He was able to find an outfit (mymovietransfer.com) to do a much superior scan of the footage to what he had previously posted, so re-did this film and replaced the older version There are more still images from this amazing day, in color, at discoveringhawaii.com

VJ Day, Honolulu Hawaii, August 14, 1945 from Richard Sullivan on Vimeo.

In 1943, the world was a different place.

There was no Google yet. Or Yahoo.

In 1943, the year of my birth, the top selling movie was A Guy Named Joe. People buying the popcorn in the cinema lobby had glazing eyes when looking at the poster.

Remember, that was before there were DVDs. Heck, even before there was VHS. People were indeed watching movies in the cinema, and not downloading them online. Imagine the packed seats, the laughter, the excitement, the novelty. And mostly all of that without 3D computer effects.

In the year 1943, the time when I arrived on this planet, books were still popularly read on paper, not on digital devices. Trees were felled to get the word out. The number one US bestseller of the time was The Robe by Lloyd C. Douglas. Oh, that’s many years ago. Have you read that book? Have you heard of it?

In 1943… American movie studio executives agree to allow the Office of War Information to censor movies. The drugs Vicodin and Lortab are made in Germany. Rome is bombed by the Allies for the first time in the war. The Order of Bogdan Khmelnitsky is instituted in the USSR. The Merrie Melodies animated short Falling Hare, one of the only shorts with Bugs getting out-smarted, is released in the United States. The Colossus computer is invented by the British to break German encryption. Jacques-Yves Cousteau co-invents, with Emile Gagnan, the first commercially successful open circuit type of scuba diving equipment, the Aqua-lung.

That was the world you were born into. Since then, you and others have changed it.

The Nobel prize for physics went to Otto Stern from the United States for his contribution to the development of the molecular ray method and his discovery of the magnetic moment of the proton. The sensation this created was big. But it didn’t stop the planets from spinning, on and on, year by year. Years in which you would grow bigger, older, smarter, and, if you were lucky, sometimes wiser. Years in which you also lost some things. Possessions got misplaced. Memories faded. Friends parted ways. The best friends, you tried to hold on. This is what counts in life, isn’t it?

The 1940s were indeed a special decade. World War II continued, affecting people in Europe, Asia and elsewhere. The post war world encouraged decolonization, new states and governments emerged, while others declared independence, often not without bloodshed. The dystopian novel Nineteen Eighty-Four is published, picturing a totalitarian Big Brother regime controllings its citizens. The NATO gets established. Iceland declares independence Denmark. Mao Zedong’s Chinese Communist Party is victorious in the Chinese Civil War. Mathematics sees the invention of cryptography. Ballistic missiles are created.

Do you remember the movie that was all the rage when you were 15? The Young Lions. Do you still remember the songs playing on the radio when you were 15? Maybe it was All I Have To Do Is Dream by Everly Brothers. Were you in love? Who were you in love with, do you remember?

In 1943, 15 years earlier, a long time ago, the year when I were born, the song White Christmas by Bing Crosby topped the US charts. Do you know the lyrics? Do you know the tune? Sing along.

The sun is shining
The grass is green
The orange and palm trees sway.
I’ve never seen such a day
In Beverly Hills LA.
But it’s December the 24th
And I am longing to be up North.
…

There’s a kid outside, shouting, playing. It doesn’t care about time. It doesn’t know about time. It shouts and it plays and thinks time is forever. You were once that kid.

When you were 9, the movie Jack and the Beanstalk was playing.

Progress, year after year. Do you wonder where the world is heading towards? The technology available today would have blown your mind in 1943. Do you know what was invented in the year you were born? The Aqua-Lung.

I am the son of a grassland farmer
Western Oklahoma 1943
I always felt grateful to live in the land of the free
…

That’s from the song Let Us Begin by John Denver.

In 1943, a new character entered the world of comic books: Chip ‘n Dale. Bang! Boom! But that’s just fiction, right? In the real world, in 1943, Eric Idle was born. And Mick Jagger. Robert De Niro, too. And you, of course. Everyone an individual. Everyone special. Everyone taking a different path through life.
It’s 2010.

The world is a different place.

What path have you taken?