She went to Hawaii for adventure, a South Dakota farm girl with a new nurse’s license and a heart set on new horizons. Little did they know she would begin her journey mere days before the Japanese bombed Pearl Harbor. On November 15 AraBelle Fuller departed San Francisco to serve as a Red Cross Nurse at Tripler General Hospital in Hawaii. Within two weeks of her arrival the Japanese bombed Pearl Harbor forever changing the world. She was not officially in the Army on the “Day of Infamy” and was not “recruited” until December 16 although she witnessed the atrocities of war first hand.

In a mere two hours – the duration of the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor – a new and sobering truth was presented:  Americans were no longer safe from the upheavals that had already devastated Europe, where WWII had begun two years earlier. In particular, this situation brought into focus the new and unusual demands that were going to be made on women.  December 7, 1941 – was the day that will live in infamy.

It was the day that shaped the lives of an entire generation. December 7 was the day that the Japanese attacked and my Grandmother was there, She Remembers Pearl Harbor. The stories of women during WWII are few and far between, the stories of women on the front lines are even scarcer – that is why I’ve decided to capture all of these pieces in one place. This is her story and the story of how our nation pulled together to save the world.  By preserving stories like these our children will gain from the lessons paid for in the blood of our countrymen and women. The stories of women during WWII are few and far between, the stories of women on the front lines are even scarcer – that is why I’ve decided to capture all of these pieces in one place.

Why She Remembers Pearl Harbor?

Sometimes those we love take their secrets with them and sometimes they leave behind clues, like bread crumbs, waiting for someone to assemble the pieces.  My Grandmother left behind just such a trail with minuscule pieces, nearly microscopic, for me to recreate and it’s taken more than 10 years to do so.  This is her story, or as much of her story that I can assemble with the help of Ancestry.com and EBay. While I cannot defer from paying attention to the historical atrocities she witnessed I’ve tried to go beyond December 7 to paint a picture of what is was to be an America, a military nurse, a daughter, a wife and a woman in a time when up was down and down was up. We can hardly image from our place today with the benefit of hindsight, what it took just to stay alive and to join together as a country to accomplish a single goal. I hope I have been able to add some elements of perspective, may include of bit of history you never knew before. I hope you enjoy this journey with AraBelle Fuller, as she develops from naïve student to mother as we slowly unravel some of the secrets she held so tight.

How the Pieces Came Together

Two weeks after I told Grandma that her first great-grandchild was going to be a boy, I found myself in her house filled with 55 years of memories, wondering how life can end so suddenly. It was in my grief that I found the bits and pieces of her WWII story. I found letters in a box of my Great-Grandpa’s belongings I was about to throw away, her mother’s scrapbooks were in the nook behind the deep freeze that had been infested by critters and her journal – well I gave it away accidentally (but amazingly enough got it back, that’s another story altogether). It was this set of almost unnerving coincidences that brought the pieces together that told me I had to share her story with the world.

Now, two sons later, I’m still compiling all of the pieces – archiving this precious information to share with you. I’ve tried to include enough reference information in the form of “time capsules” to make this narrative interesting and put this story in perspective. I think of it in terms of “pop up video” to make the history aspects more entertaining.