If given the chance, Carl Amundson would enlist in the Navy again.

The 90-year-old World War II veteran was invited to speak in Anita Gaul’s class on Oct. 30.

In 1942, when he was 17 years old, he went to Mankato, Minn. and enlisted in the Navy.

“I felt like I had to,” Amundson said. “I felt like it was my best bet for survival.”

Because the Navy was in short supply of manpower, Amundson spent only 21 days in boot camp in Green Bay, Wisc. before having a nine day leave to say goodbye to family and friends. From there, he got on a train to Alameda Air Station in San Francisco. By Nov. 1, 1942, he was in Pearl Harbor.

According to an interview Amundson did with the Daily Globe newspaper, Amundson worked salvation duty in Pearl Harbor, which meant that he would remove ammunition and anything else that they save after the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor.

Later on, he would board an amphibious petrol destroyer (APD), which was built in 1918 and was converted into a landing craft for World War II. It brought Jimmy Roosevelt’s Raiders to the Solomon Islands on reconnaissance missions.

“We’d come back in eight or ten days and pick them up if they were still alive,” he said. “They weren’t to contact anyone if they could help it.”

When Amundson landed in San Francisco, he was given a seven-day leave before going to Astoria, Ore. to help put the USS Gambier Bay into commission. They finished their work on Dec. 28. 1943, and the Gambier Bay with its men headed to the South Pacific.

Amundson was stationed on the USS Gambier Bay the day that it sunk. It remains the only American aircraft carrier to be shot down by enemy fire as a result of an Imperial Japanese attack on Oct 25, 1944. She remains at the bottom of the Pacific Ocean today, a victim of the Imperial Japanese attack.

“We run into the biggest Japanese fleet – the biggest battleship ever built – with 18 inch guns. They could shoot 30 miles. We could only shoot nine,” he said.

They got the order to abandon ship, although the shooting on the ship had begun at 7 a.m. that day. The men stationed onboard jumped over the sides if they were able. At 9:07 a.m., the Gambier Bay capsized and sank. Amundson shared a floater net with 37 other men. Approximately two days later, they were picked up by a petrol craft.

Amundson did not spend any time in the hospital despite how long he spent in the water. He caught another ship back to the United States, but by then the war was over. When he was discharged, he moved from Minneapolis to California, where he lived for 60 years. He did not find it difficult to readjust to civilian life.

He met his wife in California, and after her passing, moved back to Minnesota.

When asked if he would do everything over again, he said that he would.

“In the Navy, you always had a place to eat and sleep unless it got sunk. In the Army, you had to march and dig foxholes and trenches. I would enlist in the Navy again, definitely,” Amundson said.

Other speakers that have appeared in Gaul’s class are Karen Knife Sterner, who spoke about her experiences attending and teaching in Indian boarding schools; Dr. Joan Gittens, who spoke about Jane Addams, who was the founder of the Hull House in Chicago; and two local women, who spoke about their experiences living through the Great Depression.

Additional speakers who are expected include an anti-Vietnam war protestor, a recent Latin American immigrant to the USA, and an Iraq War veteran.