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And War Came, 1941 - Ballston Spa in World War II History of Us Clip: Pearl Harbor
"...Pearl Harbor was not the full answer to the question of why the United States went to war. This treacherous attack was but the last explosion in a long chain reaction."
The new queen attended missionary school embraced Christianity but never lost touch with her native heritage. When he brother turned over Pearl Harbor to the Americans in 1887, she wrote in her diary that it was “a day of infamy in Hawaiian history.”
Source: "Easy Company My Life in the US Marine Corp." Ballston Spa native Robert Graf, 1999
December 7, 1941. I don’t believe that I will ever forget that Sunday afternoon. I was in my bed room doing my homework as I was going to a professional basketball game in Saratoga Springs that evening. Dad was listening to a football game on the radio and my Mother was reading the Sunday papers.
My two sisters were wheeling the Parrelle twins, Ronald and Reta on Malta Avenue. The twins were young, having been born during the previous June. Today was to be an exciting day in town. The last of the trolley cars had made their final trip between Schenectady and Saratoga Springs the previous evening. Bus service had replaced the trolley and my sisters were waiting to watch the first bus pass through the town.
One of the Connor girls came by and asked my sisters if they had heard the news about the bombing at Pearl Harbor? Neither sister had heard the news, and once they heard the news they stored it in the back of their head because the bus was due at any moment and that was where the excitement was for these two young kids.
Back in the house the game was interrupted by the following announcement; “Pearl Harbor is being shot at”. “Who is she?”, my Mother asked, thinking it was a movie star.“I don’t know”, my Father replied. But then the word spread like wildfire. The radio came on with more details. Neighbors knocked on our door to tell us the news and we knocked on other doors to help spread the news.
“JAPANESE PLANES ARE ATTCKING PEARL HARBOR AND THE UNITED STATES FLEET IS DESTROYED!”
“THE JAPS ARE BOMBING BATTLESHIP ROW AND OUR SHIPS ARE SINKING!”
“THIS IS NOT A DRILL!”
Over and over the radio made the announcements. Our family had our ears “glued” to the radio. We listened – we wondered – we were frightened – we were worried – and eventually a thrill settled within me. “Where is Pearl Harbor?” “Will the Japs attack the west coast?” “The Germans and the Japs have a treaty, will Germany hit the east coast?” “Mom! Dad! May I join up?”
We were living in the Tom Manoque building, 54 Milton Avenue, Ballston Spa, New York. “We”, the family, consisted of my parents, Fred L. Graf, Jr. and Iris (Roche) Graf plus my two sisters, Audrey, age 13 and Irene, age 8. I, Bob, had just turned eighteen and was a senior in high school. People were stunned by the news. We found it difficult to believe. The war had been going on for a long period, but to date, the United States had kept out of it. Hitler was walking all over Europe and the Japanese were spreading throughout China. Only a short year or so prior to 1941, Japanese planes had sunk one of our River Boats, the USS PANAY, while the boat was in China waters. The Japanese said that it was a mistake and that they were sorry.
For years, through movies, through comics, through radio, through newspapers we knew that the Germans and Japanese were the “Bad Guys”. The Japs were usually pictured as the buck tooth, weak eyed, sinister villains. The Germans were portrayed as Atilla, the Hun, or as a firey red eyed monster with a Hitler type mustache.
The United States Navy, during this period of time, was escorting convoys from the United States and was delivering them to waiting British ships. It was rumored that we did fire, “in self defense”, at lurking German “U” Boats. But we were not at war. But to be struck in this sneaky way was unbelievable. The attack did serve one useful purpose, it united the country as nothing else could have. How exciting the news was for me. For years I had intended to make the sea my career. Both my Father and his brother, My Uncle Charlie, were in the Navy during the World War I. I was brought up on tales of adventure of the sea and ships since I could remember. When I was about four years old, my Father almost closed the door on a Navy career for me. Dad told me that I could never get into the Navy if I were unable to tie my shoes. I worked and worked on those laces, trying, until at last I mastered the only requirement known to me, to enter the navy. I could tie my shoes.
My Mother’s step brothers, Joe and Harold Finneran were both on Tug Boats in New York Harbor. They worked for the Moran Company. When I was ten years old, I spent the summer with my Grandmother Finneran in New York. My Uncles had me on the boat when they worked Sundays. My Uncle Harold was a Captain on the boats. I was disappointed in him. He wore civilian cloths, sat on the barge that was being towed and mostly read newspapers. He only moved when we dropped off or picked up barges. But my Uncle Joe..Now he was something. He was the Pilot. He wore an officer’s cap, a blue turtleneck sweater and he was stationed in the pilot house. He steered the boat through the river traffic, blowing the boat’s whistle, giving commands through the speaking tube to the engine room below and swearing and shaking his fist at other boats who’s pilots didn’t suit his fancy. Ah! It was great to be a ten year old and at sea with a salty sailor. But that wasn’t all that my Uncle Joe could do. No sir. He was above going to the bathroom.
Instead, when nature called, he stood at the pilot house door and urinated a mighty stream away out, over the side of the boat and into the harbor. And when he went, I was left in charge of the boat’s wheel and kept a straight course. Later, when my Uncle wasn’t looking, I tried urinating from the lofty perch. Alas, it was no good. I only managed to hit the deck below. I cleaned it up before the crew noticed my unseaman capabilities. I always read all the sea stories that I could. I read about the navy, pirates, merchant marines, whaling and adventures of the sea. My favorite book was a biography by Lowell Thomas, “Count Felix Von Luckner”, a German sailor during World War I.
During my senior year in high school I was in the newly formed branch of the Boy Scouts, called the Sea Scouts. With the help of the County Scout Executive, I was trying to get an appointment into the Merchant Marine Academy at Kings Point in New York. It was a four year college course and upon graduation you were an Officer in the US Merchant Marine and also you received a reserve commission in the US Navy. But war was here. I couldn’t wait four additional years to get into the war. I would miss it. I had to get into the war soon. “The Saratogian”, the major newspaper in the county and published in Saratoga Springs came out with an EXTRA. The headlines roared in big bold type: TOKYO WARS ON U.S.! HAWAII BOMBED. The front page carried bits and pieces of the news as it had filtered back to the States. 350 soldiers were reported dead at Hickam Field, Hawaii. There was no information on the damage at Pearl Harbor.
That evening, my friend, Tom Brower and I. hitched a ride to Saratoga Springs to see the Saratoga Indians play basketball against the Pittsfield Golden Bears in Convention Hall. Convention Hall was on Broadway where the present YMCA is located. My mind just wasn’t on basketball that night. We caught a ride home with John Tomeck, another Ballstonian. We three talked about the war. By the time I reached home, my mind was made up. I asked my parents for their permission to enter the service. I needed their signature to get in. Finally after much talking, they agreed, but only after I graduated from high school.
The next day, Monday, the 8th of December, 1941, President Roosevelt went before the Joint Houses of Congress. The President climbed to the podium in the House of Representatives, clinging to the arm of his son, Marine Captain James Roosevelt. “Yesterday, December 7, 1941, a date which will live in infamy, the United States was suddenly and deliberately attacked by the naval and air forces of the Empire of Japan”, rang out the President’s voice. President Roosevelt asked Congress to declare a state of war to exist between the United States and Japan. An hour later Congress voted for war and there was only one negative vote. Hitler joined Japan as per their agreement and Germany declared war on the United States on 11 December, 1941. Again, President Roosevelt went before Congress and again Congress voted for war. My personal enemy was Japan. They hit us with a sneak attack. THE UNITED STATES WAS IN WORLD WAR II.
How many people died at Pearl Harbor during the attack?
The total number of military personnel killed was 2,335,
..1,177 were from the USS Arizona.
Isolationists
Interventionists
The nation should refrain from words as well as deeds that might involve the US in a power struggle in Europe
They included the America First Committee – Gerald Nye, Robert Taft, Hamilton Fish (congressmen) and Charles Lindberg
"England will fight to the last American." - Advocated U.S. protection of its own shores if Hitler defeated Britain.
Senator Robert A. Taft: urged "Fortress America"; defense not intervention
The best security for the US was assisting the Allies through “all measures short of war”
They included the Committee to Defend America by Aiding the Allies – run by William A. White
Claimed U.S. couldn’t let Axis powers dominate the world
Urged direct aid to Britain. Roosevelt had strong internationalist sympathies but had to temper them publicly.
"...Pearl Harbor was not the full answer to the question of why the United States went to war. This treacherous attack was but the last explosion in a long chain reaction." – Page 820
The four Neutrality Acts of the late 1930s represented an effort to keep the United States out of "foreign" wars, an effort resulting in part from widespread questioning of the reasons for and results of America's participation in World War I.
"Storm-cellar neutrality proved to be tragically shortsighted. America falsely assumed that the decision for peace or war lay in its own hands, not in those of the satanic forces already unleashed in the world." – American Pageant Page 805
"'Appeasement' of the dictators, symbolized by the ugly word Munich, turned out to be merely surrender on the installment plan. It was like giving a cannibal a finger in the hope of saving an arm." – Page 807 American Pageant
"...Pearl Harbor was not the full answer to the question of why the United States went to war. This treacherous attack was but the last explosion in a long chain reaction." – Page 820
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