Frank Robbins Moran Full Narrative

Frank Robbins Moran was born on May 28, 1921, to Frank Goding Moran and Grace Robbins Moran. He was his parents' third child; he had an older sister, Mary, and an older brother, Robert, who died in 1917 at the age of five. He was the grandson of shipbuilder and former Seattle mayor Robert Moran, for whom Moran State Park on Orcas Island, Washington is named for. His father, Frank Moran, Sr., established the Moran School for Boys on Bainbridge Island, a prep school developed to "educate the minds and develop the character" of the sons of Seattle's wealthy elite. Young Frank was educated during his elementary years in Geneva, Switzerland, the Montezuma School in California, and the Moran School run by his father. He graduated from Roosevelt High School in Seattle in 1939. Moran's mother, Grace, died on December 2, 1939. Moran attended Washington State College (WSC) for one semester in the fall of 1939 as a business administration major. He transferred to Hillsdale College, a private, conservative liberal arts school in Michigan. It is unknown if he graduated from Hillsdale with a Bachelor's degree. He was a member of the Alpha Tau Omega fraternity. After he left college, he worked at Seattle-Tacoma Shipbuilding Corporation. According to his family, he had a lifelong fascination with boat building. Moran married Evelyn Cooke in Los Angeles on June 22, 1943, and together they had a daughter Linda, born on her father's twenty-third birthday on May 28, 1944. Moran joined the United States Army in May 1942 and was commissioned a Second Lieutenant of Infantry. He later volunteered to join the paratroopers and trained at Fort Benning, Georgia. Assigned to the 507th Parachute Infantry Regiment, 82nd Airborne Division, he first saw combat during the Normandy invasion on June 6, 1944. Separated from his unit in Normandy, he was killed in action near Amfreville, France on June 15, 1944. He is buried at the Normandy American Cemetery and Memorial, Colleville-sur-Mer, Departement du Calvados, Basse-Normandie, France, Plot 1 Row 8 Grave 31. Frank Robbins Moran is memorialized at Roosevelt High School in Seattle, Washington and the Washington State University Veterans Memorial.