Remembering Japan 1945 – 1946: A Memoir by Gerald Rasmussen

Title: Remembering Japan, set over a photo from 1945 of three American sailors in uniform standing in front of the Great Buddha at Kamakura, Japan.

Title: Remembering Japan 1945 – 1946 by Gerald Rasmussen. Type is set over a black and white photo from 1945 showing three American sailors in uniform standing in front of the Great Buddha at Kamakura, Japan. My father is on the left.

 

From October 1945 to June 1946 my father, a Navy signalman, was stationed in Japan  at Toriga-saki by the town of Kamoi, at the entrance to Tokyo Bay. He was then nineteen years old, a young Danish-American man from rural Oregon. The experience made a profound impression on him and he spoke of it often.

In 2003 Dad traveled with my family (my spouse and three children)  to Japan to track down the places he had been. We found the pier and the site of the signal station and were able to visit other landmarks he had seen at that time including the Great Buddha of Kamakura and the Kofukuji (Five Story Pagoda) in Nara.

As each chapter is published it will be linked below until the entire book is online

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Introduction (by Keith L. Miller)

Chapter One: The Sea Devil to Japan

Chapter Two: Harbor Entrance Control Post Toriga Saki, Tokyo Bay

Chapter Three: Kamoi

Chapter Four: Work and Play

Chapter Five: Japanese Signalmen

Chapter Six: General Douglas MacArthur

Chapter Seven: The Toriga Saki Fleet

Chapter Eight: The Cold War Begins?

Chapter Nine: A Social Call

Chapter Ten: Japanese Hot Tub

Chapter Eleven: Madame Butterfly

Chapter Twelve: The “Singers”

Chapter Thirteen: The Japanese “Intelligence Officer”

Chapter Fourteen: The Girl from Hiroshima

Chapter Fifteen: Oops

Chapter Sixteen: The Kamikaze Pilot

Chapter Seventeen: The Bigot

Chapter Eighteen: The Spring Festival at Kamoi Grade School

Chapter Nineteen: Kites

Chapter Twenty: Leave for the Lucky

Chapter Twenty-one: A Missed Opportunity?

Chapter Twenty-two: We Close HECP and I Go Home

Epilogue

 

2 thoughts on “Remembering Japan 1945 – 1946: A Memoir by Gerald Rasmussen

  1. Susan,

    I haven’t posted it yet. Fell behind on my tasks. I’m hoping to get to sorted out in the next few months.

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