80th Anniversary of the bombing of Pearl Harbor

December 7, 1941, was a long time ago – 80 years to be exact. Hopefully President Franklin Delano Roosevelt's words still ring true. "Yesterday, December 7, 1941-a date which will live in infamy-the United States of America was suddenly and deliberately attacked by the naval and air forces of the Empire of Japan."

The attack and the President's speech rallied a previously neutral country. War against the Empire of Japan was declared, Dec. 8, 1941, the day he made his oft quoted speech. On Dec. 11, 1941, the Third Reich, commonly called Nazi Germany, declared war on the United States. Later the same day, the United States issued a declaration of war against the Nazi regime.

Within four days, the United States went from being a neutral country to being a country at war. Industry changed nearly overnight into a war industry, determined to produce the war materials needed to fight and win a global war being fought on two fronts.

Dec. 7, 1941, at Pearl Harbor, on Hawaii's Oahu Island, was chaos, shock, explosions, fire, sinking ships and death. Death for 2,335 U.S. military personnel and 68 civilians. On the USS Arizona alone, 1, 177 service men lost their lives. It was almost a death knell for the United States Navy's Pacific Fleet. Almost – almost but not quite.

But here in Jewell County, it was a peaceful Sunday. People had been to church, were eating Sunday dinner, visiting, listening to the radio or out hunting. Though many are not old enough to remember, several still do.

"Out hunting cottontails" was what 12-year-old Bill Smith (Mankato) was doing that day. The J. C. Smith family farm was two miles east of Mankato. When Bill got back to the house, Milford Fall was there. The Falls had a radio, the Smiths didn't. Fall was there to tell his neighbors the shocking news about Pearl Harbor.

Fawna Arasmith Barrett, formerly of Randall, was with her parents, Ralph and Ida Arasmith, on their farm southwest of Jewell. They weren't listening to the radio – they couldn't. The batteries weren't charged up because usually blustery Kansas wind, hadn't been blowing enough.

She tried to make a phone call but there was someone already talking on their party line. Someone talking about planes, bombs and Pearl Harbor. She put the phone back down and remembers asking her mother, "What is Pearl Harbor?" They and the rest of the United States would quickly learn of the havoc and devastation which had occurred halfway around the world at a place called Pearl Harbor.

The radio was how the Thummel family learned of the attack. They were listening to the radio and, though Ted Thummel (Esbon) was only eight years old, he still remembers being with his family and hearing the news.

In December, 1941, Alma Decker Garman (Mankato) was a young teenager on the Decker farm just east and a bit north of Burr Oak. The family turned on the radio that Sunday and learned of the attack. Garman remembers that Pearl Harbor "Changed everything. Everybody was more patriotic."

She also recalls watching the news reels at the movie theater on Sunday evenings. There she and other movie goers learned what was happening in the war, the war the United States quickly entered after the attack on Pearl Harbor.

Garman and her husband, the late Lee Garman, would tour Pearl Harbor years later. They wished they had more time at Pearl Harbor, where the world dramatically changed.

Phyliss Warren Lange (Mankato), was at her brother Blaine Warren's home in the Olive Hill Community. She wanted to listen to the radio and recalls the room with the radio was cold. She listened just a bit to what she thought was a radio war program and didn't want to stay in the cold room to listen to a war program. The next day at school, she and her sister, Joyce, learned the truth. The Pacific Fleet had been attacked at Pearl Harbor. She hadn't been listening to "a program."

The late Bill Lange was already in the Army and serving at Fort Bragg, Missouri when Pearl Harbor was bombed. He was on K.P. duty when he learned about the surprise attack. Lange said, "Before Pearl Harbor, we walked where we were going. After Pearl Harbor, we ran."

Like Garman, Esther Phillips Headrick (Superior) and her husband, the late Wendell Headrick, also toured Pearl Harbor. Their tour was 40 years ago, on the 40th anniversary of the bombing of the harbor.

She also remembers how she learned of the attack. As she recalls, "It was a beautiful December day" and she and her friend were out roller skating on the sidewalks of Norton. After a time, her friend suggested going to see her grandmother. When they got to the home, they learned of the attack and like many others asked, "What is Pearl Harbor."

Wayne Young (Chicago) a cousin of Frosty Crouse (Jewell), went to high school in Hartley, Texas. He said, "I remember it as the day Patrick Stovall, a young Marine from Hartley, Texas...died." Stovall, serving on the USS Arizona, was the older brother of one of Young's classmates.

Young, living on a farm in the Texas Panhandle had no idea there was a place called Pearl Harbor. With no radio on the farm, he didn't learn of the attack until the next day at school. Before noon, his classmate had been called home – the parents having learned of the death of their older son.

Norman Greene (Jewell) also remembers that infamous day. His parents, brother and sister had left home early that Sunday to go to Lincoln, Neb. An uncle was in the hospital and they were going to visit him. Greene's job was to stay home, water the sows and do the other chores. When it was noon, he was to ride his pony to Dick and Hazel Wolfe's home and eat dinner.

That was where he learned about the death and destruction that was a half-a-world away. He knew what an airplane was but not what a bomb was and really didn't understand what was going on. Back at his home waiting until after dark for his family to return, he just remembers being scared.

Justifiably scared. It would take until Sept. 2, 194,5 and some 640,000 American service men and women's lives before World War II was over. Before it was over, there were Gold Stars hanging in many a window in Jewell County. Those stars signified someone from the home had given their life serving their country.

The following are those whose lives were given in the service of their country during World War II by Jewell Countians:

Julian Edward Ball, Robert Luther Burchinal, Vandy Huff Butler, Clarence Arthur Butts, Vernon Crum, Lawrence W. Dillman, Robert L. Edwards, Keith H. Fedde, Robert Green, Arthur F. Hanson, Omar W. Headrick, Harry D. Higbee, Bill G. Huber, Lee C. Keeler, Anthony L. Matousek, Robert F. McGaughey, Russell D. Murray, Ray C. Olena, Lester Piplow, Arthur V. Pontius, James M. Porter, Ralph S. Rich, Lester M. Sisson , Robert F. Sloan, Dean W. Stephens, Lawrence L. Terrill, Bernard H. Thompson, Ellery R. Vader and Aubrey D. Varney.