WACO, Texas – World War II veteran Frank Curre died Wednesday, exactly 70 years after surviving the surprise Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor.

Curre died after battling mesothelioma, a cancer caused by asbestos exposure, for more than a year. He was 88.

Additional Photos

Pearl Harbor veteran Frank Curre holds a photograph of himself as a young Navy sailor in this June 23, 2011, file photo in Waco, Texas. Curre died Wednesday, exactly 70 years after surviving the surprise Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor. The Waco native was 88 years old. Associated Press photo by Rod Aydelotte/Waco Tribune Herald

Curre was a mess cook aboard the USS Tennessee at Pearl Harbor when the naval base was bombarded. He later was assigned to the USS Petrof Bay and participated in attacks at Iwo Jima and Okinawa.

“It’s like he held on for today, which is his special day,” Curre’s daughter, Linda Lee, said Wednesday. “He was very much a family man. He taught us family values, patriotism and love for our country.”

Lee said Curre was exposed to asbestos as the ships were bombed and set ablaze, spreading the harmful chemical into the air. After leaving the military, he worked as a pressman for the Waco Times-Herald, now the Tribune-Herald, for 42 years. He continued to work part time for the paper for another 18 years.

Curre was the president of the local Pearl Harbor Survivors Association, and returned to Pearl Harbor four times with group members, most recently last year for the 69th anniversary of the attack.

“There’s a lot of stuff I don’t remember much in my old age. But that day? Everything that happened that day is tattooed on your soul,” Curre told the Tribune-Herald in 2010. “It never leaves you. You carry it with you the rest of your life.”

Robert Carter is commander of the William B. Moody Memorial VFW Post 2034, where Curre was a member. Carter said he and Curre would visit local schools and talk to students about World War II. He said Curre also loved to go to a McDonalds to drink coffee with fellow veterans.

Mary Duty, a history teacher at Tennyson Middle School, said Curre was a frequent guest speaker in her class. The school named its Hall of Honor after Curre last school year, and Duty’s class presented him with a plaque.

Two students created posters of Curre to march in the most recent Veterans Day parade. Duty said she will take the artwork to Curre’s two daughters to keep.

“He was funny at times, but he would tell very serious stories,” Duty said. “He had a gift as a storyteller, he would lean into them and talk to them in a manner that made them want to listen.

“He told kids that every day after Pearl Harbor was like a gift, because he should have died that day, and when he didn’t, every day for the next 70 years was from God.”

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