Pearl Harbor remembered 84 years later at USS Arizona Mall Memorial

TUCSON, Ariz. (KGUN) — Sunday marks 84 years since the Japanese bombing of Pearl Harbor on Dec. 7, 1941, which killed more than 2,400 people — one of the most devastating events in American history.

The USS Arizona was a battleship that sunk during the Pearl Harbor attack, killing 1,177 sailors and Marines.

The University of Arizona created the USS Arizona Mall Memorial in 2016 on the 75th anniversary to honor and pay tribute to the lives lost.

Bronze medallions are displayed throughout the memorial inscribed with the name, rank and home state of those killed. This includes Seaman James Randolf Van Horn, a 17-year-old sailor from Tucson.

The flagpole represents the ship's foremast, which hung the bell that is now housed in the bell tower of the Student Union Memorial Center. The bell came to the U of A in 1946.

According to the university, alumnus Wilbur Bowers ( class of 1927) encountered the ship's bell in Bremerton Navy Yard in Washington State in 1944. It was enclosed in a crate and in line to be melted down. After Bowers realized what he had come across, he reached out to the U of A President Alfred Atkins. Atkins contacted the Navy requesting the bell be turned over to the U of A once the war ended and be hung on campus.

The U of A's Naval Reserve Officers Training Corps (NROTC) unit says this memorial serves as a powerful reminder of resilience, duty and honor.

You can learn more about the U of A and USS Arizona history here.

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