Our opinion
After 81 years, President Franklin Delano Roosevelt’s statement still rings true. The attack on Pearl Harbor on Dec. 7, 1941, absolutely has lived in infamy.
It was not just a historic day that forced us into another brutal war, decades after World War I which was supposed to be the war to end all wars.
But it was a day that changed the world forever. It was a day to remind us that evil will not go quietly away and freedom will never be free.
The brave men and women who died Dec. 7, 1941 in Hawaii will never be forgotten, nor will the heroics that ensued for the next four years, enabling the free world to triumph over the axis of evil.
We have so few World War II veterans left with us, and we must treasure their knowledge, their experience and their courage. We should take every opportunity to show our appreciation for their service and sacrifice to preserve this world and learn all we can from them.
There has been much written about the war and the Pearl Harbor attack, much of which is encapsulated in this poem.
“December Seventh”
by Cornelius Douglas
Pearl of beauty, Pearl of life,
Within your channels deep
Rest the men and tools of war
For you and God to keep.
From northern skies fell death and strife,
Your paradise turned hell;
As history wrote by early light
A tearful memory tale.
Such valor there was to be found
Mid tragic human loss;
While doomed souls lay in perils rain
War bloomed…the final cost
For all who died that Sabbath morn
We bow our heads and pray
For them God please, A Grant of Peace,
For us….a better way.
This is a somber day in American history, matched only perhaps by Sept. 11 on our calendar. We lost more than 2,000 Americans Dec. 7, 1941, and we cannot take for granted the freedom they bought for us through their sacrifice.
Today is a good day to glance up at our American Flag and thank everyone who made freedom possible for our country.