From the June 8, 2024, Michigan Live "He served his country and community. Jackson Pearl Harbor survivor dies at 102" by Chloe Miller.
Elfring was born in South Dakota in 1922, but the Dust Bowl forced his family to sell their farm and move to Montana in 1933. He was one of nine siblings, and after graduating high school, he moved to San Diego to live with his brother and sister-in-law.
At 18 years old in 1940, Elfring joined the California National Guard while attending San Diego State University, "just to make an extra dollar," he said.
On September 16, 1940, he was sent to Hawaii, a little over a year before Pearl Harbor was attacked.
He was at Camp Malakole, about three miles from Pearl harbor on December 7, 1941. Bullets barely missed him a couple times.
"I was reading the bulletin board at the barracks when the first plane shot down at us," Elfring remembered.
Afterwards, he was deployed to multiple other locations in the war before being officially discharged on November 18, 1945, as a captain.
--GreGen
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