Sixty-one years after almost going down with two battleships, Oak Harbor resident Glenn Lane has been inducted into the American Combat Airman Hall of Fame.
The ceremony of the Commemorative Air Force Ghost Squadron was held Oct. 4 at the museum in Midland, Texas. Due to a health problem, Lane could not attend.
“I had a heart attack but it’s quite an honor, really,” Lane said this week. “Some colonel stood in for me.”
Having a colonel as a stand-in produced a chuckle from Lane, an old enlisted man. “Seldom if ever are enlisted men inducted,” he said. “It’s all generals and colonels.”
Lane retired as a Command Master Chief Petty Officer after 30 years in the Navy. His introduction into World War II came on Dec. 7, 1941 when the Japanese attacked Pearl Harbor.
Lane was stationed an board the ill-fated battleship Arizona. He recalled Thursday that he saw airplanes coming toward the ship and assumed “the Army was practicing.” But that notion ended when he saw how the planes were equipped. “The Army ain’t got torpedo planes,” he remembers thinking.
During the attack he was thrown overboard by a massive explosion. Badly burned and injured, he swam to the equally ill-fated battleship USS Nevada. It too was sunk by the Japanese.
“I’m the only guy in the world who had two battleships sunk out from under him in less than two hours,” he said.
After recovering, Lane served in the Pacific Theater as a gunner and in the Atlantic flying as the radio and radar operator of the TBF Avenger torpedo bombers.
Lane spent many hours in the Avengers as well as Kingfishers and Douglas Dauntless Dive Bombers. He described a typical 24-hour day as “22 hours of boredom and two hours of sheer terror. But we were young and didn’t know any better.”
Lane isn’t sure how he became a member of the American Combat Airman Hall of Fame. Someone nominated him, perhaps an old flying mate, and the organization’s selection committee approved even though he was an enlisted man. He received a medallion in the mail.
Others inducted Oct. 4 include Brig. Gen. William Spruance, Brig. Gen. Robert Scott, 1st Lt. James Luma, Lt. Col. Donald Lopez, Brig. Gen. Frank Gailer Jr., and Lt. Col. John F. Bolt, as well as the famous Navy Fighting 15 (VF-15) squadron of World War II.
Lane has lived in Oak Harbor for over 40 years with his wife Beverly and has already shook off the effects of his heart attack suffered in September. He and his are planning an extended trip to visit relatives, as soon as he finishes an elk hunting trip. His doctor advised against it, but this tough old sailor has his mind made up. “If I die, it want to die doing something I want to do,” he said.
