INDIANAPOLIS – Survivors of a World War II torpedo attack will be greeted by a spruced-up monument at their annual reunion this weekend in Indianapolis, but not everyone is happy with the results.
Volunteers dismayed by mildew, weeds and other conditions have cleaned the granite USS Indianapolis memorial along the city’s downtown canal and repainted the black letters that make up the names of the 1,196 servicemen who were aboard the armored cruiser when it sank on July 30, 1945. Only 317 survived.
“Weeds had taken over,” said volunteer Barry Fairfax of the Indianapolis Radio League. “Black mold and moss were growing on all the letters, and it quite frankly was a disgrace.”
About 18 members of the club washed and waxed the monument, which was built in 1995, and removed rust stains from the walls of the reflecting pool. They also repaired lights, removed more than 100 pounds of dirt, twigs and leaves and spread fresh sand at the base of the monument.
One change that isn’t sitting well with some survivors is the addition of color to the gray Marine Corps seal and Navy emblem.
“I don’t think it should have been messed with, period,” said Jim O’Donnell, 90, of Indianapolis, one of about 50 survivors still living.
Those who worked on the project say they wanted to honor those who served on the Indianapolis, not upset them.
Ray Miller, 49, who did three tours of duty with the Army in Iraq, spent 100 hours repainting the names on the monument while undergoing chemotherapy for leukemia blamed on shrapnel fragments embedded in his back from an IED explosion.
Miller’s uncles died in the attack on the USS Indianapolis, and he said keeping the monument in top form “gets me in touch with an honor before my time.”
“We’re carrying on the memory,” Miller said.
The Indianapolis was used as Franklin D. Roosevelt’s personal carrier before it went into battle. It sank after being struck by two Japanese torpedoes between Guam and the Philippines.
About half the living survivors are expected to attend this year’s reunion, which includes a memorial ceremony at the monument site at 9 a.m. Sunday.
Don McCall, 85, will be among them.
The Champaign, Ill., man spent years unwilling to talk about his ordeal, which included five days floating at sea and watching fellow crewmen die of exposure or shark attacks before rescuers arrived.
He attended his first reunion in 1965 and has become more willing to talk about his experience. He’ll share those tales with his family and fellow survivors this weekend.
“I’m one of the lucky ones,” he said. “I lead the life of Riley now.”
