72nd Anniversary of Pearl Harbor Attack

Above, the USS Arizona burning after attack.

Today is the 72nd anniversary of the attack on the U.S. fleet at Pearl Harbor, Hawaii.

To commemorate the anniversary, the Huffington Post has posted "5 Facts You Didn't Know About Pearl Harbor, On The 72nd Anniversary."

One of them (you'll have to read the full article to find out what are the other four) is:

5. Many tourists from Japan come to visit the memorial: 

While most school children can tell you that the Japanese were responsible for the attacks on Pearl Harbor, not everyone realizes that the Japanese now visit the memorial in droves. Japan, now one of America's strongest allies, is the largest source of international tourists to the state of Hawaii. They pay their respects at Pearl Harbor just as Americans do, and ironically, the economic vitality of Hawaii today depends largely on tourism from Japan.

Here's an additional tidbit of Pearl Harbor trivia:

Above, the Hario Wireless Towers in 2007. Photo by Armand Vaquer.

The station in Japan that transmitted the coded message to the Japanese fleet to initiate the attack came from the Hario Wireless Towers in Kyushu just outside of Sasebo City. The towers are a short distance away from the Saikai Bridge on the Hario Straits that were featured in Rodan in 1956. The towers were also shown in the movie (photo below).

I visited the Saikai Bridge in 2007 and photographed the Hario Towers. A radio room of one of the towers is now open for tours. These are spotlighted in The Monster Movie Fan's Guide To Japan on page 48.

To read the full Huffington Post article, go here.