"Pearl Harbor--75 Years" Topic

Few remain. Interviews with a couple of them:

youtu.be/ncBSa6TuH94

My uncle was on the Oklahoma.

Prime minister Abe of Japan will be the first Japanese leader to visit Pearl Harbour this year, hopefully bringing the old bitterness to a close, let's hope there will be better understanding between old enemies and new friends, the sailors and airmen of Pearl Harbour will not be forgotten and will be remembered as doing their duties and perhaps we all will be less antagonistic about old battles and wars, as these old adversaries try to bridge divides that are no more.

My uncle was killed at Hickam Field. The youngest of seven brothers.

My sister in law's grandmother was on Oklahoma as well, he survived.

My dad had been drafted 2 months before Pearl Harbor. He was hitchhiking back to Ft. Sam Houston in uniform when a motorist stopped to give him a ride. He heard the news on the radio in the car.

One week later, he was on his way to the Pacific.

According to this first-person account,all hatches on the Oklahoma were ordered to be left open that morning,because an admiral was scheduled to do an inspection:

link

A day to remember.

No one I know of that was at Pearl in the family, but had a number of uncles who fought in the Pacific and/or Europe.

Grandma used to climb the fire tower while pregnant, and listen out and watch for enemy aircraft.

My Dad (still living) told me that he had finished his first week of Army Air Corps basic training in San Antonio, Texas, on Dec. 7. His class was given their first off-base pass. Donning civilian clothes, each man purchased a hat to make his close-cropped head less conspicuous. Part way through a movie it was announced that Pearl Harbor had been attacked and all military personnel must return to base. Outside the theater each man tossed his hat in the air, strewing Houston Street with fedoras; nobody, he said, would need one for a long, long time to come.