Biography
Alan Southworth was born to his parents, Mr. and Mrs. Robert Southworth, sometime in 1926. He had three sisters: Mrs. O. L. Smith, Undine Southworth (a Home Economics senior at Iowa State College at the time of his death), and Mrs. Fred E. Miller. He had one brother, Lieutenant Robert S. Southworth Jr., who served with the Navy in Tokyo just after the war. While growing up, Alan won the Des Moines Register and Tribune model plane contest twice. When he was 16, he worked at Langley Field in Virginia for the national advisory aeronautical committee for one year.
He graduated East High School and attended Iowa State College briefly before entering the Navy in March 1944. He then received training in V-12 naval program at Iowa State. Later, he graduated from preflight school at St. Mary's college in California. He had be stationed at Norman, Oklahoma for about a month prior to his death.
Air Cadet Alan David Southworth (Ex 1947) died in an airplane crash at the Norman, Oklahoma naval air base on October 26, 1945. His body was brought home to Des Moines, Iowa, for services at Dunn's Funeral Home and his was buried in Merle Hay Cemetery.