Hide Article Text (OCR)
Saturday, December 7,1991By Daniel CurryDaily Herald Staff Writerknew, Japanese planes were pelting the ship with bullets.During the war, Lessard and his crew fought throughout the SouthWhat brought Michael Musko, Joseph Lessard and Bill Bader to the same spot 50 years ago was coincidence. What fused them indivisibly was a Japanese miscalculation.Decades tumbled their lives and deposited them again within a fewMusko also was on a docked ship in Pacific. He almost died toward the the harbor, the mine-laying U.S.S. end of the war, when a kamikazeOglala. The 17-year-old was eating breakfast when explosions were heard. “At first someone said wedove into the ship’s photo lab, killing47. Only two minutes earlier, Lessard and a friend decided to visit awere blasting new docks at Ford Is- different part of the ship beforeland,” he said.Minutes later a torpedo hit a shipmiles of each other, this time in Du- nearby, jolting the Oglala. MuskoPage County.Yet the three never met in 1941 atPearl Harbor and barely know each U.S.S. Helena, helped where hedied underneath an overhang. Helpless, the military men began singing“God Bless America.”other today. Their bond is membership in one of the country’s most famous clubs: survivors of Pearl Harbor. *“It’s not something I go around talking about to other people,” said was a 28-year-old Marine. He wasMusko, of Naperville. “Some people stationed on a base attacking Japa-want to ask me questions about it, nese had to pass over before strikinggoing to the photo lab.Musko almost never entered the service. Kicking around his hometown of El Dorado in southern Illinois after graduating from high school, he unsuccessfully applied forcould, then joined other seaman hud- work at every business in town, in-was thrown to another room. He scrambled off the ship to the cruisereluding the “place where they pluck chickens.”A friend persuaded Musko to enlistand others aren’t that interested.”Bader, now living in Glen Ellyn, in the Navy with him. His friend,however, flunked the physical and Musko was on his own. His trip to Hawaii was the first time he’d the harbor. He was walking across strayed more than a few miles fromMembership in the nationwide the base when planes began strafing home.Pearl Harbor Survivors Association the ground around him. “We got our After the Oglala, Musko was as-is more than000guns and ammunition and startedhundred living in northern Illinois, shooting back.”There were more than 75,000 mili-The Marine was loading his riflesigned to the destroyer U.S.S. Mug-ford. He insisted he wanted to be afire controlman, a person who oper-tary personnel in Hawaii on Dec. 7, when an enemy bullet hit Bader in ates and maintains the ship’s guns,1941.The already famous actor Henry Fonda was among the officers on the U.S.S. Curtiss, a seaplane tenderthe right hand, severing his knuckle and two fingers.even though he had no formal training. In the end, that’s what he became.Musko also teased death. A diveLessard hails from Lowell, Mass., bomber’s load killed 21 members ofdocked on the far side of the harbor, and had enlisted May 5, 1941. He a gun crew where Musko had beenLessard, of Bensenville, was a 20- trained in Seattle and was shipped to stationed only four days earlier,year-old radioman on that ship. Hawaii several weeks before the at- Bader grew up in Wahoo, Nebras-000He remembers talking to the chap- tack. About 80 crewmen on the Cur- klain about taking a boat across the tiss were killed or injured at Pearl mous citizen is the late Hollywoodharbor to attend Mass. Next thing he Harbor.film executive Darryl Zanuck.•. * *- » * *• *- •• •» .... a.*.* t • ■ •»•••».» • * • _• • • • * lt;• « • ».* • » • • »• ft ,«••«». * • * ft * 4 « * • • •«»»+«« » ••• % • • • • • • * • * » • • • • • • * • •* • * • ♦ •• • »• r « * • • •Jb. • « t« lt;• «•»••«•• • . * • * • • • • • • • *Vt • ro i • » # * 1 • • • • • • • * • • *••••• ■ • •• •X-X**iv.wa« • • r».• • • «• • • 4...v./.vft...kvS;• • . . . . » . .TT* •••••■-• .«jr •wtv* V3!r.v-rVlt;:%A:.v.X«v* 1*...«• • • • fa...*,*! * • » • • ft ..... ft.* * • • •_» •» «• . . ft ft ft a ; • • • • « • • » • « r a m ft...a.■ a • • ■ • t . • ••■(raa» . . — . . ........ * » a • a . a . . . a ft......... • ft a « a a a . * a .• a a ..aft.a a . a a a ft • • .• . » • » » • 4• V*v.'.v.'.v.vy.*,• a.aaaaa.aaaa.aa.aaav!vX*Xy//XwXv3!r a a a a . aaaaaaaa.aafl,aa. . . . . . . . . . . . » - a a a • • a • a « * j- * • ••* •..W.W.V.Va •'•V.%.. ,. .,.v,v.v.,.v.v.v•V./.V.V.V.V.VM, ...i...taaa • a a a,a a . . • aaaaaakav • * • 4 a. a a a a a • a a /« aa . - a a • a • ..v.•a • .* a- 4*.V.*a%V.jrirjrt i nr.a'a*.Va a a a -a a a a a t •ft a a a a a a;• ».* a ft * •k.v.v. .a . . a . . . . . . . . . . . . »fc.* * .• V/.V/aV,*.*.. a a ft rv.vwXvvvfc5 •-V.mMmvKfv/1 'v*'•Xlt;.-v:'.‘.'aV .« -v.y* ▼ ?x:‘S'A'v*/V//-/ .v-' **•«a a* aft ft . a a . «X-**.'X iva........■ ▼’nr* WTO * ■ •a JUL'■'“Xikv;'-■V-va a a .iM■a • a a A aft a ft . . .•a-.*.A*•:*m. .WAV.’’. ■ *vv.x*x• •ft.7•V . .^—y . — y.........-W?.........yss.'.-a « a a a# a a a. a a . ■ ftr a . ft * a ft ft V ft ft ft3;v'v'vA-'W..:*x*HarborWheaton Friday to commemorate the 50th anniversary ofDaily Herald Photo/Edward LeeJapanese ‘apology’ resolution crumbles in angera____j n-___Lnchi a former iustice broadcast Sunday that no apologiesSection 1/ News 7PM-A 17-year-old Michael Musko, top row in middle, with other members of his gun crew on the U.S.S. Mugford.After he was wounded, Bader was sent to California to recuperate, although a Purple Heart helped ease the pain some. By 194,3 he was back overseas in the Pacific theater.More misfortune befell him when he contracted malaria in Okinawa.Ironically, he recovered at Pearl Harbor.Lessard just bought a Toyota Corolla, a move he realizes won’t make him popular with the boys down at the VFW hall. But he says he never felt much lingering animosity toward the Japanese.“At first I hated them, naturally,” he said. “It’s too late to hold big grudges. I’m just a little guy and I’m sure there are a lot of little guys overthere that didn’t want to go to war Joseph Lessard at a U.S.S.any more than I did. But I respect a Curtiss dock after the attackmilitary man who believes in fight- at Pearl Harbor.ing for his own country.“When you buy coffee, is it American?” he asks. “What about a TV, a VCR? I just bought some medicationPresidentlets past fade awayAssociated PressONTARIO, Calif. — Journeying to an emotional anniversary at Pearl Harbor, President Bush said Friday that Americans should observe the healing of peace as well as the memory of the Japanese attack that began a war, calling it “a turning point, really, in terms of peace andfreedom.”“For me, it will be emotional because, like a lot of those veterans out there, I lost friends, my roommates, two roommates, killed in action off our carrier,” said Bush, a World War II Navy pilot, before flying to Hawaii for 50th anniversary observances on Saturday. ;The president said he holds no rancor toward Japan.He said he would “approach it as a day of healing, appropriately honoring those who died at Pearl Harbor and those who were killed in World War II after Pearl Harbor.”On a 9,900-mile journey — he returns to Washington early Sunday Bush stopped in California to tour a flashlight factory and push his economic ideas in speeches there and at the local Kiwanis Club. %“I am absolutely confident things are going to be better,” he told about 200 people in a loading lot outside the Mag Instruments, Inc., plant. He urged Congress anew to approve a capital gains tax cut and other economic moves he has been recom-Musko said he wouldn't own a Jap- mending for three years.anese car and is frustrated with theHe promised that his State of theand it came from England. I bought economic advantage the country Union economic proposals late nextthe Toyota because I thought it was seems to be gaining over the U.S. He month will include a comprehensivea better-made car.”said he’d like to see more stringentLessard retired from the Navy in tariffs on Japanese cars.1961 and worked until 1984 as a storekeeper supervisor with United Airlines.After he left the Marine Corps in“They are doing with dollars whatbombssays.He also said he was not supportive tern.proposal on health care and insurance, one that can deal with the problem without new taxes. But he said it will not dilute American health care “by socializing our sys-1948, Bader went to work for Ameri- money for internment camp survi- As he answered questions, onevors. “There was no compensation came from a man who said theyat Pearl Harbor,” he shared wedding days, and invitedcan Can Co. in Waukegan. He was a office administrator until his retirement.Like many other Pearl Harbor .survivors, Bader said he strongly opposed the U.S. government’s decision to give $20,000 to survivors of Japanese-Ameriean internment camps.“The only thing I could say about that is: Why is it I didn't get $20,000 for the two fingers the Japanese blew off?” ■killedasserts.the Bushes to a cookout on theirAfter the war, Musko got his de- shared anniversary, gree in electrical engineering from “Well, if I can remember it,” Bushthe University of Illinois and has chuckled. “I’m the guy that couldn’t worked 30 years at Argonne National remember when Pearl Harbor was. Laboratory near Darien. Campaigning on Sept. 7, 1988, he’dOnce Musko was walking on cam- called that the 47th anniversary ofPearl Harbor Day, correcting it topus at Champaign when a plane zoomed overhead. He reflexively hitDec. 7 after an unsettled murmur inthe dirt. “I guess it’s just something hjs audience of veterans alerted himyou never forget.”to the slip.SER VICE PRO VIDEO B Y:BASED ON 6 HRS.WHITE COTTAGE MAID SERVICEOF ELMHURST832-9057
Newspaper Details
Arlington Heights Daily Herald Suburban Chicago
Arlington Heights, Illinois, US
Sat, Dec 07, 1991
Page 188
Full Page
Clipped by
Raymond L.
USA 07 Nov 2022
Other Publications Near Arlington Heights, Illinois
Arlington Heights Daily Herald Suburban Chicago
Arlington Heights Herald
Daily Herald
Arlington Heights Day
Arlington Heights Sunday Herald
