Oral History Interview with Floyd W. TeWinkel

[Interview Begins]

MCINTOSH: Okay, we're talkin' to Floyd TeWinkel. This is the 10th of November, and it's 1999. Floyd, where were you born?

TEWINKEL: I was born at Baldwin, Wisconsin.

MCINTOSH: Where?

TEWINKEL: Baldwin, Wisconsin.

MCINTOSH: Okay. And when did you join the service?

TEWINKEL: Uncle Sam wanted me to come in in June of '41.

MCINTOSH: You're, you're --

TEWINKEL: A draftee [laughs]

MCINTOSH: A draftee. You went in for a year, right? [Floyd laughs] Isn't that right? Is that when you joined, when you were drafted you' re there for a year, that was all?

TEWINKEL: I think that's what it was. A year, but --

MCINTOSH: Just a year and then you go back home, nothing to it, right?

TEWINKEL: It got to be four years [Jim laughs], three months, and ten days. [laughs]

MCINTOSH: Okay. So, where did they send you when you joined up, Floyd?

TEWINKEL: I went out to California, Camp Callan, San Diego.

MCINTOSH: And in the Army, right?

TEWINKEL: Yeah, in the Army there.

MCINTOSH: And what did they teach you there? Specialty.

TEWINKEL: Well, there we trained mainly on the 155 cannon. Drilled on that quite often, about three days a week, and the other days we'd have classes. Then after they decided to ship us out we got away from the cannons.

MCINTOSH: So, when did you ship out to Hawaii?

TEWINKEL: That was in September.

MCINTOSH: Okay. And did you have your duty -- tell me what you did when you got to Hawaii.

TEWINKEL: Well, see we -- but, well, we didn't know when we got a ship. We found out the next day after we got on a ship in the forenoon, and we got started out, and everybody was wondering where we was going to go, and well finally somebody from the cabin said," We're headed for the Philippines," see. So everybody said, "Gosh, that's going to be a long ride." The next forenoon they says, "No, we're going to go to Hawaii." We got orders from somewheres during the night or 00:02:00sometime, and we'd end up in Hawaii then, so -- got there. You know it was just like a wild country. These Army trucks come and got us, and the guy starts driving and says, "Now, when we go down the streets," he says, "you hang on." And everybody says, "Well, what kind of a driver have we got?" Well, that was all right. Then come to find out, those people who were driving -- nine out of ten were driving on the wrong side of the road that we'd meet. Then we got back to the camp where he was going to take us, then they told us that to drive here, they says, watch out because these people ain't been trained to drive on the right had side of the road yet [laughs].

MCINTOSH: Oh.

TEWINKEL: He said they drive on both sides.

MCINTOSH: What, camp did you go to?

TEWINKEL: It was Camp, it was at Fort Kamehameha. I believe it was called once like "Fort Kam." It was in the A-97th outfit. There we trained on radar.

MCINTOSH: That was brand new then?

TEWINKEL: Yeah. We were the B-97th. Then after the war started then they changed it to B-295!

MCINTOSH: That was your battery?

TEWINKEL: Yeah.

MCINTOSH: And your duty with this battery was specifically, what?

TEWINKEL: Well, they trained us on radar. See these are portable ones that could be moved, you know, from one place to the other. Well --

MCINTOSH: And that's what you mentioned, search lights.

TEWINKEL: Well, there was a searchlight hooked to it. They could connect a searchlight to it so in case we would be on target of a plane we just gave them a signal, and they put the light on. It was right on the plane.

MCINTOSH: What happened to the 155mm cannon they trained you for in the United States?

TEWINKEL: That all went down the drain [laughs].

MCINTOSH: The Army just forgot about that.

TEWINKEL: They forgot all about that, Yeah. When we got over there everybody 00:04:00says, "We don't see no big guns around here." Well no -- [both laugh]

MCINTOSH: Typical.

TEWINKEL: Everyone got trained on different things, you know. Well, then after the war started, after the bombing got over with and that stuff, well, in fact we had our radar set up near the beach. And if they'd only seen us they could have blown it all to pieces, but they didn't bother with something like that, that day.

MCINTOSH: Right. Tell me about, how learning how to use the radar. Was that difficult?

TEWINKEL: Oh, it was quite a bit to it, yeah. You had to give readings and stuff, you know. It, you sat right out in the open. See this; I could have brought you some pictures if I'd thought of it, of the thing. You set your head up against the dish, like this, and looking, and you see these little lines while you turn you'd crank it this way to match it and they' re this way, and one guy had to do the high side, see. You got it matched up and --

MCINTOSH: It took two of you to run it?

TEWINKEL: Yeah, it two of them to run it. One for elevated and goin' up and down --

MCINTOSH: How far out was that radar beam, do you know? How many miles?

TEWINKEL: Twenty miles.

MCINTOSH: You went out twenty miles?

TEWINKEL: It went out twenty miles.

MCINTOSH: Was it hard to distinguish the blip from --

TEWINKEL: Well, see, we'd call it in and they'd tell us. Once in awhile, they'd say, "Hang onto that one, don't let him get away on ya." But they'd never tell us what it was. Then again, you'd call in, and it would be on one, "He's alright. Let 'em go."

MCINTOSH: These were practice missions?

TEWINKEL: Well, no that was at well, some of them were practice missions, yeah. But then they'd fly at night, too, ya' know. You never knew when you were gonna do it. You could probably be, before the war started." Well, you could probably just get in bed about 10 o' clock, and I'd think, "I'll go to bed." Then "push," off you'd get to run your radar again.

MCINTOSH: They'd wake you up and you'd have to go to your --

TEWINKEL: Yeah, and they expected you to be up in operations in two minutes.

MCINTOSH: You'd sleep in tents?

TEWINKEL: Well, we had barracks where we was at first until the war started. Before that we slept in barracks, but they expected you to be out of bed and dressed and have your equipment running in two minutes.

MCINTOSH: Just two of you or did someone else run the power equipment?

TEWINKEL: Well, everybody in the outfit had to be out of bed. The rest of them had to have the men and their guns

MCINTOSH: Ah.

TEWINKEL: And the rifles out then --

MCINTOSH: And that was your Battery B?

TEWINKEL: Yeah.

MCINTOSH: Ok.

TEWINKEL: Everybody had to --

MCINTOSH: How many radar outfits did they have? How many units, radar units, did your battery have? Just your battery.

TEWINKEL: Well, they had four.

MCINTOSH: Four?

TEWINKEL: Yeah. See then there was a searchlight hooked to each one.

MCINTOSH: What powered those batteries? Did you have a generator?

TEWINKEL: Well, they had another big truck with a big motor in it, with a generator in it.

MCINTOSH: You did? Okay, that's what I was getting at.

TEWINKEL: Yeah, they had another big --

MCINTOSH: Gasoline powered generator to give you the power to run the radar --

TEWINKEL: But they had em' fixed so that if you wasn't too far from electricity, they had a big cable you could get it hooked on, and you wouldn't have to start your motor up. All you'd had to do is just throw a switch and you'd be ready to go. But then sometimes, you know, the guy'd run down there and he'd give the switch a click, and he'd run to the machine and nothing happened. So you had to run back again and check the switch. Yeah, you didn't get it quite far enough. Now you see, when you use the big generator motor, there was some guys would run right to that, get that started, and then the rest of us, that was supposed to be on the tracking part for that time.

MCINTOSH: How many 155mm guns did your battery have, to go along with this radar?

TEWINKEL: We didn't have any. We didn't have a gun.

MCINTOSH: Oh. You said somebody manned the guns, you said in the --

TEWINKEL: Well, their rifles.

MCINTOSH: Oh, those kinds of guns.

TEWINKEL: Yeah, they' re just the rifles.

MCINTOSH: What would they do when they got you up in the middle of the night?

TEWINKEL: Well, they just had to sit and watch too, you know. Well, they finally got away from that 'cause at first, after the bombing, then everybody was so excited, and half the guys were getting so tired they couldn't sleep, you know, ' cause they'd hear a noise, they'd jump, you know, but they finally got that out of their system, and it wasn't so bad.

MCINTOSH: Now, we' re going back to that day, now. Now that we've established it. Okay, so on this particular Sunday what were you doing? Sleeping?

TEWINKEL: No, I was out of bed. I was standing about from here to that round thing down there, from the door, to go in to have my breakfast.

MCINTOSH: It's fifteen or ten yards away.

TEWINKEL: Only about that far from the door.

MCINTOSH: Okay.

TEWINKEL: See, the mess hall wasn't big enough to hold all at one time, see --

MCINTOSH: Okay.

TEWINKEL: So the first ones got there and got it filled up, and you just had to wait-

MCINTOSH: So you were standing in line?

TEWINKEL: I was standing in line.

MCINTOSH: And then what happened?

TEWINKEL: Then we see the plane go by; it went right over our barracks. Then all at once, we heard a bang, and somebody says, "What was that?" It wasn't long another plane went, and a guy looked up. He said, "That's trouble." He said, "Look at that round circle under it." You see, we, our barracks were here, and Hickam Field was right here, see, and that's what they was bombing. They come down over our -- if they'd dropped a bomb a little quicker they'd had all of us guys out of the way. They wouldn't have had to bother with us, but they went right, in fact, one of our guys after we kind of cooled down and they tried to make us all eat, and nobody could eat, 'cause you know how ya are. Then one guy went back, and he well, it was morning pret' near sunup. They had about five tents up, four guys in each tent. This one guy had a bullet go through his tent, through his pillow. So he just got out of bed --

MCINTOSH: He was in a tent, but you said you lived in a barracks.

TEWINKEL: Yes, we was in a barracks --

MCINTOSH: Was the barracks hurt?

TEWINKEL: No, the barracks weren't hurt.

MCINTOSH: They weren't touched?

TEWINKEL: No, they weren't touched at all so we was all right, but, this guy, he just come back shaking when he found out, he was --

MCINTOSH: Did they get close to your radar equipment?

TEWINKEL: Well, it stood right out in the open along the shore, right close to where--

MCINTOSH: But they didn't bother --

TEWINKEL: They just flew north. They didn't bother us. No, 'cause we was all wondering --

MCINTOSH: They were aiming for those hangars and the planes --

TEWINKEL: Yes, they was after the planes and then the harbor. They --

MCINTOSH: So how long did that first wave last?

TEWINKEL: It maybe lasted twenty minutes, but it seemed like a day! [laughs]

MCINTOSH: Right. So then what did you do?

TEWINKEL: Well, as soon as they got over, then we got all our equipment out, you know, and stuff like that and everybody -- the first thing they had us to mind was to get sandbags around everything and get a shovel -- and this guy shoveled, 00:11:00this guy a big armful of bags, get bags around this stuff and that stuff. Then that night of the war we had to be out along the beach where our equipment was. Well, then it was starting to get dark, and everybody said, "What are we gonna be doing?" Then we all had to dig a trench, about that deep, so we could lay in it so if that night if we wanted to lie down and try and get a little sleep. They always kept two guys up for guard so if one would miss it so the other one could see it. Later they said, "Don't have your gun loaded, all your clothes on." You lay and stay down there in case you hear a little noise. If they holler, you can jump up and grab your gun. But one guy says, "Well, if I jump up and if I see somebody over there moving," he says, "do I shoot him?" [laughs]. And the one guy says" No, don't shoot him until you see the whites of their eyes." [both laugh] But then -- see, this was along the beach, and it was about 00:12:00a week after it started, then they had an infantry bunch that was stationed back of us yet, see, and we was out there, and they had these big lights that shined, went way out, showed way out, on the water, and them guys back there put that on right on our equipment right out there, and moved it back and forth. Well, the next day that light was dismantled. Well, then about three or four nights later when it was getting dark the infantry back there started shooting at us.

MCINTOSH: At you?

TEWINKEL: Yeah! And all the guys just dropped themselves on the ground. Well, that was the last night the infantry was out there.

MCINTOSH: Did they hurt anybody?

TEWINKEL: No. You could hear the bullets go "sh-sh."

MCINTOSH: Probably something spooked them.

TEWINKEL: I don't know if somebody like that thought they, seen something out of the ordinary and they just all start shooting. Everybody just flopped to the ground [Jim laughs]. Some of 'em crawled behind our equipment a little bit, probably thought they had a little protection, but you didn't dare to move either 'cause we don't know what they was seeing back there. So it got to be -- it was about three months there it was just hectic. At night --

MCINTOSH: Erratic shooting went on for three months?

TEWINKEL: No, you'd hear a shot once in awhile during the night. You didn't know who was shooting or what they were shooting at or --

MCINTOSH: You were right on the ocean?

TEWINKEL: Yeah, we was right--

MCINTOSH: On the beach.

TEWINKEL: Where they had it set up there.

MCINTOSH: How far was that from the barracks?

TEWINKEL: Oh --

MCINTOSH: Hundred yards?

TEWINKEL: No, it was more than that. It'd be -- I believe it was close to half a mile.

MCINTOSH: You had to walk there?

TEWINKEL: No, we had a truck out there. See, a lot of guys would jump behind the truck, you know, whip themselves around the truck when that shootin' was going on.

MCINTOSH: I bet.

TEWINKEL: They thought, well, let them shoot the truck. So that took for that time again. Well, finally they moved us to a different spot -- we had to load all -- packed all our stuff up and move to another spot on the island 'cause they thought they could control that with the radars they had. So we went around to another spot. We were so glad to get out of that spot, they put us in a spot where you couldn't really pick up anything. It was, you know, kind of in the back bank around that hill. And the mosquitoes by the handful --well, then they decided to have us move. Then it rained somewhere on the island every day. There wasn't a day went by that it didn't rain some, not a whole lot, but back where they put us if it rained fairly hard the night before and we had to get our equipment out there was mud knee deep almost, and we had those big trucks back 00:15:00in there and everything. And everybody says," We' re not going to outta here." They come out and says" We gotta get out of here right now. We gotta get moving, get us out." See, these trucks had these big winches on. So one guy got in one of the big trucks, and he went through. When it started to get a goin' , went through this mud, got out, when he was on solid ground turned the truck around and unwrapped the winch, and we come from the other way with some of this equipment behind the truck, they hooked the two winches together and dragged that other stuff all through the mud. Well, then they decided that spot wasn't any good after we'd there about six weeks on the island.

MCINTOSH: How far away were you from the original beach area?

TEWINKEL: Well, the second time we was about -- oh it'd be about two and a half miles from there.

MCINTOSH: Inland.

TEWINKEL: So then they finally moved us around. Then they had established a 00:16:00headquarters out there in a different spot, so then they -- we had to be moved in there then, see.

MCINTOSH: But you were off the beach.

TEWINKEL: Yeah, we was off the beach then. So then we weren't on the beach no more, so then we stayed there for -- well in fact the thing stayed there in that spot until the war ended. But in the meantime they picked the crew I was on, and they put a new crew on the machines and sent us to Baker Island.

MCINTOSH: Okay, don't get to that yet. What was your first thought when you saw the Japanese planes come over?

TEWINKEL: Well, everybody says that -- thought that was it, 'cause they thought they'd be following up. We expected to see troops coming down the shore.

MCINTOSH: Did your commanding officer tell you to be prepared for a landing?

TEWINKEL: Oh, yeah. Yeah, he says -- he'd hollered out, and he come out and says "Now, just anything can happen now." He says, "They could be coming in most any 00:17:00place on the island now," and stuff. But we eventually found out that they got the bombing done. That the ships were already headed, they said, the other way.

MCINTOSH: Oh, yeah, we knew all that. But I want to know your reaction. That's what I' m interested in.

TEWINKEL: No, it was -- well, about the first four months, actually, it was first four -- I didn't think there be that much upset in the whole outfit for about the three, four months.

MCINTOSH: Due to confusion?

TEWINKEL: Yeah. Seemed like a lot of them didn't know they was doing. Then you got some guy here in your outfit that was so jumpy, you know, you'd think, well, hope he don't grab his gun and start shooting us! You know, it was really terrible.

MCINTOSH: You said some of them had trouble sleeping?

TEWINKEL: Yeah. Now, there was some of them didn't sleep. They'd be up in the morning, you'd tell them to do something and they'd just, they was like half asleep, you know, and you'd have to go and get ahold of them and say, "We' re gonna do this now." "Okay, if I get woke up," they'd say, you know, and --

MCINTOSH: If you couldn't repel those invaders with M1 rifles, or with whatever they'd give you, you must have thought about getting some other equipment down there if you were going to fight the battle on the beach.

TEWINKEL: Well, yeah. What we had for guns out there weren't much.

MCINTOSH: Right.

TEWINKEL: But, no, they could have come in onshore, but they didn't, which is a good thing, which they didn't.

MCINTOSH: But they didn't put in machine guns or anything?

TEWINKEL: No.

MCINTOSH: Any mortars on the beach?

TEWINKEL: No, No, no. No, there was no mortars--

MCINTOSH: Nobody thought about doing that.

TEWINKEL: No, I think their -- I don't know how close their ships were, but they apparently they was out too far, but there were several of those -- well, I think it was a suicide squad that come in. I don't think none of them figured on making it back to the carrier.

MCINTOSH: What suicide squad?

TEWINKEL: These Japs that come in, you know, they just -- there was planes different places on the island, they found planes that went down.

MCINTOSH: Yeah, but some of them were shot down.

TEWINKEL: Some were shot down --

MCINTOSH: But they didn't use kamikazes that early in the war.

TEWINKEL: So. Anyway, it was a bad three months there for us I know. The first we got --

MCINTOSH: Did you have trouble getting food those first couple weeks?

TEWINKEL: No, the food seemed to be there. It seemed like we had plenty of food all the time.

MCINTOSH: Were you under any special rules?

TEWINKEL: No, we was pretty well on our own. Well, they sent this crew out here with a light and this one, out here a couple spottin', and this here (??). In fact they told us we was on our own. We had to take care of it. So, but then --

MCINTOSH: Who were you to report to if you saw something on your radar? Who would your report that to?

TEWINKEL: Well we -- they had a headquarters, we had a phone line out there, and 00:20:00they would report that to the headquarters, and they would tell us whether it was really -- sometimes I don't know if they done it just to get us more alert or something. They'd say, "Hang onto that line. Don't let that get away from you," they'd say of that plane. Then they never would tell us. Then another time you'd get a plane, you'd track it for a little while, and "Oh, that's all right. That's ours," they'd say.

MCINTOSH: They were just testing your radar? (??)

TEWINKEL: I don't know. They wouldn't tell ya a lot of stuff. There was a lot of things --

MCINTOSH: You were on how many hours and then you'd get a rest? How long -- what was the interval there?

TEWINKEL: Oh, once in awhile you'd get three, four hours.

MCINTOSH: You mean you were on for a specified number of hours and then you'd -- somebody else --

TEWINKEL: No, it was just the first ones that -- we all had -- everybody had to be alert so the first ones that could get to the equipment had to start tracking them, get the machines going. You might have been on a tracking maybe for an hour and a half or two hours and they'd finally says, "It's okay for awhile, you 00:21:00can take off." Maybe fifteen minutes later you gotta be back on it. You might be the first one to the machine; you'd be on it again.

MCINTOSH: Were you the only group on that machine?

TEWINKEL: Yeah, there was -- tryin'to think now -- there was eight of us that took care of that machine.

MCINTOSH: Oh, so you rotated?

TEWINKEL: Yeah, we was trying to rotate. In the daytime we could rotate --

MCINTOSH: That's what I was getting at is how long you stayed at -- on the duty?

TEWINKEL: Then sometimes they would be shut down for awhile, you know.

MCINTOSH: But generally you were on for how many hours, and then the other crew took over?

TEWINKEL: Yeah, you'd probably be two hours on the thing.

MCINTOSH: Two? Okay.

TEWINKEL: That was long enough to look into that scope.

MCINTOSH: That's what I was getting at. It's pretty intense.

TEWINKEL: Yeah, you --

MCINTOSH: Staring in that --

TEWINKEL: You sit there and look at that thing for that time, you know --

MCINTOSH: Give you a headache?

TEWINKEL: No, I never even got a headache over it, but you know, your eyes, would get so [laughs] -- which way I'd turn that thing, which was the tallest 00:22:00one and which was the shortest one of them two pegs. You gotta get them matched even so they' re both the same height. Then you had --

MCINTOSH: The two what?

TEWINKEL: It's so -- it's just like, you know, when you see on there where they test your blood or something like that, this thing goes up and down. These had two little points like that come up. See, now if the plane is over here this would be the brightest target, and you had to keep on turning it this way so they evened up like that. Then you was directly on the plane.

MCINTOSH: But there was another guy; he was going the other direction.

TEWINKEL: Yeah, he was for the height.

MCINTOSH: Up and down.

TEWINKEL: Yeah, he could bring that thing up and down. He'd bring it around.

MCINTOSH: Did your equipment break down much?

TEWINKEL: No, we had really good luck with it. There was one night -- tryin' to think what it was -- some little thing went wrong with it, and we sent a guy out there from our outfit that had done a lot of mechanic and electrical work stuff. So, he got out there. Him and I worked until about 1:00 o'clock one night, just 00:23:00to get it going again. Then I got to bed. At 6:00 o'clock, I was supposed to be on the thing again. He had -- and this other guy, the mechanic, he had to drive back to his outfit after 1:00 o'clock. So, he was probably tired the next morning, too, and he didn't get -- he probably got another call, for all we know.

MCINTOSH: Right.

TEWINKEL: That was -- kept on like that.

MCINTOSH: How long was it before you figured out that the Japanese were not going to land an army on your beach?

TEWINKEL: Oh, I think it was about two weeks, and somebody says, "They're probably back in Japan," somebody told us.

MCINTOSH: Right. Did things relax then?

TEWINKEL: Oh yeah, things relaxed quite a bit then. But then some of the guys said, "Don't trust them at all," you know, and, "They might be here." It took quite awhile for some of them to get that out of their minds, before they was 00:24:00gonna let it.

MCINTOSH: No one was allowed any time off during all this two weeks, were they?

TEWINKEL: No, you stayed right there. You didn't get no --

MCINTOSH: No free time.

TEWINKEL: No, we was busy.

MCINTOSH: So when was your first chance to go to Honolulu? Roughly.

TEWINKEL: Oh, I imagine it was pret' near three months after it broke out before anybody got to go into town.

MCINTOSH: Three months?

TEWINKEL: It was a long time. They only let us have a day so I could go into Honolulu once.

MCINTOSH: Right. You couldn't call home.

TEWINKEL: No.

MCINTOSH: They wouldn't let you do that.

TEWINKEL: No, you couldn't call because you might say the wrong thing, but it would have been censored anyway on the way if you would have said the wrong thing. So --

MCINTOSH: Did you write home?

TEWINKEL: Yeah, I wrote home, Yeah. They made everybody get a pencil and paper, and they said if you only write three or four lines about the day and send it 00:25:00off, your parents are gonna want to know how you are. So that's what most of 'em did, just that little bit, and put it in an envelope and mailed it home.

MCINTOSH: I saw a guy in a movie. He said they gave him a card, a printed card that said, "I am well," and they could sign that and send it. That's all they had.

TEWINKEL: No, we never got anything like that.

MCINTOSH: Nothing like --

TEWINKEL: No, that's something we never did get, the card, but they did wanted us to write.

MCINTOSH: After a few months you had a chance to go to Honolulu?

TEWINKEL: Oh, yeah.

MCINTOSH: And then did you have a chance to see the damage from the -- in the -- of the ships that were there?

TEWINKEL: Oh, yeah. Yeah, we got a chance to see them, 'cause, see, from where we were the harbor wasn't very far. We could stand right out in front of our barracks on the street, and there was just a black cloud of smoke. It was black.

MCINTOSH: Oh, from the raid.

TEWINKEL: Yeah, during that raid that morning.

MCINTOSH: You heard the bombs drop?

TEWINKEL: Oh, yeah. It was just like they was lighting off a dynamite stick here, and here and here. So, bing bing bing, it was just going there.

MCINTOSH: And then the smoke?

TEWINKEL: And then the smoke was blowing. Well, we had one guy that was on guard down the street a ways that was around the water tank there, see. He was on this side of it, and the shots come from this way. He just walked around and looked around the corner and stepped back. He said, "The minute I stepped back" he said, "I heard a bullet go by". If he had taken maybe two steps ahead he'd probably been dead right then and there. So, it was -- you can't imagine what it's like when this starts you know.

MCINTOSH: The bombs you heard dropping, were those the ones then at Hickam Field or were those the ones, on the ships in the harbor?

TEWINKEL: Well, we could hear them both. Yeah, 'cause when they got done with the -- when they got done with the bombing there, then we heard a few more over at the harbor after.

MCINTOSH: Well, the Japanese made a second attack. Did that come by you?

TEWINKEL: No, there wasn't -- it was just that one attack that come by us. I think those were on the other side of the island more. We thought there was going to be a little more finishing off, but -- there was just -- when that one -- they quit where we was at it was done with. Some of us didn't even know that they'd made the second the attack so somebody told us. They said, they come and said, "Did you know they was back? Done some more bombing?" So, they was at a different part of the island then. Ya ain't on a very big spot. It's only -- if you drive around the Island it's only ninety miles. If you walk the shoreline it's 110.

MCINTOSH: I know. I've done it, yeah.

TEWINKEL: Yeah, it ain't that big a spot, but --

MCINTOSH: Didn't everybody try to wonder what happened elsewhere, like back in the United States, didn't anybody --

TEWINKEL: Oh, yeah. Different ones wondered if anything happened in the States. Well, it took awhile before you got a letter back from anybody.

MCINTOSH: But there was no official word --

TEWINKEL: No

MCINTOSH: Given by the officers there about what went on back home? Didn't they tell anybody anything?

TEWINKEL: No, we never heard anything about it. So, but then -- I forgot who -- somebody said one time about they thought it was a Jap sub off the coast of California. Well, one of the guys said, "I think that's just rumor." He said, "They wouldn't get that close." But apparently they did. Now, I don't know. Well, then they decided to send a bunch of us to another island. It was Baker Island.

MCINTOSH: Ah, okay. How'd you get there?

TEWINKEL: Well, you couldn't get -- that little old island is a mile long, and three quarters of a mile wide.

MCINTOSH: How did you get there?

TEWINKEL: We had our ship on there --

MCINTOSH: Okay.

TEWINKEL: We was on the ship going to the --

MCINTOSH: The whole battery?

TEWINKEL: No. Just a part of our battery went.

MCINTOSH: I see.

TEWINKEL: I' m trying to think. Well, it was just the crew from my battery. All that went is the one radar crew and the searchlight crew from our battery went. But then we -- I' m trying to think of the other battery that was stationed, had their mess hall right next to them, and we ate with that battery. I can't think what battery that was. And then, then the Air Force guys ate in there too. The F pilots, they all ate there with their planes parked just right out in front of our equipment.

MCINTOSH: What was your -- you were doing the radar thing on Baker Island?

TEWINKEL: Yeah, yeah we had the radar there.

MCINTOSH: But it was an airbase.

TEWINKEL: Yeah, airbase. But, you know, the funniest part of it was, like we was stationed over here in this corner, and there was another group up here. To this day I couldn't tell ya' what that group was that was up here [laughs]. A lot of the guys, you never went back and forth.

MCINTOSH: Didn't you eat in the same place?

TEWINKEL: No. This group up here had their mess hall, and we had ours out here.

MCINTOSH: Was that Air Force, too, or Army, or what?

TEWINKEL: That was Army. [Unintelligible] or what it was. No, we never did.

MCINTOSH: Did you have anything to defend yourself with on Baker Island?

TEWINKEL: Just those planes, those P-38s.

MCINTOSH: Oh, that's what was stationed there.

TEWINKEL: Yeah.

MCINTOSH: B-17s?

TEWINKEL: Yeah.

MCINTOSH: And?

TEWINKEL: P-38s.

MCINTOSH: P-38s.

TEWINKEL: Was settin' there. The B-17s, they'd take off in the morning, and they'd go out and bomb. I don't know where they went; they'd never tell us. But they'd come back laughin'. I remember one guy come back, he said, "We sure as hell, we got 'em today," wherever they were.

MCINTOSH: How far is Baker Island from Hawaii?

TEWINKEL: Oh --

MCINTOSH: Or what is it close to? Perhaps that's easier for you.

TEWINKEL: It's near Wake Island.

MCINTOSH: Near Wake Island.

TEWINKEL: Down there. It's right near the equator. The temperature there on the thermometer showed 104 every day, but it didn't feel that hot because you had the ocean. But the thermometer read that. And when they got the ship there, the only time you could unload was when the tide is in. Maybe for about six hours they could unload stuff from the ship and haul it in, then the next six hours they couldn't. And that ship stood, at least a mile off shore. The thing stood out there.

MCINTOSH: So then you were in tents?

TEWINKEL: Yes, we had tents. We had our big motor for the generator. They got a bulldozer and dug a hole and moved that down in there and our tents right here, and I was in the tent one night, and I was just going to come out, and one of the guys hollered, "Step back!" and I thought," Well, gee, what now?" Just about 00:32:00then one of the P-38s went "Zip" right through ya. I looked the guy right straight in the face. His head was even with my eyes.

MCINTOSH: Was he taking off or landing?

TEWINKEL: Well, he was a young guy, and he was coming in.

MCINTOSH: He was tryin' to.

TEWINKEL: But see when the tide is out, they could fly on the water here like this, and then if he come up and across you couldn't see him. But this one guy happened to see this plane coming. And if this guy -- and I see -- I stood there -- I just stepped back a step, and I looked right straight in the eye just like I' m looking at your eyes now.

MCINTOSH: He was coming right at you?

TEWINKEL: Well, he was going to fly between our equipment and our tent.

MCINTOSH: I see.

TEWINKEL: Maybe he only done that one night. They never flew through there again, and that was the first night he'd done it. If I'd a maybe been two steps ahead that wing -

MCINTOSH: That wing would have taken your head off.

TEWINKEL: More than likely would of. And he was going out there [unintelligible]. I can just -- [Jim laughs]

MCINTOSH: You didn't expect to see an airplane at that level, did you?

TEWINKEL: No.

MCINTOSH: They' re usually up in the sky [laughs].

TEWINKEL: Yeah, and I never seen the guy [laughs]. Me standing on the ground, him and the plane I could look right straight at his face. He was just like this, I could see his--yeah, his head wasn't over six feet off the ground 'cause I'm six feet four [laughs], and that plane was below him. Anyway, that was the only time that they ever done that.

MCINTOSH: Well, that's good.

TEWINKEL: It was surprising too, when the tide was out -- and I don't how you say it -- how much down it was--quite a bit --

MCINTOSH: Lower.

TEWINKEL: Yeah, to the water, so when the tide come in it was way up, not too far from -- but then -- want to go down to get cleaned off, we'd get in our nude suit and go down to the water, but you didn't dare to go down there when the tide was starting to go out.

MCINTOSH: It might sweep you out?

TEWINKEL: Oh, the undercurrent -- yeah, you could stand maybe in" that" deep of water, you know, that was when it went back. In fact, one of our guys, we was already on an angle like that, and if another guy hadn't a grabbed him, he'd a went out. That was the guy that come to our house in Chicago, Squale. Yeah, he was swimmin', and the tide was coming in and he wasn't thinking nothing of it, and there was another guy from our outfit, he was a pretty good husky guy like me, if he hadn't been that close this guy would have been gone.

MCINTOSH: Was your duty different on Baker Island?

TEWINKEL: Just wait around and operate the machine we had.

MCINTOSH: Nothing else to do in between.

TEWINKEL: No. There was nothing to do.

MCINTOSH: It was pretty boring? It was only a small, small island.

TEWINKEL: Yeah. But, you take a thing a mile long and three quarters mile of a mile wide, that ain't even as big as a section, but here you can drive a mile around a section here.

MCINTOSH: Did they have a mess hall?

TEWINKEL: Yeah, we had a mess hall there.

MCINTOSH: The food pretty good?

TEWINKEL: Yeah, we had pretty good food. We had bread with all those -- you know how weevils get in the flour?

MCINTOSH: Yeah.

TEWINKEL: We had a lot of bread with that in.

MCINTOSH: They say if you cook them they' re pretty good [Floyd laughs]. You get used to them. They taste pretty good, they give more flavor to the bread.

TEWINKEL: You'd see everybody sitting by the table with [unintelligible] and stuff like that and thick bunch here. They'd pick this bunch off and this thick bunch off." Oh, the heck with it. Smear butter on and eat it" [Jim laughs]. See, you know, what they should have done is not brought so much flour there when we first come. They could have sent that in later on because there was a plane come every week there and bring us our mail and bring us different stuff, you know, and he could as well have brought some flour, but no, they sent everything in that--some got flour in for at least a year, you know, getting those in, and that--

MCINTOSH: You got pretty used to tasting those boll weevils?

TEWINKEL: Oh yeah, they tasted pretty good after you eat them.

MCINTOSH: After awhile.

TEWINKEL: If you wanted to eat any bread, you know --

MCINTOSH: Sure, you get your meat and your bread altogether.

TEWINKEL: All in one meal. You didn't even have to really cook anything else [laughs] if you do that, you know.

MCINTOSH: Did they have any beer for you?

TEWINKEL: Yeah. They'd bring us, plane would come in, and they'd have two cans of beer for everybody. A lot of guys would drink theirs up within ten minutes, their beer, and other ones would go into the barracks, and they'd scratch, and they'd stick one can in and cover it up with some dirt, and then drink one. The next day, or so, then they'd dig it out and rinse it off and drink the next one [laughs].

MCINTOSH: That's how they kept it cool?

TEWINKEL: Yeah, it stayed cool there, surprising. I thought that'd get warmer. I know I did that. I had four cans in there one time covered up, but then one day I took one, and another day I took another, and then they brought us some more beer so I stuck one more back in that hole, and I [laughs] drank one. So that 00:37:00went on like that. I can't remember now whether it was Christmas or Thanksgiving, I was most generally about the first on in our barracks, in our tent, to wake up, see, and I woke up, I rolled over and everybody was gone. I thought, "Now what are they doin'? Pulling a trick on me? They all jumped out of bed and let me sleep here?" Didn't take long to find out.

MCINTOSH: What was that? Where were they?

TEWINKEL: They was outside, sitting.

MCINTOSH: I' m sorry?

TEWINKEL: They was outside digging little holes, and they were poopin' in 'em [laughs].

MCINTOSH: Oh, I see.

TEWINKEL: We'd had -- I think it was Thanksgiving. We had turkey, and I got a leg and I was puttin' -- looked like it was all white around there, and I thought to myself, "I ain't gonna eat that." Which I should of opened up said something, but I didn't. I thought maybe it was -- I didn't know if it was just me or something. I thought, "Well, if I say something then they' ll say 'Well, what are we gonna do?' " So I didn't eat my meat. Everybody had diarrhea.

MCINTOSH: The meat was spoiled.

TEWINKEL: Yeah. I should have said something. I thought, of that later on, I 00:38:00thought, "Well, why didn't I say something?" The lieutenant, we had a lieutenant, there for a couple days we thought he was gonna die. He was really sick for a couple days, but he snapped out of it.

MCINTOSH: How many people were on Baker Island? Roughly.

TEWINKEL: Oh, there might have been 200 of us in there. That's all that was there. When you get up in the morning, it's just like you got here, like you just got up and sit here, and you'd see all that going on here. It wasn't much except the people walking around the tents up here and us down here. At one end there was some trees. They looked --when we was there they looked like they were about two-thirds dried up dead, and I don't think any of them are any bigger around than when I put my arms like that, but maybe there was a dozen. They was right on the end, right near the water so when the tide come in there'd be a little moisture. There was no shade to them. They never did get any leaves on 00:39:00them while we was there. But there was no shade.

MCINTOSH: But that was the only tree, it was the only trees on the island?

TEWINKEL: Yeah, it was the only trees on the island. There maybe was ten or twelve of 'em growing up there, little ones. They were just in a short distance apart, didn't take up too much room on there. But that's all there was there.

MCINTOSH: You never really -- you never saw anything on your radar from the time you were on Baker Island.

TEWINKEL: No, we never, never got a -- we searched -- we never picked up a plane. They never got that close. But one night when the P-38s went up, they all come back, and there was two of them lingering. And somebody said, "Oh, oh, two of them got shot down." But they finally come, and they was having the biggest time. They'd got a hold of a Jap bomber and shot that down, and they swerved back and forth and shot him as long as they could see him. You know, he was up 00:40:00there, said the plane was even under water, and they were still shooting [laughs]!

MCINTOSH: They'd been waiting a long time to find something to shoot at.

TEWINKEL: Yeah, they was just going to shoot at something no matter what it was or how it got there or what it did or nothing. But then one night, one of the guys come back on his P-38, and I don't know how he discovered it, but a bullet had come in this side of the plane and went out the other side right in back of his back. He said, "I still don't figure out how come that thing didn't hit my back! Well, where I was sitting, where my seat was, and where that hole went through there!" And everybody said, "You' re just lucky." He said, "I know I was lucky." Yeah, he seen the hole 'cause he -- different ones of us went around and looked and he lined it up for us. He said, "I was sitting right like that," he says, "and I never even know it went through." Till he got out of his plane, he discovered a hole, and you could hear him say, "There's a hole there." He said, "I looked right over, there's a hole there."

MCINTOSH: How long were you on Baker Island?

TEWINKEL: Oh just, I can't tell you in the months, but it was just a little bit over a year.

MCINTOSH: Over, roughly a year. And then what happened?

TEWINKEL: Well, then we went back to Hawaii, and then we got a -- went back on the equipment just like I was before I left there again, see. See, the unit we took over there wasn't the one I operated in Hawaii. It was one that a group went over and took and crated up at a different part of the island, the other crew had. They sent us over there to take that one apart. Get it packed up and everything, you know. But then, I think there was ten-twelve of us, for that day to get that all ready. We had to get the generator done and everything, so we had to get that all taken care of. Yeah, we got back then, and everybody was back where they was. But see, the outfit I went in with, we got so split up. 00:42:00Those guys that I was in the barracks with when they bombed, and actually the war started, I never seen those guys no more. Some of them, I found out later on, some of them got shipped out with different outfits, and we found out some was on the other side of the island. They'd never say where the guys were, that we had in the barracks. Well then, then this -- a little town there, Aiea [Honolulu Co., Hawaii], they had put our headquarters there. So then that's where some of the guys were assigned, and finally you get a chance to go on a pass, from where Aiea's at, you stopped in to see them." Oh, he got shipped out, the other day with so and so and all them" were shipped out, but then you'd see new faces in there. 00:43:00Then we had different guys say, "Your outfit ever have a reunion?" Well, where are all these guys? Nobody ever knew where they went. They just, you know--

MCINTOSH: So what was your duty the when you came back the second time to Hawaii?

TEWINKEL: We was back on the radar again.

MCINTOSH: Was the radar close to water again, or not?

TEWINKEL: No.

MCINTOSH: Pretty far away this time.

TEWINKEL: Yeah.

MCINTOSH: Was your equipment better then it was originally?

TEWINKEL: Well, when we first started out [laughs], on the radar thing they had these big old things with like a big old horn on, you know, and you had to listen by the sound. Well, the airplane could be pret' near on top of you sometimes before you [both laugh ] -- you could see it. Some other guy standing around he said, "Turn your thing that way. It's up there." Yeah, you could hear it real plain. Well, you could tell if a -- you had to find out which way the sound was going, and you'd turn it that way. And the guy for the height, you 00:44:00know, he'd have to turn it up or down because he was on the same level or what he was on, and that was--that stuff, that should have been thrown in the junk before --

MCINTOSH: Pretty crude stuff, wasn't it.

TEWINKEL: Oh, it was something. Stuff that should have been thrown away long, long ago. The stuff we had was -- well, we knew we could trace out twenty miles all around so we had a forty mile circle around us. They kind of spotted the planes, these outfits on long islands was kind of like that, you'd know. You could cover out this far, and then the next one so far, and you'd get all that done, and it was rugged.

MCINTOSH: When you went back for the second time, though, there were so many airplanes and things that I don't know how you were able to distinguish our side from their side, you know.

TEWINKEL: Yeah, there was --

MCINTOSH: Because they'd put so many -- stuff there.

TEWINKEL: Oh, yeah. Yeah, there was a lot of stuff that'd come in there, and then there's stuff like that, you know. But after -- well, yeah, that was after 00:45:00we'd come back, then we heard a howling noise and everybody said, "What in the world is that howling noise?" Then it was one of our own planes, and it wasn't too far. He was coming straight down like this. And somebody said, "If he don't turn, he's gonna crash." And he crashed. I don't know if he fainted or passed out or what, but that plane was headed down, and it was really coming -- you could real -- so then we had a truck there. So what we do? We jumped in the truck, and we kind of knew where it was, and our guys from our outfit were the first ones there. You know, he was a young guy. I think he was maybe about twenty five, nice looking guy. He was deader than he could be.

MCINTOSH: What kind of aircraft was it?

TEWINKEL: That was a --

MCINTOSH: Navy or Army?

TEWINKEL: That was an Army -- that was an Army plane. He really ruined that one. 00:46:00Never did really hear anybody say really what happened to him, whether the guy well, I don't know if they can tell if he passed out or fainted or anything like that, but the thing was -- you could see it up there, and you could just hear that howling noise, and it was coming straight down. Just comin' like that, and [thud sound] hit the ground. It was a mess.

MCINTOSH: So, do you think life was easier the second time around then when you were in Hawaii?

TEWINKEL: Yeah, Yeah, when I come back, when we come back from there --

MCINTOSH: This was about 1943 then, '44?

TEWINKEL: Yeah, we come -- yeah-- it was in '44, '44, yeah. Now we'd -- we'd get more -- you could get a pass once in awhile then pretty easy without going to Honolulu.

MCINTOSH: Duty wasn't very difficult then.

TEWINKEL: No, no. The tracking, and we didn't have near the duties like we did before, but they'd pull an alert thing any old time during the day. We had a 00:47:00mess hall there. We'd be in the mess hall eating, and you'd be half done with your meal, you'd leave your meal, and go when you' re up. Then you'd come back and, if you'd want, felt like eatin' what you had, most of the guys would take, when they come back to the table they'd just take it out and throw it in the garbage can. And it's all cold by this time, you know, it probably set there a half hour. Well, then see, were we sat they had the headquarters there. They had the major and the colonel and stuff, that was there. They would stand outside, you know, at night, and we would be tracking afterwards, you know, and we'd now and then we'd get a plane. This one guy was pretty good at giving a whistle, see. He'd give a whistle, and they'd turn the light on. So the major done that one night, see, and everybody just -- and he'd get the light, they'd get this flash light on because they didn't know from where they was at where he was at, 00:48:00who he was. Anyhow, then the next thing, "Get that goddamn light off right now!" Well then, we thought we' re gonna fix that so we got a wire and we put a little buzzer over there with a light. So the next -- went and got some wire, covered on the ground, cleaned it all up so nobody would ever know it was there. The next night, all at once, we heard a whistle, and the light didn't go on 'cause these guys didn't hear our buzzer [laughs]. We couldn't hear what the Navy said, but there was another guy there, he said something to the other guy, but when he whistled he was gonna have them put the light on again, but there wasn't no way for him to do that with that buzzer 'cause that was all planned ahead of time. But, see, then I-- when I got back then they had these field telephones, you know, in a box about that square, and about that high, cute 00:49:00little thing. I says, "I'd like to take two of them home." Well, sure enough, that got assigned to me. Then this one lieutenant, he went back to his, where he was stationed, then he says, "Give me so much time." He says, "We'll test it out." So then he'd call on it, and I had to be there. Well, then we get done, he'd say, "You got your watch with you?" And I'd say" Yes." "What time you got?" And I'd tell him." Yeah, "he said, "we' re just maybe a couple seconds different." He said, "We'll talk about it another time again." So I had to be by that thing, he says. Well then, then they hollered for me for the radar. Well, then finally it got so -- see, the other guys got interested in that thing. I said, "We'll get in trouble," I says, "maybe if you do that" I said around that. I said, "But I wouldn't care for myself if you answered, to go down the other 00:50:00side there." I says, "He'd probably recognize your voice and want to know where I was." Well, it ends up-- ends up I said if I'd had a -- it ended up all that equipment got charged out to me, all this radar equipment and everything.

MCINTOSH: What was your rank then?

TEWINKEL: I was a T-4. We all got charged out because that guy that was charged, he got, getting near the end, wasn't so fussy, but he got to home on a furlough and by god, when he got home, he didn't have to come back, got discharged, discharged at home. So, then they kept on going -- they went on -- down then to another guy -- well, finally that guy got to go home. Well, then it come down on me. So, then -- then nobody wanted to be assigned to all that thing 'cause some of these lieutenants would get kind of strong-arm ya. They'd look at stuff and 00:51:00go, "d'you got to get that painted" or "You got that color paint out here? Put some paint on that. Do this stuff [unintelligible]." Nobody wanted to be assigned to anything. But you didn't have a choice. They'd say, "We got it signed out to you." They'd stop and tell you it was signed out to you. Well see, then we had one guy who drove a truck. He wasn't a truck driver, but they told him to get in the truck one night. That was right after the thing started, you see. They said move some stuff one place to the other. It was dark at night. He never drove a truck in his life, he says. He had run over something and got a flat tire, and they was gonna make him pay for the tire [laughs]. He got on, he didn't have to pay for the tire.

MCINTOSH: That's good. It was an idle threat.

TEWINKEL: Yeah, but he ain't a truck driver, never drove a truck, then it's dark, going down someplace where you can't see anything. How you gonna know what 00:52:00you' re doing? You can't say back to them, "No, I' m not going to drive the truck." You just go ahead and you do it. So that's the way that whole mind stuff went on. But --

MCINTOSH: You finished out the war then in Honolulu?

TEWINKEL: Yes. Yeah, Yeah, I got done out there in Honolulu.

MCINTOSH: When did you return home?

TEWINKEL: It was in September --

MCINTOSH: '45?

TEWINKEL: Yeah.

Ethel: You was home on furlough in December

TEWINKEL: Yeah, Yeah, I was home on furlough there.

ETHEL TEWINKEL: In December of '45 I think.

TEWINKEL: Yeah, it'd be February, wasn't it, I think. Yeah. If I wouldn't of got 00:53:00shipped out on furlough quite so quick, I wouldn't have had to go back over [laughs].

MCINTOSH: But you had to -- after your furlough you had to go back to Honolulu.

TEWINKEL: I had to go back over there again.

MCINTOSH: Third time.

TEWINKEL: Yeah.

MCINTOSH: So, you were there until September of '45?

TEWINKEL: Yeah. Yeah, I got out in September of '45.

MCINTOSH: Right. Did you use your GI Bill?

TEWINKEL: No, no. I didn't do that.

MCINTOSH: Okay. So. what did you do when you got home?

TEWINKEL: Well, I drove milk truck before I went in the -- then when I come back again.

MCINTOSH: They gave you your job back?

TEWINKEL: Job back.

MCINTOSH: Where was that?

TEWINKEL: That was at River Falls.

MCINTOSH: In River Falls.

TEWINKEL: Drove milk truck. Got tired of that, then we, then I got down here and got to farmin' down here. In fact we sold our farm -- American Family is built 00:54:00on it now.

MCINTOSH: Oh, I see. Yeah.

TEWINKEL: So. Got out of farmin' -- I' m glad I ain't farmin' now.

MCINTOSH: Hard work, famous for low pay and hard work.

TEWINKEL: Well, they -- all your machinery you buy is -- if you had a million dollars and you was going start farming, you wouldn't have much left when you got your heavy equipment bought.

MCINTOSH: It would it take all that for just the basic equipment?

TEWINKEL: If you just want a cash crop, but if you wanted to buy cows, and milk cows, you'd pay anywhere from $1,000 to $1,500 a cow, and you'd have to have about forty cows. So you just figure that's about $50,000 right there for them. And the machinery, the price--a piece of machinery I used to haul manure, when I was on the farm you could buy for $400, and now it's pret' near $6000 for that 00:55:00same thing! So, that's the way that goes, you know. And you buy a tractor, why when we started farmin', what'd we pay? $1500 for a tractor, brand new tractor.

MCINTOSH: How many acres to support forty cows?

TEWINKEL: You'd have to have 160 acres.

MCINTOSH: Of corn?

TEWINKEL: Well, I used to have about fifty acres of corn, and then I'd put in oats, and you'd have some for hay and stuff, you know--

MCINTOSH: What would you do with the oats?

TEWINKEL: The oats, we'd grind it, feed it to the cows, and get some other things mixed up and you'd mix oats and corn together and go to the feed mill and mix some concentrate, a little concentrate, put a little salt into it, and stuff like that for cows. But now you see these people around here, go to these $125,000 tractors.

MCINTOSH: You'd own a lot of cows to buy one of those [laughs].

TEWINKEL: Yeah. And you see the people out in these combines in the fields, well, that's another $100,000. Somebody told me the other day a guy had bought one this fall, it cost him $125,000 for that one piece of thing. Well, you start adding all that up --

MCINTOSH: You can't do that with forty cows. You need a big farm.

Ethel: Not anymore.

TEWINKEL: When you got to have, you got have a lot of land.

MCINTOSH: A lot of land and a lot of cows and --

ETHEL TEWINKEL: And then you still go into debt.

MCINTOSH: Right. Big business --

TEWINKEL: Yeah, you --

ETHEL TEWINKEL: I don't know if you noticed, Floyd had four brothers that were all in the service at the same time he was.

MCINTOSH: Oh.

TEWINKEL: I had two -- one in the Navy, one in the Air Force. There were two other ones in the Army.

MCINTOSH: Where do they live?

TEWINKEL: Two of them live in Sheboygan. One of them that's in Sheboygan was in the Navy, and one was in the Army. Then I got a brother down in Ohio that was in 00:57:00the Army.

ETHEL TEWINKEL: And Morris.

TEWINKEL: Yeah, Morris was, he is in River Falls. He was in the Navy. Yeah, there was five of us. There was six of us boys in the family in all. Older brother Gene, never got in.

MCINTOSH: Have you been back to Pearl Harbor?

TEWINKEL: We was back there -- well, it's been quite awhile. It was '72, we were back there. But that's changed a lot. There's no main street in Honolulu. And they did build that bank on the main street, that nice looking bank, built just two years before the war. That was the only thing that I seen that was there, otherwise.

MCINTOSH: Nothing looked familiar.

TEWINKEL: Otherwise, it was all built on the beach. See, there used to be just that Royal Hawaiian Hotel there. That's all hotels now. You can't get to the beach anyways around there.

MCINTOSH: [unintelligible]

TEWINKEL: Yeah, they' re just here, here, here, and here. So. It's gotten --- and I know we thought we'd see a big bridge. You'd hardly see a big bridge over any road, but now you do. This one's over this road, and this one's over this road. Gosh.

MCINTOSH: Well, anything else that you forgot to talk about, that you can think of?

TEWINKEL: Oh --

MORRIS TEWINKEL: I can't think of anything.

TEWINKEL: I can't think of anything. I' m starting to scratch my head. But I know we got a neighbor right now --

[Interview Ends]