Sun City residents were prominent players in piece of history
Depending on which history book you read, World War II officially ended on three different dates 70 years ago. If you live in the United Kingdom, V-J Day (victory over Japan) is celebrated Aug. 14. Or was it Aug. 15, as it is noted (not celebrated) in Japan? In the U.S., however, V-J Day is celebrated Sept. 2, the day Japanese notables were brought aboard the USS Missouri in Tokyo Bay to sign the official document of surrender.
What history books won‘t tell you is that two heroic Americans who played prominent roles in bringing about Japan‘s formal surrender lived quietly and unobtrusively in Sun City Summerlin during their later years.
Second Lt. Morris Richard Jeppson, who preferred to be called "Dick" Jeppson and who passed away in Summerlin Medical Center five years ago at age 87, was the last person to touch the atomic bomb that fell Aug. 6, 1945, on Hiroshima. Three days later, a second atomic bomb that landed on Nagasaki forced Japan‘s surrender.
Jeppson was the weapons test officer aboard the Enola Gay, the B-29 super bomber that dropped the first atomic payload. His job was to remove the electronic testing plugs from "Little Boy," the name given the bomb, and replace them with firing plugs, Jeppson explained to me during an interview in his Sun City home. That interview was the subject of my June 12, 2007, Summerlin View column.
Then there was U.S. Navy Officer Carl Reisman, who just before midnight Sept. 1, 1945, had been ordered by Third Fleet Adm. William F. Halsey to bring a party of Japanese dignitaries aboard a lifeboat to the Battleship Missouri the next day for the official surrender ceremony.
"Halsey‘s flagship had been the USS New Jersey. But President Truman sent a message to Halsey to change his flag to the Missouri for the surrender ceremony," Reisman told me during an interview in his Sun City home. He said Truman chose the Missouri because it represented his home state.
The interview was the subject of my column in the Aug. 25, 2009, Summerlin View. Reisman, who was 89 at the time, no longer lives in Sun City, and his present status is unknown. But I vividly recall the vast amount of memorabilia in his home, including photos of the ceremony aboard the Missouri and a copy of the signed surrender document.
"I was an officer in charge of an anti-aircraft position," Reisman recalled as he described events leading up to his prominent role. "I was on the main deck the night before when I was ordered to report to Adm. Halsey.
"I identified myself, and Halsey replied, ‘Yes, Reisman.‘ He then said, ‘Capt. (Stuart S.) Murray said you would be a good man to pick up the Japanese surrender party and bring them to the Missouri.‘ I said, ‘Aye, aye, sir.‘ And I left the room."
Reisman explained the ordeals he faced in finding a "gig," which is a small, covered lifeboat, in so short a time frame. The Japanese party was to be picked up in Yokohama Harbor by the destroyer USS Lansdowne and taken to Tokyo Bay. Reisman‘s responsibility was to ferry the group from the Lansdowne to the Missouri, a short distance away, which was why the gig was required.
"We almost had a misadventure when I picked up the Japanese party," he recalled. But destiny prevailed. "The foreign minister, Mamoru Shigemitzu, had a prosthetic leg. The only way to get off the Lansdowne, onto the gig, was to climb down a wide net, in lieu of a ladder.
"Shigemitsu slipped. Fortunately, I was there to grab him and keep him from falling into the water."
Destiny also prevailed the day "1st Lt. George Koester flipped a coin, and it came up Jeppson." That was the way soft-spoken Jeppson explained how he was chosen to become the weapons test officer for "that mysterious flight, instead of a guy named Leon Smith."
Jeppson said he prepared for many months in advance for his role in an event that a nationwide survey of 36,000 in December 1999 called the "No. 1 news story of the 20th century."
Herb Jaffe was an op-ed columnist and investigative reporter for most of his 39 years at the Star-Ledger of Newark, N.J. His most recent novel, "Double Play," is now available. Contact him at hjaffe@cox.net.
