Editorial: Remembering Pearl Harbor, 75 years later
The infamy of December 7, 1941, roused a nation. Yet, it was something that could be truly known only by the individuals who were there. Listen to them while you can.
Army veteran Everitt Schlegel of Batavia tells his daughter Beverly Capiga he saw Japanese planes flying so low toward Pearl Harbor he could throw a stone and hit them. A stone, of course, would have been no use, the .45-caliber pistol he carried with seven bullets scarcely more.
Geneva native Charles T. Sehe remembers the feeling of impotence.
"About 90 feet above the deck ... we saw the planes coming in, but we couldn't do anything about it," he says now. "It's indelibly etched in my brain."
He was 18 years old that day. He would not give in to futility. He and shipmates, many of them fellow recruits from Great Lakes Naval Station at North Chicago, raced to their battle positions on the USS Nevada. They shot down four of their attackers. It would fall to Sehe the next day to remove some of their burned bodies from the machine-gun stations where they had died.
Joe Triolo, of Zion, was 21. Seventy-five years later, he is haunted by the memory of comrades entombed on the USS Utah.
"They were alive for many days," he says. "They were doomed to perish on those ships."
Our access to such firsthand accounts is fading fast. Schlegel is 97, Sehe 93, Triolo 96. Schlegel and Triolo were the only two Pearl Harbor survivors on hand for this year's recognition luncheon sponsored by the Aurora Council of the Navy League of the United States, an event that not so long ago filled several tables.
"When they're all gone," says Aurora Navy League board member Leonard Wass, "we'll just remember the day, I guess."
As we should. But we must not think only of its historical context. Yes, the attack led to America's involvement in World War II. Yes, it was a reminder of the need for the nation to stay strong, watchful and vigilant.
It was also the experience of brave, scared, determined individual kids. Let us not forget them or their stories along with the day.
"Anytime a veteran has the ability to talk about the experience, he should, if he is able to," says Sehe. "The significance of his duties can only be recognized in the time span of three generations."
We have seen more than three generations since the attack on Pearl Harbor. Sadly, infamy has found its way into them all. It has stirred outrage, shaped elections, shaken religions and started wars.
And always it has left its most indelible marks on the individuals - why so often kids? - who are the only ones who really can know it. Remember them. And, for as long as you can, listen.