This week marked the 70th anniversary of the Pearl Harbor attack. Three local boys lost their lives on that Day of Infamy. Here’s more from a Dec. 7, 1991, story.
Ralph “Red” Hollis (above) had joined the Palm Beach Fire Department. His amateur radio skills would later help him tell the world of America’s third-deadliest natural disaster: the 1928 hurricane.
He arrived Sept. 18, 1941 in Hawaii, assigned to the Arizona.
Claude Rich (above), of West Palm Beach, turned to the military as a way out of poverty. Never did anyone consider the he’d come into harm’s way. He also was assigned the Arizona.
Eugene “Gene” Lish (above) was good enough on clarinet to get A’s and a spot on the Fort Pierce High School band all four years. He joined the Navy and was assigned to the West Virginia. Its base: Pearl Harbor.
Dec. 7, 1941, was cool and rainy in South Florida.
The Sunday morning paper carried an ominous front page story: “President Roosevelt has dispatched a personal message to Emperor Hirohito of Japan in the midst of darkening war clouds in the Far East.”
Soon it was midafternoon in West Palm Beach; 7:55 a.m. in Pearl Harbor.
The West Virginia took seven torpedoes, which broke open fuel compartments. Fumes from the low-grade crude oil filled the lower decks. Lish was among those overpowered. Newspaper clippings declared him the first Floridian killed in a war too new to have a name.
The West Virginia was the first ship attacked, at 7:56 a.m., so if Lish was killed immediately, he was just minutes ahead of Hollis and Rich.
The Arizona took four direct hits from 1,760-pound converted battleship shells. The deadliest one struck just about 8:05 a.m. Seconds later 1.7 million pounds of gunpowder ignited.
It is believed about 1,000 of the 1,103 deaths on the Arizona — half of the death toll at Pearl Harbor — occurred at that moment.
The radio room was about 50 feet from the center of the blast. Relatives and friends believe Ralph Hollis and Claude Rich were killed instantly, perhaps vaporized. Their bodies never were recovered.
In honoring these three, we honor all lost on that day and in the line of service.
Tags: death, World War II
On Sept. 12, 1980, a chartered commuter plane on a gambling junket from West Palm Beach to Freeport, Grand Bahama, crashed into the ocean, killing all 34 aboard in the worst air disaster on a flight into or out of Palm Beach International Airport.
Tags: airports, death, This Week in History
On May 20, 1913, Henry Morrison Flagler died after taking a fall on the marble steps of his winter home in Palm Beach. His obituary in the Miami Daily Metropolis called him “one of the greatest of the modern captains of industry, director in Standard Oil, builder of the Florida East Coast Railroad, investor of over fifty million dollars in Florida alone, and the man who first noticed the great possibilities for the settlement and development of the east coast of Florida.”
Tags: death, Henry Flagler, This Week in History
On Sept. 16, 1928, the storm that came to be known as the Okeechobee hurricane came ashore in central Palm Beach County with winds of at least 145 mph. As the storm crossed Lake Okeechobee, the 20-foot-high storm surge crashed through the low muck along the south and east shores, sweeping water out of Lake Okeechobee and over the towns of Belle Glade, Chosen, Pahokee, South Bay, and Bean City, killing at least 2,500 people.
This photo taken in the aftermath of the 1928 hurricane shows the damage done to a cluster of Everglades scientific work stations in Belle Glade. (Palm Beach Post file photo)
The south shore of Lake Okeechobee after the 1928 hurricane (Palm Beach Post file photo).
Scenes of West Palm Beach after the 1928 hurricane, from Palm Beach Hurricane—92 Views, 1928, American Autochrome Company, Chicago, IL. More photos from the autochrome series are available here.
The front pages of The Palm Beach Post from September 1928 describe the horror of the 1928 hurricane. Click on the images below to see larger images and to browse the 1928 newspapers.
Tags: 1928 Hurricane, death, hurricane
Recently we visited the West Palm Beach Police Department, where in the lobby is a plaque that honors officers who died in the line of duty.
In the past, we’ve listed those across Palm Beach, Martin and St. Lucie counties who were slain. We decided to go down the West Palm Beach list and also honor those killed in accidents.
William Morgan Payton, Feb. 9, 1924: While he tried to break up a domestic argument on Third and Division Streets, the husband got hold of his pistol and shot him twice.
Jack E. Wadlington, March 31, 1935: He was struck by a car as he directed traffic after the city’s Seminole Sun Dance parade. He’d just returned to work after being struck by a car weeks earlier.
Lewis Allen Conner, Aug. 7, 1937: The father of seven was fatally shot by a convict at his home when Conner and another officer came to arrest him on a breaking and-entering charge.
Festus Alvah Tatum Jr., March 28, 1959: The traffic officer was thrown from his motorcycle during a funeral procession. Al Tatum Field, on 54th Street near Broadway, is named for him.
William H. Fletcher and David R. Van Curler, April 6, 1967: As Fletcher responded to a possible robbery at a bank at 45th Street and Broadway, the suspect wrestled away his gun and shot him. He then shot Van Curler off his motorcycle as he raced up. The assailant died in a mental hospital.
Clarence Leo “Lee” Wagner, Feb. 10, 1967: As Wagner rode down South Dixie, lights and sirens on, a Palm Beach Post editor entering the company parking lot following a dinner break turned in front of Wagner’s motorcycle.
Robert Dennis Edwards, Jan. 21, 1984: His cruiser struck a car driven by a Delaware man at 36th Street and Dixie Highway.
Brian H. Chappell, Aug. 22, 1988: The motorcycle officer was shot by an escaped prisoner he’d pulled over. A park on North Flagler Drive at 54th Street is named for him. His confessed killer remains on Death Row.
Thomas Morash, Oct 17, 2003: The motorcycle officer was killed when a car pulled into his path on South Dixie Highway near Southern Boulevard.
Thanks to staff researcher Michelle Quigley.
Tags: death, police, West Palm Beach
