will.illinois.edu/prairiefire/segment/pf2008-03-27-a WILL Public Media, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign Series Segment History, Military, World War II, Champaign, Mahomet, Oakland, WILL Custom Prairie Fire Subject Headings When the USS Indianapolis was sunk by Japanese torpedoes in 1945, only 317 of 1,196 men on board survived. Three of those survivors live in central Illinois. Art Leenerman of Mahomet, Don McCall of Champaign, and Earl Riggins of Oakland got together with WILL-TV producer Denise La Grassa to talk about how they survived four and a half days in the water waiting to be rescued while battling sharks, cold and hunger. About 600 men died in the water after the ship sank. All three central Illinois survivors were brought up on farms, and were accustomed to hard work, long days in the sun and difficult conditions. They think it was a factor in their survival. “They had grown up learning to keep plowing along, no matter how tough things got. And that’s basically what they did in the water,” said La Grassa. Abstract Magazine PBCore Genre Picklist Is Part Of http://will.illinois.edu/prairiefire/episode/pf2008-03-27 Illinois, Indiana Spatial Intermediate (grades 7-9)|High School (grades 10-12)|Primary (grades 1-6)|College|Post Graduate|General Education|General TV-G Denise La Grassa Producer WILL-TV, University of Illinois Copyright Holder Publisher © 2008 University of Illinois 2008-03-27T08:30:00-06:00 2008-03-27T08:30:00-06:00 video/x-pn-realvideo http://willmedia.will.uiuc.edu/ramgen/pf2008-03-27-a.rv Moving Image RealSystems Real Media 9 35208411 00:08:40 eng pf2008-03-27-a.rv WILL Public Media, University of Illinois 2008-03-27T08:30:00-06:00 2008-03-27T08:30:00-06:00 video/mp4 http://willmedia.atlas.uiuc.edu/mpeg4/pf2008-03-27-a.mp4 Moving Image MPEG video MPEG-4 33288297 00:08:40 eng pf2008-03-27-a.mp4 WILL Public Media, University of Illinois 2008-03-27T08:30:00-06:00 2008-03-27T08:30:00-06:00 video/x-flv http://willmedia.atlas.uiuc.edu/flash/pf2008-03-27-a.flv Moving Image Flash Video Flash Media 8 32281601 00:08:40 eng pf2008-03-27-a.flv WILL Public Media, University of Illinois