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Battleship USS Missouri crew members from 1945 being sought (AUDIO)

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The presiding commissioner in mid-Missouri’s Cole County is searching for living crew members of the battleship USS Missouri, who were on the ship during the Japanese surrender in Tokyo Bay in September 1945.

This is a first day of issuance (FDOI) cancellation envelope being held on the deck of the USS Missouri in Hawaii on June 11, 2019 (photo courtesy of the U.S. Postal Service)

Commissioner Sam Bushman tells Missourinet a major event is planned for September 2020 at Pearl Harbor, to celebrate the surrender’s 75th anniversary.

“If we can find them, we would like to take them to Pearl Harbor as our guests,” Bushman says. “Everything would be (covered), airfare, hotel and everything.”

Mr. Bushman is involved with the USS Missouri Memorial Association, which is helping to organize the event.

He’s asking anyone who knows of living veterans who were on the ship for the surrender to contact him at the Cole County Courthouse. His phone number is (573) 634-9113.

“There were thousands of sailors present in Tokyo Bay on September 2 (1945). They weren’t necessarily on the battleship Missouri,” says Bushman.

Bushman tells Missourinet that U.S. Senators Roy Blunt and Josh Hawley are both expected to attend next September’s Pearl Harbor event.

General Douglas MacArthur was on the battleship Missouri during the September 1945 surrender. At the ceremony’s conclusion, General MacArthur delivered a radio address to the American people.

“Today the guns are silent. A great tragedy has ended. A great victory has been won. The skies no longer rain death — the seas only commerce men everywhere walk upright in the sunlight. The entire world is quietly at peace. The holy mission has been completed,” MacArthur’s speech began.

Commissioner Bushman is praising the U.S. Postal Service’s new stamp, which commemorates the 75th anniversary of the battleship Missouri’s commissioning.

Mr. Bushman helped organize last week’s Statehouse ceremony in Jefferson City to unveil the stamp. He watched as veterans wiped tears away, during the ceremony.

“I mean this is our ship, you know it’s the battleship Missouri, it’s part of our state,” Bushman says.

There were two ceremonies on Tuesday to celebrate the 75th anniversary of the commissioning and the new stamp: one in Jefferson City and the other at Pearl Harbor.

Retired U.S. Navy Captain David Durbin says the stamp has already been very popular in Jefferson City, with the Post Office re-ordering additional stamps due to demand.

Click here to listen to the full interview between Missourinet’s Brian Hauswirth and Cole County Presiding Commissioner Sam Bushman, which was recorded on June 11, 2019 at the Statehouse in Jefferson City:

Copyright © 2019 · Missourinet

Missouri joins the Navy

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The USS Missouri is officially a United States Navy Ship. Hour-long ceremonies at the Naval Submarine Base New London (CT) have transferred the ship from being PCU 780 (Pre Commissioning Unit) to being SSN780, the USS Missouri.

You can watch a recording of the full ceremony by clicking on the USS Missouri tag on the upper right corner of this web page.

AUDIO: Commissioning orders (12 min)

Meet the Missouri’s commander (AUDIO)

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He has spent a good part of the last twenty years under water…and he’s looking forward to more months beneath the waves. Commander Timothy Rexrode is a career submariner whose first boat was built in the 60s. Now he’s in charge of the Navy’s newest attack submarine. He says it’s an exciting career because it has a long history, deals with high technology, is a unique service that requires elite teams to perform at their peaks. [Read more…]

He remembers the big guns on the big ship (AUDIO)

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He helped fire the 16-inch guns on the battleship Missouri. Today, he’s on his way today to Connecticut to help put the new USS Missouri into service

He’ll be 84 on August 7th. Harry Weiss’s memories of his two years on the USS Missouri battleship during the Korean War remain vivid—especially his work as an engineer in one of the 16-inch gun turrets…and the day one of guns fired a two-ton shell that traveled 23 miles and landed right on the mouth of a tunnel Chinese troops were using to move into North Korea. [Read more…]

A gift for the new Missouri (AUDIO)

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Some veterans of the Battleship Missouri are planning a unique gift for the new USS Missouri when it is commissioned Saturday.

The United States Navy accepts its newest Virginia-class submarine Saturday, Some of those attending will be men who served on the Battleship Missouri in World War Two, the Korean War, and the first Gulf War. One is Charlie Guthrie of Slater, who spent most of 1991 on the battleship, leaving just a few months before the ship was decommissioned. [Read more…]

Commissioning coming for USS Missouri (AUDIO)

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Missouri-Seal250The next USS Missouri will not be a ship. It will be a boat. That’s what they call a submarine like the new USS Missouri. It will be commissioned in Groton, Connecticut on the 31st.

If the new USS Missouri could be dropped into the University of Missouri Tiger football stadium, it would just barely fit. It’s 377 feet long. It’s the size of a World War II cruiser, weighing nine tons. And it packs more firepower with its cruise missiles than the Battleship Missouri did.

Chairman Sam Bushman of the USS Missouri Commissioning Committee says the boat is 21st century technology. It has no periscope, for example, but has a photonic mast that uses a camera to see what’s above water. The image appears on big screens in the control room. “Fantastic,” he calls it.

The committee has raised about $230,000 to pay for the commissioning ceremonies and related events, a little short of the $300,000 goal. The money also is being used to stock the sub library and add Missouri touches to make the sub feel more homelike.

AUDIO: Interview with Sam Bushman (19 min)

Next USS Missouri about ready (AUDIO)

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The next USS Missouri is only weeks away from heading to open water and getting under it.

The SSN780, a Virgiinia-class submarine, will be the first Navy ship to carry our state’s names since the fabled BB-63, the World War II-built battleship that was in service through the first Gulf War and is now a privately-operated museum at the Pearl Harbor Memorial in Hawaii.

USS-missouri

Rear Admiral Mike McLaughtlin, commander of the Navy’s Submarine Group Two, has briefed Governor Nixon and reporters on preparations for the ship’s commissioning on July 31. “You will be proud of Missouri when she is finally commissioned,” he said, and promised she would be around for a “good 33 years.”

McLaughlin says the Missouri will head out for sea trials next month or in June, during which time the crew will “wring out” the sub and make sure it performs properly. The Missouri not be armed during that trip. Its missiles and torpedoes will be loaded once it is considered a commissioned ship and the Navy takes control of it.

McLaughlin ways the crew has been with the ship for some time and is now honing its skills either on board or in shore-based stimulators he says can simulate about all at-sea conditions.

The submarine was christened in early December in Groton, Connecticut.

AUDIO: Gov. Nixon & Rear Admiral McLaughtlin 6 min (A few questions are off-mic and a little hard to hear)

Photo courtesy Grotjan, Full Spectrum Photo

Christening of new USS Missouri today

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The Navy christens the latest USS Missouri this morning, the fourth or fifth navy ship to carry the name of our state (the number depends whether you want to consider a leaky Confederate ironclad named for our state as a U.S Navy ship. The Navy did have it briefly after the war ended).