First hero
By MICHAEL OVERALL World Staff Writer
12/7/2006
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Ken Taylor was one of only two American pilots able to take off and fight back during the Dec. 7, 1941, Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor. Sixty-five years later, despite Taylor's recent death, a friend is still trying to get the U.S.military to award him the Medal of Honor.
They had been out partying until 3 a.m., so when the Japanese attacked at sunrise the two American pilots jumped out of bed and pulled on the only clothes they had within easy reach.
That's how Ken Taylor ruined his tuxedo pants.
Dogfighting above Hawaii, Taylor's plane was riddled with bullets, one ripping through the cockpit, narrowly missing his head before it ricocheted and exploded, fragments tearing into his leg.
Decades later, when Taylor told the story to his friend John Meek, he didn't complain about the wound.
"He was upset about his pants," Meek says. "He never talked about his injury."
In December 1941, the Tulsa World and other newspapers across the country ran stories that declared Taylor and his friend George Welch "the first official heroes of World War II" because they were the only American pilots to get off the ground and fight back during the Dec. 7 attack.
A native Oklahoman just like Taylor --
who went to high school in Hominy, northwest of Tulsa -- Meek has tried for five years to persuade the U.S. military to give Taylor its highest honor, the Medal of Honor.
Two weeks ago, Meek went to Hawaii to conduct further research into Taylor's actions at Pearl Harbor. When he got back to his current home in Arizona, he was posting new photos to his Web site -- www.pearlharborhero.net -- when Taylor's wife called.
"She told me that he had passed away that Saturday night," Nov. 25, Meek said. "He didn't live to see it, but I'm not giving up."
Taylor deserved the Medal of Honor, and his death doesn't change that, Meek said.
After the war, Taylor served in the Air Force with Meek's father-in-law, and after meeting at a family dinner party, the two became good friends, despite being a generation apart in age.
"I didn't know that he was a big hero," Meek remembered. "You would never know it talking to him. He never boasted, never bragged."
On the 30th anniversary of the Pearl Harbor attack, Meek threw a party for Taylor at the Watergate Hotel in Washington, D.C. And Taylor finally shared his story with the other guests.
But even then, he acted as if it had been easy to take off and fight against 300 enemy planes with only one wingman on his side, Meek said. And he left out many of the most thrilling details, such as the bullet ripping into his leg.
It would take several more years for Meek to drag the full story out of him.
"Heroes don't talk about their own heroism -- they just don't," said Meek, who became acquainted with several Medal of Honor recipients while working in public affairs in Washington, where he was involved with the Congressional Medal of Honor Society.
"If there's one thing that I've seen that heroes all seem to have in common, it's that they don't consider themselves to be heroes. They were just doing what needed to be done."
On this day sixty-five years ago, Pearl Harbor needed to be defended.
U.S. forces were caught so off-guard that most planes at the major air base, Wheeler Field, were parked in a group out in the open -- an easy target for the attacking Japanese.
But by lucky coincidence, Taylor and Welch's P-40 fighters were parked at an auxiliary field, unmarked on Japanese maps and therefore untargeted.
They raced to the field in Taylor's Buick and were the only Americans to counterattack, Meek said.
Their actions became highly publicized in the early days of the war, and were later celebrated in several books and movies, including the 1970 Hollywood epic "Tora! Tora! Tora!"
Taylor and Welch received the Distinguished Service Cross -- a high honor, but not enough for Meek.
Meek has a theory why.
After their first dogfight, Taylor and Welch landed to refuel and reload their guns with higher caliber ammunition. An officer excitedly jumped on the wing of one aircraft and ordered them to get out of their cockpits and stay on the ground, where it was safer.
Taylor and Welch disobeyed those orders and took off again, downing several more Japanese aircraft before the attacks ended.
"They had a reputation for being troublemakers," Meek said. "They were also known as the hottest pilots around, but they weren't by-the-book."
Welch died in 1954. And now -- with Taylor gone, too -- it's time to overlook the flaws and give both heroes the honor they deserve, Meek said.
"It's long past due," he said. "They both should've lived to see it."
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Michael Overall 581-8383
[email protected].