Prayers to all who perished on that awful day in history. My Dad was stationed on the cruiser Helena and wrote a 3 page account of the attack.
When I was growing up December 7th was a date indelibly afixed in the American mind and heart, kept in our national memory by an annual mention of it. In 1984 our niece and her fiance' selected that day to be their wedding day and I recall at the time how shocked I was they would choose that "day of infamy." But the years do have a way of softening our pain and grief and time does heal the wounds, and any scars remaining from the attack have been softened. Each year when that day comes around I remember her anniversary - today - mostly because she was married on that particular date. In our more recent memories September 11 carries the same sort of indelible mark the earlier generation recognized with December 7. As with Pearl Harbor, that date will eventually fade from our collective national memory much as the bitter sting of December 7 has dulled with the passage of time.
I'm sure I could do this with a map now (I might be rusty on a few obscure capitals). I used to be able to do this with Brazil too because I was required to learn it to pass a test in a class. Safe to say I couldn't do this anymore, because its just some facts I had drilled into me at one time and no longer need. I think a lot of people just forget, because it sort of becomes useless unless you have a strong memory for that kind of stuff or find reason to apply it.
Something that’s swirled around in my brain for decades now… I went to Pearl in 1992. Amazing place, particularly as a history major. But when we were out at the Arizona memorial, a small skiff pulled up to the memorial with a veteran, and two escorts. He was almost certainly one of the survivors. He stood solemnly looking at the wall of names, I think we left before he did. But I would have given anything to have known his story. I mean, to be in the presence of an Arizona survivor at the Arizona? But it’s not like I could just walk up and bother him while he was presumably morning his friends. Could have looked for him onshore I guess, but we didn’t stay that long. At a minimum, would have been nice to tell him thanks. Just has always been a regret, even if there wasn’t much I could do.
Maybe off topic, but an a couple more of these. It’s not until something like 2150 before the US will have held Florida longer than the Spanish did. President John Tyler has a living grandson, despite Tyler being born in 1790. Frank Buckles was the last WW1 veteran to pass away. He remembered having conversations with his grandfather who was born in 1817. Frank died in 2011, so given his grandfather would have almost surely known revolutionary war veterans, there was a guy still alive in 2011 who had revolutionary war stories that were only one person removed from the event. By the way, Frank was also a prisoner of war in the pacific in WW2. History can be crazy.
“Sunday, December 7, 1941, the day that will live in infancy, suddenly and without warning, the United States was bombed by the Empire of Japan, “ President Franklin D. Roosevelt’”. that attack on Pearl Harbor had big impact on my Mom and Dad as it did with everyone else at the time’. .
You are so correct’ that attack by Japan had a big impact on myMom and Dad, as it did me later on when I was born in 1943, my older brother was 2 years old at time Pearl Harbor was bombed.
