Veterans recall Pearl Harbor at Bangor event Attendees reflect on Day of Infamy

BANGOR – As they gathered upon a footbridge spanning the Kenduskeag Stream on Friday, participants in a ceremony marking the 60th anniversary of the Pearl Harbor attack couldn’t help but draw parallels to the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks.

Though six decades apart and perpetrated by enemies from different parts of the world, both events were unexpected and both were unprovoked, Col. Doug Damon, commander of the 101st Operations Group, said in his Pearl Harbor anniversary address. He was not alone in making that connection.

As Americans in Bangor and other communities around the country gathered to remember the attack on Pearl Harbor, other Americans were away fighting another war.

Though both attacks were over in hours, they led the United States into war. To some, Sept. 11 marked this nation’s second Day of Infamy.

The Pearl Harbor attack claimed nearly 2,400 lives, injured 1,178 and crippled the U.S. Pacific Fleet 60 years ago Friday.

Organized by Paul Colburn of the Pearl Harbor Survivors Association, and supported by veterans organizations from throughout the region, Friday’s ceremony moved many to tears.

As they do each year, the Bangor High School band played the national anthem and the Navy Hymn, and members of the school’s Junior ROTC fired a salute to the honored dead. A lone trumpeter, Hal Wheeler of the Bangor Band, played taps.

After tossing a wreath into the stream, a floral tribute to those who lost their lives at sea, U.S. Navy veteran John Garzarelli of Orland remembered some of those no longer here.

“This means a lot to me,” Garzarelli said. “There were 10 of us in my immediate family who went to war. There are only two of us left now,” he said, adding that he also has outlived two wives.

“This is my original uniform,” he said of the dark blue wool coat, beret and pants he wore for the occasion. Despite the passage of decades, the uniform still fit him to perfection.

For those who lived through it, Pearl Harbor is an event that remains crystallized in time. For many, it proved a defining moment.

In his invocation, the Rev. Robert Carlson observed that the annual ceremony was about thanking and remembering those who sacrificed their lives to preserve individual freedoms and a way of life that made possible gatherings such as the one in downtown Bangor.

“We stand shoulder to shoulder to proclaim freedom shall not end,” Carlson said.

Bangor City Councilor Gerry Palmer, who spoke on behalf of the city of Bangor, recalled the events that triggered a war 60 years ago and those that triggered a war less than three months ago.

“Today, we are sending our sons and daughters to war, but a war that has no boundary,” he said. This time, he said, the nation could draw on the experience of the men and women now remembered as the “Greatest Generation.”

U.S. Rep. John Baldacci, who attended to thank those who gave their lives for their country, described feeling the ground shake as one of four commercial airplanes hijacked on Sept. 11 struck the Pentagon, noting that those at Pearl Harbor must have felt a similar sense of shock. Since Sept. 11, Baldacci said, he has witnessed a resurgence of patriotism among young people that gives him hope for the future.

Others who participated included Raymond Lupo, past state commander of the Veterans of Foreign Wars, who read a list of known Pearl Harbor survivors from the region; Gail Kelly, who attended on behalf of U.S. Sen. Olympia Snowe; Judy Cuddy, who attended for U.S. Sen. Susan Collins; representatives from AMVETS, Veterans of Foreign Wars, the American Legion and the Military Order of the Purple Heart; and veterans from World War II, the Korean War, Vietnam and later eras.