“When we still heard the five-inch guns firing, we didn’t have to get too nervous. But when we heard the 50 calibers, that’s when things got nerve-wracking,” recalled Harold Van Gundy of rural Houston about his three-year stint in the U.S. Navy.

Van Gundy, who was a Machinist Second Class, spent much of his time deep in the bowels of the USS O’Bannon in one of the two engine rooms making sure the Navy destroyer continued its motion through the waters of the Pacific Ocean.

See more in Editor Charlie Warner's Caledonia Argus story.

U.S. Navy Machinist Second Class Harold Van Gundy as he looked in the mid-1940 while serving on the USS O'Bannon.

(Submitted photo)