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We are saddened to report that another of the veterans we met last fall during our Oklahoma World War II Stories series has died. Army Sergeant Alexander Mathews of Cache, Oklahoma, died of pneumonia on March 14, 2008 at the age of 88.
Mr. Mathews was a full-blood Pawnee indian, born in Pawnee, Oklahoma on May 11, 1919. He attended Haskell Institute before joining the Army and serving in the Phillipines. Mathews was one of almost 80,000 American and Filipino soldiers who became prisoners of war when the American General surrendered to the Japanese at Baatan, shortly after the start of World War II. Mathews and his fellow POW’s were forced to walk more than 70 miles to the Japanese prison camp, Camp O’Donnell. More than 10,000 of the prisoners died or were executed on the way, in what became known as the “Baatan Death March.”
Mathews was shuttled from camp to camp throughout the war, performing slave labor, and later being transported to Japan on the so-called “hell ships,” where prisoners endured inhumane treatment and unimaginable living conditions. Mathews spent the entire length of World War II, four and a half years, as a prisoner of war.
After the war, Mathews returned to the United States and began a career with the Bureau of Indian Affairs. He also served as Chairman of the Pawnee Tribe of Oklahoma. In his later years, he was a frequent speaker at schools in Oklahoma and the Pacific Northwest, where he discussed World War II and his experiences on the Baatan Death March as part of a Living History Project.
Mathews is survived by his wife, Joyce, and two sons and daughters from a previous marriage. 
(Above: Alexander Mathews looks over a gun at the 45th Infantry Division Museum in Oklahoma City. Mathews served in artillery in the U.S. Army. Below: Mathews during his interview with OETA’s Dick Pryor and Boots Kennedye on August 23, 2007 in Oklahoma City.)
“We had a good hospital”
November 14th
As stories are told about World War II one group is sometimes forgotten, but according to many veterans, they were the real heroes of the war: the medical units. Doctors, surgeons, dentists, nurses, all risked their own lives to save the lives of others. The survival rate during World War I was about 8%; during World War II it dropped to 4%; and one unit did even better - the 21st Evacuation Hospital from the University of Oklahoma.
Dr. Daniel Pearson was one of those doctors, having graduated from the University of Oklahoma Medical School in June, 1941. I met Dr. Pearson on August 24, 2007 at his office in south Dallas. Pearson told me that he had always planned on joining the Army if the U.S. went into war, but his draft board said they were going to take him as soon as he got through his internship (because of his low draft number), so he joined the 21st Evacuation Hospital.
“The Army had asked most medical schools to organize an affiliated hospital that could serve in the war and treat casualties,” said Dr. Pearson, ” so Oklahoma organized their’s as the 21st Evac Hospital. It probably started out with a dozen or more doctors from Oklahoma City, then it gradually grew from there.”
Dr. Pearson trained in the desert of California, expecting to go to North Africa, where General George Patton and his tank corps were operating, but the 21st was sent to the South Pacific, instead. Dr. Pearson set up a medical unit at Guadalcanal, several months after the invasion. “We took care of casualties that came in from the field,” said the soft-spoken Pearson. “About 2,000-3,000 patients. We were there (Guadalcanal) about 40 days. By that time we had finally pretty well filled up our quota and I think we rose to 46 doctors and about 60 administrators.”
Despite their training, the members of the 21st were not totally prepared for what they saw. “Everything we saw was trauma. Gunshots wounds and fragment wounds. In civilian life you don’t see too many casualties like that. When we got to Bougainville, especially, we had more destructive trauma.”
The 21st worked in tents, with 3 general surgical teams of 3 men to a team. In Bougainville, they worked on 12 tables, doing surgery underground to stay out of the line of fire. The operating room wasn’t actually dug into the ground, but was built up with walls, logs laid across and covered up with soil to make an “underground” room.
Dr. Pearson describes the conditions at Bougainville with one word: wet. “At Bougainville, on the side of the island where we were, average rainfall was 274 inches a year, so it rained every day. It would get up to 90, but not bad. We would sweat a lot, humid, and there were mosquitoes, lots of them, so we slept under nets,” Pearson said.
The unit was only 200-400 yards from the front lines at Bougainville, so the 21st got fresh battle casualties. Pearson remembers that the casualties came in so heavy that the surgical teams worked day and night for about three weeks, operating on all 12 tables.
After a little more than a year, the 21st went to Luzon, in the Phillipines. Once in the Phillipines, Pearson was sent to a small town named San Carlos, about 15 miles inland. There, he set up a hospital in a Catholic cathedral that was built in 1585, but not before giving the cathedral a thorough cleaning. “It was in good condition, and it looked like people had been kneeling on a ground floor, but actually it was bat manure (on the floor). There were bats all over the ceiling, live bats, so we drove about 7 vehicles, trucks and other vehicles, in there and left them running until they burned out all of their gas, hoping the fumes would drive the bats out. We scooped up the bat manure, raked it up and put in the trucks. We got seven truck tons of that bat manure out and hauled it off. Under the manure we found a beautiful tile floor,” Pearson said.
In San Carlos, there were about 400 cots in the cathedral and another 400-500 beds outside in tents. The 21st stayed in San Carlos for about 40 days before heading to the New Bilibid Prison, where they cared for survivors of Bataan. Pearson figures if he hadn’t joined the 21st he would have been among the Army soldiers sent to Bataan. He says many in his advanced officer training class at OU wound up there. “Close call. Yeah, close call,” Pearson told me.
Pearson stayed in touch with his family through mail and pictures. He left one daughter (Maureen) and his wife behind when he left for the South Pacific. Another daughter (Diana) was born while he was gone. He didn’t see her until she was nearly 3 years old.
Pearson says those sacrifices were just part of the job. “You have to accept it - just like life. You may not like it, but there is nothing you can do about it, so you just have to accept it. It’s an adjustment you make in your life.”
After the war, Pearson went into general practice in Perryton, Texas and later began practicing psychiatry, with an office in Dallas. Now, at the age of 93, Dr. Pearson still practices psychiatry 3 days a week. He says the worst part of war was being away from home for three years. The best part was taking care of people. “The best part,” Pearson recalled, “was that we could be a doctor.”
(above) Dr. Daniel B. Pearson with three of his children in his Dallas, Texas office. (l-r) Maureen, Daniel, Diana.
Thanks to Judy Kelley of the University of Oklahoma Health Sciences Center and Editor of OU Medicine for her invaluable assistance in the preparation of the story of Dr. Pearson and the “Fighting 21st.”
Until next time, Dick Pryor
(Dr. Daniel B. Pearson was profiled on the Oklahoma News Report on November 14, 2007. To see the story, click on “Videos” on this website and go to “OETA’s Dick Pryor interviews Oklahoma WWII veterans.)
“It’s the most difficult period of your life”
November 7th
Pendleton Woods remembers that he was in his dormitory at the University of Arkansas when somebody rushed down the hall and said that Pearl Harbor had been bombed. “We didn’t know what Pearl Harbor was,” he recalled, “and then we began listening to the radio, and that’s when it really hit us.”
Within hours the United States was entering World War II and by 1942 Woods had signed up for the Army Reserve. He remained stateside for about two years, but wound up in Germany, on the Belgian front, by October, 1944. Woods was there just in time for the Battle of the Bulge, but he missed most of the fighting.
On December 10, 1944, while on patrol behind German lines, Woods and seven others were cut off and surrounded by a German unit. Their squad leader was killed, another person was wounded, and the group of Americans was captured. So began Pen Woods’ 5-month ordeal as a prisoner of war.
The captives did what they could to stay warm, sharing one blanket to keep their feet warm, and huddling together in a boxcar on the way to a German prison camp. Woods spent 8 days on the boxcar, where he “celebrated” his 21st birthday. He spent Christmas of 1944 inside the walls of a German prison camp before being transported to a labor camp, where conditions were somewhat better.
Woods remembers that a soldier who had served time in a Pennsylvania penitentiary, Red Martin, taught him how to steal. “Red Martin and I had honest faces,” said Woods, “and when we’d steal stuff we’d blouse our trousers into our combat boots and put food there. The armpit is also good. You’d be surprised at how much food you can put under your armpit and get away with it.”
Martin gave Woods a nickname, “Steal ‘Em Blind Woods.” According to Woods, the name was a real compliment. “Don’t laugh,” he told me, “because that would be like Babe Ruth or Joe Louis calling you slugger, or in academic circles, it would be like an honorary degree. The nickname I got I got from a professional.”
(above) Corporal Pendleton Woods during World War II.
Woods finally escaped on Hitler’s birthday, April 20th, during Russian artillery fire that had the Germans pre-occupied. After five days, Woods and the others linked up with American soldiers near the Elbe River. Ironically, Woods’ prison bunkmate was Clarence Deal, who lives in Jones, Oklahoma. “Every day on April 20th, for some 60-odd years now,” said Woods, “I will call my prison bunkmate, or he will call me, wishing each other “Happy Hitler’s Birthday,” because that’s the day we got away from that prison camp.”
Woods believes that Germany’s biggest problem in the war was attacking Russia, because it forced the Nazis into a multi-front war. The Germans and Russians hated each other, he recalls, and Russian prisoners were treated ten times worse than Americans were treated in the prisoner-of-war camps.
Woods doesn’t watch many movies, but he has watched the famous prisoner-of-war movie, Stalag 17. “I thought it was phony,” Woods told me. “In Stalag 17 they made the Germans look stupid, but they weren’t stupid, they were smart. Stalag 17 was not real at all. If they do it real it doesn’t make much of a movie. It’s the most difficult period of your life.”
After the war, Woods returned to the University of Arkansas and got his degree in journalism. He became Public Information Officer for the 45th Infantry Division and served in that capacity during the Korean War. He achieved the rank of Colonel in the National Guard and worked for many years as Public Relations Specialist for OG&E. Woods was chosen the nation’s outstanding ex-POW of 2005.
Until next time, Dick Pryor
(above) Pen Woods with OETA’s Dick Pryor.
(Pen Woods was profiled on the Oklahoma News Report on November 7, 2007. To see the story, click on “Videos” on this website and go to “OETA’s Dick Pryor interviews Oklahoma WWII veterans.”)
“The Japanese had no mercy on us”
October 10th
Just meeting Alexander Mathews, you might not guess his “story.” Slight of build, soft-spoken, and unpretentious, it is only after listening to him talk for a few minutes that you begin to understand what makes his story so compelling. Listen carefully, and look into his eyes, as the words and emotions spill out, and you will begin to touch the horror, heartbreak and heroism of war.
Alexander Mathews was born in Pawnee, Oklahoma on May 11, 1919. A full-blood Pawnee, he graduated from high school in Glencoe, Oklahoma. After high school, Mathews attended the Haskell Institute in Kansas, and spent a year in the First Cavalry. In March of 1941 he entered the Army in Santa Fe, New Mexico. From there he went to Fort Bliss, Texas for basic and individual training in artillery. His unit left the United States on September 12, 1941 and arrived in the Phillipines nine days later.
Just a few hours after the Japanese attacked Pearl Harbor, Imperial war planes were heading toward Clark Field in the Phillipines. American planes were scrambled, then returned to refuel. While they were on the ground, the Japanese attacked, destroying more than 100 American planes and launching the Japanese offensive in the Phillipines.
Mathews had heard about the attack at Pearl Harbor, and remembers seeing the high-flying bombers coming toward Clark Field, but he says American officers thought the planes were American. It wasn’t until after they released their bombs and the strafers followed behind them that the reality was known: the United States was at war.
Soon, Mathews and other Americans were moved to Nichols Field to await the Japanese advance. Within three weeks, the Japanese invasion forces were nearing Manila. General Douglas MacArthur declared it an open city and pulled the American and Filipino troops back to Bataan, where, with dwindling supplies and aging guns and equipment, they would fight the Japanese as best they could. By March, MacArthur had gathered up his family and left for Australia. That left the Americans under the command of General Jonathan Wainwright, with Edward P. King serving as the Commanding General of the American and Phillipine forces in Bataan.
Mathews says the fighting became increasingly hopeless as medical and food supplies “became nonexistent” and it became obvious the remaining American and Filipino forces might have to surrender. “We didn’t know what we were going to do,” Mathews recalls, “until a little jeep came by with General King, with a white flag on it.” General King agreed to surrender on April 9, 1942, after receiving assurances from the Japanese command that the nearly 80,000 American and Filipino troops would be treated well. “I just said, well, I guess that’s it,” Mathews told me, “because we realized we didn’t have enough food supply, we didn’t have enough ammunition.”
Mathews says the soldiers were instructed to destroy their guns so the Japanese could not use them. “We began dismantling what we could of our rifles,” he said, “took the firing pins out and the bolt and buried them, until the Japanese came. They told us to form a column of fours. We didn’t know what it was, but it was the death march.”
And so began Sgt. Alexander Mathews’ journey into hell and history. During the Bataan Death March, American and Filipino prisoners were marched almost 80 miles to Camp O’Donnell. Starving soldiers were forced to march through the searing heat with little food, water or medical treatment. “Those that were too weak, if they fell by the wayside,” Mathews remembered, “were either bayonetted, clubbed to death or even shot.” Thousands died on the Bataan Death March, and many thousands more died at Camp O’Donnell. The Japanese viewed the prisoners as cowards, and showed them no mercy.
The Americans were used as slave labor, in violation of the rules of war. Mathews was placed on burial detail, digging graves for his fellow prisoners at Camp O’Donnell. He remembers going to the infamous prison camp at Cabanatuan, where he cut down tall grass so the Japanese guards could better watch their prisoners. It was there that Mathews received an indication of the treatment to follow. “We heard yelling in the back, behind the fence, and some shooting,” he said. “We heard singing as the Japanese came marching in with the head of this Filipino on a bamboo pole, marching down the middle where everyone could see it. As we began to get in formation they put us in groups of ten and said ‘if one escapes, the rest of you die.’ That was their way of telling us we were going to be there for a while.”
Mathews, and other American prisoners, were shuttled from camp to camp. They walked, or were herded onto railroad boxcars, or were stacked into the cargo hold on “Hell Ships” to reach their next destination. Life on those ships, he says, was the worst part. “That was the most gruesome experience,” he said. “You had to stay in that one position and wonder whether you were going to get any water.”
The dropping of atomic bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki ended the war, and Mathews was finally released in August, 1945. He had spent 42 months as a prisoner of war.
After the war, Sgt. Alexander Mathews completed college and worked for the Bureau of Indian Affairs for 33 years. He later served as President of the Pawnee Tribe of Oklahoma. Today, he is 88 and lives in Cache, Oklahoma with his wife, Joyce.
(above) Alexander Mathews, former President of the Pawnee Tribe of Oklahoma.
(below) Alexander Mathews with OETA photojournalist Boots Kennedye.
One of the promises made by the men of Bataan and Corregidor to their families, communties and each other is “Always Remember Us, Never Forget Us.” Mr. Mathews is thankful to have survived, and he is now sharing his memories of World War II with school children in Oregon, Washington, and Oklahoma.
Until next time, Dick Pryor
(Alexander Mathews was profiled on the Oklahoma News Report on October 10, 2007. To see the story, click on “Videos” on this website and go to “OETA’s Dick Pryor interviews Oklahoma WWII veterans.)
“You do what must be done”
October 2nd
Ministers cannot be drafted into the military, but Charles Richmond knew, when the United States entered World War II, that he was destined to serve. “You remember the picture of Uncle Sam pointing right at you - we want you? As a minister I looked at that picture,” Richmond said, “and looking over the shoulder of Uncle Sam was God himself, looking at me and saying,’I want you’.”
Richmond had been married about three years, but he decided he would rather pray with the the soldiers in the theater of war, rather than stay home and pray for them. “I just thought I needed to get in the Army,” Richmond told me, “because they needed chaplains and our men needed guidance during that time and I just felt that’s what God wanted me to do.”
Richmond went to Harvard University for a one-month orientation for chaplains and 30 days later received his military orders. He not only had to leave his wife, but the Baptist church in Oklahoma County, just west of Edmond, that he had pastored for two years. Richmond went to Rothschilds in Oklahoma City to buy a uniform, and reported to Will Rogers Field to get sworn in. He remembers that he avoided seeing any enlisted men because he did not know how to salute. 
Richmond boarded a ship in California and sailed across the Pacific, stopping in New Zealand and Australia before reaching his final destination, India. Richmond got to know his men on the long ship ride. He remembers that the ship was crowded and there was hardly any room for the men to sleep. With 7,000 on-board they could only get on deck for a couple of hours each day to get some fresh air. He stayed with those same men for two and a half years. “The men,” he said, ” may have gotten bored, but I was busy all the time, conducting church services. And, if the men had a problem, they took it to the chaplain.”
Richmond served in the China-Burma-India Theater, where American troops were busy helping supply their Chinese allies, either by flying “over the hump” (the Himalaya Mountains) or by constructing and using the Burma Road. He recalls that many casualties in Burma were from health hazards. In fact, the first casualty was from malaria, caused by a mosquito bite. 
The chaplain had many duties: delivering death messages from home, Dear John letters, helping the troops deal with loss and the anxiety of war. Richmond drove to the frontlines every two weeks to minister to his troops and conduct funerals and memorial services (he received permission to drive to the front day or night, but was prohibited from carrying a weapon) . He also had the solemn task of writing to the parents of the soldiers who had been killed and explaining the kind of service he performed for their child.
Two of the death messages were delivered to Richmond himself. Both of Richmond’s parents died while he was in Asia. It was a tough time, but his faith got him through. He dealt with his loss through prayer. “Somebody would say,” Richmond said, “everybody takes their problems to the chaplain. Who does the chaplain take his problems to? And, invariably they would say, he takes his problems to God.”
After the war, Richmond received a doctorate in education and became a professor of education and Dean of Students at Central State University (now the University of Central Oklahoma). He also pastored a church and returned to combat duty during the Korean War. Dr. Richmond served in the National Guard for more than twenty years and rose to the rank of Colonel. Even now, in retirement, at the age of 89, Dr. Richmond stays active by holding worship services once a month. 
He says the war was bound to have changed him, perhaps by instilling “a deeper faith, a deeper love, a deeper confidence.” Richmond adds, “there’s not much good about war, but it brings out the best, sometimes the worst, but mostly the best in a man. When you’re in a position that we were in, you just stand tall, throw your shoulders back, depend on the Lord and do what must be done.”
Until next time, Dick Pryor
(Charles Richmond was profiled on the Oklahoma News Report on October 2, 2007. To see the story, click on “Videos” on this website and go to “OETA’s Dick Pryor interviews Oklahoma WWII veterans.)
By late 1944, the end was nearing for the Nazi army. The best Luftwaffe pilots were mostly gone; men and equipment were diminishing as Hitler and the Axis fought on the eastern and western fronts. The Battle of the Bulge, in the winter of 1944-45, was the turning point in Europe.
During those final months, Stanley F.H. Newman was a fighter pilot, patrolling the skies over western Europe. By the time he finished his sophomore year at the University of Illniois, the Army Air Corps dropped its requirement of two years of college, so Newman signed up in November, 1942. After two years of intensive training, he was off to Europe.
Newman flew the P-51 Mustang, doing reconnaisance, visual intelligence, flying support for bombers like the P-47’s and leading them to their targets. Newman flew 57 missions in Europe, sometimes two in one day, piloting a plane he said was truly “a wild horse.” Newman said, “you had to treat it with respect.”
Newman’s plane was equipped with a camera, yet the pilot could not see very well. “The P-51 had these long noses,” Newman said, “and in landing or taking off, when you taxied, it was hard to see out. In the air, you couldn’t see under anything. You did have that blind spot directly underneath the wing and, of course, behind you. That’s why we always flew in pairs…each to protect the others.”
Newman and other pilots were prohibited by the rules of engagement from shooting on German planes except in self-defense. So, the American saying was, “to go out and get attacked,” he said. “We wanted to get attacked, so we could shoot back.”
On the final day of the war in Europe, Newman forced down two German planes and fired on another one, forcing it into a crash landing. His actions achieved great notoriety, including front page treatment in the Chicago newspapers. He was grateful for the press coverage, because that is how his parents learned he was still alive. It was not until many years later that Newman learned that two more German planes were shot down around sundown that same day.
Newman’s flying career was far from over. He received his degree in Aeronautical Engineering from the University of Illinois, but returned to the skies as a fighter pilot during the Korean War. He flew more than 100 missions. Newman also flew cargo missions into Southeast Asia during the war in Vietnam. Stanley Newman worked for NASA and rose to Major General in the Oklahoma Air National Guard. He was inducted into the Oklahoma Aviation and Space Hall of Fame in 2003.
Newman admits the war had a generally positive impact on him. “I grew up a lot,” he told me. “I went in as a 19-year old student and came out as a 22-year old. After the war I knew exactly what I wanted to do. The G.I. Bill enabled us to build our first home. I was always patriotic, from cub scouts on up, but the war made you even more appreciative of what we have in this country. I’ve gotten to see my grandchildren and great-grandchildren, and that’s more than my friends got to do,” he said.
(above) Major General Stanley F.H. Newman looks over his scrapbook from World War II.
Until next time, Dick Pryor
(Stanley F.H. Newman was profiled on the Oklahoma News Report on October 1, 2007. To see the story, click on “Videos” on this website and go to “OETA’S Dick Pryor interviews Oklahoma WWII veterans.)
“We wanted to see how the devil lived”
September 28th
Emmett Steeds entered the National Guard in 1936, served for a year, and got out. He was working for a hardware store and remembers he was eating lunch when he heard that the Japanese had attacked Pearl Harbor, and President Franklin D. Roosevelt had declared war.
I recently visited with Steeds at the 45th Infantry Division Museum in Oklahoma City. He told me, “We had no choice. They jumped on us without provacation, so when they bombed Pearl Harbor there was no question about going into war.”
Steeds’ unit was still in Abilene, Texas, so he went home, told his wife, packed up his things and got on the bus to Fort Barkley, Texas to rejoin his outfit. “Within a few days,” he said, “practically everybody that had gotten out had come back to the unit.”
So began World War II for U.S. Army Platoon Sergeant Emmett Steeds. Steeds spent more than a year in training before sailing out of New York, across the North Atlantic, to North Africa, which was already under American control. After landing at Oran, Steeds and the others in the 45th Division, 179th Infantry headed to Sicily, then Italy, where they landed at Salerno. He received his commission as a 2nd Lieutenant from General George S. Patton for his service in the Italian campaign.
The 45th marched across western Europe and Steeds reached the Dachau concentration camp within hours after it had been liberated. He remembers the dead he found there, bodies stacked in boxcars, and finding a lot of people barely alive. It was an experience that haunted him for months.
The 45th continued on to Munich, to become part of the occupation force. The regiment’s headquarters was set up in a rather unlikely place: an apartment where Adolph Hitler had lived. Steeds remembers it was a big house in Munich, and some of the officers from the U.S. Headquarters of the 179th stayed in the building. A famous picture at the 45th Infantry Division Museum shows another Oklahoma soldier from the 45th, Sgt. Arthur E. Peters, reclining on Hitler’s bed, reading a copy of Mein Kampf. The picture made it onto the cover of the May 14, 1945 edition of Life magazine, with the caption, “Get your feet off my bed.”
Steeds stayed in the military after World War II and served in Korea, where he rose to the rank of Captain. The Blair, Oklahoma native worked for the postal service in Oklahoma City for 30 years. He’s long since retired, but at the age of 90, still volunteers at the 45th Infantry Division Museum on weekends.
You can see two of his prized possessions at the museum: a Nazi medallion and personal stationery of Adolph Hitler that Steeds “liberated” from the Fuehrer’s Munich Apartment.
If you have a chance to visit the museum, I encourage you to go - but plan to spend some time. There is a lot to take in, and you might get to visit with Emmett Steeds. If you see him, tell him, “Thanks.”
Until next time, Dick Pryor
(Emmett Steeds was profiled on the Oklahoma News Report on September 29, 2007. To see the story, click on the “Videos” link on this website and go to “OETA’S Dick Pryor interviews Oklahoma WWII veterans.”)
Rave Reviews for “The War”
September 20th
“A riveting experience.” “Outstanding.” “Well-done.” “Strong.” “The war as I remembered it.” “I can’t wait to see the entire documentary.”
Those were some of the comments heard Wednesday night at the Oklahoma City Museum of Art after the screening of an hour-long preview of the Ken Burns documentary, “The War.”
Several veterans were in attendance to watch excerpts from the 7-part, 15-hour television event that begins on OETA Sunday night at 7:00. Following the screening Dr. Robert Griswold, Chair of the History Department at the University of Oklahoma, WWII Veteran Paul Wilson of the 17th Airborne Division and Roger Harris, oral historian at the Oklahoma History Center, answered questions about the film, the war, and its impact.
Wilson emphasized the sense of duty that Americans felt during the war, and how young men everywhere wanted to get involved to serve the country and their families. He, like so many soldiers who fought in the bleak winter conditions during the Battle of the Bulge, suffered from the effects of the bitterly cold temperatures. “Medics,” Wilson said, “were the real heroes of the war. And, I wouldn’t be here today without help from the man above.”
Harris said many veterans are now coming forward to talk about their experiences, ending years of trauma-induced silence. Griswold said such stories are important to help future generations understand the scope and gravity of the war. He teaches about World War II at the University of Oklahoma. Griswold is hopeful that programs such as “The War” will help students of today better appreciate the sacrifices involved in World War II and its impact on history.
SEEN and HEARD: Among those at the event on Wednesday night were OETA Station Manager Bill Thrash, Scott Horton and Paige Lessly of NewsOK (Scott designed the fabulous Oklahoma World War II Stories website), and World War II veteran Zee Howell, who will be featured on Friday night in the Oklahoma News Report. For more on the event, be sure to read the September 20th front page story in The Oklahoman.
Until next time, Dick Pryor
(above) Moderator Dick Pryor with Don Wright of Oklahoma City, a veteran of Guadalcanal who attended the screening event at the Oklahoma City Museum of Art.
(below) Panel member Paul Wilson, a paratrooper in the 17th Airborne Division, visits with members of the audience about his experiences in World War II following the screening event at the Oklahoma City Museum of Art.
(below) A crowd of more than 235 people watched the pre-screening of The War and the panel discussion at the Oklahoma City Museum of Art. Our thanks to Film Curator Brian Hearn and our friends at the Oklahoma City Museum of Art for their support of “The War”!
(below) Dr. Robert Griswold discusses the impact of World War II. Oral Historian Roger Harris of the Oklahoma History Center is on his right.
Tulsans Pack Circle Cinema for “The War” Preview Screening
September 19th
A standing room crowd watched the first hour-long preview of Ken Burns’ important, new documentary, “The War,” Tuesday at the Circle Cinema Theatre in Tulsa. Several veterans attended the pre-screening event and they seemed to appreciate the approach used by Burns to tell the story of the “greatest generation” at home and in the theaters of war. The film presents the horrors and heartbreak of war in the riveting and personal style that has made Burns America’s most prominent producer of historical documentaries.
Following the screening, OETA’s Dick Pryor moderated a panel discussion with WWII veteran Kenneth Renberg, a German who trained American troops and fought with the 45th Infantry Division; Dr. Brad Agnew, Professor of History at Northeastern State University and an expert on military history; and Eva Unterman, a survivor of the holocaust who spent most of the war in Nazi concentration camps. OETA’s Lori Holliday showed the dynamic, new Oklahoma World War II Stories website (including this blog) and encouraged everyone attending to participate in the story collection project using the website’s “Share a Story” module. To-date, more than 700 people have shared a story - an overwhelming response!
Special thanks to Clark Wiens and Amberla Tepe of the Circle Cinema Theatre for hosting such a great event to begin the march toward “The War.” Ken Burns’ 15-hour epic, “The War,” debuts Sunday night at 7:00 on OETA.
(above) Several veterans attended the screening of “The War” at the Circle Cinema in Tulsa. (below) War memorabilia decorated the Circle Cinema. 
(above) Holocaust survivor Eva Unterman of Tulsa, one of the panel members at the Circle Cinema screening, with Moderator Dick Pryor.
Recording History
September 12th
What should future generations know about war and what your generation did in World War II? That’s a question photojournalist Boots Kennedye and I have asked each of our veterans in interviews for the Oklahoma World War II Stories series. The answers have varied, but a common thread is clear - they saw America attacked and the world threatened, and did what had to be done.
Interviewing these everyday heroes has been an enriching experience for Boots and me. Meeting them, and producing their stories, is a real privilege. Some WWII veterans have a difficult time discussing their experiences of more than half a century ago, but the ones we talked to were eager to give their thoughts about war, World War II, and their participation in it. To be sure, it was a defining time in the history of our nation, and for many veterans, it was a defining moment in their lives.
Each interview lasted more than an hour. In that amount of time you can learn a lot about someone and make a personal connection. They are grandparents and great-grandparents now, yet for most the images and details are as fresh as they were more than 60 years ago. Looking into their eyes was like looking into a window to the past - to a time that seems so far away, yet is still important and relevant. We were struck by their sincerity, willingness to share (and sacrifice), and their perspective on our world. As much as anything, I think they want the lessons they learned to endure for the benefit of future generations.
Our pieces will run less than five minutes, but we are providing the entire interviews to the Oklahoma Historical Society, for archiving at the Oklahoma History Center. Some of the interviews may also wind up at the Library of Congress. We are grateful to have the chance to honor our veterans this way - it’s the least we can do for what they have done for the rest of us.
I encourage you to watch our Oklahoma World War II stories on the Oklahoma News Report beginning on Friday, September 21st at 6:30 p.m. I also encourage you to get involved in our story collection project and see for yourself how meaningful a discussion with a veteran can be. Each one has a story; each one should be remembered.
Until next time, Dick Pryor
(above: Dick Pryor with Ned Hockman, Lt. Colonel, Air Force Reserves)
(below: Boots Kennedye with Sergeant Alexander Mathews)
