Episode 56: Pearl Harbor Aviation Museum

📅 A Date Which Will Live in Infamy
Today, we reflect on December 7, 1941—a date that will live in infamy. On this day, the United States of America was suddenly and deliberately attacked by the naval and air forces of the Empire of Japan. With Amanda Sheley as our guide, we delve into the attack on Pearl Harbor at the Pearl Harbor Aviation Museum in Hawaii.  Join us as we uncover the reality of the attack, which extended beyond Pearl Harbor to multiple airfields on Oahu. We examine the circumstances that both aided and hindered the response of U.S. forces, including chaotic communication efforts, technological limitations, and human errors. 

 🤝 Unsung Heroes
Amidst this chaos, unsung heroes emerge, such as in the Niʻihau Incident where a native Hawaiian woman played a crucial role in what became the first battle of WWII.  We also highlight the rallying of local communities to support the war effort, exemplified by the model airplane project in which students meticulously crafted 500,000 exact models to train soldiers in field identification.  Additionally, we discuss the tragic fate of three men who were trapped underwater with no hope of rescue for over two weeks aboard the sunken USS West Virginia. 

🎖️ Heroism and Impact
This episode delves into stories of true heroism in the face of adversity and explores the profound and lasting impact Pearl Harbor had on world history. Please note, this episode contains depictions of death and may not be suitable for all listeners.

 🔗  Episode Links
Pearl Harbor Aviation Museum: https://www.pearlharboraviationmuseum.org

Day of Infamy Speech: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Day_of_Infamy_speech

Transcript

Speaker 1: 0:00

that this was a land battle on US soil, the first one of World War II, the only one of World War II on land, and it was won by a Native Hawaiian woman. Hi, I'm Ayla Sparks, and this is Curator's Choice, a podcast for history nerds and museum lovers, from ancient relics to modern marvels. Each episode of the show features a new museum and a curator's choice of some amazing artifacts housed there. These guardians of history will share insights, anecdotes and the often untold stories that breathe life into the artifacts they protect. Thanks for tuning in to this Mighty Oak Media production and enjoy the show. Have that you're doing? Yeah, I am.

Speaker 1: 0:43

Technically, the collections manager is my official position, so my specialty is in object care. We have a really diverse collection here. It ranges from bombs to airplanes. We've got uniforms and medals, and then we also have an enormous, as you can see, behind me we have a huge library that contains tens of thousands of archival materials, photographs, maps, books. There's just an insanely large collection here at this museum and it's all focused on the attack of December 7th. Obviously is the beginning, but we also focus on all the battles in the Pacific region that come afterwards, so really just trying to piece together all the puzzle pieces of World War II in the Pacific. So we hear a lot about the European theater during World War II, but the Pacific theater had a ginormous impact as well in the war. So we tried to educate, inspire future generations, all of that.

Speaker 1: 1:41

When it comes to Pacific, most people are fairly familiar with Pearl Harbor, especially if you are any kind of history person. But can you give us like a SparkNotes version of Pearl Harbor, like Pearl Harbor in a nutshell? Yes, not the easiest task. It's definitely not an easy task. So at 7.55 in the morning on December 7th 1941, we got attacks here at Pearl Harbor, the island of Oahu, by Japanese Navy forces. Their aircraft carrier pulled up and all of their airplanes came over. And they didn't just attack Pearl Harbor, which is one little section of Oahu area, but they also did all of our airfields. So they attacked all the airfields all around Oahu and tried to keep all of our planes on the ground so that they can destroy our fleet, so all of our ships. They wanted to destroy everything and then leave. They didn't want to battle. So they were trying to keep all of our airplanes on the ground. So they went to all of our airfields shot up, all of our planes sunk. All of our planes sunk, all of our ships, and then they took off. Then they came back for a second wave and did it again. This went and destroyed everything and by that time all of our pilots were starting to catch on, they were starting to catch up and get in the air. So the guys, they went back to their carrier and they took off. They were supposed to do a third wave, but since we had awakened and we were starting to fight back, they decided not to do a third wave.

Speaker 1: 3:06

What was the presence of the US on Oahu to begin with, like why was it such a strategic place and why did we have so much of our force there? So it is, you know, about halfway between us and Japan, so it was a very advantageous area for our fleet to be. There's also a lot of resources in the Pacific, all the islands and things that Japan wanted control over. They were attacking and going through and trying to take all these islands, and so us being on Hawaii was very advantageous for us. So we wanted to make sure we had that presence and that we were close enough that we could strike back.

Speaker 1: 3:43

So I'm curious particularly about our communications because obviously I wasn't around back then, people couldn't just pull out a cell phone and immediately call, and the fact that they were able to do a second wave. I figure it's probably just mass chaos trying to get the information out that this is happening. And, like you said, it wasn't like they just bombed one place. They did quite a few areas. So what was the communication madness happening? And obviously we got to a point where we had spread the word enough that they couldn't do that third wave. But I'm just imagining these poor communications guys just losing it. Yeah, it was pretty messy. We had a couple of things that held us back and a couple of things that gave us advantages as far as communication goes. One of the things that we us back and a couple of things that gave us advantages as far as communication goes.

Speaker 1: 4:25

One of the things that we made a mistake on was our radar guys. Up in the north area of Oahu we had a big radar station. It was new technology. The guys there didn't really know how to use it effectively, I guess I would say. So when the plane started showing up from the Japanese carrier, we saw them on the radar and the guys didn't really know what they were. Looking at this new technology, they're looking at it in confusion. And so they call up their superiors and they're like, hey, we see some planes coming towards Oahu and they're like, well, you know what are you seeing, what's there? And they're like, well, I'm not really sure, we just know there's something coming towards us. So they were told don't worry about it. And that's an exact quote don't worry about it, because they were expecting a group of B-17s that were being ferried from California. So they were expecting a few planes to come through. So when they saw them on the radar, they said don't worry about it. So the planes came in without any kind of warning or concern.

Speaker 1: 5:23

And then also, another thing that held us back was that the night before there was a lot of parties, a lot of things going on down in the downtown area, so all the sailors had been out drinking, partying. So on Sunday morning there wasn't a lot of people at their stations. So when they hit us we were completely unaware. So there's a few of the famous pilots who got up in the air that morning were actually in their pajamas still when they got into their planes. There was one field that didn't actually get hit and that was something that was lucky for us. They didn't know about Haleiwa. It's a little airfield up in the North Shore, so they had no idea that that was there. So our guys jumped in their cars they knew that it wasn't getting hit by bombs, so they booked it up to Haleiwa, jumped in some planes and took off. So that was one advantage that we had, that the Japanese were unaware of the first, I guess, wave of attack. It only lasted like 75 minutes or a little over an hour. Right, yeah, it was pretty quick. They had a plan, they knew what they were doing and they just went for it. They just showed up, dropped their bombs and then took off. So they all came together all in one big group and once they hit Oahu they kind of branched out and all went in different directions.

Speaker 1: 6:37

The decision to attack Pearl Harbor obviously was a very pivotal point, the point of the US really formally entering into the war. Before then I feel like the US was kind of helping as much as they can without officially saying they're in it. And the plan seemed from Japanese side to kind of attack once and hard hit one of their main areas. Then they'll just kind of back off and had exactly the opposite effect. Why did they think it was going to work? So they actually thought that our entire fleet was going to be here. So they expected every single carrier ship everything that we had to be here. So we got lucky. That was one of the things that was advantageous for us. There were some carriers and some things that were not in our harbor that they were unable to sink, which was really lucky. So that means that after they were done and they went home, we still had resources. We didn't have to start from scratch. We also were able to fix some of the things that they took down. So our fleet was not crippled like they expected, because if they had done what they had set out to do in the full extent, there's no way we could have hit them back.

Speaker 1: 7:54

That airfield up in Haleiwa. It had a lot of airplanes. It had a lot of resources and materials that we were able to use later on as well. They also missed a water tower that I mean. That seems like a silly thing, right, it's just a little water tower. The pilots saw this water tower and they thought that it was a religious temple because of the way that it was designed. They decided not to hit it because they didn't want that kind of war. They just wanted to sink our ship, right. So they just wanted to disable us, so they didn't want to have a war on our religion, basically. So they saw a religious temple. They didn't bomb it, they didn't destroy it, and this water tower played a pivotal role in putting out the fires so that way we could keep our fleet working and repair things without it burning all the way to the ground. So that was a huge advantage for us.

Speaker 1: 8:49

So, yeah, a few things happened that kept them from being successful in that, and I think that we probably would never have recovered if they had gotten our entire fleet. Is it purely by chance that they didn't get our entire fleet, or were there times? If they would have hit during the proper time, then they actually would have been successful? It was by chance. So there were times when we had our entire fleet here. We didn't think that they would ever even challenge coming here. We thought we were good to go.

Speaker 1: 9:13

Actually, all of our planes were lined up on the flight lines and stuff because we were so terrified of espionage and stuff. Because we were so terrified of espionage which you know a spy coming in and infiltrating from the ground that we had all of our planes lined up and squished together outside so they were easy targets. So that way they were able to take down all of our planes with a quickness. So they were worried about the espionage. So they kept the planes together. Yeah, so that way we could see people coming in rather than having it all spread out and in like under buildings and things like that. We had people who were watching from the outside so we were watching. So basically they had a herd and they kept them all together so they could keep watch. But it just kind of created an issue.

Speaker 1: 9:54

We also in our harbor. Our harbor is only 40 feet deep, so that is not deep enough for a normal torpedo to hit. So we thought that our harbor was safe from torpedoes. A normal torpedo would go down and before it levels out it goes down really deep, way below 40 feet. So our boats would sit here. Torpedoes would go down and hit the dirt and would never make it to a boat. So we thought we were good to go if somebody were to hit us with torpedoes. The Japanese knew this, so they discovered a way to make torpedoes go down about 30 feet level out and hit our ships. So that was another way that they got us unsuspecting was being able to hit us in that way.

Speaker 1: 10:34

What was on the ground happening after the bombings happened and we were trying to recoup? What did that look like on the ground at Pearl Harbor? An absolute disaster. So here on Fort Island we called this the eye of the hurricane. Here we're, a little island surrounded by Pearl Harbor, right? So ships were all around us, they were sinking, they were on fire, there was oil burning in the harbor and there were men everywhere trapped inside of the ships. We had guys trying to get them out, trying to rescue them. We had a clinic set up here on Ford Island where we were bringing people out of the water and trying to help them medically.

Speaker 1: 11:13

There were people all over the island so confused they didn't know what to do, they couldn't hear, they couldn't talk to their husbands who were all here. I mean, the men went to work that morning and never came back, right? So they just didn't know where their husbands had gone. The women were just terrified, didn't know what to do. There were blackouts enforced, so we were terrified that they were going to come back. So the whole island was put on blacklight, right. So as soon as it turns dark, nobody could turn any lights on. Everything was blacked out. That way, if a plane were to fly over, they wouldn't even see the island at all. It was kind of that was the hope, right, that we were hiding. In plain sight. Martial law was enforced where we had ration tickets, because being out here in the middle of nowhere there's not a lot of resources all of a sudden. So this place was completely locked down and everybody was very scared. So a lot of people were hurt, a lot of soldiers not knowing what to do, where to go next, being on high alert. It was pure chaos, yeah, definitely. And then the next day we declared a war. That day, like you know, like our president said, we'll live on infamy, and it has.

Speaker 1: 12:27

But when people come to the museum, what can they expect to learn about and what will they see when they come and visit? So our museum is focused on the stories, so we really humanize everything rather than talking about the aircraft themselves. I know a lot of aviation museums you go to. They talk about the airplanes and all about them. Well, here we talk about the stories that go with those airplanes, so the connections. You know who flew this airplane and why was it significant and what was their story and what happened to them. So that is a huge part, and that's actually one of my artifacts that I wanted to bring in today was an aircraft and its story, because that's what we're all about. It's the story of educating people in the future, because no matter who started it, no matter who finished it, war is bad, war is terrible and it doesn't make anybody feel good. We're all about teaching that to the future generation so that people can see like this is no positive thing in any light, no matter who won the war, and see like this is no positive thing in any light, no matter who won the war, it was still horrific.

Speaker 1: 13:26

So what is the aircraft that has the story? So it's an airplane called the Japanese Zero. So we have all three of the types of aircraft that attacked us that morning the Japanese showed up with three different it was the Kate Bomber, the Zero, which was a fighter, and the Val, which was also a bomber. So we have all three of those types of aircraft and one of them is the Japanese Zero which crash-landed on the island of Niihau that morning. So very significant aircraft with a wild story, a very crazy event that not a lot of people have heard about. Have you heard about the Niihau incident? No, okay, it's a great story, all right.

Speaker 1: 14:02

So the artifact itself, the Japanese zero, is a loan from the Robinson family. This family owns the island of Niihau. It's a privately owned island up at the tip of the Hawaiian Islands. So we're kind of like a chain right the Hawaiian Island chains, and up at the top is the island of Niihau. Very small and it's privately owned, so you can't just show up and go there. It's really secret-y. They own it. They're loaning it to us so that we can put it on display and share the story.

Speaker 1: 14:29

So on the morning of December 7th, the pilots who took off that morning were told if you find that you're not going to be able to make it back to our carrier, we have an island which is uninhabited that you can land on and we will send a rescue team to come and get you. So that was kind of their emergency backup plan, right. Like, oh, you got hit by bullets and now you're leaking fuel so you're not going to be able to make it back to the carrier. Or, oh, you're wounded and you know you need to land for whatever reason. So they were told to make it to Niihau. So only one pilot made it to Niihau and landed. It was a crash landing. He jumped out of his plane and he immediately realized that it was not uninhabited. There were Native Hawaiians living there and they had not yet heard about the attack.

Speaker 1: 15:14

So these people saw this pilot. They had no idea why he was there. They didn't take complete alarm, you know, they weren't terrified, they just took his weapons. But they didn't imprison him or anything like that. They did have a Japanese resident there who came in and was interpreting for them. So over the course of the night this pilot his name was Nishikaiichi talks to his interpreter and convinced him to help him. So this interpreter's name was Harada.

Speaker 1: 15:43

These two broke out. They went to the plane. They set it on fire so that the plane was no longer something that we could study. It was really high technology. So he was like we got to burn it so that nobody can study it in America, right? So they burned the plane and they took hostages, and these hostages' name was Ben and Ella Kanahele. They were native Hawaiians who was born and raised on Ni'ihau, and these two did not take very kindly to being hostages, so they started a fight, they got into a tussle and Ben Kanahele got shot three times so he was wounded not, he wasn't dead yet, but he was wounded and his wife grabbed a large rock and bashed it over the head of the pilot, nishikaichi, and she killed him. So then Harada, his helper, realized that he had just performed treason, so he committed suicide. So in the end Ben Kanahele got the Purple Heart and the Medal of Merit and his wife did not get anything.

Speaker 1: 16:45

The lead up, right, I know, I know. So this was a huge deal, right, that this was a land battle on US soil, the first one of World War II, the only one of World War II on land, and it was won by a Native Hawaiian woman. It was kind of a special thing. Wow, that's such a good story. Yes, it is, and you have the now flamed out one.

Speaker 1: 17:16

We do have the plane. It is not at all restored. It's in all the pieces. He torched it, so it's all charred and the pieces are all there, though. So we have it in an exhibit set up to look like it's in a field, just like as if he had crash-landed and it was sitting where it originally had been. We also have with the exhibit a tractor that he had found in the field and used to get to a boat ramp.

Speaker 1: 17:38

It's a pretty cool exhibit. It's a very cool exhibit. It's a very cool artisans with a really rich story on it. But yeah, and I don't think that, you know, if there wasn't anybody there, if he hadn't died, there would not have been a rescue team to come and get him. So it's a very interesting idea to think about what would have happened if it had been uninhabited, such as what the Japanese thought it was. So really interesting. Yeah, that was a really good one.

Speaker 1: 18:01

Yeah, and for the exhibit, is it inside? It must be outside in a field. It's inside. No, we've got it inside. Yeah, we just got it in a big area where we've got like some fake dirt and that kind of thing to make it look like it. But it's a beautiful exhibit and a really fascinating story that I don't think that it's talked about enough. Because it is, that's a really good one.

Speaker 1: 18:23

Yeah, I'm curious. I have never, like I said, I've never been, so I know that in a lot of images that I've seen online, there's the large tower, the red and white tower, and then a really long then this might be a different museum the long white over the water building. Oh, okay, yeah, so that is the USS Arizona Memorial. So underneath that big, long white thing, that is the ship itself. It's still under the water there and there are still people inside. We never recovered the bodies. They went down with the ship and are buried there, so to speak. People go, it's free to go. You just have to reserve your spot. The ferry will take people out to it and you can go and pay respects and put lay on the water. There's pictures, of course, but it's a really beautiful and moving memorial for the ship underneath and the floor is made out of glass so you can see down inside and see the ship under the water Very cool.

Speaker 1: 19:24

So obviously you have some really great plane remains. What are some of the other things that people can see when they come through? So, let's see, we've got 50 different aircraft and it actually ranges from pre-World War II all the way through to, I believe, 2018 is the newest plane we have. Oh, wow. But everything has connections to the Pacific region is why we keep things, not World War II. So it's all about our involvement in Hawaii and what we have to do with war and with aircraft and aviation and the evolution over time of aircraft technology. It goes from fabric-covered wings and biplanes all the way up to super-fast jets that can go like three times the sound barriers.

Speaker 1: 20:07

What was the other artifact that you wanted to share? So this one is on the completely different side of the spectrum of the types of collections we have here. So we have a very diverse collection. One of the things that I am in charge of is our archival collection. So we have the ginormous library, a whole bunch of archives, and I have a huge box full of just one collection of material that comes from a project called the Model Airplane Project. This is another one that not a lot of people have heard about, and I hadn't heard about it until the collection actually came to us. It's really incredible. The box is full of archival material, including blueprints, the models themselves, instruction booklets, manuals, logs of students who worked on it and different inspections.

Speaker 1: 20:54

It's a huge project that they rolled out right when we started the war, right when we joined. So right before it happened, our leaders recognized that war was on our doorstep. We were about to join, whether we liked it or not, right. So they wanted to prepare for it. They wanted to train more soldiers, more sailors, get more people ready for what was inevitably coming. So they sent a request to the Office of Education asking for collaboration, and what resulted was a huge project that helped high schoolers get involved and helped them put their mark on the war effort Because that was what it was all about during World War II is how can you help?

Speaker 1: 21:33

How can you get involved? What can you do? So there was all kinds of ways right. People did the victory gardens, people donated aluminum, some people were like women were joining the air forces. There were all kinds of different things that people could do.

Speaker 1: 21:47

So one of them was this model aircraft project, and it was where they wanted students to create model airplanes that were exactly like the airplanes that were currently being flown. So they had 50 different aircraft models ranging from six different countries. It included both Allied and Axis countries. We created blueprints for those models, handed them out to the students and told them make this out of wood. It's just a blueprint showing all the different sides of an airplane and what it looked like and its exact dimensions. So these kids who were in shop class would basically figure it out, figure out how to build it, and then they would have to undergo really strict inspection to make sure that it was within one thirty second of an inch. So, like I mean, it had to be perfect. It was basically the military's rule.

Speaker 1: 22:35

They wanted 500,000 of these. That's very ambitious. For what? So they would take these models and they would put them 35 feet away and if you look at it from 35 feet away it looks exactly as a real airplane would from half a mile away. So they could look at this airplane and they could start figuring out airplane recognition, like what kind of airplane is that? If I see this thing 35 feet away, it's actually an airplane half a mile away and it's a real airplane, right? So that way you know if you're looking at a bomber or a fighter, what country it's from, where their guns are going to be located, all of that kind of thing. They would train them all about the whole ins and outs workings of the aircraft and that would give them real-life experience. Practicing this is making me think of when you're taking, like, an ornithology class and you have to memorize the silhouette of the different birds and their wingspans. It's exactly the same thing. It was fascinating. It's a really wild project.

Speaker 1: 23:33

So there were probably hundreds of schools participating, thousands. So there were 6,000 school districts that participated in it. So each state was given a quota where they had to make sure that they reached it in order to meet the 500,000, right, like, how are we going to distribute this evenly, because some states are more populated than others? So each state got their own quota to reach. And do you have some of the actual models themselves? Yes, they're 80 some years old, but they're beautiful. Do you guys have any plans for, like, maybe creating projects for schools that are similar, where they can also make their own?

Speaker 1: 24:11

This collection just came in like two months ago, brand new. It's brand new, and it's been the excitement of the museum. Everybody's talking about it and we've been trying to figure out ways that we can publish it, that we can use it, we can educate people on it. We talk a lot about the different ways that people were involved in the war effort and now that we have this, we're really excited to share it and find ways to engage the public with it. So we have a really amazing piece of this collection that I just take it over. It's a whole list of all the students that participated and which planes they signed up for, and then next to it is a whole checklist of what part of the airplane they completed, when they completed it and whether or not they completed the inspection pass. It was so strict that not a lot of the students passed it.

Speaker 1: 24:56

Wow, who gave you this collection? The family of a teacher who participated donated this to us. They found it in the attic of someone who had passed away and they thought this is an interesting project that I've never heard of before. Let's see if a museum might want it. And when they first reached out to me, I almost declined because she said it was a large box of archival material and blueprints and I'm like that doesn't really sound super relevant. I'm not really sure if we can house something like that, but as I started doing research and finding out more, I thought this is a real gem. This is a treasure that needs to be protected and taken care of.

Speaker 1: 25:30

We were all really excited to bring it in and to show people. So in our research we found that mostly boys participated right, that's the whole thing and that would be the expectation, right, is that this was a boys club Model aircraft club even today would have mostly boys in it, right? So we didn't expect to find any girls' names on those logs, but we did. We found several girls' names on the log. It was really exciting because they all passed inspection. So there's one girl named Rose and when I first saw her name I'm like, yeah, we got a girl. You know this is great, and she passed inspection and then she signed up for another one and she did that one too. So she did multiple airplanes, passed inspection and obviously was really interested in it. These things took about 50 hours to complete. So that's a huge time commitment for a high schooler. Yeah, absolutely.

Speaker 1: 26:17

What kind of events do you guys host at the museum? So we actually just finished one of our biggest events of the year. We call it the biggest little air show. So every June, the first weekend of June, we host a bunch of RC plane flyers and that sounds kind of cute, right, like toy airplanes that use a remote control. No, but some of these are thousands and thousands, like they are legit little flying machines, exactly. It's incredible. They bring like F-22s, they bring World War II airplanes. I mean, these things are incredible and when you see them zooming around in the sky they really do look like the real thing.

Speaker 1: 26:54

This year it was all focused around Disney because we just opened a new exhibit called Walt Disney Studios in World War II. So this was a traveling exhibit that started with the Walt Disney Family Museum and we get to be the last host of this exhibit, so we're very excited about it. First time we've ever brought fine art in here, where you know usually everything is airplanes and it's a little gritty, and here it's a very different feel. So it's all about Disney and their involvement during World War II. We've got propaganda films, training films, cartoons from the era, lots of original drawings, that kind of thing. It's an insignia. So we've focused this whole event on Disney. Thousands of people coming, people dressed up in their Disney gear, with their ears, and then we did a showing out on a large field. We put a huge screen up in the middle of it and did a lawn showing of Lilo and Stitch. So that was kind of special. We do that every year. That's our big one. And then we also have our Love of Country Gala. So this one is a very different feel.

Speaker 1: 28:00

It's the first weekend of December, so it's to commemorate the attack on Pearl Harbor. So this last year 2023, it actually fell on December 7th itself, which made it very special, and we welcome in just a lot of people to come in and have a fancy dinner in our hangar surrounded by World War II aircraft. Then we have live performances, we do an auction, we have giveaways, all kinds of special stuff. So it's just a big fancy event where people like to dress up in black suit and tie attire and sit amongst all of these war heroes. We bring in a lot of World War II vets and honor them, that kind of thing. So that's another of our big events. That's awesome.

Speaker 1: 28:38

Thank you so much for agreeing to meet with me, amanda, and sharing some of these really cool stories that come with these artifacts. Good, I'm glad you enjoyed it. We have so many artifacts and I just thinking about this interview for weeks of like what kind of artifacts really show off the importance of this place? Because what we represent is very important and it's something that we can't forget. We don't want to pretend that it didn't happen and move on, because history repeats itself. Right, but when you come here, you can really feel it and you can really witness the pain and suffering that comes with war, and as a good reminder that we don't want to do this again, if we can help it. So our buildings actually still have bullet holes in them, in their windows, so you can see strafe marks on the concrete. You can see the bullet holes in the windows. All of these buildings were still here and it's just, it's an important reminder that it wasn't that long ago. It really wasn't.

Speaker 1: 29:35

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