I wasn't quite a year old so I definitely don't remember the day. But my formative years were highly infiltrated with news of the war. It wasn't until I was a young adult that I realized why I didn't like to hear airplanes flying over OR why I'd leave the room when the news came on. (Maybe I still should leave the room when the news comes on.)

Shirley

i too was very little during that time My oldest sister was an early enlistee in 1942 in the WAAC Women'sAuxiliary Army Corps which was the forerunner to the WAC My other sister later joined the WAC. Their husbands were both in the Army and later my Brother joined the Army paratroopers so Mom had a 5 star flag in her window. I too hated to listen to the news. Everyone around was very patriotic and We had signs all over Loose Lips Sink Ships and Remember Pearl Harbor and People really meant it later we also had Blackouts practice Air Raids

I asked my Mom where she was on Pearl Harbor day. She was driving in a car with her cousin and the cousin's husband. The husband was on leave from the Army, he said woefully "Now I'll be going to war." He was fortunate; he came home alive.

I was in a nice warm womb. I was born almost 5 months later. Living in CA, my parents experienced the blackouts. My dad had flat feet which classified him 4F and kept him out of the service. Growing up, I heard stories of the war rationing stamps. People could buy limited gasoline, meat, shoes and I don't know what else. Everyone seemed to pull together back then.

I remember exactly where I was. In Ventura CA right on the west coast, 10 years old, scared to death because the Santa Catalina Islands are within sight and I truly believed that was Hawaii Islands and I thought that the planes were headed to CA. Mom had a heck of a time calming me down. But in realty, there were Japanese submarines off the coast, and the oil fields in the area were shelled later. My Uncles went off to the war, my Dad was too old, but later worked at North American Aviation in near LA until he retired.

I noticed my neighbor is flying the flag today, so I went over & talked to him. Surprisingly, though he was 1 month short of 11, he doesn't remember that day, but remembers the next day, Monday, at school. I was only about 3, so don't remember PH.

We both remember President Roosevelt's death, & I well remember VJ-Day. I recall telling my grandmother, who lived with us at the time, that I was so happy because now there would be no more radio news programs! Funny when you're a kid, the strange conclusions you reach.

I was eleven. It was my birthday. Some cousins and I played in the sunshine in a field. I had no idea where Hawaii was. Soon enough my 3 brothers went to the service. Daddy had been wounded in WW1 so we always listened to the news... Gabriel Heater? I remember rationing very well...gasoline, sugar, coffee, shoes. My husband and his two brothers were in service also, though I did not know them at the time. All came home. We were fortunate.

I was a baby. My father's business was important in the war effort. His eldest and youngest brothers were in service. I remember rationing and going with my mother to turn in grease at the butcher's counter at the IGA. I remember people trying to keep their cars in running order because there were no new ones being manufactured. We had an old Nash. We later 'inherited' an uncle's Packard convertible that we couldn't afford to gas up until after the war!

The Naval officer father of one of my grade school friends had been killed at Pearl Harbor. My youngest uncle and his bride lived with us briefly after the war. I remember them jitter-bugging in our living room -- pushed the furniture away and turned the *victrola* volume on high! He also had bouts of malaria. They later went to live on Kauai; he'd fallen in love with Hawaii while stationed there.

We've paid our respects at The Arizona in Pearl Harbor and at the memorial cemetery at Punchbowl.