World News – USA – COMMENT: Pearl Harbor Day: A memory runs out

May all sailors and Marines on the Arizona rest in peace and be duly honored on this day.

Harley and Mary Miller celebrated their wedding anniversary on December at their farm in Marysville, Ohio. 7, 1941. But they could not fully enjoy the occasion because their two sons were in danger – as sailors on the USS Arizona in Pearl Harbor.

The Millers were devastated to learn that Arizona sank in just nine minutes after its hull was ripped open by a Japanese torpedo bomb. The wreck remains the water grave for 1. 177 Sailors and Marines, including the Miller boys.

On that fateful day, there was a second group of Ohio Brothers in Arizona who, as President Franklin Roosevelt said, “will live in shame. « My family had a connection with this second group of brothers – our first house on 1629 Clio Avenue in Cincinnati was bought by the boys’ father.

My parents took me home from the hospital on Clio Avenue in 1939. Ironically, I would be the only member of the family keeping the history of the house. My mother must have mentioned the tie several times in my childhood – and only after we moved into another house.

Years later – when I was in my sixties and seventies and from time to time a picture of Arizona sank on television – this haunting memory was of living in a house whose owner « lost his two sons in Arizona. » Would show up. By then my parents and brother had died, and my older sister Dorothy had no such memory. I started to doubt myself.

But fate would ensure that 1629 Clio Avenue’s connection with Pearl Harbor would be maintained. Because it was my sister Mark’s son who was sent to Honolulu on a business trip – and who emailed me a photo of the Pearl Harbor Memorial. This had to be more than a fluke, and I decided to find out once and for all around 1629 Clio.

Computers and modern databases enable each of us to be detectives who solve puzzles. I first have a list of the 1. 177 seafarers searched who died in December. 7, 1941, looking for two identical last names with Ohio as their home state.

There were only two such sets, Miller and Keniston. The Miller’s chase only brought me back to the farm in Marysville, Ohio. « Keniston » was my last hope. My parents bought the house in 1935, so I downloaded the 1934 Cincinnati Telephone Directory. And there it was: “Keniston, Howard, 1629 Clio Avenue. ”

Confirmation came when I went to the Facebook page for the local cemetery near Clio Avenue. They had a photo of Howard Keniston’s headstone – he had died in 1985 – that read, “Sons, Kenneth and Donald, died in December. 7, 1941, on the USS Arizona. ”

The moral of this story is that if you have a very vague memory – you’re not sure if something happened or not – but it’s something important, don’t make it go away. Don’t make it go away. And may Howard Keniston and his two sons – and all sailors and marines on the Arizona – rest in peace and be duly honored that day.

The United States League of Women Voters would rather silence the votes of women than see them help Republicans.

It’s hard to rejoice at the idea that Joe Biden’s top printing operation is done for women only.

Attack on Pearl Harbor, USS Arizona, Infamy Speech, Franklin D. . Roosevelt