by
Evan Christopher
Adolph
Kuhn is a walking (albeit with a bum
knee), talking, living piece of history,
and although he could be most easily
be defined by one day in history (and
he would refute it, what man wouldn’t?),
he truly adds up to more than “a date
which will live in infamy.”
A
recent celebrant of 62 years of marriage,
father of one, grandfather of three–including
a grandson who drove in Nascar and
Winston Cup, with a few great‑grandchildren
to boot, he even played an instrumental
though backstage part in the filming
of 1963's “It’s a Mad, Mad, Mad, Mad
World.” (Kuhn welded the aluminum
camera boom for recently deceased
director Stanley Kramer, and assembled
the winch setup that made Phil Silvers’
car appear as if it were driving across
sand dunes.)
But
the fact of the matter is, Adolph
Kuhn was present at one of the loci
and foci of American history–Pearl
Harbor. Since that fateful day, he
has spent many nightmarish nights
and hundreds of days at speaking engagements,
reliving one of history’s turning
points.
On
the not so nightmarish side of reliving
history, Kuhn has spoken to numerous
middle school and high school classes
(never to younger children, as “mothers
don’t take that so kindly ... this
stuff is gruesome”) as well as countless
groups at Veterans Days, Memorial
Days, Independence Days, and of course
Pearl Harbor Days, sharing his eyewitness
account of history–an account worthy
of a best‑selling nonfiction
book or blockbuster movie, but without
all that Hollywood bull.
Born
on a Kansas wheat farm in 1921, this
ninth child of twelve upon graduation
from high school signed up six days
later for a six‑year hitch in
the U.S. Navy on May 26, 1940. The
first to leave the fold much to the
chagrin of his mother, he told her,
“I’m not going to stick around the
farm. I want to put my education to
work.”
And
he nearly wasn’t accepted for service.
Standing at 6 feet 5 inches tall,
the Navy’s acceptable maximum height
was 6 feet 4 1/2 inches. After some
anxious moments thinking he’d be “back
on the farm slopping hogs,” the doctor
congratulated him, saying, “You’ll
never find another sailor standing
on your right side.” And he didn’t.
Kuhn was the tallest sailor in the
Navy, but he banged his head many
times passing through compartments
that measured a little over five feet
in height.
At
basic training in Great Lakes, Ill.,
Kuhn was handed his Navy garb along
with size 12 shoes. Unfortunately,
his feet fit far more comfortably
in size 13. Kuhn spent 2 1/2 years
in the Navy with the self‑acclaimed
“closest cropped toenails in the Navy.”
When
regulation Navy shoes were finally
found on the East Coast, one of his
sailor buddies kidded him that they
were “making them in a shipyard.”
When he was kept waiting for the shoes’
arrival, another joked that they were
“towing ‘em through the Panama Canal.”
Ultimately,
the shoes did arrive in Hawaii. “The
day they got there, all my toes saluted,”
Kuhn
chuckled.
No
less circuitous, Kuhn’s journey to
Hawaii took him from basic to Aviation
Metalsmith School in Pensacola, Fla.,
to San Diego, Calif. From there he
was shipped on Jan. 27, 1941 on a
“7‑day seasick ride–a farm boy
wasn’t used to waves bouncing him
around” to Ford Island U.S. Naval
Air Station, otherwise known as Pearl
Harbor, to report as a metalsmith
and welder.
His
job was to weld manifolds onto plane
engines and “hard‑face” the
tail hooks, so the cables on the aircraft
carriers wouldn’t shear them off.
With
a weekend pass, the night of December
6, 1941 found him at a dance at Honolulu
with a cousin. As they were both early
risers, the two were awake when they
“heard bullets come through the roof
of the barracks and splinter the floor”
near Hickham Field Army base.
Some
of the men in their skivvies ran outside
and shook their “fists at the Japanese
planes” as “they thought they were
American planes.” But after seeing
the planes flying so low, “their landing
gear was practically touching the
tops of the palm trees,” they realized
their mistake.
Eager
to return to his station, Kuhn hitched
a ride in the rumble seat of a Model
A Ford with two sailors. At one point,
a Japanese pilot honed in on them,
but miraculously the three escaped
the strafing fire. En route to their
ship, the two dropped him off at the
gate, where a Marine let him in. “I
never saw them again.” They would
not be the only people about which
Kuhn uttered that statement.
Cutting
across an officers’ golf course, a
Japanese pilot spotted him in his
“Navy whites.” Again he became a target.
As the pilot fired upon him, he ran
for his life as the turf got “tore
all up” about him until he reached
a temporary haven.
“I
hugged a palm tree,” Kuhn said, and
then noticed a Marine and another
soldier ahead of him doing the same.
The three were advancing palm tree
to palm tree, when they had to make
a longer dash for safety. In front
of him, Kuhn watched as “the soldier
was beheaded, his head was blown off.”
He and the Marine jumped over the
headless body in their mad run away
from the Zero. The two fortunate men
parted paths, another comrade in arms
he never saw again.
When
he arrived at the boat landing, the
timbers and tar were all afire. “There
were 11 other guys waiting for a boat.
My Ford Island base was across the
channel. I saw planes I worked on
the day before burning.”
The
men spotted and hailed a fisherman
in a boat. Of course, there was no
chance of his hearing them among the
din of the air traffic and explosions,
but by chance the fisherman saw them.
Twelve men packed on a “compact and
crowded” 6‑person boat. “On
the port side, we were so overloaded
my fingertips were in the water,”
Kuhn said.
Yet
another Zero had Kuhn and the unlucky
group in its sights. “The pilot grinned,
and we watched as the trail of fire
came towards the boat.” The plane
passed by. “The boat was sinking.
The floorboard and railing were riddled.
Our mouths were agape. Not one guy
got hit.”
For
another one of numerous occasions
that day, Kuhn thanked his guardian
angel. To this day, Kuhn said, “Every
day and every night, I pray to my
guardian angel.”
It
was man overboard the overloaded vessel.
“I never saw the other 11 men again.
I dog‑paddled.”
Raised in Kansas, Kuhn didn’t spend
too much time in water and hesitates
to say
swim. “Oil and fire was on the water.
I
was hanging onto arms and legs to
keep from sinking.”
He
watched as a Japanese torpedo with
wooden fins passed by, “the Japs knew
the torpedo would sink” without the
fins, and met its target. “The ship
leaped up like a wounded whale. There
were body parts flying up and into
the water. ... The water was covered
with sailors’ white hats with all
the names stenciled on them.”
The
Japanese continued the barrage, both
on land and on water
as they searched for victims. Finally,
he made his way back to his base.
He swam to a concrete ramp used for
launching ships. With the leather
soles of his shoes inundated with
oil, and the ramp slick with algae,
Kuhn had to “dig his rubber heels
in” to get any traction. After crawling
out of the water “on all fours,” he
watched the destroyer USS Shaw as
it exploded in dry dock, shrapnel
whirring perilously close by him.
“The chunks of metal from the ship
blew clear across the channel.”
Kuhn
sought shelter in the air hangar that
was his work station, under a heavy
steel welding table. Just when he
hoped to take a moment’s rest, “a
crash came through the roof. A bomb
landed 20‑25 feet away. ...
Obnoxious fumes came out, and I inched
back and out” a door of the hangar.
When
he got outside, all the planes were
ablaze, gas tanks were exploding,
and 30‑caliber shells were firing
off in all directions. As one of the
planes put the hangar at danger, Kuhn
and another sailor got a cable sling
to tow the plane off “with a Minneapolis
Moline tractor” to the other end of
the runway. With the plane in flames
and the tires burning off, Kuhn looked
up to see a Japanese plane with its
bomb bay doors open.
“I
remember saying to myself, ‘Adolph,
this is it.’” The Japanese bomb landed
in the runway not far from him. Its
impact “threw chunks of concrete all
over the places, some of them the
size of a VW, and little pebbles dropped
on me.” Yet again Kuhn thanked his
guardian angel.
Kuhn
pulled the hitch pin, and left the
plane where it was. As he made the
U‑turn in the tractor, the plane
exploded, most likely from the gas
tank igniting. He returned to the
hangar and stood under a concrete
archway, figuring it to be the safest
place among the bedlam.
Not
long thereafter, a Navy officer with
a megaphone showed, calling for volunteers,
“Now hear this: We need sailors to
rescue those poor sailors on the ships.”
Read
next week’s edition to find out how
Kuhn boarded the USS Arizona on a
rescue mission and survived the remainder
of Pearl Harbor Day.
Kuhn
offers his books for purchase,
with all proceeds going to the Pearl
Harbor Survivors Association or other
veterans’ groups. “Pearl Harbor Remembered,”
a book of over 350 pages with poems
and personal anecdotes can be purchased
for $23, ($18 for the book, plus $5
for shipping). A shorter tome, “Pearl
Harbor Poems,” is available for $14,
($10 for the book, plus $4 for shipping).
Send a check or money order to: Adolph
Kuhn, PEARL HARBOR SURVIVOR, 3500
Lake Blvd., Apt. 121, Oceanside, CA
92056‑4600.
