Last USS Arizona survivor

[Jr_Token]

https://news.yahoo.com/lou-conter-last-survivor-uss-192735128.html

[HamptonRoads]

Rest in Peace, Lou.

Edited April 2 by HamptonRoads

[Utt_Bugglier]

A healthy percentage of those reading this thread or the linked article will live to read someday about the death of the last surviving WWII veteran, in our lifetime.

[Project45_Opytny]

2 hours ago, Utt_Bugglier said:

A healthy percentage of those reading this thread or the linked article will live to read someday about the death of the last surviving WWII veteran, in our lifetime.

That will be sometime in the 2030s (not too far in the future indeed) I guess, when even young boys who joined military during the war's closing months will become centenarians if they managed to live that long.

[Snargfargle]

A bunch of my great uncles and cousins served in WWII. When I was a kid, most of the men in my home town had either served in WWII, Korea, or the occupation forces. The last WWII veteran I knew died last year. I went to school with his kids and worked for him a couple of times driving a tractor and moving irrigation pipe. His unit helped liberate Dachau. After that, he spend a year and a half guarding former SS soldiers who were sentenced to repair war damage in Austria. He then came home and resumed farming. He was a pretty good musician and marched with the county band in Kennedy's inaugural parade. He was an accomplished amateur photographer too -- we are talking Ansel Adams quality here -- and his house was full of pictures he'd taken on his trips. He also had an amazing rock and gem collection.

[Navalpride33]

So it begins... When living history becomes delegated to the history books.

From here on forward.. There's no one left to speak on the behalf of the events of that day (A day that will live in infamy).

The horrors the sailor lived on that day... No longer told in vivid detail.

May he find peace at heart... May his family, rejoice on his glorious life and mourn respectively his passing.

Dismissed Sailor.

We'll take the watch from here...

 

[Yinzer_1]

The greatest generation.

[HogHammer]

36 minutes ago, Yinzer_1 said:

The greatest generation.

So true.  Many did not even talk about their service until years prior to their death from old age.  I had relatives keep aspects of the war bottled up for years before telling their stories.  The emotional toll on many of them was just too much.  

[Snargfargle]

40 minutes ago, HogHammer said:

Many did not even talk about their service until years prior to their death from old age.

I'd grown up going on fishing and hunting trips every year with my "uncle" (actually first cousin, once removed) and my second cousins. I never knew he'd served in the military though until I stayed with him and my "aunt" during my great aunt's funeral. Even then, it was his wife that told me most of what he'd done. He had dropped paratroops during D-Day, was on the first American cargo plane that landed in Berlin during WWII, and participated in the Berlin Airlift. What I remember best about him though is that he could skin and dress a squirrel faster than anyone I've ever seen -- it only took him about ten seconds. He had a heart attack and died six months later and I was back down there attending another funeral.