Oral History Interview with Vernon Hanks, March 7, 1998

The National Museum of the Pacific War presents an oral interview with Chaplain Vernon Hanks. Hanks was born in Sterling, Kansas on 21 November 1908. He joined the National Guard doing drills with horse-drawn caissons and French 75s while attending Sterling College in Kansas. He graduated in 1931 and then attended the Iliff School of Theology in Denver, graduating in 1940 with a Master of Theology. Hanks joined the Navy after Pearl Harbor and received orders for Naval Chaplains School (NCS), Norfolk, Virginia, in August 1942. He was stationed at MCAS Cherry Point in North Carolina where he remembers counseling a distraught young Marine pilot who had been shot down during the Battle of Midway. Shortly afterward he was assigned to Bunker Hill Naval Air Station where he counseled Marines and Navy personnel. He facilitated a free circus performance at Christmastime. On 5 June 1943 he was assigned to the USS Wright (AV-1), a seaplane tender, for duty in the South Pacific. Hanks was on the Wright at Bougainville, the Admiralties and during the Battle for Leyte Gulf. In February 1945, USS Wright was renamed USS San Clemente (AG-79) and served as communications center for the 7th Fleet. Hanks returned home 5 June 1945 and was assigned to the Coast Guard base at San Diego. Lastly, Hanks served as executive officer of the Chaplain’s Division of the 11th Naval District in San Diego