The U.S. Marine Corps War Memorial

The U.S. Marine Corps War Memorial

The tiny island of Iwo Jima lies 660 miles south of Tokyo, Japan. Mount Suribachi, an extinct volcano that forms the southern end of the island, rises 550 feet to dominate the ocean around it. U.S. troops had recaptured most of the other islands in the Pacific Ocean that the Japanese took in 1941 and 1942. By 1945, Iwo Jima had become a primary objective in the American strategy to bring the ‘War of the Pacific’ to an end.

On the morning of February 19, 1945, the 4th and 5th Marine Divisions invaded Iwo Jima. The 28th Regiment of the 5th Division was ordered to capture Mount Suribachi. They reached the base of the mountain on the afternoon of February 21 and, by nightfall the next day, had almost surrounded it. On the morning of February 23, Marines of Company E, 2nd Battalion, started the treacherous climb to the top. At about 10:30 am, men all over the island cheered when they saw a small American flag flying atop Mount Suribachi. 

That afternoon, when the mountain was clear of enemy resistance, a second, larger flag was raised in the same location. Joe Rosenthal of the Associated Press caught the second flag-raising in a famous photograph that won a Pulitzer Prize and later became the model for the U.S. Marine Corps War Memorial.

Once the statue was completed in plaster, it was carefully disassembled and trucked to Brooklyn, New York for casting in bronze. The casting process, which required the work of expert craftsmen, took nearly 3 years. After the parts were cast, cleaned, and treated, they were reassembled into approximately a dozen pieces (the largest weighing more than 20 tons) and trucked back to Virginia, where they were bolted and welded together on a granite base.

President Dwight D. Eisenhower dedicated the Memorial on November 10, 1954, the 179th anniversary of the United States Marine Corps.

The U.S. Marine Corps War Memorial