Son remembers Monessen father who served during attack on Pearl Harbor
Assocated Press
In this May 24, 1943, file photo, the deck of the capsized battleship USS Oklahoma, damaged in the Japanese attack on Dec. 7, 1941, sits in Pearl Harbor in Honolulu, Hawaii, in May 1943. Monessen native Pearson Harkema (at top), who died earlier this year, was serving on the ship at the time of the attack.
The stricken USS Oklahoma battleship lies half-righted as cables stretched over wooden A-frames to Ford Island at Pearl Harbor are used to right the ship in 1944. The ship was hit by torpedoes and sunk in the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor, Dec. 7, 1941 during World War II. (AP Photo/U.S. Navy)
Harkema
When Monessen native Elmer Harkema attends a Pearl Harbor service today commemorating the 75th anniversary of the attack, he will do so with pride for his father and a heaviness in his heart.
That’s because this will be the first anniversary service his father Pearson Harkema, a survivor of the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor, won’t be attending. The elder Harkema, who was 95 and a lifelong resident of Monessen, died July 27.
“It will be bittersweet because it will be the first time that the anniversary has come and he hasn’t been around,” Elmer said. “It is bittersweet because there will be good memories of my father, but he won’t be there.”
Elmer, now of Pittsburgh, said because his father had been one of the few surviving veterans of Pearl Harbor, the national Pearl Harbor Survivors Association had wanted to fly him to Hawaii for ceremonies and the Pittsburgh Steelers had wanted to honor him Nov. 13 in conjunction with Veterans Day.
Pearson, a 1939 graduate of Monessen High School, served as a fire controlman first class on the battleship USS Oklahoma when the Japanese attacked the U.S. military facilities in Pearl Harbor, Hawaii on Dec. 7, 1941.
As the ship was sinking, Pearson jumped over the side into oil-soaked, flaming water. Although wounded, he was rescued and brought ashore. He recovered from his wounds and served with the Navy aboard the USS Northampton, a heavy cruiser, and the battleship USS Indiana.
Elmer said his father went into the service by 1940 and served a six-year stint in the Navy.
“On USS Oklahoma, he had a bunch of friends who did not survive,” Elmer said.
His passing came as Elmer was just learning in recent years about his father’s service to his country.
“He did not talk about World War II,” Elmer said. “He was very tight-lipped about it. I would ask questions, and he would push it aside.”
That changed a little more than a decade ago when Pearson was interviewed by a California University of Pennsylvania student for a project on veterans. He reluctantly agreed to the interview only after the student agreed to preserve Pearson’s anonymity.
“After she gave him a copy of the report she filed for Cal University, that was the first I ever learned about his experiences,” Elmer said.
Elmer, who earned degrees in history as well as business from Carnegie Mellon University, began to do a little research of his own at the Monessen Library and District Center.
“I was interested in that part of my father that I did not know,” Elmer said. “I wanted to find out what he went through.”
Shortly after, the Veterans of Foreign Wars Post 914 in West Mifflin began holding services honoring the remaining Pearl Harbor survivors. The Harkemas attended those services for the past five years.
“That brought me closer to him,” Elmer said. “I would drive down (to Monessen) and pick up him and my mom and take them to and from West Mifflin.”
Marion Harkema, 92, lives in the same Pacific Boulevard home in Monessen in which Elmer grew up.
The ROTC class at West Mifflin High School this year traveled to Pearl Harbor and had planned to give Pearson a gift they brought back for him.
His son will accept the gift on his father’s behalf today.
Elmer said as Pearl Harbor survivors numbers slowly fade, it is the duty of their families to continue their stories.
“Someone needs to let people know what they went through,” Elmer said. “Anything I can do to make sure they know that, I will do.
“He will be remembered and anything I can do to keep that memory not only of him but of the event that is unparalleled in recent history is something that needs to be done.”