80 years after the Japanese attack, survivors still remember
Eighty years ago, 6-year-old Dorinda Makanaonalani Nicholson was eating Sunday breakfast at her home on Pan American Air Force Base in Hawaii when the walls began to shake.
It was December 7, 1941, and the planes were flying overhead.
She recalls her father, a civilian, commenting how odd it was for the Army and Navy to participate in practice flights on Sunday. They ran outside and saw Japanese torpedo bombers hovering over the treetops along Pearl Harbor.
Nicholson, 86, told USA TODAY. “I didn’t know at the time that they were torpedo planes.”
Before long, the walls of the Nicholsons’ kitchen would have bullets in them. There will be shrapnel in her front yard.
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She still carried a bullet lodged in the phone on the wall as a keepsake.
“You need to know your history,” she said.
Tuesday marks eight decades since the horrific attack on Pearl Harbor. The day a nation’s course will change will be marked by some 35 military survivors who plan to rally at many events.
Craig Nelson, author of the 2016 book, said: When hundreds of Japanese planes bombed American service members and civilians on American soil on December 7, 1941 – killing more than 2,400 – America was one “isolated, quiet, withdrawn” country. “Pearl Harbor: From Infamy to Greatness.”
The events of that day, called “a day that will live in disgrace” by President Franklin D. Roosevelt, kicked off America’s involvement in World War II, beginning decades of growing global influence. demand of the United States.
The day will be celebrated at Pearl Harbor National Monument in Hawaii with a variety of events, including a ceremony for the 429 USS Oklahoma crew members killed in the attack.
Each year, the National Monument marks Pearl Harbor Memorial Day by celebrating “December 7 was the catalyst that led to a world change”. This year, the memorial focuses on the “long and difficult road to peace” and highlights “the importance of peace bringing reconciliation,” according to the organization’s website.
This week’s ceremonies will be the first in-person event to commemorate Pearl Harbor since the start of the COVID-19 pandemic. The National Parks Administration says it is working to minimize veterans’ exposure to coronavirus. This year, masks are required in all areas regardless of vaccination status, even if social distancing is maintained.
“This year won’t be as big as previous years,” National Park Service expert Emily Pruett told USA TODAY.
Even with annual memorials, Nelson says, the general understanding of Pearl Harbor is dwindling. In 2021, most Americans probably don’t realize how much of a cultural and social change the attack has created for the individual American, Nelson said.
“If you lived before Pearl Harbor, you would feel more comfortable going back to the Revolutionary War era than going into the present era,” says Nelson.
The attack on Pearl Harbor drew Americans “to pull together” to fight fascism, Nelson said. Then, during the Cold War, the country waged a global war against communism. Most recently, the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan have further expanded the global reach of the US military.
But Nelson and Nicholson say the nation’s collective memory of Pearl Harbor and the impact of World War II is fading.
“A dead snake represents a mother, a father and a brother back home,” Nicholson said. “I want people not to forget what is happening to those left behind.”
She said people were stunned by the bombing of Pearl Harbor in 1941 – the same way Americans were shocked and overwhelmed by the 9/11 attacks nearly 60 years later.
But the aftermath of Pearl Harbor is what Nicholson remembers best: hiding at the Waipahu Sugar Plantation, martial law in Hawaii, and her family unable to return to their home on the Waipi’o Peninsula because of the threat of a bomb. explode.
In her three decades of working cataloging the stories of Pearl Harbor, Nicholson said she wants people to re-examine the lives of everyone affected by the war, including women and children, and civilians whose stories she told were more likely to be forgotten.
“I want people to know that war affects everyone,” Nicholson said.