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Cdr. R.J. Norman
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Fort Drum challenge coin
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WWII Silver Salvage
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Capt. R.J. Norman
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Fort Drum
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Capt. R.J. Norman
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Capt. R.J. Norman
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Capt. R.J. Norman
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| The Tulsa World: Unsung Hero to Receive Silver Star After 57 Years
March 22, 1998 - Robert Norman didn't expect to get up that morning and find Japanese planes bombing his ship in Pearl Harbor. He didn't expect to risk his life, to be set on fire, while saving others.
And he certainly didn't expect to receive a medal for it 57 years later.
But this Tulsan knows better than most that life is full of surprises.
The latest surprise came a few weeks ago, when the secretary of the Navy signed a citation to award Norman a Silver Star, the third-highest honor that the Navy can bestow.
Norman never saw it coming. He hasn't been in the Navy since 1973, and he has been retired from Willbros Engineers since 1995.
Now he's a 79-year-old who gets up every morning at 5:30, plays golf and looks after rental properties that he owns. And he helps his wife, Fran, take care of their own home in a historic Tulsa neighborhood just south of downtown.
This sudden medal is as big a shock for him as that earlier surprise back in December 1941, when Japan launched the sneak attack that pulled the United States into World War II.
That morning Norman was a petty officer in charge of turret No. 4 aboard the battleship USS Nevada. The ship was torpedoed and hit with 10 bombs, and it eventually sank in the shallow harbor up to its main deck.
While the ship was on fire, sinking, an ensign named Joseph Taussig Jr. was stranded up on the mast, one leg blown off and bleeding badly.
Norman climbed up, his clothes catching on fire as he went, scorching his back. He reached the young ensign, strapped him into a stretcher, tied it to the mast and slowly lowered it down to the deck. Bullets and bombs were flying around his head the whole time.
That ensign, like Norman, survived and had a long, fruitful career in the Navy. Both men rose to the rank of captain.
Norman didn't seem to think it was such a big deal - not then and not now.
"I'm not the medal type. I figure you go out and do your job, do your duty. And if you happen to do it while bullets are flying, well, that's what you're trained for."
But the other guy, Taussig, long considered Norman 'an unsung hero,' and in recent years he began pressing the Pentagon for a medal.
It wasn't easy. Congress had to grant special permission to award a medal so long after the event. The usual military deadline for medals is three years, expiring in 1944 in Norman's case.
Undeterred, Taussig kept writing recommendations.
"Medals and citations cost very little," he wrote in one, "but are priceless to the recipient and family and friends."
Indeed, Norman said his new medal will be "worth more than all the money in the world."
"It's coming way late in the game, of course. But it's an honor. I'm proud to receive it. I spent 36½ years in the Navy, through World War II, Korea and Vietnam, and I'm proud of all of it."
Norman will put on his uniform and take possession of the medal April 8 during a ceremony at the U.S. Naval Academy in Annapolis, Md.
He will already have one big medal pinned to his jacket, a Bronze Star with a Combat "V" that he received in 1966 for "performing heroic achievement against the enemy during a search and seizure operation while commanding a destroyer division."
Still, Norman won't claim the title 'hero' for himself. In a Pearl Harbor Day speech given at Rosehill Cemetery this past Dec. 7, Norman described himself as just a "disciplined member of the armed forces charged with maintaining the peace and protection of the United States."
But he doesn't really have to seize the 'hero' mantle for himself. Plenty of others have thrust it upon him.
By Michael Overall
Source: From the Tulsa World, not an endorsement
©1998 The Tulsa World |
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