Seventy-one years ago Friday, people around Polk County, as was true throughout the nation, were shocked and horrified when they learned that the United States had been attacked by the Japanese at Pearl Harbor.

The late Charlie Swain, a Bartow resident and the father of long-time newspaper employee Anita Swain, was a proud survivor of the Pearl Harbor attack. His ship, the USS Vestal, was attached by line to the ill-fated USS Arizona. Swain’s ship was hit two times in the same attack that sank the Arizona.