Vanishing Generation, Part 3 - Boxer - Episode 3

Don Ziglar, U.S.S. Yorktown Quartermaster, recalls Japanese fighter planes coming toward the Yorktown. The captain was out on the wing of the bridge, at the starboard side. The bridge wasn't big. There were about 50 planes on the flight deck with the engines roaring, then the main batteries started firing, and more in front, on top and on the starboard side. He describes all the firing from all sides and says that the captain could not be heard. He wanted them to turn right. The captain started beating the quartermaster on the right arm, telling him to go that way. This went on for several hours, but none of it had ever been rehearsed. He refers to the aircraft carrier as being "a heavyweight boxer with a glass jaw" and says they were "just kids." Some of our airplanes would fail, and the Japanese would capture them and cut their heads off. He says, "What do you think that did to us? Made us tigers." He recounts the Japanese warships, battleships, cruisers, carriers, and planes that were destroyed, and says, "that was the bad news." The good news was that they took no prisoners.  

Standards

• Along with the rest of the world, the United States and South Carolina experienced economic instability during this period. As a result, political instability and worldwide conflict consumed the world in the 1940s. Following World War II, the United States emerged as a world leader through political policies and economic growth.
  • 5.3.CX Contextualize the technological and geographic influence on military strategies in the Pacific and European theaters of war of World War II.
• This indicator was designed to promote inquiry into military and economic policies during World War II, to include the significance of military bases in South Carolina. This indicator was also developed to foster inquiry into postwar economic developments and demographic changes, to include the immigration of Jewish refugees following the Holocaust.
  • 8.5.CO Compare South Carolina and U.S. wartime contributions and demobilization after World War II.
• This indicator was constructed to facilitate inquiry into how economic conditions prompted an evolution of fiscal and monetary policy featuring significant turning points. This indicator also supports inquiry into the laissez-faire policies of the 1920s, the balance of free markets and government intervention of the 1930s, and the command economies during World War I and World War II.
  • USHC.4.E Utilize primary and secondary sources to analyze the impact of changes in American foreign policy, worldwide conflicts, and business cycles in capitalism.

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