The Willamette University Football Team, Part 1

When the Japanese attacked Oahu all leisure travel was suspended, leaving hundreds of people stranded in Hawaii.

Among the people stranded, were Hollywood movie makers, and the Willamette University and the San Jose University football teams. The Hollywood movie makers immediately pitched in and made dummy cardboard planes and placed them on the airfields to fool Japanese into thinking not all planes were hit.

The Willamette football team made an immediate, active, and (for some) a long-term commitment.

One of the biggest football events in Hawaii was the Shrine Bowl game, climaxing the school football season. In 1941 University of Hawaii was scheduled to play teams from Willamette and San Jose. In the first game, on December 6, 1941, Willamette lost 20-6 to the University of Hawaii and had the rest of their time in Hawaii to "relax." But that didn't happen.

PHOTO: The 1941 Willamette University Bearcats: (front row, from left): Irv Miller, Cecil Conner, Pat White, Tony Fraiola, Al Walden, Jim Fitzgerald, Buddy Reynolds, Chuck Furno, (second row from left) Earl Hampton, Bill Reder, Martin Barstad, Ted Ogdahl, Jim Burgess, Gene Stewart, Glenn Nordquist, Wally Olson; (third row from left) Dick Kern (manager), Paul Cookingham, George Constable, David Kelly, Ken Jacobson, Allan Barrett, Marshall Barbour, Clarence Williams, Assistant Coach Howard Maple; (back row from left) David Kurtz, Robert Bennett, Gordon Moore, Andrew Rogers, Neil Morley, Marv Goodman, Carrel "Truck" Deiner, Coach Roy S. "Spec" Keene. Note Cookingham, Kurtz, Clarence Walden and coach Maple did not make the trip to Hawaii. (Willamette University)

The morning of the attack, their coach volunteered his players for guard duty at Punahou School. And he sent the Willamette co-eds who were in Honolulu to a Navy hospital to act as nurses’ aides. The students were for two weeks before passage could be secured for them aboard the ocean liner President Coolidge.

(If you read the next post, you will read a different version of "volunteering." In that article, with direct quotes from the players, the coach bartered the services of the team for passage home. However, I think the athletes would probably have volunteered. Many of them went on to serve in the military during the war. Bill Reder was killed in action, and many continue in community, political, and social service to their country. The San Jose team members also aided the Army, but it is not so much part of the schools tradition. At Willamette, that team is mythic--and all were inducted in the Hall Of Fame for their action.)

Some of the football players from Willamette stayed on island to become volunteer policemen, and later join the regular forces and some worked with the Army Engineers at Punahou.

NOTES: The story of the stranded Shrine Bowl football teams was featured on an ESPN special that aired November 24-28, 2000 entitled “The Moment of Impact." Another good coverage of the event can be read at http://www.d3football.com/notables/2003/12
as well as the Willamette University website.