Robert L. Rorschach was born in Tulsa [Annotator's Note: Tulsa, Oklahoma] in August 1922. It was a small town at the time of his birth. His father had multiple occupations fully utilizing his high school education. Rorschach's father went on to receive his law degree and was admitted to practice at the Supreme Court of the United States. His father built up a fine oil and gas royalties company that has been passed down to his heirs. Before the Great Depression, Rorschach's father had a tax case where the resulting fee from the client supported the Rorschach family throughout the Depression. Rorschach had two younger brothers. Both were very intelligent. They both received MIT [Annotator's Note: Massachusetts Institute of Technology in Cambridge, Massachusetts] degrees that aided them in their successful careers. Likewise, Rorschach, his son and granddaughter all graduated from MIT. When the Japanese attacked Pearl Harbor [Annotator's Note: the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor, Hawaii on 7 December 1941], Rorschach was relaxing after lunch in his fraternity house. The conversation quickly centered on the potential impact the attack would have on the lives of the fraternity brothers. It was several months before the scope of damage at the Hawaiian military installations would be revealed by the press. Summer vacations were limited after that as the educational programs were accelerated. As a result, Rorschach graduated in February rather than June 1943. He went to work for DuPont [Annotator's Note: DuPont de Nemours, Inc.] where he was assigned to an experimental station. Though the company wanted him to stay with them, Rorschach decided the excitement of service beckoned him. His brother, Harold "Bud" Rorschach, Jr., served in the Navy on the home front. Rorschach's youngest brother, Richard, had taken ROTC [Annotator's Note: Reserve Officer Training Corps] courses and served during the Korean war as an engineering officer. He saw no real combat but while on leave [Annotator's Note: an authorized absence for a short period of time] in Japan, he acquired a unique chess set that he gave to Rorschach as a gift. Rorschach's eldest son now has the chess set.

Robert L. Rorschach enlisted in the Navy and attended Midshipman School at Prairie State, and spent time aboard the converted old battleship USS Illinois [Annotator's Note: USS Illinois (BB-7)] in New York [Annotator's Note: New York, New York]. There was classroom training on the Illinois. A classmate there who had also attended high school with Rorschach was Howard Kauffman who later became president of Exxon. The weather in New York was cold for outside drills and activities. Several of the recruits came down with a flu called "Cat Fever" from too much exposure. The cold was as bad in Oklahoma but Rorschach knew enough not to stand in it back home. [Annotator’s Note: Rorschach laughs.] The classes were very intense with much material covered in a short duration. Training included Navy indoctrination, drills, and exposure to boilers, turbines and other shipboard engineering requirements. Rorschach was then sent to advanced training in radar and electronics at Harvard [Annotator's Note: Harvard University in Cambridge, Massachusetts] and MIT [Annotator's Note: Massachusetts Institute of Technology in Cambridge, Massachusetts]. He was qualified in the skills and in the process. He preferred learning those advanced training skills as opposed to going into engineering where he might be assigned to an LST [Annotator's Note: Landing Ship, Tank]. After the commissioning of the Pickaway [Annotator's Note: USS Pickaway (APA-222)] at the Mare Island Navy Yard in San Francisco Bay, California, Rorschach was assigned to the crew. He joined the ship at Treasure Island and participated in the ship's shakedown in December 1944 in Southern California near San Diego [Annotator's Note: San Diego, California] and San Pedro [Annotator's Note: San Pedro, California].

Robert L. Rorschach was a member of the radar crew on the Pickaway [Annotator's Note: USS Pickaway (APA-222)] which was an attack transport of about 14,000 tons. It was a Victory ship [Annotator's Note: a class of quickly produced cargo ship] built in the Kaiser Yards. The transport could carry a combat loaded battalion of troops to place on a beach. A five inch gun provided the only significant self defense the ship had. The Pickaway had a dead reckoning tracer which Rorschach would use to track the ship's course. A chart would be placed on top of the glass top cabinet that had a moveable light inside it. The light was tied into the ship's compass and the revolutions of the screw [Annotator's Note: propeller] in order to show the vessel's position on the chart as the moving light shined through the chart above. Most of the time, the ship traveled alone carrying troops. On occasion, Pickaway would join a convoy. The first voyage picked up troops in Seattle [Annotator's Note: Seattle, Washington] and transported them to Hawaii. Ferrying Army and Marine troops back and forth, most voyages involved picking up veterans who had been engaged in combat. At Guadalcanal [Annotator's Note: Guadalcanal, Solomon Islands], the ship arrived a couple years after the fighting. Most of the troops were quartered in their own area of the ship so contact with them was limited. As a member of the radar crew, Rorschach was responsible for maintaining the equipment and changing tubes. He was also in charge of the Combat Information Center and reporting any enemy contacts to the bridge. One of the islands where the Pickaway laid anchor was Eniwetok [Annotator's Note: Enewetak Atoll, Marshall Islands]. Resting ashore in the makeshift Officer's Club, Rorschach had an unexpected reunion with a fellow high school classmate. Later in Pearl Harbor, Rorschach ran into an uncle in the Supply Corps. The ship encountered a floating mine at some distance and tried unsuccessfully to sink it. Pickaway anchored in the shadow of Mount Suribachi on Iwo Jima [Annotator's Note: Iwo Jima, Japan] where the combat on shore could be observed. As a result of the transport being there during the fighting, the ship was awarded a battle star even though it did not actually participate in combat. There was an occasion of friendly fire from the shore when a false report about the armistice in Europe came through. Celebrating Marines fired their weapons in the air toward the sea and some rounds fell on ships moored offshore. A false air raid warning was issued to cease the celebration and the ensuing scramble to get underway resulted in another ship colliding with Pickaway. The other ship had to go to Pearl Harbor [Annotator's Note: Pearl Harbor, Hawaii] for repairs. The crew of that ship claimed that Pickaway rammed them though it did not. There were never any Japanese air attacks on the transport. To avoid submarine attacks at sea, the ship would follow zig-zag [Annotator's Note: a naval anti-submarine maneuver] courses and man general quarters at dawn and dusk. Rorschach never worried for his safety but going to general quarters was exciting. With his claustrophobia, his general quarters was above deck. The ship transited the western Pacific including the Philippines. En route from San Francisco [Annotator's Note: San Francisco, California] to Hawaii to the western Pacific, the Pickaway carried supplies and movies to the ships at sea. Those vessels always welcomed seeing the Pickaway because they carried good things to them. After the war, the Pickaway participated in Operation Magic Carpet as it transported troops home. After Rorschach left the ship, it continued serving for 20 years, including the atomic bomb tests at Bikini Atoll [Annotator's Note: Bikini Atoll, Marshall Islands] and the Korean War [Annotator's Note: Korean War, 1950 to 1953]. When the atomic bombs fell on Japan, Rorschach was on leave in California with his girlfriend and her family. The ship commenced a party that continued through the signing of the surrender by the Japanese. When the atomic bombs fell [Annotator's Note: nuclear weapons dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki, Japan, 6 and 9 August 1945], Rorschach was reassured by his physicist brother that the chain reaction would not continue into the crust of the Earth. The Pickaway crossed the International Dateline twice when the Germans and the Japanese surrendered so the crew missed both. When Easter came, the ship celebrated the event twice. The chaplain on the ship would end up having a church in Tulsa [Annotator's Note: Tulsa, Oklahoma].

After the war, Robert L. Rorschach stayed on his ship [Annotator's Note: USS Pickaway (APA-222)] until a replacement for him as Radar Officer could be found. He passed through separation and went on inactive duty in the reserves in April [Annotator's Note: April 1946]. He remained in the reserves until the 1950s, reaching the rank of lieutenant. After he was discharged from active duty, Rorschach returned to Tulsa [Annotator's Note: Tulsa, Oklahoma] and was married. He worked in a plant for an oil and gas company. He used the G.I. Bill in 1948 to return to MIT [Annotator's Note: Massachusetts Institute of Technology in Cambridge, Massachusetts] where he received a graduate degree in chemical engineering. In 1950, he moved to Salt Lake City [Annotator's Note: Salt Lake City, Utah] where he accepted a job with a sulfuric acid plant connected with a copper smelter. He moved back to Tulsa after moving to a job nearby in Oklahoma. He ultimately started his own consulting business. He has attended ship reunions but the ship had so many crews come and go after the years he served that he saw few people at the reunions that he knew. As a plank owner [Annotator's Note: a plank owner is an individual who was part of a ship's original commissioning crew], he was in the initial crew of 450 on the ship. In the navigation division, he came in contact with few of the engineering people. The war helped Rorschach mature and learn to work with people. He enjoyed working with the radar systems on the ship. The dead reckoning system on the ship allowed the Pickaway to plot itself into an anchorage in San Francisco [Annotator's Note: San Francisco, California]. He was amazed at that.