Past comes to life during festive Living History Day

“If you don’t know history, then you don’t know anything. You are a leaf that doesn’t know it is part of a tree. ”

— Michael Crichton (1942-2008), author

It is with this thought — to honor the past and to remember the ways it has shaped the world — that the Battleship Missouri Memorial will present Living History Day on Saturday.

Among the 21 exhibitors will be Bishop Museum, Iolani Palace, Queen Emma Summer Palace, the Japanese Cultural Center of Hawaii and the Hawaiian Mission Houses Historic Site and Archives.

“Although Living History Day activities will take place at Pearl Harbor, beside the Mighty Mo, the most famous battleship in World War II, the event’s theme is not war but history,” said Dan Parsons, the Battleship Missouri’s education director. “It’s not about any specific subject or era; that’s why there will be such a wide range of exhibitors.”

In 2013, Joshua Stutz, former coordinator of the Missouri’s education department, proposed launching Living History Day at Pearl Harbor after he saw the success of similar events at the U.S. Army Museum in Waikiki and the Tropic Lightning Museum at Schofield Barracks.

The Battleship Missouri, Pacific Aviation Museum and Ford Island, the active military base where the two attractions are located, partnered to put on the inaugural Living History Day in January 2014. Since then, the Missouri has hosted the event on its own.

This year’s festivities mark the 73rd anniversary of the launch of Mighty Mo and the 18th anniversary of its opening as a maritime museum (see sidebar). Planned are exhibits, historical re-enactments, performances by jazz bands and tours of the ship’s radio room and captain’s cabin — areas not usually open to the public.

Leading the captain’s cabin tour will be Toby Langcaon, who was the captain’s steward on the Missouri during the Korean War. In the cabin, local actor Billy Sage will portray Gen. Douglas MacArthur, the commander-in-chief of the Allied forces in the southwest Pacific during World War II. On Sept. 2, 1945, in a 23-minute ceremony aboard the Missouri in Tokyo Bay, MacArthur accepted Japan’s surrender on behalf of the Allies, which officially ended the war.

Another not-to-be missed draw will be flybys between 10 and 10:30 a.m. by an SNJ-5 aircraft, which was issued to the Navy in July 1944 and is now owned by Paradise Helicopters. The plane was nicknamed the “Pilot Maker” because of its use as the premier trainer for U.S. pilots during World War II and through the late 1950s.

The Hawaii Civil War Round Table (facebook.com/groups/hawaiicivilwarroundtable) comprises Civil War enthusiasts who have a special interest in the 100-plus men from Hawaii who fought for both the North and the South. About half of those men were Native Hawaiians.

In addition to discussing the lives of Civil War soldiers, sailors and civilians with Round Table members, visitors can try on uniforms, watch a muzzle-loading rifle demonstration and complete a drill before marching down the pier to get a sense of how Union soldiers felt as they charged Fort Fisher, a Confederate fort near Wil- mington, N.C., in January 1865. Six Native Hawaiians participated in that assault, which was led by Major Gen. John M. Schofield (after whom Schofield Barracks on Oahu is named).

Members of the Hawaii Historic Arms Association (hawaiihistoricarms.com) and Hawaii Military Vehicle Preservation Association will also be on hand to explain their displays of weapons, uniforms, equipment and vehicles used by the U.S. military during World War II and the Korean War, two conflicts in which the Missouri served.

And Hawaii Jitterbugs (hawaiijitterbugs.org) will get visitors on their feet to dance the Lindy Hop, Balboa and jitterbug to the sounds of the Glenn Miller, Duke Ellington and Count Basie bands — lively swing music and dances that lifted spirits during the dark days of World War II.

“Living History Day brings significant events and people from the past to life,” Parsons said. “It’s important to share those stories so that we can better understand each other, learn from each other and apply those lessons to the future.”

Battleship Missouri Memorial

The USS Missouri was commissioned on June 11, 1944, the third U.S. Navy ship to be named after the Show Me State and the fourth American warship to bear the name (a Confederate Missouri was captured by Union forces during the Civil War but never commissioned as a U.S. Navy ship).

It was nicknamed “Mighty Mo” because of its size: 887 feet long, 209 feet high from keel to mast top, unloaded weight of 45,000 tons and capacity to carry more than 2,500 men.

The Instrument of Surrender ending World War II was signed aboard the Missouri in Tokyo Bay on Sept. 2, 1945. The battleship had an amazing career over five decades and three wars —World War II, Korean War and Operation Desert Storm. In 1992, it was decommissioned as the last active-service battleship in the world and donated to the USS Missouri Memorial Association, a 501(c)(3) nonprofit organization.

Since the Battleship Missouri Memorial’s opening on Jan. 29, 1999, the association has operated it as a historic attraction and oversees the ship’s care and preservation with the support of visitors, memberships, grants and donations. Tax-deductible contributions can be made online at ussmissouri.org/store/charge/donate.

— Adapted from text at ussmissouri.org

Cheryl Chee Tsutsumi is a Honolulu-based freelance writer whose travel features for the Star-Advertiser have won several Society of American Travel Writers awards.