Orlando Legion post honors Pearl Harbor hero Dorie Miller with a birthday tribute

An American Legion post in Orlando that carries Doris "Dorie" Miller's name is throwing a birthday celebration on Sunday for the World War II sailor. His quick thinking and courage at Pearl Harbor made him one of the first American heroes of the war.

The program begins at 3 p.m. at the Doris "Dorie" Miller Memorial American Legion Post 331 on Fairmont Street. Organizers have invited veterans, Gold Star families, local officials, Orange County residents and fellow Legion members. Xavier Moss, an artist and teacher known for the history murals he has painted around Oviedo, will be the guest speaker.

A cook who took up a gun

Miller was born on Oct. 12, 1919, in Waco, Texas. In the segregated Navy of his day, Black sailors were mostly kept to jobs such as cooking and serving meals. Miller was a mess attendant aboard the battleship USS West Virginia when Japanese planes attacked Pearl Harbor on the morning of Dec. 7, 1941.

He helped carry his badly wounded captain to safety and pulled other injured sailors out of danger. Then he took over an anti-aircraft machine gun he had never been trained to use and fired at the attacking planes until he was ordered to abandon the burning ship.

The first of his kind

On May 27, 1942, Adm. Chester Nimitz pinned the Navy Cross on Miller's chest at Pearl Harbor. He was the first Black sailor to receive the medal, at the time the Navy's second-highest honor for bravery in combat.

Miller did not survive the war. He was serving aboard the escort carrier USS Liscome Bay when a Japanese submarine torpedoed it on Nov. 24, 1943. He was 24.

A name that keeps sailing

His story has been passed down for generations. The Navy plans to name a future Ford-class aircraft carrier, CVN-81, after him. It will be the first carrier named for a Black American and the first named for an enlisted sailor.

For the Orlando post that bears his name, the yearly tribute is a way to keep that legacy in front of young people. Post chaplain George McZeal Jr. is coordinating the event and the public is welcome.