Posted on 12/06/2006 6:06:05 PM PST by concentric circles
Many years before Sept. 11, when the Twin Towers were not even a gleam in their builders' eyes, America experienced a "Day of Infamy" - the attack on Pearl Harbor. Bill Shaw of Newhall recalls where he was that day.
"I remember very vividly the morning of Dec. 7," he said. "At the time I was a young student and working in a drugstore in Los Angeles. I had gone to work that morning and it came over the radio that Pearl Harbor was bombed. We were flabbergasted - it was the last thing anybody thought would happen."
Shaw signed up for the Navy right after having graduated from high school. Assigned to the U.S.S. O'Brien, a destroyer, he worked as a deckhand and as a loader on a 40 mm anti-aircraft gun. Though he was never in combat, the ship was.
"We shipped out in late '44 or early '45; the war had just about ended then," said Shaw.
Military service became a Shaw family tradition - his two sons were both in the Air Force, one serving in Greenland and the other son in Alaska.
John D. "Jack" McKeon of Valencia also enlisted into the Navy in 1942. He worked as a naval aviator in WWII and then as a carrier pilot instructor at Pensacola Naval Air Station in Florida for 13 years during the Korean war. He saw combat as a fighter pilot in the World War on the aircraft carrier U.S.S. Lexington over the islands of Midway and Tarawa in the Pacific Theater.
"Pearl Harbor inspired me to enlist; I enlisted as soon as I was 18, in 1942," said McKeon. "I was elated to be fighting. I loved every minute of it."
Morris Silver of Santa Clarita was drafted in 1944 and served on the U.S.S. Nehenta Bay CVE-74, an escort aircraft carrier, or "Jeep carrier" as the men who worked on these vessels called them. The Nehenta Bay, along with the rest of her formation, survived a kamikaze attack in the South Pacific in June 1945, and eventually was awarded seven battle stars for her World War II service. Silver went to a reunion with his war buddies in San Diego in 1993, and is looking forward to another this coming year.
"It will probably be the last one," he said solemnly.
In 2004, The Smithsonian estimated that this country is losing these heroic warriors of WWII at the rate of 1,200 per day. Here in the Santa Clarita Valley, Robin Clough, recreation and volunteer coordinator at the SCV Senior Center, is honored to serve them.
"That whole generation is here," said Clough. "We have about 300 people coming for lunch every day and a majority of them are probably vets. When we have live music at lunch they usually sing patriotic songs. And some are very involved in veteran's affairs."
One of those is Harry Gratz, a disabled veteran. Gratz, 88, of Santa Clarita was running a liquor store in the Bronx when he was drafted into the Signal Corps. The day of Pearl Harbor he was in training at Camp Alfred Vail in Fort Monmouth, N.J.
"I was just coming out of the Postal Exchange when I heard about it," he said. "I had thought I'd be in for a year and go home, but when I heard about that, I said, 'I'm in for the duration, now!'"
Gratz fought in the European Theater, in the Italian and North African campaigns. He was wounded on Anzio Beach Head under commanding officer Gen. Mark Clark in Operation Shingle, commonly called the Battle of Anzio, an Allied amphibious landing in Italy. Gratz, a member of the Disabled American Veterans, is now trying to get the city to commemorate disabled veterans with a memorial separate from the one at Veteran's Memorial Plaza in Newhall. Gratz, who has shrapnel in his right leg, was awarded a Purple Heart.
"I got caught in a barrage of 88s (a huge gun), and I still have a 10- to 15-inch scar from my knee to my thigh," said Gratz. "But I still got my leg, so I don't care. There are people much worse off than me. I'll tell you the truth, war is hell."
Richard Van Der Hart "Dick" Roelofs V, of Newhall, was working for his uncle in Los Angeles and not yet 21 when the Japanese attacked Pearl Harbor.
"I felt very patriotic and wanted to enlist, but my parents wouldn't sign the paper," he said. "So I had to wait until I was no longer a minor. I really wanted to fight those people who had done such a dastardly thing to us in Hawaii."
Roelofs had been an engineering student and so was tapped to work as a Fire Control Technician.
"I thought I was going to fight fires," said Roelofs. "In fact, it was a highly technical job directing the fire power of the guns."
He began his service within two weeks of turning 21, and served on the U.S.S. David W. Taylor (D.D. 551), a Fletcher-class destroyer, in the South Pacific. Roelofs fought in campaigns in the Gilbert and Marshall Islands, and on Chichi Jima in the Bonins. The Taylor sunk the Japanese submarine I-10, and eventually hit a mine in Tokyo Bay, after being the first destroyer to anchor in Japanese waters after the war.
Roelofs has kept in touch through annual reunions with other veterans of his ship, and serves as the Secretary of U.S.S. David W. Taylor Association, editing its newsletter, "The Straight Scuttlebutt."
I like the story from the former sailor assigned as a fire control technician who thought he was going to fight fires.
Very moving.
Every sailor on the ship did "fire control" when required, as with employees at a coal-fired generating station. Everyone trains on how to fight fires along with their job specialty.
Anzio took a lot of good men including one of my great uncles who was a tanker.
God bless those aging vets and all vets.
Sad. But I bet the MSM will hardly touch this subject tomorrow. Fox might.
I'm guessing that their will be no mention of the attack in the front section of the paper I read but there may be a short item in the local/state section B.
Used to live on Pearl Harbor. One Dec. 7, I dug down 18 inches into the sand of the beach along the harbor to see the oil soaked remnants of the attack. There are still bullet holes visible on the sides of a building on Hickam. Tomorrow morning at 7:55 a.m. Taps will echo across the harbor on the 62nd anniversary of the attack. Dec. 7 is almost always a beautiful day on Oahu. It is hard to imagine the chaos and explosions and fire in the midst of such beauty and peace. Once a person experiences a Dec.7 anniversary at Pearl, he never quite lets his guard down. He knows that it can happen anywhere if it happened in Paradise.
My Dad was a WW II vet who served stateside. He's gone now, but we used to reminisce about Pearl Harbor every December 7th. I'd call him on the phone and ask, "By the way, Dad, what were you doing on December 7th, 1941?" (He was an engineering student at Penn State, studying with his buddies when the news came over the radio. "We knew right them we were going to war," recalled my Dad.)
My Uncle is a WW II Navy veteran. May I state my gratitude to all veterans of that terrible war.
My husband's grandfather was killed in Pearl Harbor that day. My husband's father died three years ago on December 7th.
My Mother was also in her teens on Dec.7, 1941. She was visiting a sick uncle with her parents, somewhere in the boonies near Los Angeles. She said that they never turned the radio on during their visit, so they didn't know about the attack right away. When they left for home, on the 8th or 9th, they were stopped by a policeman, who began to ask them all sorts of questions, like where have you been, where are you going, how come you're travelling at night...they couldn't figure out what all the fuss was about, until the policeman finally realized they hadn't heard about Pearl Harbor, and told them. They were absolutely shocked. Everybody in the L.A. area was pretty nervous, since there was nothing between them and the Japanese at that point.
Well, very little mention today. We have a diseased nation.
Then, due to an accident of time, there was an obituary on page B8, "Kenneth Taylor; 86; 1 of first 2 pilots to get airborne after Pearl Harbor attack."
This writer for the Taladega, Alabama Daily Home came closer to getting it right; Veterans remember Pearl Harbor. He quotes a couple of vets, "Kent said Americans should remember the lesson of Pearl Harbor, echoed five years ago on Sept. 11." “I don’t think people are as aware of the fact that it could, and probably will, happen again,” Kent said..."
“The only thing I can say is that everyone should recognize and remember it,” Ray said. “It’s something all of the country should remember and honor.”
Well, they are treated as old relics. Shame , people need their message, now. My Grandfathers were both in WWI and were sent to France. Of course to save those who now stab us in the back. My father was in Japan right after the war and really did make some fine Japanese friends. My Hubby was in Vietnam. The kids right now are really not too interested in that anymore. What is interesting, is the bond that is formed by service to our country. Another wonderful thing that only those who serve now understand. Page 24, huh? Wonder how many had the patience to flip that many pages! Well God love em'. I guess most of us are proud of them, mostly here on FR.
http://www.ksby.com/home/headlines/4859971.html
Local Pearl Harbor Survivors Remember December 7, 1941
Organizers estimate 8 years ago there were 45 survivors in attendance; today there were 17
Andrew Masuda - KSBY San Luis Obispo, CA
Thursday, December 7, 2006
December 7 has lived in infamy for 65 years. 2,400 people died when the Japanese attacked Pearl Harbor. Today, a Central Coast restaurant paid tribute to local Pearl Harbor survivors.
Local Pearl Harbor survivors say it's important to remember this infamous day every year, especially because their numbers are dwindling.
One by one, local Pearl Harbor survivors said where they were 65 years ago today.
"I was on the Nevada, of course, when that happened," says Pearl Harbor survivor Tom O'Reilly. "We had two planes up that survived because they were up. But everything else was burned. Hangars were set on fire. We were hit in two waves."
O'Reilly was one of more than a dozen survivors at F. McClintock's 25th Annual Complimentary Luncheon for Pearl Harbor Survivors at Steamer's of Pismo Beach.
87-year-old Norman Roberts is another. He was trapped for three days below deck on the U.S.S. Oklahoma.
"We had taken 5 torpedoes by the time we got there," says Roberts. "We got into my compartment. We only had lights on for about 30 seconds and everything went dark."
Richard O'Melveny was just 5 years old that day.
"I could see the silhouettes of the pilots and the meatballs on the sides of the airplane," says O'Melveny.
O'Melveny's father, who has since passed away, was stationed at Pearl Harbor. O'Melveny brought a souvenir: an artillery shell that he and his father found the day after the attack.
Survivors note there are more empty tables and chairs this year. Organizers estimate 8 years ago there were 45 survivors in attendance. Today there are 17. Nevertheless, these survivors say their bond -- evident every year on this date -- remains as strong as it was 65 years ago.
One survivor, Norman Roberts, says he planned to attend today's ceremony in Pearl Harbor. But his chemotherapy treatment kept him here on the Central Coast. He says he's determined to be in Hawaii for the 80th anniversary. He'll be 102 years young.
A few months after the bombing of Pearl Harbor, the Japanese navy attacked the Central Coast. The only attack on California during World War II happened in Goleta. A Japanese submarine captain launched several shells toward Ellwood Beach in an attempt to blow up the oil wells there. It didn't work. The only thing that was destroyed was a wooden pier. J.J. Hollister, 10-years-old at the time, witnessed the attack.
"We thought, well, that can only be a shell hitting the hill behind our house," says Hollister. "We heard it whistling overhead and we knew it was real."
More than 20 rounds were fired by the captain of the Japanese submarine. One of the shells can be seen at the Goleta Valley Historical Society.
The only other Japanese attack on the U.S. mainland during World War II was on September 9, 1942 when incendiary bombs were dropped on Mount Emily, Oregon, with the intention of setting ablaze a huge forest fire to influence the U.S. Navy to reposition its Pacific fleet out of the Pacific theater and closer to the U.S. mainland. Recent rains had saturated the forests, however, causing the Japanese plot to literally fizzle.
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