McCash, William

On September 9, 1942, a site near Brookings, Curry County, Oregon was bombed by a Japanese floatplane piloted by Nobuo Fujita. Fujita was a Warrant Flying Officer of the Imperial Japanese Navy. His floatplane was launched from an I-25 submarine and carried incendiary bombs. Its mission was to start massive forest fires throughout the Pacific Northwest; however, the attack was a failure due to heavy rains the previous night. Two decades after the attack, in 1962, Fujita was invited back to Brookings as a sign of friendship. At that time he gave the town his family’s 400-year old samurai sword. Additionally, he was granted honorary citizenship in Brookings shortly before his death in 1997.