The Day the Japanese Bombed Oregon

September 9, 1942 - Early on this day a Japanese submarine surfaced off the coast of Oregon and launched the first bombing mission on the continental United States.

The floatplane that took off from the sub flew over a heavily wooded area near the town of Brookings. Its mission was to drop two incendiary bombs on Wheeler Peak in hopes of igniting a massive forest fire, but the areas in which the bombs landed were damp due to recent rains. The fires were quickly contained and nobody was hurt.

Despite the fizzled-out fires, the Japanese took great pride in this first attack of its kind.

Two decades later, the citizens of Brookings invited the Japanese pilot, Nobuo Fujita, to serve as the Grand Marshal in their Azalea Festival. Fujita brought along a samurai sword that had been in his family for 400 years. He offered it to the people of Brookings as his "gift of regret. Fujita would return to Brookings 3 more times before his death in 1997, and the following year his daughter buried some of his ashes at the site of his famous bombing.