My World War II Memories:Pearl Harbor and Beyond
It was December 7, 1941. Grandpa and I were taking my Uncle Dale to Riley Hickock’s birthday party. On our way back, the car radio was filled with news about the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor. I was eight and didn’t understand much of it, but my grandpa was very upset. For the next four years, newspapers and radio (there was no TV yet) could talk about almost nothing else but our war with Japan. This war suddenly and unexpectedly pulled our country out of the Great Depression by ramping up production of ships and aircraft. There was no official Air Force yet. Our well-known athletes, both local and national, joined the armed forces, and certain foods and gasoline became very scarce.
The war ended in 1945, and surprisingly, things started to sell quickly. Military surplus items like clothing and jeeps flooded the market, and G.I. veterans began attending our local college. Soon, we no longer hated the Japanese. Pacific Coast cities once again, and even more so, became densely populated with Japanese people. By 1956, when I was in graduate school at the University of Washington, my best friend there was a Japanese guy named Charlie Chihara. After that, our country grew closer to Japan, becoming an economic and military ally. Today, our Major League Baseball teams are filled with Japanese players, and our two countries are allies. It’s incredible and fortunate that former enemies can become allies so quickly. World history often follows these post-war patterns.