The Legacy of Rear Admiral Lewis B. Combs

On May 20, 1996, Lewis B Combs, American civil engineer and US Navy officer (1917-45) and a founding member and commander of the "Seabees", died at the age of 101.

"Ask any member of the Naval Construction Force (NCF) who is considered “the father of the Seabees” and they will answer Adm. Ben Moreell. Ask them who is the “uncle of the Seabees,” and they may give a quizzical look.

In a military career covering two world wars, the legacy of Rear Adm. Lewis B. Combs can be measured in the people and organizations he touched. At the time of his death in 1996, Combs had directly influenced, either in uniform or as an academic, perhaps more civil engineers in the Navy’s history than any other man. Therefore, he was considered to be the “uncle” of the Seabees.

As the assistant chief of the Bureau of Yards and Docks (BuDocks) during World War II, Combs served as Moreell’s deputy, responsible for administering the Navy’s shore construction and development program. At the time of his appointment as assistant chief for BuDocks in 1938, fewer than 120 Civil Engineer Corps (CEC) officers were on active duty. That number grew to more than 10,000 by war’s end, together with approximately 325,000 Seabees. Postwar, he became the “Dean of the Latter-Day CEC” while head of the Department of Civil Engineering at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute (RPI). Almost 400 military officers earned bachelor degrees in civil engineering under his guidance, predominantly CEC officers who went on to lead the NCF for decades to come."