(Author's note: About 20 years ago, my 2nd grader announced after school that "America was a bully." I asked him what he meant. My heart grieved when he explained: We had dropped the A-bomb on Japan for no reason. America is just a "mean country".

I was so outraged, I took my child directly to my Daddy, who told him why America wasn't 'mean'. And how the war had actually started.

My dad, Hallam Ross Faris, another boy in another time, used these words to tell the story of that morning to his young grandson.)

"I was a Chief Petty Officer on the USS Raleigh. A light cruiser alongside the USS Detroit, she was berthed opposite battleship row on Ford Island. It was early in the morning on December 7th, 1941. I was just a snot-nosed kid - only 19.

The CPOs had their own mess and we took turns cooking for each other. This morning, it was my turn. We heard someone running toward the mess, screaming bloody murder. The hatch was to my back and just as I turned to see what-in-the-hell was going on, a sailor stuck his head in.

He didn't even come all the way in. His head poked in and his hands gripped the side of the hatch. He was so hysterical, I couldn't understand him at first. But then I realized he was screaming "general quarters, general quarters." Over and over and over.

I couldn't move. The only thought I had was - why are having a general quarters drill on such a beautiful Hawaii morning?. The other CPOs were like me. With open mouths, none of us moved. I was frozen with a spatula in my hand.

But he must have realized that his screaming wasn't getting through to us, because he calmed down enough to shout, "No shit, this is the real thing." Finally, some actual sailor talk. I was terrified but we all moved to our battle stations. Mine was a 50 caliber gun.

And that was when the war started. We were unprepared and never dreamed that bombs would come falling out of the sky from a country we were at peace with.

And so Japan started the war, but America finished the war by being 'mean'.

I bet your teacher didn't tell you that, did she?"

My son's eyes were big as he shook his head "no".

(Author's Note: To my son, Daddy would say no more than this. In later years, he told me more. I wish he hadn't. But I was an adult so my heart moved closer to his. I mourned his lost, young years.

Daddy asked that I never tell his grandson what he saw that day, and I promised.)

Re-told by Ross' daughter, Celeste Faris

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