Pearl Harbor and the Power of Choice

Choose Gratitude

In Pearl Harbor, 17 ships were sunk on Dec 7, 1941, but 15 were raised from the harbor floor, repaired, and sent back into duty. What a testament to the will of those serving in Hawaii in 1941.

The Arizona was not raised. It sank so quickly that it became the watery grave for almost 1,000 sailors. The night before the attack, it had just been refueled with 1.5 million gallons of fuel. That fuel has been slowly leaking every single day for 76 years - about 7 quarts each day create "black tears" flowing away from the Arizona.

Just days before the attack, a USS Arizona chaplain wrote and mailed a letter to his family, expressing hope that he might see them over Christmas. The chaplain’s family received the letter several days after his December 7th death.

When I had the chance to visit Pearl Harbor, Ray was one of the tour guides on the U.S.S. Arizona Memorial. Ray was born in Pennsylvania and was only four years old when the attack on Pearl Harbor catapulted the Unites States into World War II. His father was drafted and Ray told us that he did not see his father again until almost four years later. He reminded me potently that this was a time before FaceTime, Skype, email, texting. Ray said that almost every house had a map in a prominent place on the wall with thumbtacks denoting the places that their loved ones had been when their most recent letters were received. Families anxiously awaited any news or letters from their loved ones, which often took weeks to make the journey. One letter on display at Pearl Harbor was sent by the chaplain of the Arizona on November 30th. Chaplain Thomas L. Kirkpatrick wrote,

November 30th, 1941

Dear Ones:

Keep on praying and trusting that the Japanese situation won’t interfere with what we have planned. It doesn’t look so good right now, and we are on the alert. Meanwhile, I’ve addressed and mailed quite a number of Christmas cards. It doesn’t seem possible that it can be a little less than a month until the churches will be singing “O Little Town of Bethlehem” and folks will be wishing one another “Merry Christmas.” Better not start until you get word that I am actually coming…

Much love, from your old sweatheart, Tom

The letter was received by Tom’s wife and son a few days after he died aboard the Arizona. When the bombing began, Chaplain Kirkpatrick rushed to the Arizona’s sickbay to minister to the casualties. His last moments of life were spent serving others. Chaplain Tom’s wife and young son, Tommy, heard a radio broadcast about the bombing of Pearl Harbor the day it happened. The next day, a telegram arrived from the Navy letting them know that Tom was missing and presumed dead. Young Tommy was barely old enough to have a comprehension of death and asked his mother that night if he should leave daddy out of his prayers now. Tears streamed down his mother’s face as she replied, “No, Tommy. You must always keep Daddy in your prayers.” Fifty-five years later, that little boy would donate a clock recovered from his father’s quarters to the Arizona Memorial Museum. The clock had stopped at 8:05:35, just minutes after the attack had begun and the exact moment that the U.S.S. Arizona had been destroyed.
I thought about that letter and how the chaplain’s family members would have felt when they read his words – words that must have seemed to be coming from beyond the grave. Ray continued, telling me that each family in his childhood neighborhood had a map in their home, typically tacked to the wall. On that map were pins to show the most recent known location of their deployed family members. That thought and image hit home. We stayed on the Arizona Memorial, letting the depth of sacrifice represented there affect us, to leave a mark on our hearts and minds.

The stories washed over my wife and I as we looked into the water and saw the black tears. In the center of the memorial, there is a square opening in the floor so that you can look straight down at the Arizona. My wife stood silently looking into the water. I approached her and, in words soaked with emotion and accompanied by a tear streaked face, my wife softly and gratefully whispered to the waves over the U.S.S. Arizona, “Thank you!”

Will you choose to be thankful today?

(excerpt from Jonathan’s forthcoming book, They Change Things: Creative Leadership Lessons from Legends)