They thought they'd have a story to tell. And they did, although it would read like something from Stephen King — surreal, fraught with peril and laden with moral lessons.
In November 1941, 25 members of the San Jose State College football team, and 27 football players from Willamette University, plus their head coaches and assorted friends and family members, set sail on a luxury liner to what was then the Territory of Hawaii.
The two teams had scheduled three games involving each other and their hosts, the University of Hawaii Rainbow Warriors. But that plan soon was derailed as the Spartans of San Jose State and the Bearcats of Willamette became witnesses to one of the most historic and terrifying events of the 20th century — the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor of Dec. 7, 1941.
These young men from Oregon and California, some in their late teens, most in their early 20s, left California on one of the great ocean liners of the day. They came back 28 days later stowed in steerage (below sea level), sharing an overloaded ship with civilians from Hawaii and badly wounded soldiers.
The ride was no bargain — attacks at sea were a real possibility — but it was their best option.
"To get aboard, to get passage, we had to sign a paper saying we'd help the wives and children," said Jack Galvin, a San Jose State player in 1941. He recently celebrated his 90th birthday and lives near Sacramento.
"We had heard about Japanese subs, and being below the water line, we figured if the submarines hit us, we'd be dead, so we slept on deck the last three days," said Chuck Furno, a sophomore halfback for Willamette in 1941. Also 90, he now lives in Vancouver, Wash.
"It affected the trajectory of all their lives," added Debra Fitzgerald, an attorney in Alaska whose father, James Fitzgerald, was one of the Willamette players. He died in April in Santa Rosa at 90.
"Not only the bombing, which was shocking and dramatic," she added. "What had a more lasting impression was having to care for the wounded (soldiers) on the way home. My dad was 21; they were all just kids."
The "kids" were forced by circumstances to grow up quickly:
Seven San Jose State players would remain in Hawaii after their teammates went home, and an eighth Spartan player would be talked out of staying literally at the last minute.
One Spartan, center and co-captain Robert Hamill, would see action in three wars (World War II, Korea, Vietnam), plus the Berlin Airlift in 1948.
Another San Jose player, square-jawed, German-born Hans Wiedenhoefer, had a Forrest Gump-like experience. He was also at Iwo Jima on the day six soldiers hoisted an American flag atop Mount Suribachi for a world-famous photograph.
Willamette freshman Glenn Nordquist, on "volunteer" patrol in Hawaii with World War I-era gear and weaponry after the attack, would have an epiphany, quit football and become a minister. In 1951, he would meet with Mitsuo Fuchida, a former Japanese pilot who had led the first wave of planes dropping bombs at Pearl Harbor.
The ship the San Jose and Willamette groups sailed on to Hawaii, the S.S. Lurline, would become part of war lore. Starting a week before the bombing and continuing for three days, the Lurline's assistant radio operator intercepted Japanese radio signals coming from out in the Pacific northwest of Hawaii.
On Dec. 7, the teams were staying at a hotel near Waikiki beach, 12 miles east of Pearl Harbor, where nearly 2,400 U.S. servicemen were killed, 1,177 of them aboard the U.S.S. Arizona.
Beginning just before 8 a.m. on a Sunday morning, the surprise assaults on the island of Oahu by two waves of Japanese planes drew the United States into World War II.
None of the athletes for either squad was injured that day. Most of the San Jose State and Willamette players would serve in the military. Many would see combat over the next 3? years.
San Jose's Kenneth C. Bailey would be killed in action. Willamette's Ted Ogdahl would be seriously wounded at Okinawa. He was shot as he and his fellow Marines attempted to take a beach, fell in the sand and was "bayoneted by Japanese," said one of his sons, Wally. The Marines retook the beach; Ogdahl survived. "He pretended he was dead, which wasn't very hard, 'cause he was close," said Wally Ogdahl, a lawyer in Salem, Ore.
Three days after the Lurline arrived in Honolulu, the only game that would be played in the series was held. On Dec. 6, the Bearcats, not acclimated to the 80-degree temperatures after leaving Oregon in near-freezing conditions, lost to Hawaii 20-6.
"I blame it on the trip," said Furno. "We hadn't been on land too long. It was a pretty rough crossing. Some of the guys lost a lot of weight. I could stand on the dock and get seasick."
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