Lawrence 'Slats' Trower 1925-2010

Slats Trower, bottom left, seated

June 28, 2010 -- We buried Marine Iwo Jima veteran Slats Trower (B/1/24) today in his Arthur, Illinois, hometown. His given name was Lawrence, but everybody knew him as Slats for his lean, wiry body that was full of energy for helping his family, community and country have the best life they could. Before he was wounded on Iwo Jima on March 4, 1945, he'd promised himself and his maker that if he survived the battle he would return to Arthur and never leave and would be "the best man he could."
After narrowly escaping with his life several times, he had his head down reloading his Browning Automatic Rifle (BAR) when a mortar exploded nearby and filled his body with shrapnel, some of which was still working out of his hands and other places at the end of his life, and he was carried off the island unconscious. He later woke on the hospital ship taking him to an Army hospital in Saipan. The pungent odor of rotting flesh was so strong that he later said, "It took my breath away."
After a few days on Saipan, Slats was transferred to the Naval hospital at Pearl Harbor, Hawaii, where he often said he was "nursed back to health by drinking large quantities of fresh milk." In a piece his granddaughter Keri Sowers wrote, titled "Lawrence Trower's Recollection of Iwo Jima," Slats, who was raised on a dairy farm in the Breadbasket of the World, said, “They had fresh milk in five-gallon buckets with a spigot on it. All we had been drinking was powdered milk. Here, I could drink all the milk I wanted. I love milk. I drank so much milk, I could moo."
By April 20, 1945, Slats was able to rejoin his outfit for training in Maui, preparing for the invasion of Japan. Before that happened, two atomic bombs were dropped, one on Hiroshima and one on Nagasoki and Japan surrendered. Slats and his outfit were sent to Okinawa where he worked first as a turnkey in a brig that was full of Japanese prisoners of war and Americans from all branches of service who had violated military rules, then as a military policeman.
With the war over two years after he was graduated from high school in 1944 and with less than two years as a United States Marine, Slats was discharged and arrived back home in Arthur to stay. Two years alter, he married Jane Craig to whom he was married 62 years and who survives him as do three daughters, Cheryl (Dan) Jackson, Connie (John) Armer, Cindy (Steve) Helton, six grandchildren and 14 great-grandchildren. Slats worked at nearby Quantum Chemical Corporation for 36 and one half years and ran a refrigeration business for several years.
Being a devoted family man and the best man he could be was evident in his lifetime activities after he came home from the war. I first met him in 2005 after I came back from the 60th Anniversary Reunion of Honor on the island and started forming a local Marine Corps League. So I knew quite a bit about him. But other details form his obituary follow:
"Slats was a member of the Arthur Vine Street Christian Church for more than 60 years and served as an elder and youth mentor for more than 60 years. He was a charter member and past president of the Arthur Lions Club, a member of the Arthur Masonic Lodge for 54 years and 32nd-degree Mason form the Danville Consistory, a member and past commander of the Arthur VFW Post 479, a member of the American Legion for 61 years and a member of the Urbana-Champaign Richard L. Pittman Marine Corps League #1231, named after a local Marine killed at the foot of Mt. Suribachi on Feb. 21, 1945.
"Slats was awarded the Meldin Jones Fellow by Lions Club International for dedicated humanitarian services in 1989; he received a plaque from the American Legion as the most outstanding fundraiser in 1989 for selling raffle tickets and raising money; he received the State Master Gardener Excellence Award from the University of Illinois in 2003.
“For 14 years, Slats raised tomatoes for the VFW Post that provided (thousands of dollars of) scholarships for Arthur-Lovington High School graduates. He also worked with Melissa Rush's class and the fifth-and sixth-grade students in Arthur in growing vegetables and then giving the produce to food banks, churches and families in need. He loved working with the students and the community.
“In February 2006, State Reps. Bob Flider and Chapin Rose presented Slats with a copy of a resolution of the Illinois House Representatives for winning the 2005 Humanitarian Award from the Arthur Association of Commerce. In September 2009, Slats was honored to go on the Central Illinois Honor Flight to Washington, D.C., to see the World War II Memorial (accompanied as a guardian by his son-in-law John Armer. By this time, Slats was in extremely poor health but said he'd go 'even if I have to crawl.' He was pushed around in a wheel chair most of the day by his son-in-law and was in it when Senator Bob Dole stepped up behind him and rested his hand on Slats' shoulder for a photo.
Crawling or doing whatever he had to do to get the job done was pretty much his philosophy of life and how he went about being the best man he could after coming home to Arthur. People sometimes asked him how he could do all the things he did. Always an outspoken man with colorful language, he would reply, "By getting up off your ass and doing it."
At his visitation yesterday before the funeral, scheduled for 5-8 p.m., people lined up outside the funeral home and a steady stream of people from around central Illinois stood patiently through the slow moving line that wrapped around inside the funeral home until nearly 10 p.m. One man on his way to the visitation from more than 50 miles away had been stopped for speeding by a policeman who asked what was the hurry on a Sunday afternoon.
“I'm going to a visitation for Lawrence Trower in Arthur," the man replied.
“You mean Slats Trower, don't you?" the policeman responded, handing back his driver's license. "Slow down and make sure you get there."
The funeral today was quite fitting for a man of Slats' stature. The church was filled with family and friends who viewed a Power Point presentation of photos while music played in the background. After saying a few words, the minister asked people to share memories of Slats. That went on for a full 15 minutes before the minister added his own thoughts in a heartfelt sermon.
In his last days lying in the hospital bed while he fought to live on, Slats sometimes flashed back to the days of battle on the island and hollered out about killing the enemy and tried to remove his oxygen lines while asking for more oxygen. In the end, it was one time he couldn't get "up off his ass and do it."
At the cemetery a color guard of four local VFW and American Legion members stood tall with flags and rifles; seven Marine Corps League members stood ready for a three volley rifle salute when the order came from the commander of the unit; a bagpiper from the Champaign fire department played "Going Home" on the bagpipe while the casket was taken to the burial site; and after a few words from the minister, two active duty Marines sergeants in dress blues folded the American flag and presented it to the commandant of the Marine Corps League who in turn leaned down toward Jane Trower and presented her with the flag "On behalf of a grateful nation... ." Another one would later be presented to her by U.S. Rep. Tim Johnson, who had one flown in Slats' honor over the U.S. Capitol in Washington.
As people started drifting away from the tent, a group of Marines, friends and relatives stayed back while a bottle of Crown Royale was opened and anyone who wished to poured a shot in a plastic shot glass or took a swig straight from the bottle and toasted Slats.
A local ABC affiliate had sent a camera person and a reporter to cover the funeral and will make the footage available to Diane Hawkins, niece of John Basilone, who is making a documentary about the legacy of her Medal of Honor and Navy Cross recipient uncle who was killed on Feb. 19, 1945, on Iwo Jima. And Bruce Harrison, a recent University of Illinois journalism graduate was also there filming the funeral for the same reason and reported on the funeral for AM 580, the PBS station at the University of Illinois.
Slats Trower was certainly a part of the legacy of John Basilone who led the way for thousands of Marines and Americans who survived the war and lived a good life from the sacrifice of so many. I was both honored and proud to have known Slats and to be a part of his life and helping give him a wonderful parting of the life he was given.
Sadly, the only negative part of the final ceremony for a truly great man and Marine was that the Marine Corps League khaki short-sleeved shirt that set us off as Marines has been outlawed and replaced with a white shirt that is like the uniform shirts of other veterans' organization. I can just hear Slats commenting on that one: “We need to get up off our asses and get that changed and go back to looking like Marines.” And he would have been leading the charge.

At long last, writer Jon Shirota receives well-deserved accolades

Jon Shirota currently lives in
California with his wife.

Jon Shirota's family immigrated to Hawaii from Okinawa early in the 20th century. He was still in high school when the Japanese attacked Pearl Harbor. As soon as he was old enough, Jon joined the American Army and served in occupied Japan after the war. James Jones' blockbuster novel, From Here to Eternity, about pre-war Hawaii, the peacetime Army and the attack on Pearl Harbor influenced Jon's desire to become a writer.
Finally, after three years of corresponding with Jones' mentor, Lowney Handy, Jon became the last member of The Handy Writers Colony in Marshall, Ill., where he wrote Lucky Come Hawaii, an account of the days leading up to the attack on Pearl Harbor and the response of those of Japanese ancestry. It's a worthy novel.
Since its publication, Jon has written other novels and several plays which have been produced both in the U.S. and in Okinawa. Now in his 80s, Jon continues to write and travel to Hawaii, Okinawa and Japan, where his books and plays have been produced and re-issued in both English and Japanese. A longtime member of the James Jones Literary Society, Jon and his wife, Barbara, who spent part of her youth in an internment camp during World War II, gave the first James Jones Lecture at Eastern Illinois University in Charleston, Ill., that is being presented annually while money is being raised for the endowment for The James Jones Chair in World War II Studies.
I'm posting the following brief essay so you may know a bit more about about a writer and playwright who is now beginning to receive the accolades he so richly deserves.

A barefoot boy of Japanese descent

invited to speak at a university that wouldn't accept him

"How ironic for one to be invited as a guest speaker at a university where one could not be accepted as a student.
"Jon Shirota was kicked out of high school and did not finish his junior year. He received his high school diploma after studying and passing a high school graduate's examination in the Army.
"He wanted to attend the University of Hawaii, but did not submit an application knowing that his atrocious high school grades would automatically disqualify him. Through family connections, however, he was accepted at Brigham Young University in Utah and finished in three years under the GI Bill of Rights.
"During his last year in college, he read the sensational novel, From Here To Eternity, by James Jones. It would have a tremendous effect on his life. He had been stationed at Schofield Barracks where most of Eternity took place; in fact, in the same quadrangle where Jones was stationed, and it sparked an ambitious goal.
"Jon was so enthralled and captivated by Eternity that he vowed he would one day write a novel that also takes place in Hawaii. If a haole white man from Southern Illinois can write a novel that takes places in Hawaii, why can’t he who was born and raised there?
"Of course, it’s easier said than done.
"After years of corresponding with Lowney Handy, the teacher at the Handy Writers Colony in Marshall, Ill., he quit his job as an IRS agent in Hollywood, and drove over to Marshall. He finished his first novel, Lucky Come Hawaii, at the colony, which was accepted for publication.
"The novel was eventually adapted into a play and was awarded the John F. Kennedy Center for New Plays. It was an event that led to other plays and other playwrighting awards.
"Recently, the University of Hawaii invited Jheeh University of Hawaii wanted to publish three of his plays, Lucky Come Hawaii, Leilani’s Hibiscus and Voices From Okinawa. Also, to come out with the fourth re-edited version of the novel, Lucky Come Hawaii.
"Voices From Okinawa played in Honolulu in November and December of 2009 and was extended for extra performances by popular demand. Voices is now scheduled to open in Maui, Jon’s hometown, in January of 2010. Jon has been invited to speak at high schools there, including Baldwin High, from where he was kicked out, and at the community centers. The books Voices From Okinawa and Lucky From Hawaii will be sold at the theater and at book stores.
"University of Hawaii could not accept Jon as a student, but accepted him on a grandeur scale, guest speaker at its conference.
"And the barefoot boy will be going back to Maui, not barefoot, but with a brand new pair of shoes."

Closing Guantanamo doesn't solve the problem

From all media reports, it looks as though President Obama is in the process of making good on one of his campaign promises: to close the Guantanamo Bay prison that has housed detainees since shortly after the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon and the ensuing threat of terrorism and continued combat in the Middle East.
Sounds as if it'll take awhile before Guantanamo is actually closed, but a deal seems to have been made between the federal government and the state of Illinois to turn the virtually empty Thomson Correctional Center in rural northwestern Illinois into Guantanamo North to make good on the campaign promise and spur economic development in an area with a reported 11.1 percent rate of unemployment.

The Guantanamo Bay prison is located in the southernmost region of Cuba

It ain't a done deal yet, but even if it is it doesn't look to be more than political spin — a prison is a prison is a prison. The detainees will still be in virtual lock-down, regardless of where they are incarcerated. For security reasons, that won't change. And at Guantanamo Bay, they are isolated from the citizens of this country.
How much economic development will result from bringing a mere 100 detainees from Cuba to the prison? Not much, I would think. Currently, media reports indicate there are 200 minimum-security inmates with 82 staff members in the prison with 1,600 cells.
How many more jobs will be created to supervise the 100 detainees? Not many. Even with another 100 staff members added for a one-to-one ratio and a few jobs created in the community as a result of the transfer of detainees, it's a far cry from the 3,000 jobs the federal and state officials say the change will bring. And there's still another 200 detainees still at Guantanamo. What about them?
Despite the cries that Guantanamo Bay is a recruiting tool for terrorists and alienates our allies, the function of Guantanamo will be carried out wherever the detainees go. Seems to me that it would be much better to leave them where they are and figure out what to do with them, morally and legally. Which is also something that is going to have to be done some time along the way.

With all the noise out there, reader beware

Why would anyone write a blog?  As my old friend Chip might say were he asked that question today, that's a corking good question. Blogs, tweets, e-mails and any number of other innovations in the day of instant communications attract all kinds of people for all kinds of reasons.
In my case, I used to write a daily newspaper column and miss writing daily and the immediacy of reaching people with what's on my mind. Writing books, editing newsletters or other writing I do doesn't quite give me the satisfaction I felt from writing every day. While nobody may ever read this blog, there's a certain cathartic effect to putting the words on paper — it was the English novelist D.H. Lawrence who said, "One sheds one's sickness in the novel." So there's that aspect of writing.

And then there are all the half-truths and outright lies you find in your in-basket daily that you want to respond to the masses. Today, for example, I received a story with the following headline: "VERY QUIETLY OBAMA'S CITIZENSHIP CASE REACHES THE SUPREME COURT." The story purported to be an AP-datelined account from Washington about a non-existent group called  "Americans for Freedom of Information" that had released copies of President Obama's college transcripts from Occidental College, indicating that the president attended under the name Barry Soetoro and "received financial aid as a foreign student from Indonesia. ,,," Justice Antonin Scalia reportedly announced that the Supreme Court agreed on Tuesday to hear arguments concerning Obama's legal eligibility to serve as president in a case brought by Leo Donofrio of New Jersey." Sounds ominous and foreboding, huh?

And questionable, too. So I checked Snopes, which indicates the story was false and originally filed with an AP deadline on April 1, 2009, April Fool's Day. For the rest of the story and the details, click here.

Snopes is touted as "the definitive Internet reference source for urban legends, folklore, myths, rumors and misinformation." Quite a claim, but one that has a ring of truth to it, and that site is one place to check to see whether the tall tales sent out over the Internet are true or false. Next time you receive an e-mail that sounds phony, chances are it is. Check it out.

New wing unveiled at the National Museum of the Pacific War

The National Museum of the Pacific War in Fredericksburg, TX

Just got home recently from Fredericksburg, Texas, and the new museum expansion of the National Museum of the Pacific War that took place with events on Dec. 5-7. World War II aviator and President George H.W. Bush was the special guest of honor for the ribbon cutting to open the 32,500-square-foot exhibition in his name. It's a spectacular exhibition that starts with the China-United States relations prior to our entry in the war with the bombing of Pearl Harbor on Dec. 7, 1941, by the Japanese through the dropping of the atomic bomb — a very impressive museum with a great historical perspective of World War II.
Gen. Michael W. Hagee, the 33rd Commandant of the Marine Corps and a native of Fredericksburg, is the president and CEO of the Admiral Nimitz Foundation. He acted as master of ceremonies for the event. (Chester W. Nimitz is also a native of Fredericksburg, population slightly less than 10,000, and the museum is located in and around his grandfather's hotel, Hotel Nimitz.)

"The beginning of the end of war lies in remembrance."

-Inscription near the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier in Arlington National Cemetery

Gen. James T. Conway, 34th Commandant of the Marine Corps, was the keynote speaker to a crowd

for some 3,000 veterans, their families and others with an interest in World War II, for the opening ceremony and ribbon cutting. Other speakers included Texas Gov. Rick Perry and Texas Congressman Michael Conaway. But the real special guests were survivors of Pearl Harbor, Bataan, Corregidor, Wake Island and other iconic battles of World War II.

One man I spoke with, Navy veteran James Bargesley, was a radioman on duty and copied the message to start looking for men in the water after the USS Indianapolis had been sunk after delivering the atomic bomb, "Little Boy," to Tinian to be dropped later on Hiroshima.

In his brief remarks, President Bush said, "This museum honors those who served and those who gave their lives. They fought for a world of peace, not war, where children's dreams speak more loudly than the brashest tyrant's guns. Because of those brave men and women, this museum shall pass on lessons for future generations."

He also pointed out the inscription on a bench near the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier in Arlington National Cemetery that reads, "'The beginning of the end of war lies in remembrance.' And that's what makes days like today (Dec. 7, Pearl Harbor Day) and places like this Nimitz Museum so vitally important. It is right and it is important that we honor the genuine valor of the men and women who throughout our history have made the ultimate sacrifice for their country to the cause of freedom and perhaps, most of all, for each other. Those who survived the war are always haunted by the memory of those they lost, the friends who never came home.

"So we're also right to pause and thank the living for the honor and commitment to service they have shown and continue to show to preserve this, the greatest nation on the face of the earth. At the same time, we have a solemn obligation to pass forward to future generations the abject horror of war. Ask anyone who has been there, and they'll tell you war is never to be relished and only rarely to be celebrated. Most of all, it is documented and remembered and used as a lesson, as an example of what happens when mankind falls short of his highest aspirations. It is in the act of telling the full story of war, the heroism, the moral justice of a cause, as well as the great suffering that makes this remarkable museum such a special place."

And it is a special place. I was only able to take a brief tour of the museum, where you could spend a couple of days to take it all in, before I had to head for Austin and home to beat the weather spreading havoc across the country. I barely made it before the flight delays stranded people in the airports across the country. But I hope to return some day to spend the time worthy of the history that is documented in the museum and highly recommend it to anyone wanting to learn about the Pacific War.

Links to:

National Museum of the Pacific War

Admiral Nimitz Foundation