Now on display at the University of Arizona: a new look at what life was like onboard the USS Arizona in the months before the battleship sank during the attack on Pearl Harbor.
A new collection of rare memorabilia was hand-delivered to the university by a couple who travelled to Tucson from the Green Bay, Wisconsin area.
Lowell and Wendy Franklin discovered the trove of USS Arizona history inside their home last month.
“Just want to make sure that it’s preserved,” Lowell told KGUN on Wednesday. “And this is the best way to accomplish that.”
“I heard him kind of getting choked up,” Wendy recalled. “He came up with piles of things and said, ‘This is my dad’s memories. This is my dad.’”
Lowell’s father, Arthur, served on the battleship as a member of the U.S. Navy.
He was honorably discharged only months before the attack on Pearl Harbor. This collection is a snapshot of life onboard before the tragedy.
“We saw all of these materials, and thought, ‘If this stays in the box for another 20 years, it’ll be destroyed,” Wendy explained. “And so our first thought was, ’It’s a no-brainer. It’s gotta go someplace where somebody can preserve it, restore it, hang onto it and share the story.’”