David Albert Shernick, the son or Albert Harry Shernick and Mildred Belle (Shaw) Shernick, was born at Lockport, Niagara County, New York on 26 April 1928.
The 1930 Census shows his family living at 113 68th Street in Niagara Falls, New York. In 1931, when David was 3, the family moved to Denver, Colorado. David grew up in Denver, attending local schools.
The 1940 U.S. Census shows the family living at 1339 Lamar Street, in Lakewood, Jefferson County, Colorado, near the golf course of the Lakewood Country Club.
David graduated from Lakewood High School ca. June 1946 and signed up with the U.S. Navy in the autumn of 1946. He served on board the Naval destroyers U.S.S. Gearing (DD-710) and the U.S.S. Ernest G. Small (DD-838).
In 1947 the Ernest G. Small was grounded by a storm near Boston, and while waiting for repairs David lived briefly near Boston, where he began dating a local girl, Jane Deehan. David and Jane became engaged to be married, but the engagement was broken for reasons unknown.
Perhaps it was because Jane found out about David's simultaneous engagement to marry Geraldine Muller.
After completing his last tour of duty in 1948, David was honorably discharged from the Navy and remained in the Naval Reserve until 1951. See his military records below.
Betweenf 1949 and 1956, David moved back to Colorado, studied art and architecture in local schools, and lived briefly in Colorado Springs, Colorado.
Around the spring of 1956, he decided to move to Florida, where his aunt, Ida (Shernick) Altsitzer, kept a small vacation home near Palm Beach. David was invited to use the house.
During that idyllic summer in Palm Beach, Dave made several friends and began to appear in local summerstock theatre productions. While acting on stage, he encountered an English woman named Lucille Lewis, a beautiful coloratura soprano for whom he felt a strong attraction.
To David, Lucille seemed fascinating: She was cultured, had a strong English accent, spoke French fluently, had an excellent education in piano and singing, and told some amazing stories about her life behind enemy lines in France during the war.
Born to a wealthy Jewish family in London, Lucille Lewis had grown up in New York City and attended some of the best preparatory schools in Manhattan.
In the 1930s, she and her mother, Kitty (Diamondstone) Lewis, had moved to the French Riviera. There Lucille lived the life of a wealthy wild child until she married and had a small child of her own: a daughter named Isabel.
Finally determined to settle down, Lucille began training in opera with Emma Calvé, and was determined to build a career in opera. She had just been scheduled to play the starring role in Delibes' Lakmé when Germany invaded France in 1940.
Rightly fearing for her family's life, Lucille helped her mother escape through Lisbon, then fled with her daughter to the countryside. She and her friends began working with the French underground in Lyons, helping people to escape. But their operations were soon betrayed to the local Gestapo, forcing Lucille herself to flee across the border to Switzerland.
Lucille's mother, who had arrived safely in New York, was extremely relieved to receive a short telegram from the U.S. embassy stating that Lucille and Isabel were still alive. Kitty quickly sent enough money for Lucille to rent a flat at a luxury hotel. There, Lucille sat out the rest of the war, and by 1946 she was happily reunited with Isabel, who had been left among nuns in a French convent. They soon made their way back to London, then New York City.
What had brought her to Palm Beach? Well, her White Russian friends, actually. Lucille had met many of the Tsarist Russians associated with Diaghilev's Ballets Russes while living on the Riviera, and they had a strong community in Palm Beach. She'd moved down from New York to join them, and to live with an old friend for the summer.
Amazed, David told Lucille about his own family's Russian past, and asked her to dinner many times. A romance soon blossomed. But there was a problem.
She was still married.
Before the war, Lucille had married in Paris to a man named Raymond Lucchesi, the father of her daughter. She had split with Raymond more than 10 years ago, and had gone back to her maiden name, but they had never divorced.
That meant David and Lucille had to wait a few months and (ouch) submit divorce papers to Raymond.
Undoubtedly surprised to hear from Lucille after so many years, Raymond graciously signed the divorce papers, and they soon received the blessings of the local church.
David Shernick wed Lucille Evelyn Lewis at Palm Beach, Florida, in August 1957.
Of the events that took place during the next few years, David spoke very little, but it would seem he became involved in the local community of White Russians and anti-Castro Cubans.
Palm Beach was then a staging area used by the CIA for their efforts to recover Cuba, and David Shernick certainly formed several strange business entities during that period, hidden behind post office box addresses. These corporate fronts still exist on paper, but they have no real explanation to this day.
In 1962, David's former ship, the U.S.S. Gearing, was involved in the U.S. Naval blockade of Cuba during the Cuban missile crisis, and the Navy's confrontation with Soviet submarines. In other words, he knew personally many of the men involved in the blockade and, later, the Bay of Pigs invasion.
When his father, Albert Shernick, died of a heart attack in August 1962, David returned briefly to Denver for the funeral. He arrived on a high-powered motor bike, with Lucille riding behind him.
After the funeral they brusquely refused to help David's brother settle the estate -- they had too much important business back in New York City. David left his mother, Mildred, and his brother Robert in shock by offering to burn the house down.
He certainly had no intention to help them move furniture, he said, so if they wanted to get rid of his father's possessions, he'd be happy to burn the place down. "The fire engines should be arriving about the time you return from visiting with Mrs. Berg."
That particular remark caused a serious rupture with Robert, who says the last thing he saw of David and Lucille (for the next 20 years) were the tail lights of their motor bike, disappearig at a very high rate of speed down the highway, headed east.
During the late 1960s, David Shernick worked for many years as an architect for well respected firms in New York City, San Francisco and San Jose, CA. He also seems to have worked on contracts for the U.S. Navy.
While living in San Francisco, David became an avid collector of classic motor cars, and he and Lucille joined a Great Dane rescue league. They were very keen on pure-breds, and doing well financially, but where all the money was coming from was not made entirely clear to his family.
While living in Silicon Valley during the 1980s, his firm, Shernick Associates, began building "modular systems" for office parks. David also worked on contracts for Dalmo Victor, a major defense contractor. His work was connected in some way to Cobra Dane and Cobra Judy, two highly classified missile tracking systems.
David and Lucille Shernick kept a cozy two-bedroom house at 363 More Drive in Boulder Creek Canyon, high up in the hills above San Jose, but the neighborhood that lined this long stretch of mountain road was not exactly a close community. They were largely isolated, and happily isolated, at home, watching television with their cats.
If Lucille had any social life, it certainly didn't show. During the same period, the 1980s, she began to supplement their income by giving piano lessons to local high school children. But that seemed to be the full extent of her social interests.
For all practical purposes, they had retired.
David Shernick's move to Spokane, WA, during the late 1990s seems to be related in some way to the naval stations nearby. As usual, he never wrote his brother Robert or his nephews much, and the exact nature of his business there was never shared.
Likewise, the cause of their decision to move to Montana, ca. 2000, was not explained.
David was always cordial, but also a very private and rather secretive individual. One gathers from bankruptcy filings made in Montana during this period that David and Lucille were actually embarrassed by large medical bills, and too proud to ask for help. They were certainly trying to dodge tax collectors and creditors, and therefore not very eager to share their address.
It came as a surprise to his family, then, when he and his wife Lucille gave an interview to reporter Sepp Jannotta of the Ravalli Republic on 23 March 2010. It may still be found online at the link listed below.
David and Lucille Shernick celebrated their 50th wedding anniversary in 2007. On 25 October 2010, Lucille, the love and light of David's life, passed away.
When exactly David himself died is a mystery. His heart failed. His body was found on 9 May 2012. For some reason his body was held for nearly a month by the local coroner before his family were informed.
David Albert Shernick was buried with military honors at the Western Montana State Veterans Cemetery, Missoula, MT, in early June 2012.
David's burial was followed by a strange astronomical event: a rare transit of Venus on 6 June 2012. A transit of Venus (an event in which the Planet of Love crosses the face of the Sun, as if swimming through a lake of fire) is among the rarest of predictable astronomical phenomena.
The next one will not occur until the year 2117.
David Shernick's life itself was a strange and rare event -- one that will puzzle his family forever.
Jannotta, Sepp. "It was in another lifetime," Ravalli Republic, 23 March 2010.
Ancestry.com. U.S., Find A Grave Index, 1600s-Current [database on-line]. Provo, UT, USA: Ancestry.com Operations, Inc., 2012.
Source:
Find A Grave Memorial No. 119699328
Household Members:
Source Citation:
Year: 1930; Census Place: Niagara Falls, Niagara, New York; Roll: 1619; Page: 5B; Enumeration District: 0079; Image: 167.0; FHL microfilm: 2341353
Source Information:
Ancestry.com. 1930 United States Federal Census [database on-line]. Provo, UT, USA: Ancestry.com Operations Inc, 2002.
Original data: United States of America, Bureau of the Census. Fifteenth Census of the United States, 1930. Washington, D.C.: National Archives and Records Administration, 1930. T626, 2,667 rolls.
Household Members:
Source Citation Year: 1940; Census Place: Golf Club, Jefferson, Colorado; Roll: T627_465; Page: 1B; Enumeration District: 30-54
Source Information:
Ancestry.com. 1940 United States Federal Census [database on-line]. Provo, UT, USA: Ancestry.com Operations, Inc., 2012.
Original data:
United States of America, Bureau of the Census. Sixteenth Census of the United States, 1940. Washington, D.C.: National Archives and Records Administration, 1940. T627, 4,643 rolls.
Junior Year Photo, p. 31 of 80.
Group photograph, p. 66 of 80
Caption: Scholarship Contest. "The Lakewood High School was well represented this year at the annual scholarship contest held at Adams City, April 25 [1945]."
Bottom Row: David Shernick, Margie Schoder, Martha Schwartz, Elaine Kannenberg
Birth: Apr. 26, 1928 Death: May 9, 2012
Ancestry.com. U.S., Find A Grave Index, 1600s-Current [database on-line]. Provo, UT, USA: Ancestry.com Operations, Inc., 2012.
Source Information:
Ancestry.com. U.S., School Yearbooks, 1880-2012 [database on-line]. Provo, UT, USA: Ancestry.com Operations, Inc., 2010.
Original data: Various school yearbooks from across the United States.
Description:
This database is a collection of middle school, junior high, high school, and college yearbooks from across the United States. While yearbooks may not provide information about the vital events that are usually associated with genealogical research, they do provide other information about individuals' lives. This information helps place people in historical context as well as provides detail that helps turn individuals, sometimes only known by names and dates, into actual people.
David Shernick joined the United States Navy autumn 1946. He was assigned to the naval destroyer [ U.S.S. Gearing] DD-710 [1], and stationed during this period at NTC San Diego, NTC Norfolk and USNB Great Lakes. He served in the Atlantic theatre and all parts thereof, as detailed below, from Newfoundland to Montevideo, Uruguay.
According to Wikipedia, the U.S.S. Gearing "was named for three generations of the Gearing family, Commander Henry Chalfant Gearing, Sr., Captain Henry Chalfant Gearing, Jr. and Lieutenant Henry Chalfant Gearing, III.
"Returning to Norfolk 21 March 1946, she conducted peacetime operations along the Atlantic coast of North and South America, in the Caribbean, visiting Montevideo, Uruguay; and Rio de Janeiro, Brazil. Gearing sailed 10 November 1947 on her first Mediterranean cruise, calling at Algeria, Malta, Italy, and France before mooring again at Norfolk 11 March 1948."
Source Citation:
National Archives at College Park; College Park, Maryland, United States; Muster Rolls of U.S. Navy Ships, Stations, and Other Naval Activities, 01/01/1939 - 01/01/1949; Record Group: 24, Records of the Bureau of Naval Personnel, 1798 - 2007; Series ARC ID: 594996; Series MLR Number: A1 135
Source Information:
Ancestry.com. U.S. World War II Navy Muster Rolls, 1938-1949 [database on-line]. Provo, UT, USA: Ancestry.com Operations Inc, 2011.
Original data: Muster Rolls of U.S. Navy Ships, Stations, and Other Naval Activities, 01/01/1939-01/01/1949; A-1 Entry 135, 10230 rolls, ARC ID: 594996. Records of the Bureau of Naval Personnel, Record Group Number 24. National Archives at College Park, College Park, MD.
David transferred to the destroyer U.S.S. Ernest G. Small in October 1947, just prior to the Gearing's Mediterranean cruise. He was stationed at NTC Norfolk and USNAFB Norfolk.
See Wikipedia article on the Naval Destroyer "USS Ernest G Small" here:
"Following a period of yard availability she reported to Commander, Submarines Atlantic Fleet, and operated out of New London, Connecticut, until 14 December when she was laid up for repairs at Boston, Massachusetts. On 3 April 1947 while anchored off Block Island she grounded in a violent wind and rain storm, but, refloated with aid from two tugs, she returned to Boston where repairs were made.
"Ernest G. Small sailed on 12 June for Norfolk, Virginia, and engaged in type exercises in the Virginia Capes Operating Area. On 6 August she stood out for the Caribbean, calling at Guantanamo and Trinidad before rendezvousing with Task Force 84 (TF 84) which proceeded to Rio de Janeiro where on 7 September the flagship Missouri (BB-63) embarked President Harry S. Truman and his family for the trip to the States. Ernest G. Small steamed on escort station during the voyage."
David Shernick was promoted through the following ranks:
Having served prior to December 31, 1946, David received the U.S. Victory Medal - World War II. Wikipedia explains:
"As the Second World War ended on 2 September 1945, there may be cases of service members who had enlisted, entered officer candidate school, or had been a cadet or midshipman at the U.S. Military Academy, the U.S. Naval Academy or the U.S. Coast Guard Academy in 1946, receiving the medal without having been a veteran of World War II. The reason for this late date is that President Harry S. Truman did not declare an official end of hostilities until the last day of 1946."[3]
March 1948: "Transferred to RS, NS, Norfolk, Va., for discharge."
David Shernick was honorably discharged 27 March 1948 and continued to serve in the Naval Reserve for one year of active duty and five years of inactive duty at USNTC Denver. His tour in the reserve ended 12 March 1953.
Source Citation:
National Archives at College Park; College Park, Maryland, United States; Muster Rolls of U.S. Navy Ships, Stations, and Other Naval Activities, 01/01/1939 - 01/01/1949; Record Group: 24, Records of the Bureau of Naval Personnel, 1798 - 2007; Series ARC ID: 594996; Series MLR Number: A1 135
Source Information:
Ancestry.com. U.S. World War II Navy Muster Rolls, 1938-1949 [database on-line]. Provo, UT, USA: Ancestry.com Operations Inc, 2011. Original data: Muster Rolls of U.S. Navy Ships, Stations, and Other Naval Activities, 01/01/1939-01/01/1949; A-1 Entry 135, 10230 rolls, ARC ID: 594996. Records of the Bureau of Naval Personnel, Record Group Number 24. National Archives at College Park, College Park, MD.
[David] Albert Shernick in the U.S., Newspapers.com Marriage Index, 1800s-1999
The facts in this collection were found using artificial intelligence technology and may contain errors. Learn more
Gera Zdine Muller in the U.S., Newspapers.com Marriage Index, 1800s-1999
The facts in this collection were found using artificial intelligence technology and may contain errors. Learn more
David A Shernick in the 1950 United States Federal Census
Household Members:
Source Citation United States of America, Bureau of the Census; Washington, D.C.; Seventeenth Census of the United States, 1950; Record Group: Records of the Bureau of the Census, 1790-2007; Record Group Number: 29; Residence Date: 1950; Home in 1950: North Lakewood, Jefferson, Colorado; Roll: 6219; Sheet Number: 37; Enumeration District: 30-78
Source Information Ancestry.com. 1950 United States Federal Census [database on-line]. Lehi, UT, USA: Ancestry.com Operations, Inc., 2022.
Original data: Department of Commerce. Bureau of the Census. 1913-1/1/1972. Population Schedules for the 1950 Census, 1950 - 1950. Washington, DC: National Archives at Washington, DC.
Population Schedules for the 1950 Census, 1950 - 1950. NAID: 43290879. Records of the Bureau of the Census, 1790 - 2007, Record Group 29. National Archives at Washington, DC., Washington, DC.
Source Information: Ancestry.com. U.S. City Directories, 1822-1989 [database on-line]. Provo, UT, USA: Ancestry.com Operations, Inc., 2011.
Original data: Original sources vary according to directory. The title of the specific directory being viewed is listed at the top of the image viewer page. Check the directory title page image for full title and publication information.
Source Information:
Ancestry.com. U.S. City Directories, 1822-1989 [database on-line]. Provo, UT, USA: Ancestry.com Operations, Inc., 2011.
Original data:
Original sources vary according to directory. The title of the specific directory being viewed is listed at the top of the image viewer page. Check the directory title page image for full title and publication information.
"Florida Marriage Index, 1822-1875 and 1927-2001," database, FamilySearch (https://familysearch.org/ark:/61903/1:1:VJV1-YZK : accessed 3 November 2015), David Albert Shernick, Aug 1957; from "Florida, Marriage Collection, 1822-1875 and 1927-2001," database and images, Ancestry (http://www.ancestry.com : 2006); citing Florida Department of Health, Jacksonville, Florida; and Jordan Dodd, Liahona Research.
Source Information:
Ancestry.com. U.S. Public Records Index, 1950-1993, Volume 2 [database on-line]. Provo, UT, USA: Ancestry.com Operations, Inc., 2010.
Original data: Voter Registration Lists, Public Record Filings, Historical Residential Records, and Other Household Database Listings.
[1212 E 54th Ave, Spokane, WA, 99223-6306 (1993)]
Source Information:
Ancestry.com. U.S. Public Records Index, 1950-1993, Volume 1 [database on-line]. Provo, UT, USA: Ancestry.com Operations, Inc., 2010.
Original data: Voter Registration Lists, Public Record Filings, Historical Residential Records, and Other Household Database Listings.
[PO Box 576, Lolo, MT, 59847-0576 (1995)] [PO Box 3688, Missoula, MT, 59806-3688 (1995)]
Source Information:
Ancestry.com. U.S. Public Records Index, 1950-1993, Volume 2 [database on-line]. Provo, UT, USA: Ancestry.com Operations, Inc., 2010.
Original data: Voter Registration Lists, Public Record Filings, Historical Residential Records, and Other Household Database Listings.
David Albert Shernick (1926 - 2012) is buried at the Western Montana State Veterans Cemetery, Missoula, Montana, U.S.A.
Go to Website: Find A Grave Memorial No. 119699328
Note: SK3 US Navy World War II
Burial:
Created by: Joan Record added: Nov 02, 2013 Find A Grave Memorial# 119699328
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