A Navy whale boat picks up a sailor swimming in Pearl Harbor in front of the battleship USS West Virginia badly damaged and smoking in the background on Dec. 7, 1941 shortly after the Japanese attacked Pearl Harbor. U.S. Government photo
Seventy-one years ago today, at 8 a.m. on a Sunday, Seaman Joe Kleiss was aboard the USS Dobbin, an auxiliary destroyer docked in Hawaii, writing a letter home to his mother. Read the rest of this entry »
Arnold Heins of Port Charlotte, Fla. looks an an exact duplicate in miniature of the “Red Baron’s” Fokker DR-1 tri-plane he flew in World War I. It took Heins eight years to complete. Sun photo by Jeffery Langlois
Cpl. Arnold Heins escaped death when the Japanese attacked Pearl Harbor 61 years ago today because he had just gotten off dining room duty at the mess hall at Hickam Field in Honolulu. Read the rest of this entry »
Stan Hardy looks at a daily bulletin passed out to the ship’s crew while serving aboard the carrier USS Shangri-La in World War II. The one the 83-year old Punta Gorda, Fla. resident is looking at tells about dropping the first atomic bomb on Hiroshima. Sun photo by Don Moore
The carrier USS Shangri-La sailed out of Pearl Harbor in early April 1945, headed for the war zone. Read the rest of this entry »
Capt. Ralph Styles, former skipper of the USS Sea Devil, holds a shadow box full of medals including two Navy Crosses, two Legions of Merit, Navy Unit Commendation, a solid gold submarine pin for being awarded two Navy Crosses. In the background is a banner with the USS Sea Devil’s emblem surrounded by five Japanese rising sun flags indicating five enemy war ships sunk or damaged and seven white flags with red centers denoting seven enemy transports sunk. Sun photo by Don Moore
The enemy submarine, I-374, sailed out of Tokyo Bay into the open Pacific shortly before sunrise on Sept. 22, 1944. Capt. Ralph Styles, skipper of the sub USS Sea Devil, was laying in wait submerged near the harbor’s entrance. Read the rest of this entry »
Dale Augerson of Rotonda, Fla. looks at a picture of the USS West Virginia going up in flames at dockside during the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor, Dec. 7, 1941. He served as a baker aboard the battleship during the attack 54 years ago today. Sun photo by Don Moore
When the Japanese attacked the Pacific Fleet at Pearl Harbor, Hawaii, on Dec. 7, 1941, Baker 3rd Class Dale Augerson had just put a batch of apple pies in the oven aboard the battleship USS West Virginia. The battleship was moored at “Battleship Row,” together with most of the fleet’s other capital ships. Read the rest of this entry »
Ed Blissick of Port Charlotte, Fla. is pictured as a 19-year old Navy deep water diver assigned to diving school at Pier 88 in New York City in 1943. Photo provided
Just like Mr. Roberts, who served aboard the USS Reluctant, Seaman 1st Class Ed Blissick of Gardens of Gulf Cove near Port Charlotte, Fla. served on a similar attack transport, the USS Montague, AKA-98, during the final months of World War II. Read the rest of this entry »
Cadet Larry McClure of Punta Gorda Isles, Fla. stands in front of his T-34 trainer while enrolled in 1963 in Naval Aviation at Pensacola Naval Air Station. He was 21. Photo provided
Larry McClure of Punta Gorda Isles, Fla. thinks of himself as a Pearl Harbor baby.
He was born on Dec. 20, 1941 at the Naval hospital in Pearl Harbor. His father was a Navy chief at the time serving with the Pacific Fleet at Pearl. His dad was aboard the carrier USS Lexington when she was torpedoed and badly damaged by the Japanese. The Lexington was sunk by an American destroyer with 300 trapped sailors aboard on May 8, 1942 to keep her from falling into enemy hands during the Battle of the Coral Sea. Read the rest of this entry »
Remains of Vernon Olsen will be interred Wednesday in the battleship USS Arizona, on which he served and where 1,117 sailors and Marines died Dec. 7, 1941.
Vernon Olsen, 91 — who survived the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor aboard the battleship USS Arizona, swam away from the carrier USS Lexington as it was sinking during the Battle of the Coral Sea months later, and took part in the Bikini Atoll atomic bomb tests after the war — died Friday, April 22, 2011 in Port Charlotte, Fla. Read the rest of this entry »
The ribbons on his chest show two battle stars, one for Pearl Harbor, the other for Midway. Photo provided
When the Japanese bombed Pearl Harbor shortly before 8 a.m., Dec. 7, 1941 George Hire was a Marine recovering from coral poisoning at the Naval Hospital. He was looking out the window while washing dishes and saw the first bomb hit the dry dock 100 yards from where he was standing. Read the rest of this entry »
Kathy Vanden Bosch and John Thomas, both of Port Charlotte, compare teak boxes made from the deck of the battleship USS Arizona, a war memorial at Pearl Harbor since WW II. Her wooden box was made by her uncle, Donald Newman, who served during the war and Thomas, a Marine in the war, made his jewelry box for his late wife. Sun photo by Don Moore
For as long as Kathy Vanden Bosch of Port Charlotte can remember, the little teak wood box has been a prized possession. What made it really special is it sat on her father’s dresser until he died. She was told as a child, it was made from the deck of the battleship USS Arizona by her uncle when he was in the service at Pearl Harbor during World War II.
Miles Carpenter of Park Forrest subdivision in Englewood, Fla. looks at a plaque listing the military engagements the light cruiser USS Phoenix took part in during World War II. He was a chief petty officer in the forward engine room of the ship throughout the war. Sun photo by Don Moore
“We were anchored at Pearl about 1,000 feet from Battleship Row when the Japs attacked,” the 85-year-old former sailor recalled. “We got underway in 17 minutes, but our path to the open sea was blocked by the battleship West Virginia that had been torpedoed and run up on a shoal to keep from sinking.” Read the rest of this entry »
This was Pvt. John Thomas of Port Charlotte, Fla. shortly after he got out of Marine boot camp at 22. He was sent to Pearl Harbor where he spent most of WW II. Photo provided.
John Henry Thomas was a Marine who served in the Pacific during World War II, but never fired a shot in battle. He was a carpenter before the war who worked in the woodworking shop at the Marine Corps barracks in Pearl Harbor almost a year after the Japanese bombed the Pacific Fleet at Pearl dragging the United States into war. Read the rest of this entry »
This is how Cpl. John Seelie of Englewood looked after returning from the Pacific Theatre of Operations during World War II. He served in the 25th Infantry Division at Guadalcanal and New Georgia after surviving the attack on Pearl Harbor. Photo provided
John Seelie of Englewood, Fla. was supposed to box the day the Japanese attacked Pearl Harbor, Dec. 7, 1941. He was a champion welterweight who just joined the 25th Infantry Division stationed at Schofield Barracks outside of Honolulu, Hawaii. Read the rest of this entry »
Bill Roy when he was a photo chief serving in World War II. Photo provided
Bill Roy was a 21-year-old photographer’s mate aboard the aircraft carrier USS Yorktown when she was sunk by an enemy submarine at the Battle of Midway June 7, 1942.Midway was the defining battle in the Pacific Theater during the first six months of World War II. The United States went to war after its Pacific Fleet was bombed by the Japanese at Pearl Harbor on Dec, 7, 1941. At Midway the Americans sealed the fate of the Japanese Imperial Navy and ultimately stopped its westward expansion.
Bert Earnest is pictured as a naval aviation cadet in 1941. He received two Distinguished Flying Crosses for one mission in his TBF-1 Avenger torpedo bomber during the attack on the Japanese fleet at Midway as a member of Torpedo Bomber Squadron #8.
The god of war smiled on United States forces at Midway.
“In 30 hours, at the Battle of Midway, the fate of World War II was changed in the Pacific,” according to commentary from newsreel footage taken at the time.
