The University of Arizona Naval ROTC unit will host its annual Pearl Harbor remembrance ceremony Sunday morning at the USS Arizona Mall Memorial on campus near Old Main.
The observance will begin at 9 a.m. with an invocation and the national anthem, followed by remarks from the unit’s commanding officer, Col. Ryan Allen.
Pearl Harbor and USS Arizona historian Andrew Desautels will then speak on the 84th anniversary of the Japanese attack.
Midshipman 1st Class Dominic Estevez and members of the University of Arizona Naval ROTC are reflected in a plaque during a Pearl Harbor remembrance ceremony at the USS Arizona Mall Memorial on Dec. 7, 2019.
The ceremony will conclude with taps and a bell ringing in remembrance of the eight Arizonans who died on board the battleship named after the state: George Allan Bertie Jr., Louis Edward Cremeens, George Sanford Hollowell, James William Horrocks, James Joseph Murphy, Harvey Leroy Skeen, Roy Eugene Wood, and the only Tucson casualty, James Randolf Van Horn.
USS Arizona Mall Memorial was dedicated in 2016, ahead of the 75th anniversary of Pearl Harbor. It features a full-scale outline of the battleship’s deck, with a plaza in the middle where visitors can study 1,177 engraved brass medallions, one for each crew member killed on Dec. 7, 1941.
Nearby, one of the ship’s original bells hangs in the tower atop the Student Union Memorial Center. The building also includes a number of design elements meant to evoke the USS Arizona, including a sculpture shaped like a mast that stands at the center of the union’s circle drive and holds 1,177 replica dog tags.
The U of A library houses the world’s second largest archive of materials from the Arizona, with some of the artifacts displayed on a rotating basis as part of a permanent exhibit inside the student union.
