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GM3c Harry Cecil Jones
Harry Cecil Jones was born Jan. 19, 1915 in southwest Kansas to Charles Jones, then a laborer, and Alma Haarstick Jones, a homemaker.
He was likely born in and definitely attended school in Bucklin, population 832, about 25 miles southeast of Dodge City, and enlisted in the Navy on May 20, 1940.
He was a gunner’s mate and petty officer third class on the U.S.S. Arizona when he was killed in the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor, Dec. 7, 1941.
A memorial service honored him at the town auditorium in February 1942 as well as another local man killed in the Philippines. At the service, organized by the American Legion, the audience sang “The Star-Spangled Banner” and “God Bless America.” A vocal duo sang “God’s Tomorrow” and “Let Not Your Heart Be Troubled.”
During the war, Mr. Jones’ sister, Mildred, older by nearly two years, became a welder at Boeing Airplane Co. in Wichita, Kansas. It was a major manufacturer of B-29 bombers – the Superfortress.
Sources: the Bucklin (Kansas) Banner; Yorgensen-McLoan-Londeen Funeral Home of Manhattan, Kansas; Census; Navy muster roll; Defense Department. This profile was researched and written on behalf of the U.S.S. Arizona Mall Memorial at the University of Arizona.