This bell is one of the two original bells salvaged from the U.S.S. ARIZONA in 1941. In 1944, Wilber L. Bill Bowers, UA Class of 1927, discovered this bell about to be melted down at the Puget Sound Naval Yard in Bremerton, Washington. Bowers saved the bell from destruction and was instrumental in acquiring the bell for the University of Arizona shortly after World War II.

The bell arrived on campus in July 1946. On November 17, 1951 the bell was rung for the first time in the clock tower of the then-new Memorial Student Union Building. The bell was rung on special occasions for the next 50 years until that clock tower and Student Union were razed to make way for the present day facility completed in 2002.