In 1942, twenty-two-year-old Rhode Islander Frank J. lafrate, a civilian file clerk at Quonset Point Naval Air Station who drew cartoons in his spare time, created the Seabee's Fighting Bee insignia after a Navy lieutenant with the newly established Construction Battalions asked for a Disney-type design. Rejecting a beaver as unsuitable, he chose a bee as a busy worker that would strike back when provoked, then gave it a white hat, construction tools, a Tommy gun, petty officer insignia, and Civil Engineer Corps markings. He combined “sea” and “bee” to create the name Seabee, and his sketch was sent to Washington, where Rear Admiral Ben Moreell saw its recruiting appeal. lafrate later enlisted in the Seabees in 1942, served as a Chief Carpentersmate during the war, and received the Distinguished Public Service Award in 1949 for creating the logo. His 1942 design became one of the military’s most enduring insignia, and when the Navy asked him in 1967 to modernize it for the Seabee’s twenty-fifth anniversary, he refused; the altered version never fully replaced the original. In 1971, Seabees of the twenty-first Naval Construction Regiment built a huge steel Bee for the twenty-ninth Seabee Ball at Davisville, with lafrate advising on its painting. Afterward it stood near Gate 1 on a World War Two vintage pontoon for more than twenty-five years as a well-known Rhode Island landmark. When the Seabee Museum and Memorial Park acquired the statue, lafrate personally supervised its repainting in 1999 to restore the details of his 1942 design. He died on March 30, 2000, after a two-month battle with cancer.
