At 12:55 p.m. on a Sunday, at Ralph and Ary Chitwood's house in Harlan, Kentucky, they and their three children were probably enjoying Sunday dinner. While seven-year-old Mary Alice and three-and-a-half year old Thelma could feed themselves, Ary was probably helping one-and-a-half year old Jack with his meal.
With dinner finished, Ary -- maybe with help from Mary Alice -- cleared the table, washed and put away the dishes, and bundled up any leftovers she had. (Before doing all of that, I'm sure she cleaned up Jack and took off his bib.)
Meanwhile, Ralph flipped on the radio, settled into a chair, and read the Sunday paper, while Thelma played on the floor in the living room or maybe in the bedroom she shared with Mary Alice.
If Mary Alice, Thelma, and Jack had gone outside to play, Ary no doubt would have reminded them to put on their coats, hats, and mittens because it was cold outside, and told the two older girls to "keep an eye on Jack!"
Finished with her chores, Ary settled into a chair in the living room with Ralph, maybe with mending or darning socks; or perhaps she read the paper when Ralph was finished.
*****
In another part of Harlan County, Rosspoint, Mary Sergent and her five children were probably enjoying a Sunday dinner cooked by Mary with help from 15-year-old Ruth, her oldest and only daughter. The four boys -- Wallace, 12; Arlie, 11; Tony, 9; and Jerry, 2 -- probably chatted around the table. In the back of Mary's mind were thoughts of her husband John, who'd just been killed in an accident last month. Occasionally, either Mary or Ruth would give Jerry some help with feeding himself.
After dinner, either Mary or Ruth or both would probably wash and put away dishes and store any leftovers (after cleaning up Jerry and taking off his bib.).
The boys, full of energy as preteen boys are, would probably have yanked on coats, hats, and mittens and ran outside to run off their energy. Or perhaps some of them stayed inside, read the paper, and played the radio in the background.
*****
Up in Reading, Pennsylvania, Irwin and Emma Rapp were also finishing Sunday dinner with their children, Alice, 13; Curtis, 9; Shirley, 7; and Sylvia; 3. In Alice's mind were the additional responsibilities she was taking on helping her father, a banker, who had a heart condition. He would die six months later. In Pennsylvania, snow might have already been on the ground that Sunday. Or perhaps it was waiting for Christmas.
With dinner finished, and Emma -- and perhaps Alice and/or Curtis helping -- washed dishes and put away leftovers. Alice turned her attention to her father while Emma, or maybe Curtis, turned the radio on.
****
Farther north, in Mount Olive, New Jersey, in the house of Frank and Mabel Seward, they were perhaps finishing Sunday dinner as well. On Frank's mind were the cows in the dairy farm he ran; how to keep them healthy and producing milk. He was an immigrant from England and had built a life in his new country. Since their marriage, Frank and Mabel had had the challenge of running a farm and raising a family that eventually numbered six children, Rena, 27; Elizabeth, 25; Mildred, 22; Annabel, 20; Caroline, 17; Reginald, 15 and the only boy; and Vera, 11.
Rena would have been 27 had she not died earlier that year. Her absence at the dinner table surely left a hole that nothing could fill.
Elizabeth and Mildred may have been married by then, perhaps cleaning up after their own Sunday dinners.
Annabel, Caroline, Reginald, and Vera, after enjoying dinner, may have gone outside in the New Jersey cold. Or maybe they wanted to stay inside, where it was warm.
One of them put the radio on.
****
From 12:55 p.m. to 2:26 p.m., they went about their tasks in blissful ignorance. They played. They did chores. They rested. They talked about the coming week, what they would need to do . . . and since Christmas was only 18 days away, they talked about "what are we going to do for Christmas?"
At 2:26 p.m., during a football game between the Brooklyn Dodgers and the New York Giants, with the announcer pattering and the crowd cheering, the sound stopped, quickly replaced with, "We interrupt this broadcast to bring you this important bulletin from United Press."
Over the sound, the audience -- probably mostly men -- groaned at the interruption. Who wants their football game interrupted?
Then the words: "Flash. Washington. The White House announces Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor."
Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor.
Five words that changed everything.
It was 7:55 a.m., 80 years ago today, when those first bombs dropped.
In the four places I just described, it was 12:55 p.m.
The news broke an hour and a half later.
For an hour and a half, husbands, wives, mothers, and children from the four families I just described did all of the things I just described, not knowing that five words were about to drop and upend their entire lives.
Bombs dropped and exploded, men shot back, ships sank, trapping men inside, fires started, people panicked . . . and those four families had no idea. Not until a football game was interrupted, not until the radio started buzzing with variants on those five words: Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor.
In the days that followed, new words became part of their vocabulary: Ration points. Ration cards. Draft. Enlistment. Blue stars and gold stars in windows. V-mail. Recycling.
And one person in those four families, Reginald -- who then began using his middle name of Frank -- was drafted and became a calibration technician; the person who made sure that the instruments in the airplanes the Army Air Corps depended on worked.
Why did I choose to focus on those four particular families?
Irwin and Emma Rapp were the parents of my mother-in-law, Alice.
Frank and Mabel Seward were the parents of my father-in-law, Frank.
Ralph and Ary Chitwood were the parents of my mother, Thelma.
Mary Sergent was the mother of my father, Tony.
The parents were the members of the Greatest Generation, as Tom Brokaw called them. The children were the members of the Silent Generation. Both of them "bucked up" and did what had to be done. Whether it be following the draft, as Reginald Frank did; whether it be producing food, as Frank Seward did; or growing a Victory Garden, as all of these families probably did.
They all learned to do without because of a greater cause. They learned the meaning of sacrifice.
Our parents and grandparents rarely talked about the Depression and the war. They didn't talk about the sacrifices they made; or if they did, it was in the tone of, "this was what we had to do, and we did it".
Today, if Pearl Harbor were attacked, it would not take an hour-and-a-half to learn about it. It would probably only take a minute-and-a-half, and we'd see the "breaking news" alert on our smartphones or TVs. We wouldn't have the bliss of ignorance my parents and grandparents did.
Eighty years ago, our parents, grandparents, and great-grandparents heard five words that upended their world. Like 9/11 for my generation and my son's generation, you can see the before/after, the abrupt dividing point in history where you can't go back to the way things were before.
Eighty years later, how would we react?
Would we take the lessons learned from the Greatest and Silent Generation and do what we needed to do?
Or, as I fear we Boomers, Xers, and Millenials are doing, would we object and complain that "my freedom" and "my rights" are the most important thing?
Would we come together?
Or would we fall apart?
Just my .04, adjusted for inflation.
