Barbara Tisdale was eating a piece of turkey when she heard about the Dec. 7, 1941, Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor, where her husband, William Esley Tisdale Jr., was serving in the Navy.
"I choked on it," she said years later. "Mother put her finger in my throat to remove it."
Mr. Tisdale, chief water tender on the U.S.S. Arizona, was killed along with 1,176 shipmates.
Mr. Tisdale was born Sept. 3, 1905, in Shelby, N.C. to William Esley, a manager in the textile industry, and Hattie L. Smith Esley, a homemaker.
He joined the Navy in 1920. The 1940 Census showed his permanent residence in Long Beach, California, where his wife and daughter lived.
Three months before he was killed, Mr. Tisdale applied for a transfer to the Fleet Reserve, which means he would have been retired but available for recall in the case of emergency or war. It isn't clear why he wasn't in the reserve by the time of the attack. Perhaps, with the threat of war looming, the Navy decided that it couldn't let him retire. Or perhaps he was being kept on the Arizona until it returned to its home port at San Pedro, California.
After her husband's death, Mrs. Tisdale said she once picked up a hitchhiker who stared and then called her by a name only her husband used. "I've seen your picture too many times on his locker not to recognize you," the man told her.
Mr. Tisdale's name is engraved on the tombstone of his parents at Sharon United Methodist Church cemetery in Sharon, N.C.
Sources: the Independent Press-Telegram of Long Beach, California; the Montgomery (Alabama) Advertiser; Census; Navy Continuous Service Certificate. This profile was researched and written on behalf of the U.S.S. Arizona Mall Memorial at the University of Arizona.
Contributor: USS Arizona Mall Memorial at University of Arizona (50022871)
"I choked on it," she said years later. "Mother put her finger in my throat to remove it."
Mr. Tisdale, chief water tender on the U.S.S. Arizona, was killed along with 1,176 shipmates.
Mr. Tisdale was born Sept. 3, 1905, in Shelby, N.C. to William Esley, a manager in the textile industry, and Hattie L. Smith Esley, a homemaker.
He joined the Navy in 1920. The 1940 Census showed his permanent residence in Long Beach, California, where his wife and daughter lived.
Three months before he was killed, Mr. Tisdale applied for a transfer to the Fleet Reserve, which means he would have been retired but available for recall in the case of emergency or war. It isn't clear why he wasn't in the reserve by the time of the attack. Perhaps, with the threat of war looming, the Navy decided that it couldn't let him retire. Or perhaps he was being kept on the Arizona until it returned to its home port at San Pedro, California.
After her husband's death, Mrs. Tisdale said she once picked up a hitchhiker who stared and then called her by a name only her husband used. "I've seen your picture too many times on his locker not to recognize you," the man told her.
Mr. Tisdale's name is engraved on the tombstone of his parents at Sharon United Methodist Church cemetery in Sharon, N.C.
Sources: the Independent Press-Telegram of Long Beach, California; the Montgomery (Alabama) Advertiser; Census; Navy Continuous Service Certificate. This profile was researched and written on behalf of the U.S.S. Arizona Mall Memorial at the University of Arizona.
Contributor: USS Arizona Mall Memorial at University of Arizona (50022871)
Barbara Tisdale was eating a piece of turkey when she heard about the Dec. 7, 1941, Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor, where her husband, William Esley Tisdale Jr., was serving in the Navy.
"I choked on it," she said years later. "Mother put her finger in my throat to remove it."
Mr. Tisdale, chief water tender on the U.S.S. Arizona, was killed along with 1,176 shipmates.
Mr. Tisdale was born Sept. 3, 1905, in Shelby, N.C. to William Esley, a manager in the textile industry, and Hattie L. Smith Esley, a homemaker.
He joined the Navy in 1920. The 1940 Census showed his permanent residence in Long Beach, California, where his wife and daughter lived.
Three months before he was killed, Mr. Tisdale applied for a transfer to the Fleet Reserve, which means he would have been retired but available for recall in the case of emergency or war. It isn't clear why he wasn't in the reserve by the time of the attack. Perhaps, with the threat of war looming, the Navy decided that it couldn't let him retire. Or perhaps he was being kept on the Arizona until it returned to its home port at San Pedro, California.
After her husband's death, Mrs. Tisdale said she once picked up a hitchhiker who stared and then called her by a name only her husband used. "I've seen your picture too many times on his locker not to recognize you," the man told her.
Mr. Tisdale's name is engraved on the tombstone of his parents at Sharon United Methodist Church cemetery in Sharon, N.C.
Sources: the Independent Press-Telegram of Long Beach, California; the Montgomery (Alabama) Advertiser; Census; Navy Continuous Service Certificate. This profile was researched and written on behalf of the U.S.S. Arizona Mall Memorial at the University of Arizona.
Contributor: USS Arizona Mall Memorial at University of Arizona (50022871)
"I choked on it," she said years later. "Mother put her finger in my throat to remove it."
Mr. Tisdale, chief water tender on the U.S.S. Arizona, was killed along with 1,176 shipmates.
Mr. Tisdale was born Sept. 3, 1905, in Shelby, N.C. to William Esley, a manager in the textile industry, and Hattie L. Smith Esley, a homemaker.
He joined the Navy in 1920. The 1940 Census showed his permanent residence in Long Beach, California, where his wife and daughter lived.
Three months before he was killed, Mr. Tisdale applied for a transfer to the Fleet Reserve, which means he would have been retired but available for recall in the case of emergency or war. It isn't clear why he wasn't in the reserve by the time of the attack. Perhaps, with the threat of war looming, the Navy decided that it couldn't let him retire. Or perhaps he was being kept on the Arizona until it returned to its home port at San Pedro, California.
After her husband's death, Mrs. Tisdale said she once picked up a hitchhiker who stared and then called her by a name only her husband used. "I've seen your picture too many times on his locker not to recognize you," the man told her.
Mr. Tisdale's name is engraved on the tombstone of his parents at Sharon United Methodist Church cemetery in Sharon, N.C.
Sources: the Independent Press-Telegram of Long Beach, California; the Montgomery (Alabama) Advertiser; Census; Navy Continuous Service Certificate. This profile was researched and written on behalf of the U.S.S. Arizona Mall Memorial at the University of Arizona.
Contributor: USS Arizona Mall Memorial at University of Arizona (50022871)
Gravesite Details
Entered the service from California.
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