AGAWAM — Frank J. Andruss Sr. has been a PT boat enthusiast since the 1960s. Some might even call him an expert on PT boats, short for "patrol torpedo," the fast, wooden vessels used by the U.S. Navy in World War II.

The 59-year-old Feeding Hills man's fascination with the boats was born after watching "PT 109," the 1963 biopic about John F. Kennedy's wartime heroism as commander of a torpedo boat rammed by a Japanese destroyer off the Solomon Islands in 1943.

"PT boats have been my passion since 1967," said Andruss, the year he first watched the film starring Cliff Robertson as a young JFK, the man who would go on to become the 35th president of the United States.

That cinematic experience sparked a lifelong interest that ultimately prompted Andruss to create the The Mosquito Fleet Exhibit in 1997, which had its first show at the Eastern States Exposition in West Springfield in 1998.

The exhibit, one of the most comprehensive private collections of PT boat artifacts in the nation, is dedicated to all who served on, built and repaired U.S. Navy PT boats, according to Andruss.

His latest initiative has been lobbying the Massachusetts Veterans' Memorial Cemetery in Agawam to place a memorial stone for Andrew Jackson Kirksey, one of two sailors killed when PT 109 was cut in half by an enemy destroyer on Aug. 2, 1943.

The cemetery held a memorial ceremony in 2013 for Springfield native Harold Marney, the other sailor killed in the incident. But Andruss felt that Kirksey, who was raised in Georgia, should also be formally acknowledged.

To that end, the cemetery recently erected a memorial gravestone for Kirksey, who will be honored with a ceremony on Tuesday, Aug. 2, at 2 p.m. The event will be held in the cemetery's chapel at 1390 Main St.

Andruss was impressed with not only Kennedy's heroism — Kennedy rescued one injured sailor by towing him with a belt clamped between his teeth — but also by the PT boat itself, an 80-foot vessel capable of reaching a maximum speed of around 47 mph.

"It's an absolutely incredible wooden craft that was built for speed and maneuverability in shallow waters," Andruss said. "They were made to torpedo enemy ships."

As time went by, Andruss became more involved in researching the history of the vessels and collecting memorabilia. His goal is to keep "PT boats in the public eye," he said, and Tuesday's ceremony is part of that mission.

Kirksey, 25, and Marney, 19, disappeared into the darkness after the collision with the destroyer in the South Pacific. However, Kennedy and the other 10 crewmen under his command survived the incident — and largely due to Kennedy's heroics, according to historians.

The survivors were eventually rescued from Olasana Island on Aug. 8, 1943.

Andrew J Kirksey