God Bless You Ike Schab.
Thanks for posting. He would have been 21 in 1941. Anyone at least 18 at the time of the bombing would be 100 or older now. It has been 78 years since the end of the war so virtually all surviving WWII veterans are 96 or older. My father was a WWII veteran but he passed away at age 94. He wasn’t at Pearl Harbor on Dec. 7, 1941, but had been stationed there earlier.
As Ike fades away, America fades away too.
He looks pretty good for 103.
On this day 82 years ago, the USS Arizona pulled into Pearl Harbor for the last time.
It had been a busy week for the Arizona and the Pacific Fleet. The fleet typically engaged in intense training exercises during the week before sailing into port for the weekend. Just the previous evening, Arizona and fellow battleships Nevada and Oklahoma had conducted a nighttime gunnery exercise. But now, as the fleet settled in, the ships and their crews were looking forward to a weekend of liberty and light duty before setting out to sea again.
As Arizona sailed into port, Quartermaster Lou Conter was at the helm. Today at 102 years old, Conter is the last living survivor of the ship. Carefully, he guided the Arizona into her berth, Fox 7, while the Oklahoma tied up alongside the battleship Maryland in Fox 5, and the Nevada into Fox 8. Before long, the repair ship USS Vestal would moor up alongside Arizona to conduct some minor repairs.
Though no one knew it at the time, the stage had been almost entirely set. When the fleet oiler USS Neosho arrived late on 6 December, all the vessels of Battleship Row would be in the place where history would find them on 7 December 1941.
Looks like Ike went last year, too ... Good for Ike!
”I owe them. Just like that.”
No sir, you are paid in full. We are the ones with the unpaid debt.
God bless you, Ike Schab. And God bless the Greatest Generation.