Today in History, December 7th
On December 7, 1941, Japan attacked Pearl Harbor, bringing the US into World War II. Plus Delaware's ratification and the launch of Apollo 17.
Published · Last updated
December 7 is best known for 1941, when Japan’s surprise attack on Pearl Harbor, Hawaii, pulled the United States into World War II. It is also the day Delaware became the first state to ratify the Constitution in 1787 and the day Apollo 17, the last crewed Moon mission, lifted off in 1972.
The big story: The attack on Pearl Harbor (1941)
At 7:55 a.m. Hawaii time on Sunday, December 7, 1941, Japanese warplanes appeared over Oahu and struck the U.S. Pacific Fleet at Pearl Harbor. Some 360 aircraft took part. In under two hours they sank or crippled most of the battleships moored along Battleship Row and wrecked hundreds of planes on the ground. Roughly 2,400 Americans died. Japan’s own losses were light: a few dozen aircraft and a handful of small submarines. But the attackers missed the targets that mattered most. The fleet’s carriers were away from port that morning, and they would carry the fight back across the Pacific within months. The next day President Franklin D. Roosevelt went before Congress, calling December 7 a date that “will live in infamy.” The Senate voted 82 to 0 for war and the House 388 to 1. Germany and Italy declared war on the United States three days later, and America was in the war on both oceans.
More events on December 7
| Year | What happened |
|---|---|
| 43 BCE | The Roman statesman and orator Cicero died at Formiae, Italy. |
| 1787 | Delaware became the first state to ratify the U.S. Constitution, which is why it calls itself “the First State.” |
| 1805 | Lewis and Clark settled in at Fort Clatsop, a small fort near the mouth of the Columbia River, for the winter. |
| 1862 | At the Battle of Prairie Grove, Arkansas, Union forces held off a Confederate attack, securing northwestern Arkansas and southwestern Missouri. |
| 1909 | Leo Baekeland received a U.S. patent for the first fully synthetic plastic, later named Bakelite. |
| 1917 | The United States declared war on Austria-Hungary during World War I. |
| 1972 | Apollo 17, commanded by Eugene Cernan, launched on what became the last crewed flight to the Moon. |
| 1975 | Indonesian forces invaded East Timor, days after it declared independence from Portugal. |
| 1988 | Earthquakes devastated northwestern Armenia, killing at least 25,000 people. |
| 1995 | NASA’s Galileo spacecraft went into orbit around Jupiter as its probe plunged into the planet’s atmosphere, sending back data for 58 minutes. |
| 2004 | Hamid Karzai was sworn in as Afghanistan’s first popularly elected president. |
| 2020 | Chuck Yeager, the first pilot to fly faster than the speed of sound, died at 97. |
Born on December 7
- 1598: Gian Lorenzo Bernini, Italian sculptor and architect of Baroque Rome, born in Naples.
- 1928: Noam Chomsky, American linguist and political commentator.
- 1932: Ellen Burstyn, American actress.
- 1949: Tom Waits, American singer-songwriter.
- 1956: Larry Bird, Hall of Fame basketball player for the Boston Celtics.
Sources
- On This Day: December 7, Encyclopaedia Britannica
- This Day in History: December 7, History.com
- Pearl Harbor bombed, History.com
- Cicero, Encyclopaedia Britannica
- Galileo, NASA
- Gian Lorenzo Bernini, Encyclopaedia Britannica
