Alex Phillipson is a Pennies for Pearl Harbor participant and a truly amazing boy.

Perhaps his love for his country began when his mother sang him a special themed song to the tune of “America the Beautiful”, or perhaps he is a natural patriot.

Alex became interested in Pearl Harbor at the age of three when he begged his mother to buy him a book about the attack. Concerned about the effect the war scenes would have on a toddler, she started to put the book back on the shelf. Unexplainably, she changed her mind and purchased the book for Alex. He has spent many hours looking through the book since. In fact Alex enjoyed the book so much that his parents contacted a Pearl Harbor survivor and arranged for them to meet.

Pearl Harbor survivor Elway Lichack 2CDR US Navy, USS Pennsylvania met with Alex and his family. He gave Alex a huge fold-out map from the Arizona Memorial which shows the layout of the entire Pearl Harbor area. Alex loved this map and wanted to learn more about Pearl Harbor. This led to a phone call to the Pearl Harbor Memorial Fund to get information. The family learned about the efforts to raise funds to build a new Museum and Visitor Center. The rest is history.

Alex raised funds by selling candy (bought by his own money). He told his school about his efforts and received their support.

Now at age 7, Alex hopes to someday make it out to Hawaii to see Pearl Harbor. Thank you Alex, we can’t wait for you to come!