MEMORIALS

REMEMBERING PEARL HARBOR Revisited

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I was nearly a decade away from even being a glimmer in my parent’s eyes when the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor occurred on December 7, 1941, so I have no true remembrances of the “Day Which Will Live in Infamy”. My remembrances come from listening to my father and his buddies talking, history books and movies.

My father, a single, twenty-six-year-old at the time, did what many patriotic young men did and with several friends headed to the Marine recruitment center to join up…only to find out he was 4F due to a birth defect he didn’t even know he had. Determined, he attempted to enlist in the Navy and Army but was turned down. Two years later, the now-married twenty-eight-year-old, would receive a letter that might have begun “Greetings, your friends and neighbors….” Drafting a married, twenty-eight-year-old missing an entire row of ribs and vertebrae they attached to should tell you how dire the situation was in late 1943.

I remember sitting as a family in front of our black and white television on a Sunday evening, December 3, 1961. Walter Cronkite was the narrator of the CBS documentary program, The Twentieth Century. On this particular night, the Sunday prior to the fifteenth anniversary of the Pearl Harbor attack, we sat as a family watching and listening.

The episode was “The Man Who Spied on Pearl Harbor” and Cronkite’s distinctive voice narrated the black and white action scenes, some made as the attack occurred, most staged for propaganda use during the war itself, as we remembered Pearl Harbor…and as I remember that night in 1961.

Over the years my thirst for knowledge about Pearl Harbor and my father’s war has caused me to read, watch or listen to almost every available documentary, book, movie or interview about Pearl Harbor specifically and World War Two generally. Thankfully I had access to the History Channel when it actually aired programs about history rather than programing about Alaskan truck drivers or pawn shops. I continue to remember Pearl Harbor, the men who lived it, died during the attack, the ships that were sunk, some later resurrected…and my father who was thousands of miles away at the time.

I have never outgrown my interest in World War Two movies seen repeatedly over again, especially those taking place in the Pacific Theater, the theater my father said he didn’t fight in. “What did you do in the war, Daddy?” “Son, I was so far away from the fighting the nurses went in before we did.” His admission did not deter my interest in …or my pride.

My favorite movies were movies involving Pearl Harbor on the periphery, not quite the center stage like “Tora, Tora, Tora.” Instead, it was  Fred Zimmerman’s “From Here to Eternity”, John Ford’s “They Were Expendable” and my absolute favorite, Otto Preminger’s “In Harm’s Way.”

A line from “in Harm’s Way” has always stuck in my head.  It was uttered by Henry Fonda  portraying Admiral Chester Nimitz, “On the most exalted throne in the world, we are seated on nothing but our own arse.” Good words to remember.

The featured image I used is a colorized picture of the iconic USS Arizona burning after the attack.  I met a survivor of the attack in the late Seventies.  A career Navy man he had “joined” up after during the War to End All Wars as an eighteen-year-old and served for thirty years.  He served in dozens of Pacific stations from China to San Diego.  One of those ports was on board the USS Arizona. 

 Among his many duties was manning an anti-aircraft gun.  He never got the opportunity.  Providence intervened that day.  Off duty, he met a friend ashore and watched helplessly as 1,177 of his shipmates and ship were sent to glory.  Despite the life, he was able to live…to create, he never quite forgave himself for surviving.

As I’ve gotten older and a bit of a peacenik, I find myself watching less the movies about the valor and courage of our fighting men and more about the periphery, the politics, our own cruelties…which are simply the cruelties of war itself.

I hope we continue to “Remember Pearl Harbor” and the generation characterized by Tom Brokaw as the “Greatest Generation”. We need to remember the sacrifices they made in our last righteous war before the concepts of good versus evil became so blurred during the Cold War and in the Middle East.

For more of Don Miller’s unique views of life, humor and Southern stories of a bygone time, try http://goo.gl/lomuQf

RIVER WALK-IN HONOR OF OLIN GRIFFIN WHO PASSED EARLIER THIS WEEK

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The un-named river road by my home, one of several river roads in the area which bore no sign, was a twisting affair that eventually ended up on the banks of the Catawba. To a four or five-year-old the road seemed longer than the Great Wall of China; however, in reality, the path was probably no more than three miles, if that. The Catawba was wide, wild and strewn with boulders. Hundreds of ducks crowded a feeder branch and would rest on the banks or float lazily on the water. My guess is today it would look pretty much the same…except maybe not as wild as I thought, rather slow moving. Back then the city of Rock Hill could be seen on the distant bank across the water. Now the city seems to have crept across the water, invading our side and displacing the ducks.

The river road began at my home and meandered through fields and pasture land, gradually rising, until it reached the hill where the old Collin’s house and barn sat. Then it would rapidly fall through a mixed forest down to the banks of the Catawba. There were many other dirt paths off the river road and my four-year-old self was concerned that we might become lost.

At some forgotten moment in the mid-50’s much of this land would become the possession of H. L. Bowers who began his working career as a carpenter’s helper for my Uncle Hugh Wilson. Later Mr. Bowers invented a process that would reclaim cotton from cotton waste. This process made him a millionaire several times over. He would purchase more than seven hundred acres of land from my grands and my uncles, Banks Griffin and Hugh Wilson, along with several other land owners. Despite his wealth, he was still a country man. I remember many times seeing him bouncing along his pastures in his always brand new Cadillac. With that abuse, those Caddies didn’t stay new very long which is why he purchased the latest model every year. I would guess you would need to purchase often if you treated your Coupe Deville like a GMC quarter ton.
The day was bright and glorious like all days when you are four. The river road still split my grandparent’s land and Mr. Bower’s overseer, Roddy McCorkle and his family, had not yet moved into the old Collin’s place that sat on the highest hill overlooking what would later become a twenty-five acre lake. PawPaw’s corn field and cotton patch were still on the south side of the road and the pasture, watermelon and tomato patches were up hill to the north. Many of my days were spent carrying water to those tomato and watermelons using a pail dipped in the small stream that “sometimes” ran through the property. Later in the fall, watermelons would be placed in the stream to cool and provide a sweet snack late in the day. Farther on down the road sitting off in the woods to the north was a sawmill that PawPaw and his brother Banks ran in the winter to supplement the household income.

I have no idea what possessed my Uncle Olin and Cousin Hall to take me along on a hike to the river. I was a little thing, no more than four. For all I know my grandmother may have paid them to take me just to get me out of her hair. Olin, my mother’s brother, was a tall lanky kid with bushy curly hair–tall as in six-foot-forever to a four-year-old. Hall was the son of Aunt Bess, my grandmother’s sister who lived just up the road from us and whose family ran the general store and cotton gin. Hall Junior was much shorter and sturdier-looking than Olin. Hall, known as Junior during this early life, sported a GI crew cut that he wore until he died. Olin would go off to Clemson College taking advantage of the school’s ROTC program in the hopes of becoming a Navy pilot. His dream would be thwarted by color blindness, consequently, he was forced to serve as an officer in the “blue water” Navy. Hall would join the Army and earn paratrooper wings so one of them got to fly…sort of, I guess. Somewhere in my mind is a snapshot of Olin in dress Navy whites along with a very attractive young nurse also in dress whites. They sure were young…and in love. That young nurse, Gayle Miller, in a fit of insanity, agreed to marry him and fifty years or so later they must still be in love as Gayle somehow has tolerated “Big O.”

They were no more than seniors in high school themselves; well, Olin might have been a freshman at Clemson at the time. Anyway, to me they seemed like Greek gods who had come down from Olympus to put me on their shoulders and carry me to the river, at least on the trip back. Mainly I would ride on Hall’s shoulders because Olin’s shoulders were way too far off of the ground for me to be comfortable. I am sure that I wore out poor Hall but no way was I going to climb Mt. Olin and ride him home. Even today I still get a nosebleed standing on a short ladder.

Hall and Olin were a happy pair, full of LOUD AND EAR-PIERCING laughter that accompanied every story they told and they told a lot of stories. I don’t remember much but do remember stories of catfishing, frog gigging and buzzards. No…no one ate a buzzard but someone, whose initials were Olin Griffin, got a nickname for illegally shooting some, I do declare. On a low bluff we paused to rest before making the trip back home. Both guys became a little more serious as they talked about Indian graves and battles that occurred between the Catawbas and the Cherokee. They told stories that included ghosts and long-dead Indian warriors, stories that might have been intended to scare a four-year-old. That bluff was quiet and a bit eerie. Years later when friends and I would go camping and would tell our own ghost stories, the bluff was still kind of creepy. But…I am sure there are no such things as ghosts.

When I was nine, my grandfather died. It was a gray, cool and misty day, both outdoors and inside of my head. I was sick and can remember my father joining me on the couch to tell me the bad news. My grandfather’s memory would haunt me for the next several months. In fact, that next fall, before school began, I slowly peddled my Schwinn Phantom toward the now named “Bower’s place”, past the cornfield of my grandfathers. It seemed to be a lonely field because it had been left unplanted. I felt a bit of despair and started to shed a tear or five until I looked up and saw a figure in the middle of the field waving at me! He looked a lot like my dead grandfather! For some strange reason, at that moment, my mood lightened. Then the figure dimmed and disappeared. Even though he seemed to just vanish into thin air…I am still not sure there are no such things as ghosts.

When I was older I would end up working those same river bottoms for my Uncle James and then later for Mr. Bowers. Whether I was baling hay or hoeing and pulling corn, there was never a time that I didn’t think about that “River Walk” with my uncle and cousin when I found myself on the banks of the Catawba. Sadly, Hall has passed on and left us now. I called Olin and Gayle last week. They are happy as clams and both much stronger than their age. Their kids and grandkids are close by in the Commonwealth of Virginia. I want take a trip to visit soon, to see them in person. Olin still has that loud and piercing laugh which I was so glad to hear again. As I listened to the familiar laugh which took me back in time, I realized that I need to remind Olin of the River Walk. Also, I feel an especially strong urge to tell him the story about his dad. I wonder if Olin believes in ghosts.

MRS. SARA PAYNE

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I spent four years with the “legendary” Mrs. Sara Payne and despite thinking of her often, I never saw her once I left Greenville High School almost thirty years ago. I was so sorry to hear of her passing. In a book, “Winning Was Never the Only Thing…”, I wrote a story about a moment in my life when Mrs. Payne proved to me how uplifting one moment of kindness can be. I doubt she knew and am sorry I never took the opportunity to tell her. Here is an excerpt from that story.

“The one person unintimidated by Sam Wiley was Mrs. Sara Payne. It seemed that Mrs. Sara Payne had been at Greenville High forever plus one day. In 1981 she became the South Carolina State Teacher of the Year which helped to fuel my own intimidation of her. I was not in a small group. Even before she garnered her teacher of the year award it seemed her name was already legendary. To me, she was the most intimidating person at Greenville High, even more so than Sam. Maybe the most intimidating person I had ever met. Anytime her name was mentioned it seemed that hushed, reverent tones were used, and I fully expected to hear Gothic organ music playing in the background. A mentoring teacher once told me that the key to successful classroom discipline was never to smile until after Christmas. Mrs. Sara Payne must have had the same mentor and must have listened better than I did. She had the successful classroom discipline associated with Catholic priests during the Inquisition. Well, there was the Great Mouse Invasion.

Mrs. Sara Payne was terrified of mice. After a mouse was seen in her classroom, she exited, moved her classes to the library and refused to return until the little intruder was caught. Someone decided he had a plan that would, by disrupting class, create less time spent in Mrs. Sara Payne’s Senior English Class. This someone began to release lab mice into Mrs. Sara Payne’s classroom. It worked for a while until one was finally caught. It was white, and then another was caught and it was white with brown spots, and then another, well just say a bunch were caught, none of which were the traditional “mousy” color. Resembling pets more than vermin, public outcry put an end to this rodent holocaust. We never found who “someone” was but thankfully he or she caved to the public sympathy for lab rats.

Mrs. Sara Payne and Sam Wiley took to each other like…well they did not take to each other at all. If Mrs. Payne had used the traditional fine southern feminist curse “Bless Your Heart”, she would have used it a lot and Sam just used …well I don’t know because I tried to stay away from him but I am sure it involved the word ‘bitch.’ His “stirring of the pot” caused the tension and the pressure to increase, not only in my little athletic world but all around the school. I believe we all knew what it felt like to be a green bean in a pressure cooker. The pressure would finally get the best of the normally stoic Mrs. Sara Payne when Sam began to remove the ancient flora from Greenville High School.

In the quadrangle that Greenville Senior High was built around were roses. Many had been placed there in honor of alumni who had passed away. They were the first to go. Sam’s reasoning was that it took too much man power to maintain them. I agree that you could designate one custodian to care for the roses and it would have been a full time job, but could you not allow family members to care for them or at the very least come collect them? Could you not request volunteers to care for them? NO, you just had them pulled up and dumped in the trash. The alumni association along with Mrs. Sara Payne was livid but could do nothing about the roses because it was too late. In the spring of 1986, the American Holly “bushes” became a different story.

What is the difference between a holly bush and an American Holly Tree? I never really knew, but it was a question Sam should have asked before he decided to cut down all of the American Holly trees on the campus of Greenville Senior High. It began his slippery slide into…retirement. Holly bushes can be used as hedges, trimmed, shaped or destroyed. American Holly Trees can grow to be over thirty feet high and attain ages in excess of one hundred years old and cannot be cut down if they are on a historic site. Guess which ones were at Greenville Senior High? Greenville Senior High School was built in the 1930s and is a historic site. This meant these trees were over fifty years old and of as much historical significance as was the school. Sam decided that he would have them cut down to create less work for the custodial staff. Instead he stirred up an angry hornet’s nest, led by Mrs. Sara Payne. Mrs. Sara Payne had had enough and called in the alumni association and every tree hugger in Greenville County. Greenville Senior High School is now over eighty years old. So are the trees. They stayed. Sam did not last through the summer of 1986.

After a particularly grueling “dosey doe” with Sam over a miscue by a wrestling coach and another letter to be put in my folder, I trudged into the library to find my driver’s education students. I found them, along with Mrs. Sara Payne and her class. It must have been during the mouse holocaust. As I went to the second floor of the library, I paused at the top of the stairs reflecting on the invisible weight I had just carried to get up there. I felt a hand touch my elbow and turned to find Mrs. Sara Payne staring into my face with something I had never seen before: a smile. Blessedly before I said something unintelligible she said, “Keep the faith, it will be over soon and I am not talking about you.” All I could do was nod. I did not realize that Mrs. Sara Payne even knew I was alive. I began to think of her as simply Mrs. Payne.
Rest well Mrs. Payne.