We're here to answer questions from the students regarding our experiences on Pearl Harbor when the Japanese attacked. We were both 25 years old and had been married 4 months. We were not really uneasy about the world situation. We were still in bed at 8:00 on Sunday morning and were trying to decide if we should go to church in Honolulu. The decision was suddenly made for us by loud explosions. Johnie thought a plane had crashed near the house. We rushed outside to find our neighbor, a navy doctor, looking at aircraft through a pair of binoculars. He suggested that I look at them because I knew more about airplanes than he did. I said "I don't need your glasses Doc, look at the Rising Sun on the side of the airplane. They are Japanese!" I could see tracer shells being fired at them.

What a way for Sunday to start!
Johnie and Dale Gano

Question:
What did you see?

Answer:
I lived in Pearl City on a peninsula which jutted out into Pearl Harbor parallel to Ford Island on which the Naval Air Station was based. Navy ships were tied to piers on the east and west sides of Ford Island and at the south end of Pearl City peninsula. There were others at the shipyard east across the bay from Ford Island. A very loud explosion rattled our windows. We rushed outside to see a string of airplanes in a shallow dive toward the ships at the end of our peninsula. We could see red anti-aircraft tracer shells floating up toward the lead aircraft. I could see the "Rising-Sun" emblem that decorated the side of the aircraft which identified them as Japanese. My wife and her friends who lived nearby went up into the hills to hide in a cave and I caught a boat to Ford Island. On the way over I saw a large flight of Japanese aircraft fly over at a high altitude. I saw sunken U.S. Navy ships on both sides of Ford Island burning furiously. When I got to the east side of Ford Island I could see large fires in the Navy Yard which is across the water east of Ford Island. We lost no aircraft carriers because they were at sea. The ships which were docked in the spaces used by the carriers were sunk and burning. I saw some very brave Navy Yard workers cutting holes in the bottom of ships that had rolled over and sunk. They saved quite a few sailors who were trapped in the ships. I saw an oil covered sailor who looked familiar. He and I had gone to high school together. He was lost later in the war. When I went into the barracks later in the day I saw long rows of dead and injured sailors lying on the floor. Visualize yourself standing on the east side of Ford Island looking across the water toward the Navy base. The submarine base is to your left, the shipyard straight across and the Navy Hospital far to the right on the point of land. The last attacking Japanese airplane I saw dove to rooftop height above the submarine base, flew across the shipyard and climbed steeply over the hospital and flew away. The last Japanese airplane I saw was one we had shot down. It was dragged up a ramp where I was able to take a cartridge from a jammed machine gun and remove a nameplate from a wing for souvenirs.

Question:
How far was Ford Island from Pearl City? How long did it take you to get to Ford Island?

Answer:
The distance from the pier at the south end of Pearl City peninsula to the west side of Ford Island is at least one-half mile. I expect we were underway in the boat for five to eight minutes. Please remember that this happened over fifty-five years ago and I did not measure the distance nor did I time the run. If you can find a map of Pearl Harbor, I'm sure that you will find it a very interesting study.

Question:
What was it like watching Pearl Harbor get destroyed?

Answer:
Watching Pearl Harbor being destroyed and thousands of lives lost put most of us into a state of shock. I saw no fear manifested by the people around me. We all responded as we had been trained. The first day, I manned a machine gun. The second day, I repaired airplanes as fast as I could. A few days later, those of us who had families were allowed to go look for them. I could not find my wife of 4+ months but learned she was safe. Later we were allowed one night each fourth day off the base. We were working 12 hours on - 12 hours off. It was exhausting but repaired airplanes were moving out. I remember one PBY racing down the harbor for a test flight. It had not been painted after repair and was more patch than original skin. I named it The Flying Patch.

Question:
Where were you or what were you doing at the time of the bombing?

Answer:
We were contemplating going to church when the first bomb fell. The attack lasted over a period of time which extended to my arrival at the Naval Air Station. Johnie was on her way up to the hills.

Question:
What was the first thought that came to your mind when you heard the bombing?

Answer:
The first thought that came to my mind was, What in the world was that? My windows must be broken.
Johnie: On December 5, 1941 I saw the movie "Dive Bomber" in which several military planes crashed into the ground. The first thought that came to me was that one of our planes had crashed nearby — possibly a block from our house

Question:
Could you see the bombs?

Answer:
No, we did not see any bombs but we did see tracers.

Question:
Were you scared during the bombing?

Answer:
Johnie: I drove by to pick up some friends one of whom had an eleven month old baby. We were told to go into the hills nearby . Halfway up a plane flew over- undoubtedly Japanese- and we got out of the car to take shelter under some trees. I was definitely very scared.

Question:
Did a bomb drop anywhere near you?

Answer:
The first bomb sounded like it had dropped in my front yard but I'm sure it was dropped on one of the ships at Ford Island. It would have been a torpedo because we know they were launched at our battle ships. We learned later that the Japanese had practiced dropping torpedoes in shallow water in preparation for the attack on Pearl harbor.

Question:
What did it feel like to be in the midst of the bombing?

Answer:
Being in the midst of bombing and such mass destruction was mind numbing. I went to my duty station, the fire department, to find no people and no equipment. They were fighting fires so I joined the line to draw a weapon. I selected a machine gun.

Questions:
How did you feel during the bombing of Pearl Harbor? Did you feel scared? How many people died that you knew?

Answers:
Johnie: Both my husband and I were 25 years old and I felt secure until the word was passed that all soldiers and sailors and other military had to report to their duty station. Then I cried some and grabbed my coat and a box of Kleenex and car keys and got ready to pick up two friends, one of whom had an 11 month old child. These friends did not have a car - I was too busy getting all that "stuff" taken care of to be scared. We went up into the hills where there was a huge deserted aqueduct and quite a few people there before us. Fear sort of came and went. There was a small army detail group there and that was sort of a comfort. I vaguely recall they supplied us with food.

About 4:00p.m. - near sundown we were told to go to the nearby village of Waipahu and from there we were sent to the home of the plantation manager because we had a small child in the group. There we stayed for 3 days until it became obvious that the enemy were not going to return and they never did!!!

Dale: My feelings during the bombing of Pearl Harbor were encased in shock and bewilderment. I was amazed that the Japanese would do such a thing. I was not angered to the extent that my thinking was affected but I would have been willing to shoot them all to stop the attack. I did not have any friends who died and was not motivated to look at the many bodies. There were many sailors trapped in the sunken ships who died. From the Japanese point of view, their attack was successful. They sank 21 American warships and killed 2338 military personnel and civilians. As one of their admirals was quoted, "We have succeeded in awakening the sleeping giant."

Question:
Did your ship get shot a lot?

Answer:
I was not stationed on a ship. My duty station was the Naval Air Station. Ford Island was
damaged when the airplanes parked there-on were destroyed. Damage to buildings on NAS was very minimal.

Question
Did you see anybody get shot? Did you get any wounds during the war?

Answer:
I did not see anyone get shot but I did see many bodies. I was not wounded during the war.

Question:
If you used a gun what kind was it? An automatic, a shotgun, a 9mm, or a 45?

Answer:
Dale: I used a 30:06 caliber machine gun.

Question:
How bad was the destruction?

Answer:
The Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor appeared to be aimed primarily at our ships and airplanes. I remember no buildings being bombed, however, the hangars at the Army Air Stations had been thoroughly machine gunned and their aircraft destroyed.

Question:
What did Pearl Harbor look like after the bomb?

Answer:
It was a complete mess. Ships were sunk and burning everywhere. The battleship Nevada had tried to escape but ran aground at the entrance to the harbor. Entire squadrons of our airplanes were destroyed on the ground. I saw aircraft engines in puddles of molten aluminum. Later, when I visited Hickam Field I saw the buildings had been strafed and were completely full of bullet holes. We were not strafed at Ford Island to that extent.

Question:
Could you see the Japanese pilots?

Answer:
Dale says that he could see their heads but not well enough to recognize them even if they were his best friends.

Question:
What was your favorite airplane at that time?

Answer:
My favorite airplanes at that time were, of course, Navy airplanes because they were the ones I worked on. They were PBY, SBD, F6F, TBM. The first letter tells you their function. PB - patrol bomber, SB - scout bomber, F - fighter and TB - torpedo bomber. The last letter tells you who manufactured it. Y - Consolidated, D - Douglas, F - Gruman, M - General Motors.

Question:
What kind of fighter planes did we use against Japan?

Answer:Our navy fighters were the F6F discussed above. The marines used F4U fighters. They were the gulf-wing fighters carrying six 50-caliber machine guns.

Question:
Did you know the pilots who dropped the bombs on Japan?

Answer:
If you are asking if I knew the pilots who dropped the atomic bombs on Japan, the answer is no. I did know some of the pilots who saw aerial combat.

Question:
What was the name of your ship?

Answer:
I was not assigned to a ship. I was assigned to the Naval Air Station on Ford Island. I was an aircraft mechanic and helped overhaul airplanes at the "Assembly and Repair Department" where we overhauled airplanes.

Question:
Did you see the Arizona sink?

Answer:
I did not see the Arizona sink. It was moored to a pier on the east side of Ford Island, and I was in Pearl City just west of Ford Island when it was attacked.

Johnie: There was a hole about 9 inches across in the neighbor's house probably caused by shrapnel. We understood that they machine gunned the next street over from our house.

Questions:
I know that after the attack on Pearl Harbor, Japanese Americans in California were relocated to camps away from the west coast for security reasons. Were Japanese Americans in Hawaii ever locked up? Were they considered to be potential spies? I would think that the suspicions against them would be great, especially after the surprise attack. How did you feel about Japanese Americans after the attack? At the time, who was targeted for blame?

Answers:
Dale: To the best of my knowledge Japanese Americans were not locked up after the Pearl Harbor attack. You cannot lump them together under one category. Many of them had been in Hawaii for generations and were good Americans. They owned and operated businesses. As for spying — visiting Japanese could see all of Pearl Harbor from local highways which were located well above sea level in the nearby hills. They could take pictures from Pan American Airways passenger planes that landed in Pearl Harbor and were based at the foot of Pearl City Peninsula. They could see Army installations which included air bases from those same airplanes as they approached for landing and during departure.

After the attack my every thought other than for the welfare of my wife was the repair of damaged aircraft and the preparation for flight of newly arriving aircraft on ships. Most of them arrived with their wings off so more could be packed on ships. Also, they were new designs I had never seen before so I had a lot to learn. We were working every waking hour and I had little time to think about our enemy who might be among us.

An American General and an American Admiral were targeted for blame for the poor showing we made on Dec. 7, 1941. I blame our president and the people around him for our being caught asleep that Sunday morning. It turned out later that the President, F.D.R., did know of the pending attack at least one day before it happened. His message to Pearl Harbor arrived after the attack. He should have suspected something days earlier but he elected to wait.

It does not seem to be general knowledge but an American Army division consisting of young Japanese American men fought against the Germans.

Johnie: The Americans, Hawaiians, Japanese, and other nationalities lived side by side, intermingled you might say. The small grocery in our community was operated (owned?) by a Japanese man. This store was closed after the Pearl Harbor attack, but it was opened again later on.

Our neighbor, a Japanese, raised chickens and sort of managed the properties in which the Navy families lived. He came to our door one day when I was alone; he spoke very little English and I spoke no Japanese. He finally communicated the fact that he wanted to give me one of his live chickens. Here, take him, kill him, eat him, he said. Poultry feed was very scarce and he was having to reduce the size of his flock.

The process of making this "gift" ready for dinner was entirely our way of life! It's a long story, but the next time Dale came home on liberty, he had roast chicken. I ate vegetables.

Question:
How did your wife feel about you serving in the military?

Answer:
I have always believed that my wife was proud of my profession. I'm sure she had things to worry about as do all military wives. Moving to a different part of the world every three or so years is a heavy burden for military wives.

Question:
Do you tell the story to your grandchildren?

Answer:
My wife and I wrote the story of our lives for our children and those to come later. It covered a period of over fifty years.

Question:
If there were to be a WWIII would you be prepared for it?

Answer:
I cannot believe that anyone can be psychologically prepared for a WWIII. We, of course, can be physically prepared for it but I doubt that we will because the cost would be prohibitively high.

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