Robert Michael "Mike" Quinn

Robert Hugh Michael “Mike” Quinn departed this earth June 9, 2013, having attained the age of 93 years. Mike was born in Pittsburgh, PA, on November 30, 1919. At age six he went to live with his grandfather (a “relocated” Belgian nobleman) on the grandfather’s Pennsylvanian stock farm. As Mike was already a strapping and precocious boy, immediately one of Mike’s chores was to exercise horses before and after school; he carried a love of horses forevermore. He attended a one-room school until he graduated to high school at age 12. When he graduated from high school at age 16, Mike had to wait until after his 17th birthday to enter the Naval Academy; he transferred to Penn State, and graduated in 1939 with enough knowledge to become an officer on cargo ships. In early 1941 Mike was an officer on three different cargo ships, each of which was torpedoed and sunk; he sustained injuries from shrapnel, retaining bits of metal for the rest of his life. He was actively recruited to join the Navy. He did so, but with the understanding that he was to be in a non-combative capacity (he’d been shot at enough!), and the Navy sent him to the Far East to survey an island. During this mission Mike was captured by the Japanese and was imprisoned on a deserted island for 16 months; he lived off whatever he could catch on the island and the monthly sack of rice thrown to him by a passing Japanese boat. He survived (with an enduring dislike of white rice) and regained his freedom in 1944 as part of a captured officer exchange. He returned to duty as a teacher at the Merchant Marine Academy. After the war Mike joined the Naval Reserve, but earned his living as an officer on cargo ships, finally attaining the rank of Captain. As a Reservist, he was called back into action for the Korean War, for the blockade of Cuba during the Cuban missile crisis, and the Viet Nam conflict. By the time of his retirement in 1968 he had risen to the rank of Commander in the Navy. When Mike left the open sea he became a coastal surveyor, first working in the Dismal Swamp in the Carolinas and then working for the Army Corps of Engineers on the Intracoastal Waterway along the Louisiana and Texas coasts. After “truly” retiring in 1985, he decided to see as much of the world as he could (since he’d seen a lot of ports, but not much of the countries that held those ports!). He enjoyed traveling with his wife, Sue Ellen, around the world and throughout the United States. Mike and Sue Ellen settled in Irving, TX. But Mike also bought property on Lake Bob Sandlin in East Texas, on which he built a small cabin by himself; this was his “get-away” for many years. In 1994, when the traffic around Irving got to be bothersome, Mike and Sue Ellen decided that Arkansas would be less stressful. Together they built a home Hot Springs Village, where they lived for about 5 years; after which they moved to their present home in Hot Springs. Mike was a tireless worker, especially in his yard, and believed in fitness through good diet and equally good exercise. Mike leaves his wife of thirty years, Sue Ellen Quinn of Hot Springs, AR, to whom he was an ever-caring, considerate, generous, and protective husband. He also leaves two beloved sons by his first marriage, Michael (Jennifer) Quinn and Richard Quinn, all of Miami, FL. He also leaves two step-daughters, Kathleen (James) Suit, of Hot Springs and Sandra McFarland (Glenn) of Irving, TX. He had only one grandchild, J.L. Michael Sachs, currently of Fayetteville, AR. The date for Mike's memorial will be announced at a later date.