General Talley was born July 29, 1903 in Oklahoma Territory. He graduated from the Georgia Institute of Technology and received a master's degree through the Westinghouse Graduate Engineering School. In 1926, he was commissioned as a regular Army officer in the Corps of Engineers and served in the Corps until his retirement in 1956, as Division Engineer of the Mediterranean Division in Morocco. He is known as ''the Father of Military Construction in Alaska'' because of the numerous projects built there during World War II. He landed on Omaha Beach on D-Day 1944 and was awarded the Distinguished Service Cross. He later commanded the First Engineer Brigade for the invasion of Okinawa. After World War II he served as District or Division Engineer in various locations. In 1964 as a civil engineer, General Talley oversaw the reconstruction of Anchorage and South Central Alaska following the Good Friday earthquake and later supervised heavy construction in Brasilia, Brazil, and construction for the Navy in Viet Nam. General Talley is survived by his wife, Virginia, of Washington, DC and Anchor Point, AK; a son, Robert E. Talley of Fort Myers, FL; six grandchildren and four great-grandchildren. (from Arlington National Cemetery records)