Navy Captain Arnold "Buster" Jay Isbell was born in Oto, Woodbury County, Iowa on September 22, 1899, the son of Charles Leroy Isbell (1872-1942) and Mary Elizabeth Arnold (1879-1946). In 1910, his father supported the family in Logan, Iowa as a bank cashier and prior he was working as a railroad agent. With his preliminary education completed Arnold entered the US Naval Academy at Annapolis on July 24, 1917. His graduating class was accelerated due to WWI and he was commissioned an Ensign in 1920. After serving his sea duty, he volunteered and was accepted into the Navy's flight program at NAS, Pensacola on June 30, 1923. That same year, he would marry Miss Margarita Mayes (1907-1977), the daughter of Franklin L. Mayes (publisher of the News Journal) & Mrs. Lois Kingsberry and the sister of former sheriff Howard L. Mayes.
Arnold would serve four local tours of duty in Pensacola but WWII changed the direction of his naval career. On April 17, 1943, he was given the command of the escort carrier USS Card (CVE-11) along with a submarine "killer squadron." Planes from the carrier along with a flotilla of destroyers they hounded the German subs night and day. During a ten week period in the Fall of 1943 the hunted down and destroyed eight enemy submarines. He was so efficient that he was brought to Washington on March 9, 1944 to use his skills to develop our antisubmarine tactics. On February 26, 1945, he boarded the USS Franklin (CV-13) to hitch a ride to take command of his new ship, the carrier USS Yorktown (CV-10).
Twenty-one days later, the Franklin was sailing close to the shores of Japan, more so than any other carrier of the war at the time. Their mission was to launch their aircraft against strategic targets in preparation for the invasion of Okinawa. Suddenly, a lone Japanese airplane dove out of the clouds and dropped two bombs, one on the Franklin’s flight deck and the other on the after deck. As the fires raged, they loss all power as casualties were mounting by the minute. The Franklin now lay dead in the water just fifty miles off Japan with over 724 men dead with another 265 wounded. Many of the dead were never recovered, having been blown overboard. Others like were killed, recovered, and buried at sea while their ship limped back to Pearl Harbor for temporary repairs. Captain Isbell and two other Pensacolians were among those that died that day and now rest at the bottom of the Pacific. Margarita would remarry to Augustus Albert Giese (1903-1966) before passing away in 1966. Arnold & Margarita's two sons Don & Charles both retired from the military and have since passed.
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