Survivors fade, heroism doesn’t

An important day of remembrance will be repeated today at Pearl Harbor, but it will no longer include a formal gathering of members of the Pearl Harbor Survivors Association.

Diminishing numbers and failing health resulted in disbandment of the organization a year ago after the 70th anniversary of the surprise Japanese attack, but Dec. 7 will forever be honored as a national day of remembrance.

The association was formed in 1958 with 28,000 members of the military along with federal employees who worked at Honolulu airfields that were under fire, and a congressional charter was granted in 1985.

The membership had fallen to 2,700 as last year’s ceremony approached.

"With the advanced age and ill health of our membership and the declining numbers of members," William H. Muehleib, the association’s last national president, explained last year, "it was obvious that we could not continue the requirements that corporate 501(c) lays on our membership and on our board."

About 50 survivors are expected to attend the ceremony today, and some will return a year from now.

"We don’t like to see it happen," Pearl Harbor survivor George Bennett, the organization’s national secretary, said following last year’s ceremony. "But we don’t have young members coming in like other organizations."

Several members of what was a Honolulu chapter of the association will continue to gather. What is left from chapters across the country may continue meeting each year on this and other dates but without the support of a national organization, as communication lines are breaking down.

Many of those local gatherings are no longer held because so few Pearl Harbor veterans are still alive. Most survivors are well into their 90s.

The attack left more than 2,400 Americans dead as most of the U.S. Pacific fleet was damaged or sunk, military aircraft destroyed.

In response to the infamy, the United States declared war the next day and the country rallied with heroism in the years that followed.

"It will be remembered in importance by allies and friends who were our former enemies," said Daniel A. Martinez, chief historian for the USS Arizona Memorial, and "how we learned from it."

A strong indication that the future will assure proper recognition is the recent dedication of a new Pearl Harbor Visitor Center and museum.

The military challenge today by terrorist enemies without boundaries will go down in history as an unforgivable kind of horror in American history, and 9/11 will be forever recognized as such in history.

On different notes, many Americans know about Bunker Hill and Yorktown, Fort Sumter and Gettysburg.

Likewise, what happened at Pearl Harbor and the war the followed, and what developed into close friendships for decades, will never fade from public consciousness.