words can’t describe it,” Emory said. “Coming over here for this, words can’t describe it. It makes my heart feel good at how many really turned out here today.”

According to Paul Goodyear, president of the USS Oklahoma Survivors Association, Livingston is the first of the 381 unknowns to be identified from the ship.

Of the 429 casualties from that day, he was the 39th body to be returned to family, said Goodyear of Phoenix. There are still 94 survivors alive today.

“To the survivors, it means a great deal,” he said about the identification and return. “I had a great response to the information I put out that this has happened, and we’ve even got families that are still waiting for relatives to be identified.”

Even though Goodyear didn’t know Livingston personally, he said he was probably one of the last people to see him between running around the ship or in a Liberty boat.

Each of them had different jobs on the ship, Goodyear said. Livingston was a fireman, which would be called a petty officer by today’s standards.

For Goodyear, identifying Livingston or any other unknown is 65 years long overdue for such a tragic event.“There’s not a man that was there that doesn’t remember every minute of the 10 minutes that it took us to go,” he said. “… It’s just etched right in your mind, you can never forget it.”

Livingston was 23 when he died. He left behind his mother, Lenora Price; grandmother, Alvira Livingston; and siblings Ruth Price Resler, Louise Price Hobbs, Raymond Livingston and Harold Price.
Hobbs, of Greenwood, is the only surviving sibling. She did not want to comment on her brother’s identification.

City, however, said the family couldn’t be happier.

“Everyone talks about [being] so anti-military …, but this is something that brings the whole nation together,” she said. “This is good for everybody, everyone’s happy about this.”

Crystal Garcia can be reached at (812) 231-4271 or crystal.garcia@tribstar.com.

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