Pearl Harbor Attack Jolts Michigan Men-- Part 2" "Got Drunk and Never Paid for Anything"

December 7, 1941

"It was hell.  We didn't hear any guns and all the planes were lined up nice and neat.  All our guns and the ammunition was in the No. 6 barracks and that was the first place to get hit."The car survived the attack at Wheeler Air Field, but Johnson later had to sell it.

"I had six hours to sell it after we got orders we were going to the Solomon Islands.  I sold it for next to nothing and that night I played poker and lost it all anyway," said Johnson.

SSgt. Leo V. Johnson spent the rest of the war in the Solomon Islands maintaining fighter planes.  "We got bombed and strafed all the time.  It was different (from pearl Harbor) because we were ready for it."  Over the course of time, he became really good at machine gun maintenance.

After the war, he said that on his way back to Michigan, he never paid for a meal, drink or bus ride.  "People gave us doughnuts, coffee, pies, whatever.  In Chicago, the street cars didn't cost us anything.  I was there for four days, got drunk and never paid for anything."

--GreGen