WASHINGTON -- Harold Mainer, 95, doesn't need history books to tell him what happened at Pearl Harbor. The Charleston, Ark., man was present on Dec. 7, 1941, when the bombs started falling and his colleagues started dying.
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Wednesday, on the 75th anniversary of the unprovoked attack, Mainer joined Vice President-elect Mike Pence, U.S. Sen. John McCain and other dignitaries at the National World War II Memorial, helping to present wreaths in honor of those who died.
The former sailor was one of seven Pearl Harbor survivors who participated in the ceremony.
The Logan County native looked on as a bugler played taps, and bowed his head as the U.S. Navy Ceremonial Band played "Eternal Father, Strong to Save," the branch's traditional hymn.
[INTERACTIVE: Children who lived through Pearl Harbor share their stories.]
Later, he stood beside the Freedom Wall and its sea of stars, one for every 100 Americans who died to defeat imperial Japan and Nazi Germany.
There are 4,048 altogether, symbolizing the 404,800 who perished between 1941 and 1945.
That includes the 2,403 Americans who died from the attack that Sunday in Hawaii, including nearly three dozen of Mainer's shipmates. They served on the USS Helena.
Wednesday's event coincided with the precise moment when the battle began: 12:53 p.m. EST. Five time zones away, a similar ceremony took place at the site of the battle on the Hawaiian island of Oahu.
McCain of Arizona, a former Navy pilot and prisoner of war during the Vietnam War, said Wednesday's ceremony marked "one of the dates on which history swung on its great hinge and the world was forever changed."
Dec. 7 marks "the beginning of our country's rise to its pre-eminence among the nations of the world, a pre-eminence we maintain to this day to our benefit and the benefit of humanity," he said.
But it came at a terrible price.
"Many American families were changed on that day, many endured the pain of separation from loved ones, and many suffered the pain that time never completely heals, the loss of children and parents and siblings," he said.
McCain, whose father and grandfather were four-star admirals, described the toll on his own family. His grandfather helped lead the war in the Pacific Theater but died of a heart attack on the day he returned home.
After the speeches, music and prayers, dozens of reporters descended on the veterans.
Mainer fielded questions from American, British and Japanese reporters at the site for perhaps a half-hour.
As his son, Mark Mainer, stood beside him, the veteran rattled off dates, times and statistics from long ago -- the day of his enlistment in the Navy, the day of his discharge, even the amount of money he had in his pocket on Dec. 7, 1941, cash he'd planned to spend celebrating a shipmate's birthday.
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Asked whether he'd been afraid as fire fell and shrapnel exploded, he said he and the others never panicked.
"You didn't have time ... to get scared," he said. "We just tried to do what we were trained to do and we didn't have time to think."
Later, he described his ship's damage. At one point during the battle he was ordered to wash away the blood of a fellow sailor who had been mortally wounded. He didn't see the body, but he recognized the shoes that had been left behind.
They belonged to a shipmate from Altoona, Pa., he said, and they were perfectly polished.
The Helena stayed afloat that day. It would sink near the Solomon Islands on July 6, 1943, split apart by three Japanese torpedoes. Hundreds of his shipmates died.
Mainer said he ended up in the water for four hours, clinging to the side of a life raft until help arrived.
When the war finally ended, the Arkansan was on one of the ships in Tokyo Harbor, waiting while Japan formally surrendered aboard the USS Missouri.
Mainer told several Japanese journalists that he harbors no animosity toward his attackers and isn't bothered by the first-ever visit to Pearl Harbor by a Japanese head of state.
The veteran said he hopes Americans will continue to remember Dec. 7, 1941, and its consequences. "Don't forget it, and build something good out of it," he said.
Mainer considered traveling to Pearl Harbor for Wednesday's anniversary but opted to go to Washington instead. The flight east is a lot shorter, his son noted.
The retired postal worker has marked Pearl Harbor Day for years, sometimes participating in ceremonies of remembrance at Veterans of Foreign Wars halls.
"This is a lot bigger stage," Mark Mainer said.
Wednesday's program didn't feature any high-level administration officials. But President Barack Obama proclaimed Wednesday as Pearl Harbor National Remembrance Day and urged Americans to fly flags at half-staff.
The White House has announced that Obama and Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe will travel to Pearl Harbor later this month.
"We give thanks to the veterans and survivors of Pearl Harbor who faced down fear itself, met infamy with intrepidity, freed captive peoples from fascism and whose example inspires us still," Obama said in a written statement. "Their courage and resolve remind us of that fundamental American truth -- that out of many we are one; and that when we stand together, no undertaking is too great."
A Section on 12/08/2016