Earl Arthur Reynolds was born Oct. 27, 1921 at Hayden, Colorado, to Charles Waite Reynolds and Lucille Stout Reynolds. Back then Hayden, in the northwest part of the state near Wyoming, had a population of 455.

By 1930 the family had moved south to Collbran,  where the father was a harness maker. By 1935 they were about 50 miles north in Rifle. Earl completed 6th grade there in 1937.

The 1940 Census found the family about nine miles away in Silt.  The father was a laborer for the Works Progress Administration, a Depression-era federal jobs program. He listed his 1939 wages as $673 to support a family of six.

When Earl enlisted in the Navy on Sept. 17, 1940 they were in nearby New Castle. He was assigned to the U.S.S. Arizona and was a seaman second class when he was killed in the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor, Dec. 7, 1941.

Sources: Navy enlistment records and muster rolls; US Census, unmarked newspaper clipping about his death. This profile was researched and written on behalf of the U.S.S. Arizona Mall Memorial at the University of Arizona.