From Ohio to Okinawa

During a backyard party in the summer of 1974, an out-of-town visitor from my father’s 27th Infantry Division approached me and told me a compelling story: How my dad, William “Ed” Snook, once saved his life during the heat of battle on the island of Saipan 30 years earlier during World War II. It was an incredible story I will never forget. Thus, some 40 years later, when my father was in his 90s, I started interviewing him about his experiences in the war – from the summer of 1941 to seeing Pearl Harbor soon after the Japanese attacked to almost losing his life on Saipan and later in Okinawa near the end of the war. He held nothing back. He told me everything, describing in vivid detail what it was like in combat, to take a life, to almost have his taken often, to see those next to him be killed. What resulted from my interviews is a riveting first-person account of the battlefields of the Pacific Theater during the most important war in world history. And that resulted in this book. My only regret is that I did not finish it in time for him to read it. My father died on November 17, 2018, at the age of 99 years and 10 months. He lived an incredible life and his legacy was secure – he was a true American war hero, and I am very proud to say I am his son.

– JEFF SNOOK