President Franklin Delano Roosevelt declared that December 7, 1941 was “a day that will live in infamy.” The attack by Japanese planes on Pearl Harbor on that Sunday morning seventy-four years ago does live on in our history, in memory, and in the hearts of Americans. It was a day when more than 2400 Americans lost their lives in a surprise air attack by Japan.
I cannot think about those young lives lost, the hopes and dreams and broken hearts that lay in ruins after that attack without my own heart being broken. It happened before I was born but when I see newsreels or read first-hand accounts, it is as if I were there.
Two of the ships, the USS Arizona and USS Utah, are still at the bottom of the harbor. The USS Arizona still leaks oil today, as if it is bleeding or weeping for the lives lost.
Did the Japanese emperor Hirohito think he would defeat America by that horrific treacherous attack? Did he not know Americans better than that? We have always rallied when threatened or attacked. We do not give up. We fight for all that we hold dear: our homes, our lives, our families, our freedom. It has always been so, since that time nearly two centuries before Pearl Harbor when a small group of colonists dared defy the most powerful, militarily superior country in the world.
Many books and film clips exist today that tell the story of Pearl Harbor, the viciousness and the valor much better than I could ever attempt to do.
I think the greatest tribute we can pay the Americans who died during that “day of infamy” is to hold their memories dear and teach our children that freedom is not to be taken lightly. It is more precious than gold. May we never let it slip away.
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