Please follow this link for photos of John J Gobbell.
FROM USC TO YANKEE STATION.
Upon graduating from the University of Southern California, John was commissioned an ensign in the U.S. Navy. He served as a deck and ASW officer aboard the USS Tingey (DD 539), a revered Fletcher-class destroyer and battle of Leyte Gulf veteran. He did a WESTPAC cruise and fought the battle of YANKEE STATION forming a protective destroyer screen around the carrier USS Hancock (CVA 19) in the South China Sea.
Professional Career
Most of John's career has been in executive recruiting. He was with KPMG Peat Marwick as a consultant for three years. And then for ten years, he was a Vice President Boyden Associates, Inc., a large New York City based international executive recruiting firm. He then founded THE GOBBELL COMPANY in Newport Beach, California where he worked on a retained basis with corporate clients to find senior executives. During a concentrated time of developing and presenting candidates for military aerospace clients, John became fascinated with advanced technology, weapon systems, and the executives who build them. Recently he was the Director of Development for the USC Catholic Center, located at the University of Southern California. There, he worked on a $35.0 million capital campaign to build a new Romanesque church and student center on campus.
In civilian life, John sails in Southern California yacht racing regattas. In younger days he skippered in the Long Beach Yacht Club's Congressional Cup, one of the most prestigious match-racing regattas featuring skippers from around the world, including America's cup stand-outs.
John and his wife, Janine, also a USC graduate, live in Orange County, California.
ARTICLES
ON BROTHERLY LOVE
(This
article appeared in THE
SCROLL of Phi Delta Theta in the
Fall 1995 issue)
In
Italy, for thirty years under the Borgias, they had warfare, terror, murder,
bloodshed. They produced Michelangelo, Leonardo da Vinci, and the
Renaissance. In Switzerland, they had brotherly love; five hundred years of
democracy and peace, and what did they produce? The cuckoo clock.
Military.com, one of the nation's largest on-line magazines (circulation 8 million), asked John to do a piece on the Surender Ceremony aboard the USS Missouri (BB63) on Septmeber 2, 1945. In the research phase, compelling stories surfaced that show our leaders of the time looked far into the future. The way the ceremony was structured and the instrument of surrender were unprecedented; this marvelous legacy remains with us today. Please find the article at this link.
Mix and Match -
How a Fletcher Class Destroyer Became a DDG Overnight
This article was published in the Tin Can Sailor quarterly newsletter and is basically a coming-of-age reminice of John's WESPAC cruise aboard the destroyer USS Tingey (DD 539). Please find the story at this Link.
NOTE: All photos are official U.S. Government photographs unless otherwise specified.
NOVELS BY JOHN J. GOBBELL
Be sure to CLICK on each COVER
to view synopsis, reviews, images, and charts.
A CALL TO COLORS
Published by Random
House-Presidio Press, this work features Commander Mike Donovan, skipper of the destroyer USS Matthew. With General MacArthur's 165,000 troops just ashore to begin the Philippine liberation, Donovan finds himself embroiled in what becomes the Battle of Leyte Gulf - the largest naval engagement in the history of mankind. It is available wherever books are sold.
TODD INGRAM SERIES
These are stand-alone action adventure novels featuring Navy Lieutenant Todd Ingram. Historically accurate, they are set in World War II's Pacific Theater and portray some of the critical naval battles in that period. Chronologically, they should be read in this order:
THE NEPTUNE STRATEGY
The most recent novel in the Todd Ingram Series, THE NEPTUNE STRATEGY was a 2004
hardcover release by St. Martin's Press and came out in softcover in 2005. It
takes place in 1944 with Ingram, now a destroyer captain, captured by a Japanese
submarine, the I-57, enroute to the
U-boat pens of L’Orient, France on
an exchange mission. It isn’t until the
I-57 stops in Madagascar that Ingram learns of the submarine’s true mission
and that it’s loaded with five tons of
Yakuza gold.
You Can find this title at Amazon.com for Kindle
WHEN DUTY WHISPERS LOW
The third book in the Todd Ingram series, WHEN DUTY WHISPERS LOW, is about the shoot-down of Japanese CinC, Admiral Isoroku Yamamoto in 1943. It debuted in 2002; the soft cover came out in 2004. This work is now available on Kindle.
A CODE FOR TOMORROW
The second Todd Ingram book, A CODE FOR TOMORROW, is about the 1942-1943 naval battles for Guadalcanal with Ingram as the executive officer of the destroyer USS Howell (DD 482). It was released by St. Martin's in hardback in 1999; the soft cover, in 2002. It is now available on Kindle.
You
Can find this title at Amazon.com for Kindle
THE LAST LIEUTENANT
The first book in the Todd Ingram series, THE LAST LIEUTENANT, is about the 1942 Japanese siege of Corregidor in the Philippines. It was published in hardback in 1995 by St. Martin's Press. The soft-cover version was released in 1997. It is now available on Kindle.
You Can find this title at Amazon.com for Kindle
This contemporay techno-thriller was published by Charles Scribner's Sons in hardback in 1991. John likes to feature technical-centerpieces in his works and BRUTUS, a long-legged mini-submarine powered by fuel cells, takes former SEAL Brad Lofton to Petropovlovsk, Kamchatka, where he meets Spetsnaz Colonel Anton Dobrynyn. an indentical twin Lofton never knew that he had. Asian rights to the work were acquired in 1992 by Bungeishunju, one of Japan's largest publishers. In 1995, THE BRUTUS LIE was released again in paperback by St. Martin's Press. It can now be found on Kindle
THE BRUTUS LIE
You Can find this title at Amazon.com for Kindle