Remember Pearl Harbor

[valley ranch]

Just remember!

 

[waretrop]

No one commented here yet?? WOW. So my dad was at Pearl Harbor on that day.

He told me so so many war stories until he died in 1972. I didn't appreciate it back then but listened with great interest. Now, after 9-11, I think we all have a very very different attitude about being patriotic..

 

[Nyboy]

Waretrop you are so right, anytime my grandfather started talking about his service I would wonder off. Now that he is gone I wished I listened

 

[waretrop]

@Nyboy Yes and then when the "war movies came on tv in the 60's we all ran away....LOL

But I have to say some of it was interesting to hear. My dad was an island hopper...he went around the world...and the stories he could tell....I have some great pictures..

 

[digitS']

My father was in Los Angeles searching for a job. Their story was that they were taking a lunch break at a cafe when news of the attack came over the radio. Military personnel were ordered to report back to base.

Dad was within two weeks of being discharged from the Army. He didn't return to Mainland US for nearly 4 years. Dad had two brothers who would also answer the call to military service. One wounded as a paratrooper in Europe.

My mother's father was a Canadian citizen and returned to British Columbia. My grandmother was from a pacifist, Anabaptist family. She took her 3 youngest sons from their home in California back to the family farm in Oregon. In time, all 3 defied her and joined the military. The youngest was too young for WW2 but enlisted in the Navy during the Korean and Vietnam Wars.

Dad will be 99 this winter.

Steve

 

[Nyboy]

When my father got out of the army he gave away his purple heart ( Bet my last dollar to a woman he wanted to sleep with) I just looked in to getting a replacement. The purple heart museum is only about a half hour from White plains

 

[waretrop]

That is way cool @Nyboy and @digitS' . My dad used to say, they knew something was up because he was also supposed to get out 5 days before and they froze all mustering out guys. He was in until the end...

 

[Ridgerunner]

Dad's story is a little different. He had brothers and other close relatives that served overseas but he never made it. When war broke out he went to Maryland and worked in a shipyard building ships. Eventually he was drafted into the Army and was trained as a tail gunner on one of the big bombers, I can't remember which one. One of his favorite stories was when he was in parachute training, the drill sergeant teaching them to jump off a platform so they would know how to land broke his leg when he demonstrated. They didn't skip a beat, just immediately brought in another drill sergeant to demonstrate and continue the lesson.

Just before he was scheduled to leave for Europe he became an instructor in teaching other tail gunners. One of his favorite parts of that was when he taught officers what the tail gunner had to put up with. Of course he would never be unprofessional but I'm not sure he was always real gentle with them.

He did a few other things stateside, those of us that have been in the military know you don't know what they will do with you next. He was in Seattle ready to get on a troop ship to go invade the Japanese mainland when the bomb was dropped. His last chance to serve overseas vanished. He never especially liked Truman but I never heard him say anything negative about dropping the bomb.

That wasn't the end of it. He was put to teaching soldiers returning from overseas how to farm. I don't know how long he did that but a pretty good while. He was drafted into the Army but his eventual discharge was from the Air Force. The Army Air Corps was the forerunner of the Air Force.

Dad did not talk much about his service time until he was pretty old. I learned a lot those last couple of years. One thing he asked for and got was a 21-gun salute at his funeral. The local VFW has teams that go out and do that. Mom got the flag that was on the casket and the shell casings were given to the family.

 

[thistlebloom]

My dad was fifteen when Pearl Harbor was attacked, and he joined the Navy as soon as he could at seventeen. He never talked much about it, except for a few stories of the two years he spent stationed on Adak in the Aleutians.
He was 19 when his mom died and unable to get leave to go to her funeral. He carried a lot of sorrow about that. He had been kind of a wild kid and regretted never being able to apologize to his mom or make it up to her.

 

[Nyboy]

My father had a older brother who was killed in war. I guess it was very hard on my grandmother they buried him in Italy even though he was born here. About 10 years ago my father wanted a plaque honoring mothers who lost sons to war put up in the cities war memorial. For 8 long years he went to all city hall meetings. He was commander of the local chapter of DAV and fought hard for plaque. After 8 years the city had a bronze plaque honoring the mothers that lost sons. City had a ceremony with placement of plaque on war memorial, locale news paper ran a photo of my dad and the memorial. 3 days after going up the bronze plaque was stolen, I am sure was sold for scrape for drugs. I felt so bad for my dad and how long it took him, I offered to have a new one made up in wood. but my dad said no he was done with it