Posted on 11/21/2018 10:56:49 PM PST by lowbridge
Ray Chavez, the oldest U.S. military survivor of the Dec. 7, 1941, attack on Pearl Harbor that plunged the United States into World War II, died Wednesday. He was 106.
Chavez, who had been battling pneumonia, died in his sleep in the San Diego suburb of Poway, his daughter, Kathleen Chavez, told The Associated Press.
As recently as last May he had traveled to Washington, D.C., where he was honored on Memorial Day by President Donald Trump. The White House tweeted a statement after his death: "We were honored to host him at the White House earlier this year. Thank you for your service to our great nation, Ray!"
Daniel Martinez, chief historian for the National Park Service at Pearl Harbor, Hawaii, confirmed Wednesday that Chavez was the oldest survivor of the attack that killed 2,335 U.S. military personnel and 68 civilians.
(Excerpt) Read more at nbcnews.com ...
RIP.
Wow, 106. RIP.
In just a few years, no Americans will remember that day.
I’m over 70, born four years after D-Day. World War II shaped my world. Every man, it seemed, was a war veteran and our family like most families felt the brunt of that war brutality that scarred our fathers, mothers and children.
I knew survivors of Pearl Harbor and now they are gone but not forgetten.
Rest in peace Ray. Your departed friends are waiting for you with open arms as is your Redeemer
RIP
When I was a child the old men were in WW1.
My mother has photos of a great-great grandfather or uncle in his uniform form the Spanish American War. One of my aunts has photos of predecessors from the Civil War (Both sides).
Both Grand fathers were too young for WW1 and because they were coal miners were exempt from the draft in WW2.
My father’s older brother was in WW2.
My father was too young for Korea though his next older brother (Joe was there)
My parents younger brothers were in Vietnam. I missed Vietnam by 4 years. Not that they would have taken me due to having a gimpy ankle that I broke as a teenager.
I’ve tried to visit as many of the major battle sites in the Pacific as I can. About the only ones I haven’t made are Iwo Jima, Wake and Midway because you can’t go there.
The point here is that we are now about as far from the first Gulf War as WW2 was from me as a child. We are only 40 years or so from being as far a way from the start of WW1 as the US and UK were from the start of the American Revolution in 1914
Some days I just feel old.
I've been to Iwo Jima, including the top of Mt Suribachi, where the flag raising memorial still stands. And I've been to Midway twice. Once when the gooney birds were all over the island and once when they were out to sea. Never did make it to Wake.
rest In Peace, Brother-at-Arms.
ping
>> My father was too young for Korea though his next older brother (Joe was there)
My father’s older brother fought in the Korean war. He lied about his age and joined at 17 YO.
My Father was in Pearl Harbor. Also in Korea and did 2 tours in Vietnam. Retired a Master Sergeant and died in 2005. Buried at Arl Natl. Snowflakes today have no idea.
Dad was WWII, Korea and Vietnam. We lost him in 2011.
At times like this, the book/movie title "We Were Young Once, And Soldiers" often flashes through my mind. A different war but never-the-less, a title that effectively highlights the passage of time for veterans.
RIP Sir and Thank You for Your Service.
Thank You to everyone else for Your Service.
They only make special trips to Iwo now for the men who fought there. Wake and Midway are sea-bird sanctuaries and emergency landing strips for jetliners that have engine trouble over the Pacific. You need a permit from the US department of the Interior to go there and study the birds.
The scary place to me was Chuk (Truk) There are probably 100,000 tons of unexploded ordinance in the bottom of the lagoon. You can snorkel there and see the sunken ships. I have no idea what the chances are of all the stuff exploding is but I wouldn’t want to be on the island if it does.
The street I live on here on Guam is what some of the locals call the “Way of the Spirits” supposedly the ghost of dead Japanese and American solders along with locals killed in the battle for the island walk at night. I’ve never seen or felt a ghostly presence here though I did find about 5 or 6 pounds of 6.5X50 Arisaka rifle ammunition when digging a vegetable plot. Construction crews here still occasionally find unexploded ordinance.
I knew WWI vets when I was a kid.
Never met a Spanish War vet. I know very little about that war—it was just history.
Time goes on and the same mistakes are made because no one remembers.
RIP,
Ray.
I’m a couple of years older than you—born and grew up in a Navy town, Long Beach, Cal. Every adult, of course, had gone through the war, either in service or as a civilian. No ex-service man wanted to talk about it at all to my frustration. I was a stupid kid and thought that war was ‘neat’.
Women were all too glad to talk about how they hated rationing, using margarine that you had to dye yellow instead of real butter. That sort of thing. My dad, who was in the Army Air Force but served state-side, was none too fond of the service. From his letters he spent a lot of time doing KP and apparently going AWOL. It just struck me that he could have been the inspiration for Beetle Bailey.
My Dad enlisted in the Navy in ‘42, served on Cans in the North Atlantic and Med. Sunk twice. Remainder on Guam. Recalled for Korea and then transfered to Army Guard. Activated for Berlin Crisis and also Nam.
Stood Last Roll Call in ‘90. Only 65 and lung cancer took him.
He was one of the Giants on whose shoulders I stand.
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