Photo Gallery

Pearl Harbor

December 7, 1941—and its aftermath

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Waikiki, 1940

Photograph courtesy National Park Service, The USS Arizona Memorial Photo Collection

Tourists, U.S. Navy personnel, and native Hawaiians enjoy the warm waters of Waikiki Beach in 1940. When this photograph was taken, World War II had already begun in Europe. A year later, the United States entered the war after the Imperial Japanese Navy attacked Pearl Harbor, just 18 kilometers (11 miles) from Waikiki.
USS Arizona

Photograph courtesy National Park Service, The USS Arizona Memorial Photo Collection

The USS Arizona, here in the 1920s, was named after the nation's newest state when she was authorized in 1913. (Arizona became a state in 1912.) After serving stateside in World War I, the Arizona joined the massive U.S. Pacific Fleet in Pearl Harbor.
Ford Island

Photograph courtesy National Park Service, The USS Arizona Memorial Photo Collection

Ford Island was the home of “Battleship Row,” visible in the upper right of this photograph, where two battleships are aligned. On December 7, 1941, eight of the Pacific Fleet’s battleships were moored at Ford Island—Nevada, Arizona, Tennessee, West Virginia, Oklahoma, Maryland, California, and Pennsylvania—along with the repair ship Vestal. Another battleship, the Utah, was moored away from Battleship Row, on the west side of Ford Island.
Yoshio Shimizu

Photograph courtesy National Park Service, The USS Arizona Memorial Photo Collection

Petty Officer 2nd Class Yoshio Shimizu of the Imperial Japanese Navy, left, died during the second wave of the attack on Pearl Harbor. He was 21 years old. Shimizu's family was familiar with Hawaii. His father had been employed at the Waialua Sugar Mill, 40 kilometers (25 miles) from Pearl Harbor, and his three older brothers were born in Hawaii. Yoshio was born in Japan after his family returned there in 1916.
Akagi

Photograph courtesy National Park Service, The USS Arizona Memorial Photo Collection

A Japanese Zero, one of the most agile and deadly planes of World War II, prepares to take off from the aircraft carrier Akagi. The Akagi, later disabled by U.S. aircraft at the Battle of Midway (1942), was one of six Japanese aircraft carriers involved in the Pearl Harbor attack.
Japan planned the attack to protect its ability to further expand its empire. The United States opposed Japanese expansion into mainland Asia, and had been providing aid to China following the Japanese invasion of Manchuria in 1931. Japan intended to invade Malaya and the Dutch East Indies, and attacked the Pacific Fleet to limit U.S. response to these planned invasions.
Torpedo Tracks

Photograph courtesy National Park Service, The USS Arizona Memorial Photo Collection

This image was captured by a Japanese naval aviator in the opening moments of the attack on Pearl Harbor. Torpedo tracks from a top-secret Japanese "midget submarine" can be seen headed towards Battleship Row. Midget subs were only 24 meters (79 feet) long and held two crew members. Five midget subs were used in the attack, although none caused major damage.
The smoke in the distance is from Hickam Field, the largest air base in the area. Targeting grounded aircraft delayed American response to the attack.
USS Oklahoma

Photograph courtesy National Park Service, The USS Arizona Memorial Photo Collection

The USS Oklahoma takes a direct hit from a Japanese torpedo plane at the beginning of the first wave of the attack on Pearl Harbor, which began at 7:48 a.m. on December 7, 1941. The Oklahoma was one of the first battleships to sink, taking 429 of her crew with her. One of them, Father Aloysius H. Schmitt, a Roman Catholic priest, became the first American chaplain to die in the war.
The Oklahoma was salvaged, but never repaired. She was sold for scrap, but sank in a storm before she could be dismantled.
USS Arizona

Photograph courtesy the National Park Service, The USS Arizona Memorial Photo Collection

The USS Arizona burns after being hit by an armor-piercing bomb in the second wave of the attack. Four bombs hit the Arizona, the last one penetrating her ammunition magazines, which held 500 tons of explosives.

The ship burned for two days, and 1,177 crew members were killed. It remains the greatest loss of life on any warship in American history.
View from the Shaw

Photograph courtesy National Park Service, The USS Arizona Memorial Photo Collection

During the second wave of the attack, the Japanese shifted focus from the already-damaged battleships to ships stationed in other parts of Pearl Harbor. The USS Shaw, a destroyer, in dry dock. Directly in front of the Shaw, the USS Nevada—the only battleship able to maneuver during the attack—attempts to move out of the harbor. (The Nevada was ultimately hit by a torpedo and six bombs, forcing her to be beached.) The Avocet, a small airplane carrier, remains untouched in the foreground.
Scrap Metal

Photograph courtesy National Park Service, The USS Arizona Memorial Photo Collection

In addition to attacking ships of the Pacific Fleet, the Japanese also targeted planes at Wheeler Army Air Field and Hickam Army Air Field, where 189 people died. Many of the planes at these posts were lined up out in the open to prevent sabotage, resulting in considerable destruction.
Dorrie Miller

Photograph courtesy National Park Service, The USS Arizona Memorial Photo Collection

Many American servicemen and women acted bravely during the attack. Cook 3rd Class Doris "Dorrie" Miller, a mess attendant, was recognized for his actions aboard the USS West Virginia, for example. Although he was not trained for combat, Miller fired directly at Japanese planes with a machine gun mounted on the deck of the West Virginia. He also transported wounded soldiers and tended to the injured. Miller was the first African American to be presented with the Navy Cross, one of the highest honors bestowed by the U.S. Navy.
War!

Photograph courtesy National Park Service, The USS Arizona Memorial Photo Collection

As a result of the attack on Pearl Harbor, the United States declared war on Japan on December 8, 1941, as reported by the Aurora (Illinois) Sunday Beacon-News.

The attack left 2,403 Americans dead and 1,178 wounded. Twenty-one ships and 347 aircraft were either wrecked or damaged. In his original speech to Congress on December 8, President Franklin D. Roosevelt wrote of “December 7, 1941, a date which will live in world history.” He later changed the phrase to one of the most memorable of the war—“a date which will live in infamy.”
USS Arizona Shrine

Photograph courtesy the National Park Service

The Arizona is perhaps the most famous shipwreck of World War II. Today, the battleship lies at the bottom of Pearl Harbor, its hull straddled by the shrine of the USS Arizona Memorial, a National Historic Landmark and part of the World War II Valor in the Pacific National Monument. The memorial was designed by Honolulu architect Alfred Preis—who was interned during World War II due to his Austrian birth.

When the Arizona was sunk, she carried more than a million gallons of fuel. The so-called "Tears of the Arizona" are the drips of oil that continually bubble from the wreck, forming a thin oil slick across the waters of the memorial, visible drifting to the bottom left of this image.
Memorial Wall

Photograph by Ray Sandla, courtesy National Park Service

The names of the 1,177 men killed on the USS Arizona on December 7, 1941, are etched into this marble wall in the Shrine Room at the memorial.

Fewer than 300 bodies were recovered after the disaster. The rest remain entombed with the ship. Survivors of the attack on the Arizona may request to be interred with their shipmates. This makes the Arizona an active military cemetery, similar to the one at Arlington, Virginia.
Veterans of the 442nd

Photograph by Ray Sandla, courtesy National Park Service

Members of the 442nd Regimental Combat Team arrive at the 2005 Pearl Harbor Day ceremony at the USS Arizona Memorial. The 442nd, composed mostly of Japanese Americans from Hawaii, is the most highly decorated regiment of World War II—and, in fact, American history.
Junior, Ranger

Photograph by Bradford Baker, courtesy National Park Service

A ranger at the USS Arizona Memorial shares a Junior Ranger Guidebook with a young guest. According to the National Park Service, the Pearl Harbor Visitors Center receives an average of 4,500 visitors per day and 1.5 million visitors annually.