AP WAS THERE: 75 years ago, the AP reported on Pearl Harbor

HONOLULU (AP) — EDITOR'S NOTE — On Dec. 7, 1941, as Japanese bombs rained down on Pearl Harbor, The Associated Press' chief of bureau in Honolulu, Eugene Burns, was unable to get out the urgent news of the historic attack that would draw the U.S. into World War II.

First lead Japanese

[...] lead Japanese

WASHINGTON, Dec. 7 — (AP) — Japanese airplanes today attacked American defense bases at Hawaii and Manila, and President Roosevelt ordered the Army and Navy to carry out undisclosed orders prepared for the defense of the United States.

Announcing the president's action for the protection of American territory, Presidential Secretary Stephen Early declared that so far as is known now the attacks were made wholly without warning — when both nations were at peace — and were delivered within an hour or so of the time that the Japanese ambassador had gone to the State Department to hand to the secretary of state Japan's reply to the secretary's memo of the 26th.