John Embry
Attorney and Colonel, 45th Infantry Division
John Embry, the eldest child of James A. and Ivy Embry, was born July 13, 1905, on a farm on the Deep Fork River northeast of Sparks, Oklahoma. He attended school in District No. 72, Lincoln County, for two years, and part of the third grade in Sparks, where the family lived briefly in 1912. When his father was elected Court Clerk of Lincoln County, the family moved to Chandler. He completed grade and high school there and was salutatorian of the Class of 1922.
He attended Oklahoma Agricultural and Mechanical College in Stillwater for pre-legal education from 1922 to 1924. At the University of Oklahoma from 1924 to 1927 he graduated first in his class with an LL.B. degree and was admitted to the Oklahoma bar with his class on June 7, 1927. He practiced law in Chandler with his father in the firm of Embry & Embry until elected County Attorney of Lincoln County (1929-1933). He returned to practice with his father from 1934 until September 16, 1940, when he was mobilized as commanding officer of Battery F, 160th Field Artillery Battalion, 45th Infantry Division, Oklahoma National Guard.
He served with the 45th Infantry Division through World War II and was integrated into the Regular Army in 1947, retiring as a Colonel in 1960. Combat service included eight campaigns and 511 days in combat, with amphibious operations at Sicily, Salerno, Anzio, and Southern France (St. Tropez). Decorations included the Silver Star, Legion of Merit, Bronze Star, and Commendation Medal, along with state honors including a Meritorious Service Medal awarded by Governor Henry Bellmon on July 29, 1964.
After the war he completed the Command and General Staff College and held senior Army staff and comptroller assignments in Washington, Europe, and at Headquarters Fourth U.S. Army before retiring at Fort Sam Houston, Texas, on August 31, 1960. He later practiced with Miskovsky, Sullivan, Embry & Miskovsky in Oklahoma City (1961-1971) and remained of counsel with the successor firm. He was admitted to practice before the United States Supreme Court in 1948.
He married Martha Jeanette Verser at Wesley Methodist Church in Oklahoma City on June 30, 1934. Jeanette was born at Gage, Oklahoma, on January 8, 1910, graduated from Classen High School in 1926, attended Ward Belmont in Nashville, and earned a B.S. from Kansas State University. She taught school at Hunter and Chandler before marriage, taught in the Oklahoma City Public Schools during World War II, later earned a master’s degree in library science (1966), and worked in Technical Services at the Oklahoma Department of Libraries from 1966 to 1972.
Embry was a member of Phi Alpha Delta, the Order of the Coif, and Delta Upsilon; a senior member of the Oklahoma State, Oklahoma County, and Federal Bar Associations; and a life member of the Retired Officers Association, American Legion, Military Order of World Wars, and University of Oklahoma Alumni Association. He served as past president of the Chandler Chamber of Commerce, sixth national president of the 45th Infantry Division Association, and as a director of the 45th Infantry Division Museum and the Lincoln County Historical Association. The Embrys were members of St. Luke’s United Methodist Church.
An addendum to his biography notes later honors including a 45th Infantry Division Association citation (1976), election as president of the OU College of Law Class of 1927, a fifty-year Master Mason certificate (1979), advancement to senior member of the Oklahoma and Federal bars for fifty years of practice (1977), authorship of family histories, Chandler High School Alumnus of the Year (1982), and preparation of a military exhibit for the Lincoln County Historical Society (award dated May 22, 1983).
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Source: Expanded biographic sketch of John Embry (including material published July 1976 in the History of the Virgil Rice Embry Family, with addendum to February 4, 1984). Scan provided for Oklahoma City/County Historical Society Pathmakers. Photo caption from Pruit File.