Pearl Harbor, December 7, 1941

On Sunday morning, 12/7/41 beginning at 7:55 a.m., 300 Japanese planes hammered our fleet and aircraft on the ground at Pearl Harbor just off the Island of Oahu for three hours. The flames, bombs, and smoke could easily be witnessed by the residents of nearby Honolulu. Our Pacific Fleet was caught completely by surprise, and although a warning had come, a commander dismissed it by saying the detected aircraft were our own returning from a training mission. Our planes on the ground were "sitting ducks," as they were parked on the runways, wing tip to wing tip, as a defense against possible sabotage. No one was predicting a preemptive air strike! Many ships were sunk, but the USS Arizona suffered the most losses.

Gloria's first memory of WW II was getting a call from her father, while she was playing at her grandparents a half-mile away, telling her, "Come home,NOW; we are at war." She and Jerry were both first graders, living 12 miles apart in Northwest Ohio, not knowing that one day the Lord would bring them together. Jerry's first memory was reading the big Monday newspaper headlines: "Japs Bomb Pearl Harbor." His first question to his mother was, "What's a Jap?"

During the War, we saw the battlefield scenes in newsreels that always preceded movies, and we listened to President Roosevelt and Lowell Thomas on the radio. Our Weekly Readers in school helped us to understand the struggles of our nation and our allies at war. Occasionally, the fire alarm in the schools would ring 10 times, indicating that we should line up against the walls in preparation for a possible bombing from our enemies.

After the War, when the USS Arizona, burial place for 1177 of our sailors, became a National Park, it was always our desire to visit this historic and solemn place. She continues to be visited by millions of people visiting Hawaii. Alongside her rusty, skeletal remains that peek above the water is the the Battleship Missouri, which was decommissioned after the Vietnam War. At last we made it to Pearl Harbor!