BANGOR — The City of Bangor will hold a short ceremony and ribbon cutting to officially rededicate the newly constructed Willard C. Orr Pedestrian Bridge on Tuesday, July 20. The event will begin at 11 a.m.
Please access the bridge from the Exchange Street side as the walkway leading to the bridge runs adjacent to Camden National Bank.
PFC Willard “Carleton” (as he was known to family) Orr was the only City resident who was killed during the Dec. 7, 1941 attacks on Pearl Harbor. He was 21. Orr was posthumously awarded the Purple Heart. He is considered “Missing in Action” and is memorialized on the Tablets of the Missing at Honolulu Memorial, Honolulu, Hawaii.
Orr, the fourth of six children born to George Willard Orr and Eva Helen Fitz, graduated with honors from Bangor High School in 1939. He enlisted in the United States Army Air Corps in December 1940, and following basic training was assigned to Mitchel Field, Long Island. In March of 1941, PFC Orr was transferred to Hickam Field in Hawaii where he served as one of the head cooks.
The pedestrian bridge spans the Kenduskeag Stream between Pickering Square and Exchange Street and was originally built around 1980. The new bridge was put in place earlier this summer, and remains a tribute to the life and sacrifice of the young Bangor serviceman.