NLR MUSEUM
2 survivors of assault join 75th anniversary tribute in NLR
commemorates anniversary.
William M. “Bill” Chase greeted Walter Smith with a hug Wednesday morning before the start of the Arkansas Remembers Pearl Harbor 75th anniversary commemoration outside of North Little Rock’s Arkansas Inland Maritime Museum.
The two survivors of Japan’s Dec., 7, 1941, attack on the Pearl Harbor Naval Base in Hawaii were honored guests, along with many World War II veterans, at the tribute to the more than 2,300 U.S. service members killed in the attack that sent the United States into World War II.
“I’m making it,” Chase, 92 “and a half,” a Navy veteran from Pearcy (Garland County), told Smith, 98, an Army veteran from North Little Rock. “Sometimes it’s a little tough.”
The midday ceremony, held in a 41-degree temperature and under a gray sky, drew almost 1,000 people, according to the museum staff. The observance highlighted a week’s worth of more than 30 activities, events and exhibits related to Pearl Harbor or World War II at museums, libraries and other venues throughout central Arkansas. A list of the events, many of which will continue through the week, can be found at aimmuseum.org/scheduleof-events.
Meanwhile, at the same time at Pearl Harbor, Hawaii, thousands gathered for the national observance of the attack’s anniversary.
North Little Rock’s maritime museum, just east of the Main Street Bridge on the Arkansas River, hosted
the statewide commemoration for the second consecutive year. The museum features the tugboat USS Hoga that was at Pearl Harbor during and after the attack, its crew fighting fires and pulling men out of the fiery water. Also at the museum is the USS Razorback submarine that was present for the Japanese surrender in Tokyo Bay on Sept. 2, 1945.
Aside from Pearl Harbor, North Little Rock is the only city that has Navy vessels that were present for the beginning of America’s involvement in World War II and the end of that involvement.
Gov. Asa Hutchinson, the ceremony’s keynote speaker, paused before his remarks for a moment of silence, the playing of taps and a flyover in observance of the beginning moments of the attack.
Hutchinson said those at Pearl Harbor and throughout the United States 75 years age were having “a day of normal activity” that “ended in extraordinary tragedy.” But, he added, Americans answered quickly and forcefully.
“We responded as a nation to a mobilization the world had never seen before,” Hutchinson said. Before the Pearl Harbor attack, many in the nation had supported staying out of the war. After the attack, the United States declared war on Japan the next day.
“This is a day of remembrance, and it is a day of resolve,” Hutchinson said.
Chase and Smith were among 144 Arkansans stationed at Pearl Harbor on Dec. 7, 1941, Hutchinson said. There were 23 Arkansans among the 1,177 killed on board the battleship USS Arizona when it exploded and sank during the attack.
On that Sunday morning of the attack, many Americans were “either in church, going to church or going home from church,” depending on their time zone, said former U.S. Congressman Vic Snyder, a member of the maritime museum’s board of directors who led North Little Rock’s ceremony.
“Then our history, and the history of the world, changed forever,” Snyder said.
In previous years, state anniversary ceremonies to observe the Pearl Harbor attack were held on the state Capitol grounds. But last year, after the Hoga arrived at the museum, the event was moved to North Little Rock. Secretary of State Mark Martin said having the statewide observance now held “in the shadow of the USS Hoga is truly an honor.”
The crew of the Hoga, a National Historic Landmark, fought fires on the Arizona and other ships, and is credited with helping to beach the damaged battleship USS Nevada to prevent it from blocking the harbor channel.
In 2005, the Navy awarded the Hoga to North Little Rock for preservation, after the city competed with four other groups nationally to acquire it. However, it took 10 years until the Hoga could be transported from the Pacific Coast to North Little Rock. It arrived at the maritime museum only two weeks before the state’s 2015 Pearl Harbor anniversary commemoration.