Last Reunion of the USS Oklahoma

From the June 9, 2012, San Juan Capistrano Patch "Pearl Harbor Survivors' Last Reunion for Survivors of Doomed Ship" by Penns Arevale.

The survivors of the USS Oklahoma started having reunions in 1966, 25 years after the ship was sunk.  There are only five of them left now and they met this weekend in San Juan Capistrano, California.

Ed Vezey, 92, from Moore, Oklahoma was on hand and said, "I was a simple-minded young man.  My roommate and I were arguing whether to go swim before we eat breakfast or swim first.  Five minutes later, most of my friends were dead."

Gene Dick, 91, of Placentia, California, was a hospital apprentice working sick bay duty on the third deck and was trapped underwater when the ship rolled over.  Up until then, he had felt the third deck was a very safe place to be, that is, until the first four torpedoes hit.

An air pocket allowed him and the men around him to survive during the five hours it took to open a porthole that was too narrow for most to fit through.  He and four others were the only ones to get out.

Bill Headley, 92, flew in from Wilmington, North Carolina.

--GreGen