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Luis Magris was born in Ponce, Puerto Rico, in 1896. When he was just two years old, the United States invaded Puerto Rico and captured Ponce during the Spanish-American War. Magris grew up in Puerto Rico, part of the first generation of Puerto Rican-Americans.

He enlisted in the Navy in 1918 and served on USS George Washington, a German ocean liner seized by the US and used as a troop transport during the First World War. USS George Washington also had the distinction of carrying President Woodrow Wilson to and from the Paris Peace Conference. She returned to New York with the President for the last time in July 1919, where Luis Magris was honorably discharged. The same month, he secured a job with the A. H. Bull Steamship Company as a seaman.

According to the 1920 census, Magris returned home to Puerto Rico and worked as a teacher. Sometime in the 1920s, Magris reenlisted in the Navy. In 1926, he was stationed at US Navy Yard, Saint Thomas, US Virgin Islands. In 1930, he had made Machinist’s Mate 1^st Class and served on USS Mahan, a Wickes class destroyer commissioned in 1918.

In June 1930, Magris was transferred to USS Texas. Onboard Texas, he worked in M Division as an engineering storekeeper. The ship’s newsletter, The Texas Steer, reported in November 1931 that Magris and seven other men passed the examination to be promoted to Chief Petty Officers and were recommended for promotion by Captain Townsend. Magris would still have to wait for a vacancy to fill though.

In March 1933, Magris had one of the more unique experiences for a sailor – an earthquake. A magnitude 6.4 earthquake struck Long Beach, California while Texas was there in port, substantial enough to be felt aboard the ship. Many crew reported being knocked over or items falling off shelves. Texas and the other navy ships present, such as USS Lexington (CV-2) and USS Relief, immediately sent large numbers of men ashore to help with the relief effort. The earthquake killed about 120 people in total and injured over 500 more in Long Beach alone. 75 schools were destroyed and total property damage was estimated at $50 million, equivalent to about $1.2 billion today.

In total, Luis Magris served aboard USS Texas for 3 years, June 1930 to June 1933. In those 3 years, Texas was the flagship of the US Fleet and then the flagship of Battleship Division One, he served under two captains (including Adolphus Andrews), and he transited the Panama Canal three times. The ship’s travels took him to Los Angeles, Honolulu, Seattle, San Francisco, Cuba, Haiti, and many more ports still.

In June 1933, Magris was reassigned to the Asiatic Fleet. The Asiatic Fleet spent most of its time in Chinese waters, perhaps most famously on the Yangtze River. Magris served on various ships of the Asiatic Fleet until 1941, when he was reassigned to USS Barnegat, a newly commissioned seaplane tender heading for the east coast. When Pearl Harbor was attacked, Chief Magris was in New York awaiting his next assignment. He returned to the Pacific on USS Farenholt in early 1942 and served on a multitude of ships in the Pacific over the course of the war.

After the war, Chief Magris was stationed on Oahu, Territory of Hawaii, where he got involved in the Puerto Rican community there and regularly wrote in to the Honolulu Star-Bulletin on matters concerning them. He was eventually stationed at Mare Island Shipyard, where he retired from the Navy and settled across the river in Vallejo, California. Chief Magris passed away in 1977, at the age of 81, a veteran of both World Wars, and with over 24 years of US Navy service.