Japanese fire balloons

Did you know that between November 1944, and April 1945, the Japanese launched over 9000 hydrogen-filled balloons loaded with bombs which were intended to cross the pacific following the jetstream and land in random locations in the United States with the intent of starting forest fires, possibly damaging buildings, killing people, and generally terrorizing the population? I sure didn't know about them. They managed to find their way into almost 20 states, including Iowa and Michigan - as far east as that! One of them came down in nearby (to us here in Alpine) Thermopolis, Wyoming. They were almost completely ineffectual in realizing their intended purpose, which is probably why we've never heard of them.  If you are curious about them, you can read a Wikipedia article on "Japanese fire bombs." Here is a clip from that article:

"Japan released the first of these bomb-bearing balloons on November 3, 1944. They were found in Alaska, Arizona, California, Colorado, Idaho, Iowa, Kansas, Michigan,^[7] Montana, Nebraska, Nevada,^[8]North Dakota, Oregon, South Dakota, Texas, Utah, Washington and Wyoming, as well as Mexico and Canada. General Kusaba's men launched over 9,000 balloons throughout the course of the project. The Japanese expected 10% (around 900) of them to reach America, which is also what is currently believed by researchers.^[9] About 300 balloon bombs were found or observed in America. It is likely that more balloon bombs landed in unpopulated areas of North America.
The last one was launched in April 1945."

A Japanese Fire Balloon

 

I got on to this topic entirely by chance. As I've mentioned in an earlier post, I brought a bunch of things with me to Alpine to digitize. Among them are some photographs. One of those photographs is of my father with a group of army officers standing in front of a building. 

My father is second from the left in the back

This would be a meaningless photograph (except that my father is in it). but he wrote on the back the identity of some of the people, to wit:

Using that information, I went to my father's chaplain's journal for 1943, and found this entry, which describes a trip he made to Victoria,  British Columbia.

Here is a transcription (the comments in bold type are mine): 

Tues., May 25,  1943 entry: (Dad is on leave and has made  a trip to Vancouver, B. C.)

Chaplain (Major) George H. Hamilton (1326 Yates St., Victoria),  Sixth Division Chaplain, Canadian Army, took me and Chaplain (Capt.) Paul  E. Carson, Post Chaplain of Fort Worden, Wash., on an auto trip to see Gordon Head (Officers Training Center),  a hospital at R.C.A.F. Air Base at Patricia Bay (training pilots, bombardiers, etc.),  the Butchart Gardens (where I bought 14 varieties of garden seeds), and Brentwood College. Dinner at Empress (the fabulous Empress Hotel in Victoria). {Let Obens know if Burgess Meredith and Jeffrey Lynn are at Ft. Lewis}.

(The Obens were three young women, ages 20, 23 and 25, with whom dad had had  tea  the previous day at the Empress Hotel). 

So, this mentions that a Canadian Chaplain took him on an auto tour of Vancouver, and one of the places they visited was an RCAF base at Patricia Bay, commonly known then as "Pat Bay." Looking up that base online, I learned that a plane based there was famous for having gone out and shot down two Japanese fire balloons. That got me curious and led to learning about a little-known feature of WW 2.

There is other interesting information in the journal entry. Gordon Head, the officers training center where the picture was taken, no longer exists as a military base, but is a park and recreation center with some military museum artifacts. "Pat Bay" itself is largely now incorporated into Victoria International Airport. The Butchart Gardens still exist, and judging from the pictures on-line are very beautiful. Brentwood College also still exists as a private preparatory school. Fort Wordon, which was a U.S. Army base at Port Townsend, Washington, has been decommissioned, but today is a State Park and a National Historic Site, with many original buildings preserved.

Fort Worden National Historic Site

My father mentions having tea at the Empress Hotel. If I had known five years ago what I know today, I also would have had tea there. When Ellen, Mimi (a.k.a Max) and I went to Victoria in 2013, we went to the Empress Hotel, and I wanted to have high tea there. But it cost $59 per person!  I was willing to pay that, but Mimi thought it was too excessive. So we settled on a tour of Victoria. But if I had known then that my father had had tea there in 1943, I think I would've insisted that we do it too.
(Unfortunately, dad doesn't mention what tea cost there in 1943, though he often was meticulous about recording things like that in his journal). 

A photo I took of  The Empress Hotel back in 2013

Ellen and Mimi on a tour bus with The Empress in the background

The Oben sisters, with whom dad had had tea at the Empress Hotel (not sure how he met them - they seem to have been students at a school for military personnel,  and their teacher was with them also), asked about Burgess Meredith and Jeffrey Lynn. These were two of the best-known movie actors of the era who had gone into the service and evidently there were rumors that they were based at Fort Lewis. (I haven't been able to confirm that).

All in all, a fascinating little glimpse into a period of our history.  Being able to put all this together is a wonderful little fruit of the past effort I have put into digitizing papers and photos, combined with the ability to look things up on the Internet!