Every year, Mary Ellen Fetter quietly pays her respects to the more than 2,400 Americans killed in the surprise attack on Pearl Harbor on Dec. 7, 1941.

The Roseburg woman worked as a civilian stenographer for the Army Air Forces at Hickam Field outside Honolulu. Hickam was the principal Army airbase in Hawaii, and the only one large enough to accommodate the B-17 “Flying Fortress” bomber.

Fetter, now 90, was eating breakfast that day at her boardinghouse in Honolulu — about 10 to 15 miles from the base — at 7:48 a.m., when she heard a radio report of the attack.

“They said we were being attacked unmercifully by units of the Imperial Japanese Navy. Of course, we quit eating,” she said.

More than 350 Japanese planes, sent in two waves, attacked the island of Oahu, where Pearl Harbor and Hickam Field are located. Torpedo bombers dropped their bombs on the battleships in the harbor, while dive bombers attacked planes stationed at Hickam and two other bases, Wheeler Field and Bellows Field.

Hickam suffered extensive damage, while 189 people were killed and 303 wounded.

Fetter, a 1936 Roseburg High School graduate, had gone to Hawaii to live with her aunt, who was on the staff at the Queen's Medical Center in Honolulu. Fetter, whose maiden name was Darby, attended the Honolulu branch of the University of Hawaii after spending a year at Oregon State University in Corvallis.

Fetter learned shorthand at school. It was that skill that landed her a job at Hickam Field, two years before the attacks. Sixty-eight years later, she said she still cannot explain exactly what she did because of its sensitive nature.

“Her work involves information of a highly secret nature and of great military importance,” according to a Sept. 5, 1944, account in The News-Review. At the time, Fetter was honored with the War Department emblem for meritorious civilian service, the second-highest military honor for a civilian.

While the attacks were devastating to the people at Hickam and throughout Hawaii and the nation, Fetter said the losses did not keep them from doing their jobs.

Unlike what was later portrayed in countless movies, no one panicked, Fetter said. Everyone was businesslike and they followed instructions from an Army sergeant who had previously served in World War I, she said.

“Help if you can. If you can't, get out of the way. And don't whine,” Fetter said. “That's the best rule for living that you can ever find.”

Even though the sunken wreckage of the Arizona — which claimed the lives of 1,177 crewman — remains in the harbor as a stark reminder of the attack, it inspires people to give their all. The efforts made folks proud to be Americans, she said.

“You didn't talk about it. But you stood up straighter,” she said.

Four days after the attack, she was married in the Episcopal cathedral to Bill Fetter, an insurance adjuster who later joined the Merchant Marines and was given a commission in the U.S. Coast Guard. She got off work for two hours to prepare for the wedding.

When asked if the couple considered postponing their wedding, Fetter said that never crossed their minds.

“No. Why would we?” she asked.

One of her lasting memories from Pearl Harbor came about a month after the attack. A violinist in Honolulu for a concert came out to the base to pay his respects by playing his Stradivarius, she said.

“He stood there, where the ship and crew of the Arizona was underwater, and played,” Fetter said. “We could see it from our office and hear him play. It was very touching.”

• You can reach reporter John Sowell at 957-4209 or by e-mail at jsowell@nrtoday.com.