Angelenos on alert after Pearl Harbor
Dec. 7, 1941: With news of the attack on Pearl Harbor, “men girded for action with .45s slung from their hips and folks wielding various sorts of rifles and pistols descended upon the sheriff’s office,” The Times reported.
They came to the Hall of Justice in response to “an erroneous radio request for 250,000 volunteers for the Civilian Defense Council,” the newspaper said.
“Los Angeles was a city alert as every man and woman, electrified by the news that Japan had struck at this country 2,400 miles westward in the Pacific, took his or her stand solidly for total defense,” read one report.
Filipinos in the city gathered in a mass meeting to pledge their loyalty, police were put on 12-hour shifts and the FBI “began taking into custody Japanese aliens” on Terminal Island, The Times said.
In Little Tokyo, the people “were not excited. But they seemed sad,” the newspaper said. The area was “surrounded by a cordon of police.”
More to Read
Start your day right
Sign up for Essential California for news, features and recommendations from the L.A. Times and beyond in your inbox six days a week.
You may occasionally receive promotional content from the Los Angeles Times.
