Cañon City resident Jim Kaminksi used to mark Pearl Harbor Day each year in school, but he never knew the names of the local people who died.

Ahead of this year’s ceremony in Cañon City to mark the 83rd anniversary of the bombings, he compiled information on 40 of the 41 Coloradans who died in the attacks. The task took about five days, Kaminski said.

The ceremony organized by his brother, Joe Kaminski, a former Marine, will honor the five sailors from Fremont County killed in the attacks — William Ratkovich, Marvin John Shugart, Russell Dale Corning, Wilbur Leroy Kellogg and Lester Ellsworth Mayfield.

Those five were among the 32 Coloradans who died on the USS Arizona, one of the two battleships that sank in the Japanese attacks.

The bombings killed 2,403 people, injured 1,178 and thrust the U.S. into World War II. The first Coloradan to die in the bombings, Navy Aviation Machinist Mate First Class Daniel T. Griffin, was from Colorado Springs and was standing watch the morning of Dec. 7, 1941.

Compiling the stories of the Colorado casualties is only a small portion of the research Jim Kaminski’s done over the past five years into around 600 people from Fremont County who served in World War II and about 750 people who served in World War I.

His work started with his father, retired Staff Sgt. Joseph Kaminski, who served during World War II, and then blossomed. Research on his own family stretched back to 1313 Poland.

He draws on websites, such as Find A Grave, Ancestry.com, historical newspapers available online and books. It’s not unusual for him to work into the early hours of the morning, he said.

“The records are out there you just got to sort through it,” Kaminski said, noting he was recently working on several different service members with the last name Smith, all unrelated.

In one case, he helped get photos to family members who otherwise wouldn’t know what the service member looked like.

“I like getting the information to the family members,” he said. Kaminski believes strongly it’s important to know where you come from.

Contributing to public online records helps build a story that other people can contribute to later, Kaminski said.

He also keeps paper records and expects to teach a class in March during the Senior Mini College session offered through Pueblo Community College on those who served in WWI and WWII from Fremont County.

The Pearl Harbor ceremony will feature a bell ringing in honor of those lost and Taps. It will start at 10:30 a.m. Saturday at the VFW Post 4081 at 215 N. Cottonwood Drive. The post will host a spaghetti dinner fundraiser afterward to raise money for a new roof.

The national ceremony is available via livestream at pearlharborevents.com.