TIME AND SPACE

PREHISTORY

MESOPOTAMIA

ANCIENT EGYPT

WESTERN RELIGIONS

THE CRUSADES

THE MIDDLE EAST

CONFLICTS IN THE MIDDLE EAST

ANCIENT AFRICA

COLONIAL AFRICA

AFRICA TODAY

INDIA

CHINESE HISTORY

CHINA

SOUTHEAST ASIA

JAPAN

ANCIENT GREECE

ROME

MIDDLE AGES

RENAISSANCE

ENLIGHTENMENT

WORLD WARS

RUSSIA AND COMMUNISM

EUROPE TODAY

CANADA

CARIBBEAN

MEXICO AND CENTRAL AMERICA

SOUTH AMERICA

A Kid's Perspective

Mr. Dowling's mother was eleven when Pearl Harbor was attacked. This is her story.

     I knew there was a war going on in Europe and that there was a bad man named Hitler. Our teachers sometimes talked about it in class, but we really didn't pay much attention. When you're in sixth grade, you really don't care about things like that. 

     We had a big radio our living room. My father would sit down every night and listen to the news, but that was for the grown-ups. That all changed one Sunday. President Roosevelt came on the radio. He said something about a "day that will live in infamy." I didn't know what that meant. My father got very quiet and my mother started crying. I started listening to the radio. 

     Japan attacked some place called Pearl Harbor. I was frightened because I understood that Pearl Harbor was in America. It could be down the street or in the next state. The Japanese could be coming here. I saw movies about the war in the theaters. They showed terrible things happening in Europe. Cities were bombed and people were being killed. Now, it looked like that would be coming to my country. 

     Everything went into the war effort.  At night we would have to shut off all the lights so it would be hard for the enemy planes to find us.  Things were rationed and almost every healthy young man left home to fight the war. My sister went to work in the factory to help the war effort. 

     The war never came to us, but my brother Bill had to go and fight. He survived. but many of his friends didn't. The war years were a terrible time to grow up. I hope nobody ever has to fight, or even be a kid in a war.