Pearl Harbor revisited:
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Dorwin Lamkin returned to Pearl Harbor in December for the first time in nearly 70 years. It was certainly a more positive experience than his first visit, in 1941, when his ship, the USS Nevada, was disabled by Japanese bombs during the infamous Dec. 7 attack.
"It was a once-in-a-lifetime, absolutely fantastic experience," Lamkin said of his recent visit. "I was flabbergasted. Honolulu looked like Chicago, with high-rises everywhere."
Back in 1941, Lamkin said, Pearl Harbor was a "sewage pit" from all the garbage the battleships dumped in the water. Not this time. It was pristine.
"Only the weather was the same," he said. "It was as beautiful as I remembered it. And the pineapple fields are still there."
Lamkin, 88, of Mission, was among Pearl Harbor survivors invited to attend the annual Pearl Harbor ceremonies in 2010. He was accompanied by his son, Scott Lamkin, who lives in San Rafael, Calif., and two friends, Chris Sparks, a teacher at Olathe North High School, and Bourk Dreyer, an accountant from Mission. They left Dec. 4 and returned five days later.
During the visit, the group toured the Arizona Memorial, constructed on the hull of the battleship Arizona, which sank during the Dec. 7 attack and in which 1,177 seamen are entombed. They also saw the new Pearl Harbor Visitor Center, which was dedicated while they were there.
"We were treated great," Lamkin said. "I was introduced to an admiral who said, 'Just call me Frank'—a little different than when I was a seaman second class!"
The trip came about after Lamkin, a member of the Kansas City Chapter of the Pearl Harbor Survivors Association, attended a Memorial Day ceremony in Atchison, Kan., last spring, where he saw a piece of the Arizona on display. He was told that the Navy donates pieces of the ship's superstructure to veterans and historical organizations. The superstructure was removed years ago and stored near Pearl Harbor.
In response to his inquiry to Navy officials in Hawaii, Lamkin learned that he could obtain a similar piece of the Arizona for the Kansas City Survivors Association, to be displayed in Pearl Harbor Memorial Park in Mission. The artifact, a foot-long piece of corroded metal, arrived at his home in October.
There was more. Lamkin subsequently received an invitation from the historian of Navy Region Hawaii to attend Pearl Harbor memorial ceremonies in December, an offer he couldn't refuse.
Lamkin grew up in Hudson, Wis., and joined the Navy in 1940, soon after he graduated from high school. He signed up for a six-year tour.
After boot camp he was assigned to the Nevada, which was in dry dock at the Bremerton, Wash., ship yards.
"When I got there, I saw crewmen hanging by ropes scraping the sides of the hull," Lamkin recalled. "I said, 'That looks kind of risky.' The boatswain's mate standing by me laughed and said, 'You'll find out tomorrow!'"
Later the Nevada proceeded to Long Beach, joining the Oklahoma and the Arizona. All three sailed to Pearl Harbor and tied up on battleship row. Like many Pearl Harbor survivors, Lamkin has a vivid recollection of what he was doing when the Japanese attack began.
"I was below deck at my duty station in the ship's sick bay. We were working on a sailor who had been in a fight that night," he recalled. "We heard someone yell, 'The Japs are bombing us!' I thought he was crazy. Then the general quarters alarm sounded and I ran to my battle station, the after-dressing station. I was scared to death. Here I was, only 19 years old and hardly a mature seaman. I thought, this can't be happening."
Lamkin describes getting under way and heading for open sea when a bomb pierced the main deck and hit a storage tank of airplane gasoline below. The explosion blew a hole in the hull, disabling the ship, which was pushed to the beach by tugs to keep from blocking the harbor entrance.
"When I went topside, the main deck looked like a slaughter house," Lamkin said. "Fifty-two crewmen were killed; I don't know how many were wounded."
Two months later Lamkin was sent to pharmacy school in San Diego and then assigned to the USS San Francisco, a heavy cruiser. In 1944 he enrolled in the Navy V-12 officer's training program at the University of Kansas. But before he graduated, the war ended and he was transferred to a Navy hospital in the Philippines, where he served out his enlistment. On his return to the states in 1946, his plane stopped in Hawaii to refuel.
"I didn't get off to look around," he said.
After his discharge, Lamkin returned to KU, where he received a degree in chemistry and met and married Katherine Gorrill. He also landed a job with the Upjohn Co.
Katherine died in a car accident in 1968.
"I never thought I'd marry again, but in 1970 I met Nora Cowen, a teacher at Shawnee Mission High School," Lamkin said. "We married that same year."
Nora died in 2002.
Besides Scott, Lamkin has two other sons—Peter Lamkin, who also lives in California, and Calvin Lamkin, who lives in Texas.
