Interpretive Display at Hangar 1 Shares Story of Naval Air Station Kāne‘ohe in WWII
Kāne‘ohe Landmark Shares History of World War II Battle and Aftermath By June Noelani Cleghorn, Senior Cultural Resources Manager, Marine Corps Base Hawai‘i On an early quiet Sunday morning on Windward O‘ahu, the Naval Air Station (NAS) Kāne‘ohe commander, Naval Commander (CDR) Harold Martin, was at his home overlooking Mōkapu peninsula’s north shore sipping coffee when his young son commented on the low flying airplanes with red circles on their sides coming towards the runway below their house. CDR Martin dropped his coffee cup and ran out to his car, not changing out of his pajamas, on this December 7, 1941 morning to head to his office while hearing the first bombs dropped by Japanese attack aircraft land on NAS Kāne‘ohe Hangar 1. Also targeted that day were the Navy’s PBY Catalina reconnaissance seaplanes on the tarmac adjacent to Hangar 1 and moored in Kāne‘ohe Bay. This attack at NAS Kāne‘ohe occurred only eight minutes before the bombs dropped at Pearl Harbor. In 1987, more than four decades later, Marine Corps Base Hawaii (MCBH) listed Hangar 1, its aircraft parking areas and taxiways, and five seaplane ramps in the National Register of Historic Places as a National Historic Landmark (NHL) in recognition of its national significance as the Japanese target on December 7, 1941, that, combined with the Pearl Harbor attack, triggered the United States’ entry into World War II (WWII). MCBH has continued to use and reuse its NHL to support Marine Corps and Navy aviation assets ever since NAS Kāne‘ohe changed to Marine Corps Air Station (MCAS) Kāne‘ohe in 1952 and then later in 1994 when Marine Corps assets in Hawai‘i were consolidated into the current base. In 2012, the first [...]