Design Matters

The built environment is all around us.  Good design can make what is built both functional and pleasing.  There is a saying that form follows function, but as we know that is not always the case.  It is all too often that an architect wishes to make a statement and that can easily lead to function following form.  Often, the Starchitect form is not overly pleasing, and actually does little for the good of the landscape in which it is located.  Design failures can be simple and hardly noticed, or they can be big and regularly noticed.  This post is about a few areas of what I interpret to be design mishaps in my local community of McFarland, WI.

Snow pile indicates extent of clearing.  Look into photo and see rocks and
planter which prohibit snow  plows from getting through
Looking south

Design informs how we interact not just with the constructed world, but with others around us.  Sometimes design failure is about forgetting simple aspects of human life and physics--e.g. the shortest distance between two points is a straight line.  For many, many years college campuses forgot about that and placed rectangular sidewalks around a square thinking no one would want to walk the diagonal, across a square.  The first design issue in McFarland is the new child play area adjacent to the library.  I am sure some landscape architect received many kudos for the design.  What stood out in my mind is the layout of a boulder next to the sidewalk.  A standard five foot wide sidewalk, constructed with the library, runs from the public sidewalk to the library entrance, and this sidewalk runs along the edge of the child play area totally reconstructed last summer.  The design, and construction of the play area involves large stones (and bench) at the edge of the sidewalk.  Up until the construction of the new play area the sidewalk was cleared in the winter, but  this past winter it was not cleared.  The reason is simple, the boulders prohibit the use of a small tractor, skid-steer, or small utility vehicle (such as a John Deere Gator) to clear the sidewalk.  Someone was not thinking. Clearly they did not care about the shortest distance between two points.  Having worked in local government for over 33 years one thing is certain, public works and park crews are built around the use of machines, no one is going to hand shovel unless it is absolutely necessary.  Even if they had a walk behind snow blower they do not wish to get out of their enclosed piece of equipment and do another chore.  This is a small matter of design, but one that should have been caught.

10+ minutes before school release cars are backing up on the roadway
The school addition could have been constructed toward this intersection

The other aspects relate to the construction of the elementary school directly behind my home.  There was at one point two schools on the site, but the oldest school, a two story building which had many aspects of good urbanism, was razed.  In its place is a massive one story building attached to the building that remained.  Two things strike me about this school.  First its site was designed not for its intended K-2 inhabitants, but for cars.  Second, it is a great example of suburban design, and more importantly an example of how not to design.

Crossing guard in Yellow.  Like the Maytag repairman?

The form follows function of design clearly is not at work in its parent pick up and drop off.  This is an utter failure.  This year, even though construction on the school was completed last September, the school district still has most all children who attend the school bused to the school, pretty much regardless of location in the Village.  Even before the new school was built this drop off configuration was completed at a large cost.  Since the outset it has failed.  The vehicular traffic picking up and dropping of school children is so great that it backs up onto the street, as can be seen in the attached photos (the crossing guard told me it often backs up even greater than the time I happened to view it last week).  The back up affects non-school traffic, and is a clear failure of design to have form follow function.  And, it is not like someone did not inform the powers that be that this was going to happen.  A neighbor to the school, who was employed as a city planner at the time, wrote a letter to the Village and school about the poor design and the effect it would have on traffic.  How much worse will it be if the school no longer chooses to bus so many K-5 students?

Boulder along sidewalk edge
Looking north

The school district is its own worst enemy.   To pass a referendum many years ago now they decided to break schools by grades rather than create neighborhood schools.   Instead of having two elementary schools of K-5, there is a K-2 school and another school for grades 3-5, at the opposite end of town.  Meaning more kids beyond a reasonable walk distance. The obvious ramification is kids just don't walk to school, they get driven (or bused).  By their own design of grade configuration they are making it more likely for parents to drop off and pick up their child, and of course it is double and triple fold when you have children in more than one school.  And people wonder why their is an obesity epidemic among youth. Part of the blame goes to schools and not just because of grade configuration.  Blame also needs to be placed on the "mandate" of the Department of Public Instruction that new schools have a minimum acreage requirement.  For elementary schools it is 12 to 15 acres.  This moves schools to the periphery of the community to access land availability, but where there is the least walkability and bikeability.   It is a promotion of the auto-oriented car culture. It is funny how so many climate change warriors fail to look at simple regulations and mandates that encourage auto dependency.  (If Governor Evers desires to reduce carbon, he failed to promote schools in walkable areas as head of DPI for many years.)  Auto dependency has now been so ingrained in the nation that it is expected and that low level of expectation leads to bad design, and places cars over people.  I have yet to meet a second grader that drives, but yet what one sees from the street is not the school, but the parking lots.

View up Sure Street from Exchange Street 

The other aspect of the poor school design is that it failed to do one of two things:  It was not built to the corner, and absent that it was not built to provide a terminated vista for the one street that approaches the school, Sure Street.  however, when you look up Sure Street to the school what do you see?  A parking lot.  the corner, which is but a half block from the Village Hall and Library, is occupied by a detention basin, parking lot, and pavement for drop-off and pick-up,  not a building.  It was possible to design the building at the corner or with a terminated vista as viewed from Sure Street.  The car culture kept it so neither design principle could be met. The school building addition could easily have been designed to provide either a presence at the corner, or with a prominent feature visible from Exchange Street up Sure Street, say a well designed main entry.  Then again, that would have required the architect, school board, and village to think beyond a car dependent culture, but alas that was apparently above the capabilities of those groups to understand and appreciate.

View from Sure at Johnson
Main entry to school is just to the left.
Snow piles obscure (a temporary screen) the vehicles in the parking lot

And it is that lack of appreciation for the aspects of design as to why so much design fails.  If one were to look at the cities and villages which persons hold in high regard in Wisconsin they are ones that have not lost their traditional downtown.  Would the small communities of Door County be so attractive if the villages had not required at least some design to keep building close to the street (urbanism) rather than providing a sea of parking and the building far back? Or, think of Mount Horeb and Cambridge each with dynamic downtown which embraces good urbansim.   I have written before about walk appeal, which you can read here, so it is not necessary for me to also identify the importance of urban design for walking.

School bus from Elementary School  in subdivision adjoining the school

How important is a terminated vista?  Well, for those in the Madison, WI area, think of what the view up East or West Washington Avenue (or any of the other side streets for that matter) would be if instead of the State Capitol it was a parking lot or ramp? How well would that please they eye?   What is important is that such terminated vistas be used more frequently, it should not only be the State Capitol building.  Public use buildings, whether a school, church, library or administrative building need to provide a place of prominence in the community--it adds to the purpose of what a public building is for and what it provides to the community.  It adds a sense of place and it adds a sense of grandeur.  Instead since the arrival of the car culture, generally post WWII, many public buildings fail in this test.  They are designed for cars, not people, they are designed not to provide pleasing views, but to make sure there is sufficient parking in front.  (Deflected vistas, depending upon the overall viewscape, can also be an effective tool, but alas suburban car culture also fails in the use of that design principle.)

WI State Capitol Building

There is also the failure of design professionals--planners, architects and landscape architects who have become too comfortable with the status quo car culture that is  inherently dangerous to the human scale.  Until the public starts to demand designs for the human scale and not the car scale, we will simply continue to see seas of parking and uneventful buildings that do little to raise the imagination. How many new public buildings, constructed in a suburban fashion in the last 70 years do you think are or will be worth saving 50 or 100 years distant?  Urban design need not be expensive, and that is what Starchitects do not like.  Good urban design uses simplicity to perform elegance, not disjointed and crazy roof lines or fenestration.  It will probably be less than 100 years, if  not less than 80 years out, that the school behind me will be torn down and another unimaginative building put in its place.

First seven photos by Author on 3/14 or 3/15 2019

Last photo from Google Images

Hitting Notes

One of the hymns at mass on Ash Wednesday brought to mind a book I had just completed the day before.  That book, Tattoos on the Heart by Greg Boyle, SJ,  is a compilation of stories of Fr. Boyle's work with former gang members (although once a gang member always a gang member?) who work(ed) for Homeboy Industries  in LA.  Gang members are referenced as Homies.  Fr. Boyle notes that Los Angeles is the gang capital of the United States, and the area in which he ministers is the gang capital of LA.  Fr. Boyle began work in the area in the mid 1980's as an associate pastor at St. Dolores Mission Church.  The church was in the midst of two notorious housing projects, together known as Pico-Aliso.  Fr. Boyle's stories are both heart wrenching and beautiful, showing both the hard side of gangs and yet the grace that love and compassion can render when realized. That is where the hymn "Ashes" (Tom Conroy)  comes into play.   Boyle has  the following quote (p.94):  "Resilience is born by grounding yourself in your own loveliness, hitting notes you thought were out of your range."  Every person has some loveliness, they may just need to discover it; that is what Homeboy attempts.

We rise again from ashes,
from the good we've failed to do.
We rise again from ashes,
to create ourselves anew.
If all our world is ashes,
then must our lives be true,
An offering of ashes,
An offering to You. 

What is shown by Boyle is the resilience of the Homies of LA, and the ability of many to move above a terrifying cycle and existence where parents have been drug addicts, or in many circumstances simply not present; it is an existence of drugs and crime, and quite frankly little opportunity. Given the socio-economic situation present, Boyle quickly realized more had to be done.  Fr. Boyle, who served two years as an assistant at that parish, and would become pastor after a trip to Bolivia instilled in him a desire to work with the poor.

Fr Boyle with some Homies

The church quickly became a homeless shelter under Fr. Boyle.  It did not take long for the ugly, lingering, overwhelming odor of smelly feet and homeless men to encapsulate the church and to get people to complain.  Hence, a parish meeting was called to discuss the matter.  When one person present asks "why we let it happen" (i.e. the church being used as a homeless shelter) a woman responds because that is what we are committed to do.  When asked why they have such a commitment, the response by another parishioner was simple, it is what Jesus would do.  An older man then gets up in the back and yells (although in Spanish) "It smells like commitment"; the place, Boyle recounts breaks into cheers.  The smell is still there, he says,  it is simply cloaked in the sense of mission.  This is not a wealthy parish, it is the poorest in the diocese, yet these members, from the lowest end of the social and economic strata are committed to helping their neighborhood.  Grounding themselves in loveliness. To create a world anew.

From Inaugural Radical Disruptors Event, July 2017
In 2017 "The Economist" magazine referred to Homeboy Industries  as the
most successful gang intervention and rehabilitation program in the world.

There are likely few poorer and crime ridden areas of LA than Boyle Heights, in which Homeboy and St. Dolores church are located.  Boyle quickly realized that many children in the area were kicked out of school, and so he opened an alternative school, and a day care.  This then led him to create what is now known as Homeboy Industries, a way to provide counseling, jobs and training to former  gang often incarcerated youths and young adults. All in east LA an area teeming with gangs, bad blood, drugs, and vendetta's.  

Homeboy runs the largest tattoo removal service in the world

The thing about Homeboy Industries is that it employs former members of varied rival gangs. Members of former rival gangs work next to each other.  To say animosity, hate and revenge runs deep would be an understatement.   It makes "West Side Story" a walk in the park. As one said, the book is about fall, grace and redemption. It is here, out of desire for revenge, that Homeboy wants to develop what Boyle refers to as kinship.  But yet, in too many instances a young person who had found redemption would be killed, either just because he was in the wrong place at the wrong time (as occurred to a young man who was packing his car to head out for a camping trip) or because he or she had once been a member of a rival gang.  Some gang members clearly had failures, but many obtained goodness.

We offer You our failures,
we offer You attempts;
The gifts not fully given,
the dreams not fully dreamt.
Give our stumblings direction,
give our visions wider view,
An offering of ashes,
An offering to You.

In one example of goodness, Fr Boyle was to receive an award from Loyola Marymount University, but a  previously scheduled speaking engagement prevented him from attending so he asked a Homie to accept the award on his behalf.  Most all Homies have a record, and have served time in some sort of prison, jail, or detention.  Elias, the Homie, agreed to accept the award but had second thoughts when he finds out he has to say a few words.  He walks up with his folded legal paper, reads mostly a non-descript text describing his life turnaround, his coming up from the ashes.  The audience gets he is not a well bred speaker, but he speaks from the heart.  He then ends with perhaps the most compelling words, that the audience would probably not forget: "Because Fr. Greg and Homeboy Industries believed in me, I decided to believe in myself.  And the best way I can think of payin' 'em back is by changing my life.  And that's exactly what I've decided to do  (p. 105)."  The crowd gives the boy a standing ovation although he thought it was for Fr. Greg Boyle, and not himself. Elias' road to healing was underway. Elias came to realize a vision with a wider view.

Then rise again from ashes,
let healing come to pain;
Though spring has turned to winter,
and sunshine turned to rain.
The rain we'll use for growing,
and create the world anew,
From an offering of ashes,
An offering to You.

Homeboy HQ

Another story related by Fr. Boyle is that of a Homie who has no family.  When Fr. Boyle asked what he did for Christmas he noted that he invited five other Homies from the crew over for dinner and made a turkey, which he says was prepared "Ghetto-style".  He prepared only a turkey.   What is crucial is that they were from rival gangs, who in an earlier life would have been shooting each other.  Miguel, the boy who prepared the turkey, says " Yeah, the six of us just sat there, staring at the oven, waiting for the turkey to be done." (p. 88)  Fr Boyle comments that "One would be hard-pressed to imagine something more sacred and ordinary than six orphans staring at an oven together." (p 88)  Fr. Boyle asks Miguel how he does it with all the pain and suffering he has experienced.  Miguel responds, ""You know, I always suspected that there was something of goodness in me, but I just couldn't find it.  Until one day,' -he quiets a bit-'I discovered it here in my heart.  I found it...goodness. And ever since that day I have always known who I was.'" (p 89)   Miguel had grown.   

... Thanks be to the Father,
who made us like Himself.
... Thanks be to His Son,
who saved us by His death.
... Thanks be to the Spirit,
who creates the world anew,
From an offering of ashes,
An offering to You.

What is present in this book is what Pope Francis has called the harmony of redemption.  The sad thing is that gang wars and resentment still present themselves in terrible ways,  and too many persons are gunned down for just being in the wrong place at the wrong time, or some aspect of a past they had left behind caught up with them from a rival gang.  Fr. Boyle fully understands that it is difficult to measure success, because there is the "daily dread of setbacks (p. 167).  Fr. Boyle notes the young men and women need to want to help themselves.  He notes that it is difficult for them to look to the future, likely because their present is so bleak; he comments that gang members are young people that are in an exclusive group planning not their future but their funerals.  But, Fr. Boyle also notes that the key to Homeboy Industries is not the counseling or job training, but it is about healing. It is, as he says, about accompaniment. The Homies have offered their failures and their attempts.  If healed they will redirect their path.  Many have risen from the ashes.

Homie working at the Homegirl Cafe

The last chapter of his book is entitled "Kinship" and begins with the following sentence:  "Mother Teresa diagnosed the world's ills in this way: we've just 'forgotten that we belong to each other' "(p. 187).  A simple yet elegant expression showing the need for all to belong to one kinship, as all are created in the likeness and image of God.  Good words to ponder in our present time.  Fr. Boyle demonstrates the power of compassion and getting young gang members to believe in themselves.  In that sense, he gets them to hit notes which they thought were out of their range.  In other words, these young people have risen from the ashes and made their lives anew.  Thanks be to the Spirit who creates life anew.

Note:
Homeboy Industries, is explained on their website as:

Homeboy Industries provides hope, training, and support to formerly gang-involved and previously incarcerated men and women allowing them to redirect their lives and become contributing members of our community. Each year over 10,000 former gang members from across Los Angeles come through Homeboy Industries’ doors in an effort to make a positive change. They are welcomed into a community of mutual kinship, love, and a wide variety of services ranging from tattoo removal to anger management and parenting classes. Full-time employment is offered for more than 200 men and women at a time through an 18-month program that helps them re-identify who they are in the world, offers job training so they can move on from Homeboy Industries and become contributing members of the community - knowing they count!

Homeboy has become a blueprint for more than 250 social enterprises in the US and sixteen other countries.  

Source:  Boyle, Greg. 2010.  Tattoos on the Heart: the Power of Boundless Compassion.  Free Press, NY NY.

Images from Google Images.

The Emperor's Slave Labor

When I was doing my college coursework at the University of Wisconsin-Whitewater one of my geography professors had a hearing aid in each ear.  His hearing aids, it would be revealed, was related to his being a guest of the Emperor of Japan during WWII.  Japan, thinking that such a euphemism would put things in a better light, referred to Prisoners of War (POW) as guests of the Emperor.  What would happen to my former professor, and others was that they were slave labor for many of the Japanese industrial giants, is little known and recognized today.  The book  and movie Unbroken provide but a small glimpse into the life of a POW.  As the social justice warriors of the United States drive around in their Subaru's and Prius' few apparently think of the trials and mistreatment Japan did to the Allied POWs under their "care".  Two prior posts this year focused on the rescue of prisoners who were mainly from the Bataan Death March, and the sinking of the USS Houston.  The Bataan Death March and the sinking of the Houston, along with the Lost Battalion (a National Guard unit from Texas) were among the first American's taken prisoner by Japan.  But, if Japan had followed the code of conduct for war time, as laid out in various accords, my former professor would never have been in Japan.

POWs in Japanese POW camp in the Philippines

First, I could go in to significant detail on the treatment of Allied Prisoner's of War by the Japanese government, but that would be much to lengthy. As noted in a prior post only 1% of Allied POWs died in German hands, compared to 27% held by the Japanese  Let me simply say, that now that top secret files have been released and a few survivors have talked, a better glimpse of treatment has come to light.  A few examples of how well the Japanese treated the Emperor's guests can suffice.  First, men were sometimes made to stand at attention all night naked (in well below zero temperatures of the north of Japan) and in at least one situation a Japanese guard would come by and place use a clamp the private parts of a POW he thought was particularly well endowed.  Second, while building the Burma-Thai Railway, some prisoners were buried up to their heads in the ground and the heads covered with syrup to draw flesh eating ants. Most all prisoners in the tropics of the Philippines, Burma or Thailand had come up with several tropical diseases, and many died due to those--beriberi, malaria, just to name two. Over 400 men died per mile of construction of that railway.  Then of course there was the mass killing of many prisoners, some of which preceded the 1944 order by the Japanese Government to kill all prisoners and leave no trace as the Allies advanced island by island, territory by territory.  Such mass killings is what led the United States to undertake the famous raid at Cabanatuan.  

Construction of the Burma-Thailand Railway, by Allied Slave Labor

Each camp seemed to have different methods of torture, but a few things were common:  undernourishment, if any really edible food at all, lack of clothing--most all required to wear the clothes in which they were captured even in the cold climate mining ores in northern Japan. These clothes became rags, and particularly in the jungles, many then had no clothes to wear. Even though Red Cross care packages were to be distributed once a week, most only saw one such package during their up to 3+ years in captivity.  The only time decent clothes could be worn was the rare visit by the Red Cross.  Footwear was not replaced when it wore out.  The slave laborers were transported from the Philippines and other islands to varied work locations at the homeland, or on the mainland (such as to work on the Burma-Thai Railway) by merchant ships unmarked as to carrying POWs and hence the ships became targets of Allied air forces. (The Geneva Accords required prisoner ships to be properly marked.)  How they were treated and packed into merchant ships is another story, but so many were crammed into a small space such that they became known as Hell ships. Seldom were they let up for fresh air.  By the end of 1942 Japan had 26,943 US prisoners.  Over 25,000 US citizens would serve as slave labor employed by over 72 Japanese corporations.  The Cabantuan prisoner's were considered to ill to travel and to be forced into slave labor on the Burma-Thai railroad or in Japan. 

Austrialian POW, slave labor in Japanese Mine

My professor, was a civilian construction worker at Wake Island at the time of his capture, and he was sent to Japan to work in the ship yards.  He lost much of his hearing working on the hulls of the ships.  By the approved accords for treatment of civilians and prisoners, he and other civilian men, women and children should have been sent back to their home country.  Japan did not do this--these persons became hostages; and not being military perhaps POW is the wrong term.  They were pure and simple slave labor, if that is how a guest of the Emperor is treated, how would they treat a non guest?  The skill set of US men were highly valued by the Japanese.  The country and its corporations needed the slave labor to mine the ores, build the ships, and make the fabric for the Japanese war machine.  They were forced to produce products to be used against their own countrymen.  Several did what they could to sabotage their work, such as happening to break a machine, or putting small holes in oil barrels so the oil would drain out during transport.  Although quotas still had to be met regardless of frailty or working conditions. I see this similar to the Jewish slave labor during the the of Moses--the movie the "Ten Commandments" has them making bricks without straw.

Two Mitsui Mine Slave Laborers

Command is what the Japanese did well.  Companies would apply for laborers to fill their workforce needs.  The book Unjust Enrichment, goes through a few stories of the many Japanese corporations who used Allied slave labor:  Mitsui. Mitsubishi, Showa Denko, NKK, and Kawasaki.  All are large conglomerates built in part by Allied slave labor.  Many companies at some point misrepresented their involvement in slave labor in WWII in order to secure construction and supply contracts in the United States.  Armed forces need materials, ammunition, and equipment.  The production of these items produces wealth for those entities, ie corporations, who obtained the contract.  The treatment of the prisoners by the Japanese and their corporations is beyond comprehension for a civilized society. Most report having received no pay and a few who were paid for a day or a week of the up to 3+ years of captivity had expenses deducted.  Prisoners were forced to sign time cards written in Japanese, a language they did not understand.   At one company so many men died that they stopped having funeral services since the funerals ate too much into the workday.  

Mitsui Mine

Even more difficult to explain was the treatment of the men when they were freed from captivity.  US General MacArthur made sure to get to all the POW camps as quick as possible to free the men before they mass killings could take place.  As the treaty was being signed, forces were on the move to the near 200 locations.  Although the Japanese would  only identify just over half of the actual prison/slave labor camps.  Yet, the Truman Administration in negotiating the final treaty would not allow reparations to be paid to the men, and Armed Forces brass threatened court marital of any who made their stories known.  The private corporations and their executives were not listed as war criminals, and neither was the Emperor.  It was not uncommon for ships carrying the former POW's to be kept at dock until dark so the emaciated men could disembark to avoid the public seeing their condition. The Truman Administration was concerned about public outrage, so the government hid their condition.  Of course, undertaking manual labor in extreme conditions and malnourished led to many of the POW having a permanent malady, such as that professor's hearing loss, or permanent disability.  Some were beaten so bad their bones became misaligned.

3 POWs at Fukeda #3 camp.  Middle man is being held up by
a person behind him.  All would die before freedom came.
Photo taken by a fellow POW who built a makeshift camera in which he
confiscated X-ray film to obtain the image

The US was outsmarted by the Japanese. The lead US negotiator, a good friend of former US President F Roosevelt, had limited knowledge of Japan; as one commentator said, his knowledge was limited to chow mein noodles.  Other countries sent persons who were knowledgeable of Japanese customs and methods. The trump card played by the Japanese was that they threatened to become a communist system if their corporations and emperor were subjected to war crime trials.  (We can only speculate, if not for Allied slave labor during the war, and American money after the war would Japan have become another version of North Korea?)  Not that conviction would have earned much of a penalty.  Those that were tried and convicted (some to be imprisoned for over 20 years) of war crimes had sentences commuted by the Japanese government shortly after the end of the US occupation in 1952.  All by 1958.

Some of the Emperor's Guests

The men subjected to slave labor are fast disappearing, and only a few of their stories have been told to our nation.  German companies were made to pay billions in reparations, Japanese companies, who used much more in terms of POW slave labor have not.  In fact, some reparations the Japanese paid citizens of other countries used US funds sent in 1944 to the Red Cross to purchase supplies for the POW's.  Japan would not allow this money to be used to purchase items of clothing, medicine and food for the men.  Instead the Japanese hoarded the money and would use it for their own purposes.    Social justice is a big issue in the world today, but no Subaru driving social justice warrior has taken up the claims of US slave labor to assist and enrich Japan's corporations and its Emperor.  These corporations have a great deal of our wealth, could they not spare some to assist those who gave so much to enrich those corporations?   The cruelty and brutality of the Japanese to the Emperor's slave laborers was only matched by the perseverance of those laborers at the lowest time of their lives.  

Emperor Hirohito, who served until his death in 1989.

Sources:  

Hornfischer, James D. Ship of Ghosts, 2006 Bantam Books, NY NY.

Holmes, Linda Goetz.  Unjust Enrichment: How Japan's Companies Built Postwar Fortunes 
Using American POWs.  2001 Stackpole Books, Mechanicsburg, PA.

Images from Google Images.

Houston had a Problem

The USS Houston had a problem long before James Lovell uttered similar words, albeit with a much different twist, on Apollo 13. It was on this date, in 1942 that the lives of the men on the Houston would be forever altered, as Dutch Admiral Doorman gave orders for a small Allied fleet to meet the incoming Japanese armada. On February 28, 1942 the USS Houston, which was a  US Navy Cruiser first launched in September 1929, entered battle with Japanese naval forces in what is known as the Battle of Sunda Strait.  This ship hosted President Franklin Roosevelt and became the flagship for the Asiatic fleet under the command of US Admiral Tommy Hart.

FDR on Houston

Unfortunately for Admiral Hart in the two months following Pearl Harbor he was kept in the dark about US plans for the Asia Pacific Fleet, and  he was fighting more than the Japanese.  The British, holding not uncommon somewhat racist view and thinking that they are the best at everything, undermined Admiral Hart.* (The United States had to come to the aid of Britain in the Great War, and would do so again in WWII so why the British acted so superior is probably a cultural hangover of their imperial dynasty.)  In particular, British Field Marshal Wavell's complaints about Hart reached the highest levels of British command.  He complained that Hart in particular, and Americans in general had "exaggerated ideas of Japanese efficiency." (Hornfischer,  p. 41)  In the US, during the early months of 1942, blame was being placed for the raid on Pearl Harbor, and combined with the British complaints Hart would become a scapegoat and be relieved of command.  The Brits got what they wanted when PM of England Winston Churchill complained to President Franklin Roosevelt.  Hart was out.  A Dutchman, Admiral Doorman would see the US Asiatic Fleet placed under his command.

Admiral Hart

But, Doorman and the British never fully comprehended the Japanese version of the German Blitzkrieg being used in the Pacific.  They never fully appreciated the efficiency of which the Japanese had quickly controlled such a vast sprawling region.  The Japanese were gaining additional territory each and every day.  As they reached port after an early February convoy shadow, it was realized little was present in port to repair the ships.  Late in February the Houston and its men would face battle, and their lives would be forever altered.  On 26 February when Doorman received word that a Japanese invasion force was approaching Java he decided to meet the enemy force.  Doorman's attack force consisted of six cruisers and ten destroyers. Upon initial engagement the Japanese force had four cruisers and 13 destroyers.  Things did not go well for the Allies, and four ships remained in Doorman's attack fleet as they started to retreat.  At the end of the day, however, two more ships were sunk and the two remaining, the USS Houston and the HMAS Perth (Australian), were ordered to return to Surabaya and Tanjong Priok (Indonesia). An ignominious beginning to Doorman's command.

Field Marshal Wavell

The ships would reach Tanjong Priok on 28 February for resupply, but showing a lack of Dutch and British efficiency, there was a shortage of fuel, and no available ordnance or ammunition.  Not only that, but few Dutch sailor in port to assist in supply.  Even worse of those present some refused to help the USS Houston.  The two ships, with a Dutch destroyer were then ordered to sail to Tjilatjap, which contained the only Java port of any significance on the Ocean.  The Dutch ship would be delayed so the Houston and Perth made their way to that Java port city alone.  Here they would be surrounded and engaged by Japanese forces in what would become known as the Battle of Sunda Strait.  The two ships had some initial success evading Japanese torpedoes and even sinking some of the Japanese fleet, but they were well out-manned and out-gunned.  In trying to run Sunda Stait they came to face to face with a group of Japanese destroyers. (A first person account of the Battles of Java and Sunda Strait can be read here.)

USS Houston arriving in Port after Battle of Java Sea and
before Battle of Sunda Strait. 
Crew were lost in Battle of Java, so the flag is at half mast

The Houston was struck by a torpedo shortly after midnight and was taking on water.  An abandon ship message was relayed, but later rescinded, and issued again.   The Captain of the Houston, Albert Rooks, was hit and killed by a bursting shell at 12:30 am and the ship would come to a stop as the counter forces of Japanese fire power, and listing became too great for the most notable cruiser in the US fleet.  The Japanese came in for the kill, and a few minutes later the USS Houston would go down to the bottom of the sea in the darkness of the early hours on that first day of March 1942.  Many who survived the sinking were killed in the water. Most survivors made it to land (a few were picked out of the water), only to be captured.  A small group of Americans thought they had reached safety when they came upon some Dutch nationals, only to see the traitorous nature of those Dutch as they turned the Americans in to the Japanese occupation force.  Native populations also did not take kindly to the mainly white men, who brought thoughts of colonialism, so revealed their hiding spots to the Japanese.  Hindsight being 20/20, I suspect the treatment the natives were to receive by the Japanese invasion forces would have altered their opinion.

Japanese Propaganda on Sinking of the Houston 

What we do know is that, just as with the prisoners of Bataan, the Japanese thought it cowardly of a man to surrender.  The USS Houston is often referred to as the ship of ghosts, because it would be nine months before its fate as having been sunk was realized, and it would take until the end of the war when the POW's were released for a full accounting of the battle and the trials and tribulations of the remaining crew to receive at least some mention.  Apparently, a cruiser ship was an easy thing to lose in the early days of WWII.  Of the 1,061 men on board the ship only 368 would survive.  This number included 24 of 74 in a Marine detachment being transported on the ship.  Those few hundred US Naval and Marine survivors would be taken prisoner by the Japanese. Of the 368 prisoners of war from the USS Houston an astonishing 21%, or 77 men, would die in captivity. By comparison, only about 1% of Allied POW's held by Germany died.  The 21% is under the overall 27% of Allied POW's who died in Japanese hands.

Captain Rooks, kia, of US Houston

If the survivors thought that what they had experienced in the sinking of the Houston was hell on earth, that was only a small blip in the hell that would be thrust upon them as prisoners of war by the Japanese. Showing that racism is not only a European trait, the Japanese would turn out to be just as, if not more so racist, than the opinions held by Field Marshal Wavell and other Brits in the command structure.  In the end, the survivors of the Perth and Houston would show how wrong British Field Marshal Wavell was about the thinking of Admiral Hart and other Americans on the efficiency of the Japanese.  It turns out the Japanese were brutally efficient, with the emphasis on brutally.  That is another story for a future Tom's Tales.

Source: Hornfischer, James D. Ship of Ghosts, 2006 Bantam Books, NY NY.

* The United States had its own prejudices regarding race, and like the Brits, religion. It was common knowledge that to be a higher ranking US Naval officer one had to be an Episcopalian.

Images from Google Images

Dogs and the Beatitudes

This past weekend the Gospel reading from Luke focused on his version of the Beatitudes.  Most are probably familiar with the Sermon on the Mount in Matthew where the longer, more poetic version of the beatitudes is written.  In contrast to Matthew, Luke's version is known as the Sermon on the Plain.  Not as well known, but not any less important.  The opening lines in the homily, following the Gospel reading, was not what one would normally expect.  It was a short story about man's (people's) best friend--dogs.

As told last Saturday evening the homily began with something like this story: Their is a puppy and an older dog.  The puppy says to the older dog that he finds happiness in his tail, and therefore he is always chasing his tail. He then asks the older dog if he too finds happiness in his tail.  The older dog responds, that yes he does find happiness in his tail, and that he always moves on because happiness is right behind.

Church of the Beatitudes, on Mount of the Beatitudes
 Near Capernaum

This story well relates to the Beatitudes, which to me indicates the benefits of service to others.  Dogs generally seem to bring happiness to many people.  I am not a dog owner, but dogs have a sense about their humans.  In two instances of which I know a dog(s) sensed a coming death of their human.  During that trying time they were a constant companion.  Dogs are, to generalize, in service to their humans. And for many of the dogs it is a service freely given.  Service becomes happiness for humans too.

The story in Luke is, well, kinda of downer for those in our technologically advanced age.  Today many have information at their fingertips, pretty much all day.  Luke indicates that happiness is found in  poverty, hunger, weeping, exclusion, and people calling you names.  These may well be true in statement, but also allegorical.  We all have down times.  It is not unlike the old saying of a rose has thorns.  The beauty or grace which arises from our trying times provide a situation for us in which we can grow, and adjust.  Some of our best stories may result from not so good situations, which in some cases turns out not to be as bad as we thought at the time. They provide us memories and stories.

View of the Sea of Galilee from Mount of the Beatitudes

I just completed reading Disappointment River: Finding and Losing the Northwest Passage, by Brain Castner.  In 2016 Castner replicated the journey of Alexander Mackenzie, and Mackenzie's hired French Voyageurs, and accompanying indigenous members to journey by canoe from Hay River, on Slave Lake, Canada to the north ending at Garry Island (which is part of the Deh Cho River delta area; Deh Cho is also known as the Mackenzie River) in the Beaufort Sea, or as reported in the book at latitude 60 degrees 26.5 minutes N, which is about 200 miles north of the Arctic Circle.  Castner, to get in the state of mind for his long journey, read the 1961 work of Sigurd Olson The Lonely Land, which chronicles Olson's paddling through Saskatchewan.  He bluntly refers to Olson's prose as "romantic bullshit."  He notes that life on the river was "tedious and exhausting to do simple things: eating, sleeping and shitting."  He notes that Olson "writing safely in front of his fireplace had confused the memory of the trip with the real thing."  Listening to the sermon, Castner's reference to Olson came to mind.  Because the difficulties we experience tend to fade and the trials and tribulations experienced can be replaced by better memories--in other words they turn to happiness.  Perhaps, that is why Olson's prose romanticized his 1961 journey.  Castner was more a realist.  In fact, the romantic ideal of a beautiful blue Arctic Ocean he found disappointing in both color and substance, by writing: "We saw open water. Not a sliver of ice anywhere. The ocean was not a shocking polar blue as you imagine from the movies.  It was dull, the color of a well worn coffee mug, all the way to the northern horizon."  (The horizon, from ground level is about 3 miles distant.)  Both Olson and Castner were on their own sort of pilgrimage.

In effect, Olson's paddle through the wilderness of Canada mid 20th century, was probably not a great deal of fun, but he formed different, more romantic memories to convey to his readers while writing from the comfort of his home.  Castner is much more blunt of his travels in his prose. Yet, I see both being like that older dog in that happiness was found when the journey was completed, regardless of whether or not a polar blue ice cap was discovered.  Castner admits, after having paddled over 1, 125 miles in about one month that he broke down and cried.  As the older dog knew, the journey is the adventure and happiness will follow.  

Images by author in 2013

Patriots Shade Packers

Throwing shade, is a common slang expression providing an insult, or expressing contempt.    It is not unlike its cousin, trolling, which is where negative comments are made in internet forums.  After the Super Bowl on February 2, did Patriot coach Bill Belichick shade the Green Bay Packers?

While I boycotted watching the Super Bowl, it was a very low scoring game which the Patriots won 13 to 3 over the Los Angeles Rams.  The Rams entered the game as the number three scoring offense in the 2018 regular season, following the Kansas City Chiefs and the New Orleans Saints. New England was the fourth highest scoring offense.  The two highest scoring offenses lost to the fourth and third ranked offenses in their respective championship games.  Although many argue that the Rams defeat of the Saints was tainted.  My prediction that the d-back for the Rams who was not penalized in the Saints game would be in the next game came to hold true.  That d-back was called for interference a call that only seemed to reinforce the fix was in for the Patriots as many say it was not even close to an interference call.  It is a seeming occurrence that when a high scoring game is predicted the opposite often occurs.  The tainted, fixed Super Bowl was one of those games.  The game also played into my assertion that defense wins championships, something the Packers have yet to figure out.

Bill Belichick 

The potential shade thrown by the Patriots to the Packers is easily explained.  Of the eight head coach openings in the NFL, Patriot offensive coordinator Josh McDaniels decided to only interview with one team--the Green Bay Packers.  McDaniels had been a head coach for a few years in Denver, but did not do well and was released.   He eventually went back to the Patriot organization from which he was hired.  (Last year Indianapolis McDaniels would be their next head coach, but he backed out right before the announcement, meaning get the signature on the contract before anything goes public. Indianapolis had even hired some assistant coaches the McDaniels wanted on his staff.)  One cannot hold such lack of success against a coach, as Belichick, who many now believe to the greatest football coach in the NFL lacked prior success.  In any event McDaniels placed his eggs for a head coach position in one basket-the Packers-but that team decided to hire a young man who has never been a head coach and was a play-calling offensive coordinator for only one year, yes just one year.

Josh McDaniels

While that young coordinator was hired away from Tennessee, his prior experience included stints with various teams including the Redskins, and the year before his one year in Tennessee, with the LA Rams, under Sean McVay.  Sean McVay is (was?) considered a wunderkind of the NFL and his ability to get to a tainted and fixed Super Bowl illuminated this moniker.  So, the Packers hired Matt LaFleur as their head coach, with only one year of play calling experience and no head coaching experience.  The Packers seemingly wished to imitate the LA Ram success by obtaining a candidate with an association to Sean McVay.

Sean McVay

Clearly, Sean McVay was out coached in the Super Bowl.  This is a self-admission, which you can read about here; hence it need not be debated.  It was a tight low-scoring affair, with only one touchdown scored.  Going into the locker room at half-time, the Patriots were leading 3 to 0.  This is when it got interesting.  After the game, Belichick credited his offensive coordinator Josh McDaniels with the adjustments for the Patriots ability to better control the ball and score the one offensive touchdown of the game.  It is not necessary to go to the adjustments to which McDaniels is credited.  What is important is that the head coach said the success rested with his offensive master-mind, Josh McDaniels who only interviewed for one head coach position this year--The Packers.

Matt LaFleur

The Packers have copied the success of the LA Rams and its young coach Sean McVay, but yet McVay was easily out coached and his thought of prodigious offense being no where near prodigious. So, was Bill Belichick now providing a slight, or shade, to the Packer management for having hired a protege of McVay over McDaniels?  The Packers copied a team, the LA Rams, who reached the Super Bowl due to poor officiating, and basically were also rans in the Super Bowl.  So, yes, I think this one comment by Belichick threw shade on the Packers. This one comment by Belichick clearly shows that he thinks the Packers made the wrong choice, by going for someone off the unproven McVay coaching tree and not that of the Patriots, the masters of the NFL. After all it is quite clear that any adjustments the LA Rams staff made during the game did not work.

Mark Murphy

The NFC North will not play the AFC east this year, so if the Packers were to play the Patriots, it would have to be in the Super Bowl.  That is a long shot given the pathetic nature of the Packers.  Will the Packer choice of a head coach show the folly of following a new trend?  In this case, the new trend, of the Sean McVay offense has proven that it is no match for an old hand.  Throwing shade and trolling are, in my mind, not unlike bullying.  But I guess even bullies can make a valid point.  Time will tell if Packer management made the correct decision.  If they did not, and the team goes into another four years of mediocrity the Packers need to clean house beginning with Mr. Mark Murphy.  Although in my mind he should have been fired this year.  For too long Green Bay has lived off its past laurels.  The NFL is fixing to assure Boston is the new Titletown.  Murphy forgot about the team for the past several years, and his Titletown district.  Due to the lack of success of the team, the moniker Titletown is becoming obsolete and the Titletown District will be but an adage to a long ago era.

Raid

There are all sorts of raids, perhaps the one most known today is the FBI raid on Roger Stone's house.  Back in World War II a number of raids occurred.  There were air raids, hostage raids and raids to free prisoners.  Hitler had a raid to rescue Mussolini.  But, there was another raid that is often lost in the dust heap of history.  It has become known, in the United States, as The Great Raid.  There is both a book and a movie of this title.  The Great Raid was undertaken by US Army Ranger and Philippine guerrilla  forces in January 1945.  Many have argued that the raid had little military purpose, but to many others it was a chance for freedom.  The raid that was planned and undertaken over five days in the tropics of the Philippines was to free over 500 prisoners of war from a POW camp near Cabanatuan.

Lt Col Mucci and Capt Robert Prince

The journey of most of the prisoners to the squalid prison camp near Cabanatuan, would begin with the strike in Pearl Harbor.  The day after that day of infamy, the United States declared war on the axis powers of Japan, Italy and Germany.  While the United States would begin a war on two fronts, the war in the east was, for many practical purposes, the poor step child as much of the men and material from the United States went first to Europe. England had to be saved yet once again. Yet, things were moving fast in the east.  After Pearl Harbor the Japanese fleet made its way to southeast Asia to secure the Philippines, and other islands and archipelagos.  Some were strategic in the overall plan of battle, others were necessary for resources.  General Douglas MacArthur commanded the US soldiers in the Philippines and as Japanese forces took Manila, that forced a planned US retreat to the other side of Manila Bay to the Bataan peninsula.  MacArthur would be told to abandon his headquarters.  General King, who commanded the forces on the peninsula surrendered a large number of American and Filipino soldiers, about 75,000 in total including 12,000 Americans, to the forces of the Emperor of Japan.  This is the largest contingent of American forces to ever surrender.

Allied Filipino Guerrillas

As commonly noted, the Bushido code of Japan did not agree with surrender so the Allied forces who were taken prisoner were subjected to forced labor and torture.  To the Japanese, the US, and other Allied prisoners were a nuisance, but would become a labor force.  These men would be subjected to what is known as the Bataan Death March.  A forced 65 mile hike in the tropics with prisoners subjected to mass murder on the route.  Over 600 Americans and at least 5,000 Filipino's would die (although some estimates place the Filipino account at up to 16,000) during the March. Many of these prisoners would end up at the camp near Cabanatuan.

Former Prisoners of Cabantuan Camp on way to Freedom

As MacArthur reestablished himself in the Philippines in fall of 1944 the Japanese high command sent out a list of instructions as to circumstances where they said US prisoners could be killed.  Intelligence information reported on a massacre at Palawan where over 150 Americans were crowded into small air raid shelters and the Japanese opened and rolled barrels of gasoline to the side of the pits and started them on fire.   As American forces advanced to retake the Philippines  the concern arose that this would occur in other prison camps.  Hence the great raid was planned and needed to be executed by the end of January due to the movement of American forces.

Freed Prisoners

On January 25, Major Robert Lapham, who coordinated guerrilla forces with the Filipino insurgents recommended that a raid occur on the camp. MacArthur had previously denied an earlier raid by the insurgents due to concern with capture by the Japanese before they were able to reach American lines.  It was estimated that there were 100 to 300 Japanese forces in the camp, with 5000 of their soldiers four miles away in Cabanutuan City, and another 1,000 or more bivouacked about 1/2 mile from the camp.  General Krueger approved the idea of a raid.  The approval made its way down the chain of command to Lt. Col Henry Mucci to plan and implement.

Layout and Plan of Attack and Rescue of Cabanatuan POW Camp

On January 27  Mucci and his complement of 121 US Army Rangers departed their base at 5 am to make their way the 30 some miles to enemy lines which they crossed at about 2 pm.  They then made their way to a small barrio, about five miles from the camp.  Filipino fighters assisted and guided the US force.   Filipino intelligence on the movement of Japanese forces required Mucci had to delay the raid for 24 hours from January 29 to January 30.  With the Americans on the move, the Japanese were adjusting their forces and Cabanatuan was now base for over 7000 enemy forces.  During this time, Captain Prince and Mucci were provided with more detail on the geography of the area, and the situation at hand from American scouts.  The flat, open nature of 800' around the camp was a major concern.  They realized there would be only an hour of full darkness between sunset and moon rise.  The 121 Americans would need to crawl that distance in open view, and they had limited time in which to do so.

Prisoner Hut at Cabanatuan POW Camp

The leader of the Filipino guerrillas suggested, and Mucci agreed, to a US plane to fly over to distract the Japanese as the Americans made their way to their final positions.  The one plane flyover, in which the pilot risked his own life by flying close to the ground, would distract the Japanese guards for about 20 minutes.  Two Filipino guerrilla forces would be sent up and down the road to slow any of the other Japanese forces.  At 20 minutes to eight the Rangers, now in position, would begin the raid.  The POW's were not aware of the raid, even though two Filipino boys had thrown two rocks which contained a note:  "Be ready to go".  The prisoners thought it was a prank.  Luckily no guard caught a rock.  By 15 minutes after 8, the death camp was secure and the 513 prisoners, including 464 Americans, were on the first leg of their journey to American lines.  The planning of the escape from the camp required the gathering of a large number of carts pulled by the local draft animal--carabao, all secured and guided by the local population.  By 10:00 pm the group had reached the community of Plateros and at 11 pm headquarters was notified.  There were Communist Filipino guerrillas who disliked the Americans and the Japanese and were in control of a village through which the caravan would have to pass and refused to do so.  That is until Mucci relayed a message that he was calling in an air raid to destroy the whole village.  It was a ruse as his radio did not work, but the threat worked.

Survivors of Bataan Death March and Camp Cabanatuan 

Two American soldiers and  21 Allied Filipino guerrillas died during the rescue raid.  A few of the Americans rescued would die within a few days, due to illness from captivity.  Malaria, dystentery and cholera were common illnesses in the camp.  MacArthur would say of the raid:  "No incident of the campaign in the Pacific has given me such satisfaction as the release of the POWs at Cabanatuan. The mission was brilliantly successful."  The news of the rescue was released on Feb 2 in the Philippines, which was Feb 1 in the United States.  It is likely the news headline on groundhog day was of the rescue of the prisoners of war.  It is thought that over 20,000 Allied soldiers and civilians were interred at this camp.  Death and transfer to other camps reduced the camp population.  The horrors undertaken by the Japanese would also become known to the American population.

Former Prisoners being treat at a MakeShift Hospital

As bad as things were for the survivors of the Bataan death march, and in the camp near Cabanatuan, some claim that there was even worse prisoner treatment in other areas of the Japanese Empire, such as in Malaysia, and Burma (present day Myanmar).  The raid my have had little military value, but it would be one of the first to show the atrocities of the Empire of Japan not only on Allied Prisoners of War, but also on local populations.  For readers of this blog, look for more on this matter in a future blog post.   

Images from Google Images