Originally
Published on Memorial Day 2001 . . .
At
a recent visit to the cinema, I saw the trailer
for the new WWII epic Pearl Harbor. As the action-packed
trailer rolled, it occurred to me how popular perception
distances us from a sense of the era of MacArthur,
Ike and Marshall. Hollywood-machined dramas about
the time and people of World War II often contrast
with the reality that happened to thousands: like
my family that morning in 1941.
How
long ago was World War II? Culturally speaking,
it was an eon. In actuality, it wasn’t that
long ago. Despite the renewed interest in the era
generated by Spielberg’s post-heroic film Saving
Private Ryan, and more recently Tom Brokaw’s
book The Greatest Generation, the early 1940s
seems locked in a late-night black and white movie,
as far back in time as WWI and cowboys and Indians.
A post-Boomer, I was born a mere 17 years after
V-J Day…. 17 years ago now, Miami Vice was
popular on network TV.
As
a kid, I found my family's physical evidence of
the attack at Pearl Harbor. It was a valuable part
of the story not yet made public, and something
that shrank the distance to World War II to my chronological
backyard.
*
* * * * * * * *
I
never knew my grandfather. A well-known Navy Ace,
he was apparently on the short-list for command
of the new-construction, first nuclear carrier,
Forrestal, and many felt he had a good shot
at becoming Chief of Naval Operations. He died in
1957 in a jet crash. His friends called him Bill,
but he was known throughout the service as "Killer
Kane". His tombstone is a simple white marker,
embedded among the thousands of markers at Arlington
National Cemetery in Washington DC.
Killer
Kane graduated from the Naval Academy in 1933. He
was tall, handsome and athletic and knew he was
going to fly. The Navy had just combined the concept
of Air Power with Sea Power and starting with the
Langley--a freighter with a wooden runway
nailed to the superstructure--it had begun to develop
the art and science of launching, landing and fighting
Navy airplanes from "carriers". Before
he was eventually assigned to fight and then command
a fighter squadron from a carrier christened Enterprise,
"Killer Kane" was stationed at Ford Island, the
Navy’s Air Station resting in the middle of
Pearl Harbor.
His
pretty, young naval wife, Madeline (my grandmother),
lived with their two young children next to a runway
in a bungalow placed in a row of houses several
hundred feet from the U.S.S. Arizona on Ford
Island. The Arizona was a battleship parked
in two rows of ships that lined one edge of the
island (one of the many blunders that would culminate
in the disaster then flying low and fast, and undetected,
through Hawaii's morning mist).
My
Uncle Bill was a toddler and my mother Judith was
still a baby on this bright Sunday morning of December
7th. They were asleep in the small bungalow, and
Honolulu woke slowly as usual. Their father, Lt.
Commander William R. Kane, whose handle "Killer"
had been borne from his football and wrestling days
at Annapolis, drove over to the Air Station. He
was Officer of the Day (OOD).
*
* * * * * * * *
I
was maybe 14 the day I found them. It was the summer
of 1976.
My
mom and dad woke us at 4 a.m. for the long drive
from upper NY State to Virginia Beach where Madeline
(who we called Nona) had a small house. Her Virginia-clapboard
home in the piney woods a mile from the Atlantic
hosted the Moore Family each summer for a long week
of vacation. After a morning and afternoon of body
surfing and sand construction, I found myself a
little bored around Nona’s place. Nona was
married to Ned Hurlburt at the time, a Navy MD who
had also seen fleet action during WWII.
A
large bookcase housed some favorite objects, and
for the first time I explored its lower cabinets.
I opened a box containing what seemed to be old
Navy photos. Buried with the memorabilia, I noticed
a roll of yellow paper. It was perforated on the
sides, obviously the product of a ticker-like printing
machine. The roll contained what seemed hundreds
of 5X7 inch pages. Each page had faded blue type
struck by typewriter-like strokes.
I
have not seen them since, so I can only do my best
to remember what I read. One page in the middle
of the roll said: "Flight of 3 planes spotted
from West Observation Point." The next one
read: "unknown aircraft heading towards Harbor."
Each page, as I read, came from various places around
the island of Oahu describing the movements of Japanese
planes coming in. As what I was reading sunk in,
my heart began to race.
It
was a running account of the Japanese attack on
Pearl Harbor.
I
was a relatively normal teen, and I was not especially
interested--yet--in my forebears and their accomplishments.
I knew that my grandfather was a famous Navy double
Ace who had flown off the U.S.S. Enterprise.
I had asked Nona about Pearl Harbor, or it had come
up at one of those magical Italian feasts she prepared
in her small kitchen. I remember her describing
the attack. So for this physical piece of history
I had inadvertently discovered, I at least had the
semblance of Nona’s first-hand perspective.
*
* * * * * * * *
Again,
it was just another Sunday, and Bill Kane had gone
off for duty at the Air Station. Madeline woke up
to the sound of airplane engines, a common sound,
but this time they sounded different. This time,
she heard a lot of planes.
Madeline
walked outside to see what was happening, and a
plane zoomed low and fast over the house. She said
she saw red circles on the underside of the wings.
That’s
when the explosions started. She ran inside and
grabbed her infant daughter (my mother) and young
son. Along with her best friend Katie, they got
in the Packard parked in the carport and raced for
safety down the runway’s side road.
Her
description of being strafed by the Japanese torpedo-bombers
was almost cute. She made little pecking motions
with her hand as she told us of the dirt erupting
next to the car. But in the same moment it gave
me a deep chill. Vast explosions rocked the ground
around my grandmother as she fled, and the big ships
erupted in fire. She made it to the nearby Navy
hospital where she and the other families hunkered
down in the basement. They had no idea what had
happened until the casualties started to come in.
I
don’t know what specifically happened to my
grandfather that day. I am sure he was either fighting
this new enemy or saving what and who he could.
The attack ended, leaving our anchored ships ablaze,
aground (attempting to escape), or sunk. Kane went
home that night. At the bungalow, Nona found his
uniform crumpled on the bed, and that’s when
she found a roll of yellow reports jammed into his
pants pocket. Being the quintessential Navy wife,
she put them safely away until such official documents
were again requested by her husband.
They never were, and the pocketed reports ended
up stored with his beloved Navy things, including
his Graduation pointed-hat and sword and his 5 medals
(including the Navy Cross and his Distinguished
Flying Cross.) Nona will never let them out of her
custody - until the day he asks for them.
I
have read accounts of the man and his squadron,
including a book titled "The Grim Reapers," which
was the name of his VF-10 squadron. The Reapers
flew at most of the big battles, including Midway
and Guadalcanal from CV6, his beloved U.S.S. Enterprise.
Kane was shot down several times, and received 12
confirmed kills. A consummate pilot, he was also
a natural leader, eventually being designated CO
by the first "Reaper" leader, Jim Flatley.
Most importantly, he was my mother’s father.
Through my mother, I understand his intense love
and the subsequent heartbreak of his ironic, accidental
death after surviving so much action.
*
* * * * * * * *
So
I will pay my eight dollars and watch another movie
about World War II, this time in color and with
computer-generated airplanes and more actors. And
I will reach out across time, wondering if any one
else in the theater is doing so, to real men and
women who fought the fires and manned the gun emplacements
and even flew in the few airplanes that straggled
off the ground that day. The Greatest Generation
is still here, but my own generation knows so little
of the sacrifice, the horrors--and honor--of
what they did…
What
they did for you and I, not so long ago.
Killer
Kane is honored by the same squadron that still
flies for the US Navy, VF-101. The Killer Kane Leadership
Award is given each year to a deserving pilot. My
grandmother Madeline lives in Virginia, and is still
the quintessential Navy wife. Fly Navy.
Look for Webmaster Michael Patterson's memorial
to William "Killer" Kane at -
http://www.arlingtoncemetery.com
HONOR OUR VETERANS EVERY DAY ~
