Des Plaines event honors survivors, fallen from Pearl Harbor attack

Bob Birdsall of Lisle wakes up each morning on the anniversary of the attack on Pearl Harbor to text messages from family members.

His father, mother and uncles were veterans of World War II, all combining to serve in every major battle in Europe and the Pacific, Birdsall said.

After a memorial event Wednesday in Des Plaines for the 75th anniversary of the attack, Birdsall pulled a cellphone from his pocket and scrolled through the text messages. One was a picture of the headstone for his father, Army Air Corps veteran John Birdsall, who was finishing his shift when Japanese planes began bombing Pearl Harbor.

“You can imagine how that's meaningful,” Birdsall said.

Birdsall's father died three years ago at age 93. Birdsall, 69, remembers hearing stories of helplessness and comedy from the attack. Based on intelligence that attackers might ascend the hill to Hickam Air Force Base, which overlooked Pearl Harbor, his father was armed with a shotgun rather than his usual long-range rifle when planes began bombing the base the morning of Dec. 7, 1941, Birdsall said.

“Planes are coming over, and he's got nothing to do but bounce BBs off them,” Birdsall said.

The night after the attack, Birdsall's father found a small cave to sleep in rather than risk being caught in a crumbling building should the Japanese attack again. He woke to find a mongoose had crawled up his pantleg.

“So that was the funny story he told,” Birdsall said.

The Sons and Daughters of Pearl Harbor Survivors organized the event held at the Prairie Lakes Theater, and one survivor, Joe Triolo, 96, attended. Triolo, who served in the Navy, was asleep in the USS Tangier when the nearly two-hour attack started.

“All during this attack, we were reacting as we were trained to react — it was almost automatic, and there was no fear — no fear,” Triolo said. “Then after the attack and everything began to settle down, then you began to be afraid, and the fear set in.”

President Barack Obama in May visited Hiroshima, Japan, where the United States dropped an atomic bomb at the end of the war in 1945, and Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe plans to visit Pearl Harbor later this month. Leaders from each nation had never previously visited the respective sites.

But Triolo holds conviction 75 years later the events are not comparable. He broke into the ceremony to point out Japan had never apologized for the surprise attack, while the Hiroshima bombing came when the U.S. was at war and Japan refused to surrender, Triolo said.

“There was no comparison whatsoever of Pearl Harbor and Hiroshima,” Triolo said, bringing many of the veterans and community members to their feet to applaud.