AS I WAS walking toward the Neiman Marcus exit on Dec. 7, a man called my name. He was Jie Sing "Sonny" Chun, one of the kids I grew up with in Makiki when I attended Lincoln Elementary. Sonny lived on the corner of Piikoi and Davenport streets and I lived across the street. Early on the morning of Dec. 7, 1941, shortly before the attack on Pearl Harbor, I was spinning tops with brothers Hank and Mark Auerbach on Piikoi, steps away from where Sonny and I lived. Sonny was watching from his front steps. What a coincidence! Here we were, meeting up again on Dec. 7, 71 years later. We had not seen each other in years. On that dreadful morning in 1941, another neighbor came running across the street calling out to my mom to tell her of the attack. After hearing the news, the Auerbach boys ran to their home up the street. In 1941, Hank and I were 10, Mark and Sonny were 8.
Catching up with Sonny last Friday was a pleasure. He said he reads "Wood Craft" regularly (hooray). He and wife Gertrude have two sons, Mark and Philip, who are golf pros. Mark Chun and his wife, Lori, live in the old Chun family house on Piikoi and Davenport. Sonny and I discussed what a loss it was for our group when the Auerbach boys, including older brother Shay, 12, were taken to the mainland by their mom for safety reasons soon after the attack. Sonny reminded me that Phyllis Zerbe, who lived next to the Auerbachs on Piikoi, was still around after they left. That’s right. But shucks, Phyllis was a girl. Who wanted to play with girls? …
RHS TRAVEL owner and retired electrical engineer Richard H. Sato, 83, pledged to donate $5 to the March of Dimes in 1948, when he was in Japan with the 11th Airborne Division, providing the Armed Forces Radio station would play "Blue Hawaii" for him during a pledge drive. The deejay mentioned Sato’s name but played "Danny Boy" instead of "Blue Hawaii" and the Wahiawa boy decided not to donate. Sato said that has been on his conscience ever since. So this past Nov. 11, Veterans Day, Sato wrote a letter to the Hawaii March of Dimes office and included a check for $2,026.33. He wrote that he decided to honor his pledge by compounding $5 with 10 percent interest per year for 64 years. "This clears my conscience," he wrote. …
SAD TO LEARN of the death of Larry Mosher, 81, of Hilo, Dec. 5 in Pohai Malama Hospice. Larry was a fine tackle for Roosevelt High, class of 1949, and earned a scholarship to San Jose State. Larry’s Roosevelt teammate, Vernon "Bully" Windrath, an all-star tackle, also received a football scholarship to SJSU. They were on the freshman team there along with end Bill Walsh. Walsh went on to become the three-time Super Bowl winning head coach of the San Francisco 49ers. Larry suffered an injury while at San Jose State and eventually returned home. He enrolled at the University of Hawaii and played for Hawaii in 1952. Larry was a retired Hawaii Air National Guard pilot and also served on former Gov. George Ariyoshi‘s security team before making his home on the Big Island. Condolences to his wife, Millie, and other family members.
Ben Wood, who sold newspapers on Honolulu streets in World War II, writes of people, places and things. Email him at bwood@staradvertiser.com.
