From the February 18, 2013Waterloo-Cedar Falls (Iowa) Courier by Pat Kinney.
Eddie Welter died Tuesday. As of last April, according the the USS Arizona Organization, there were only 13 survivors of that ship from Pearl Harbor still alive of the 330 sailors and Marines who did not die. Mr. Welter is believed to be the last survivor living in Iowa..
He was born in Minnesota and grew up in Waterloo. In recent years, he had been a resident of the Iowa Veterans Home in Marshalltown.
When the attack came, he was an 18-year-old seaman below deck in the laundry room when General Quarters sounded. He went topside and to his battle station. After the explosion, he remembered going down a gangplank and suffered ruptured eardrums and received splinters from the deck.
He was able to get to an aid station where he administered morphine to the wounded. "I'll never forget the guys whose legs and arms were as black as tar. Their skin already peeling."
He served out the war in Hawaii as a cook.
Sad to See Them Go. --GreGen
The USS North Carolina (BB-55) My all-time favorite warship. As an elementary school student in North Carolina, I donated nickels and dimes to save this ship back in the early sixties.
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