This 3-day weekend is in celebration of the American Memorial Day. We will probably go out and enjoy the holiday like everyone else, but I wanted to make my tribute to our Armed Forces and Veterans here.

This is Part 1.

In an earlier entry, I mentioned that my father had served as a Navy Corpsman in the battle for Iwo Jima late in World War II. And that this battle was the one where the famous photograph shown on the left was taken, of the five Marines and one Navy Corpsman raising the second US flag on top of Mount Suribachi, the volcano on the south end of the island.

You cannot see it, but the first US flag is being lowered just off frame to the right of this photo, being taken down from the same small pile of rocks. The histories I have read make no mention of orders to this effect, but these GIs apparently knew that it was important that there never be even a second when the American flag be seen as coming down. To neither discourage the GIs below nor encourage the enemy, they carefully pivoted one flag down as the other was lifted up.

Why replace the flag at all? Apparently the Marine commander was afraid that some GI would swipe the first flag for a personal souvenir, and the commander wanted it for the Marine Corps. Little did he know that the second flag would become the famous one. Thanks to the most famous photograph of World War II.

The battle for Iwo Jima was one of the bloodiest of the war. Of the five Marines who raised the first flag, three died on Iwo Jima, and two were wounded. Of the six men you see in the photo raising the second flag, three were killed in action on Iwo Jima, and two wounded.

Once the US invasion force landed, the seven and a half square miles of Iwo Jima was one of the most densely populated places on the planet. While Suribachi was the high ground, the flag raising occurred on Day 5 and the battle for the rest of the island raged for weeks.

My Dad was assigned to the Marine battalion that took Suribachi and raised the flags, although he was not there when the flag went up. He was on the side of the volcano, crawling through the loose volcanic rock to the top and pushing a box of C-rations up ahead of him. He spent the night on the rim of the volcano, sleeping about 30 feet from the flag you see in the photo. He told me he could hear the flag snapping in the breeze all night, and that the sound was reassuring.

On that night, the 28^th Battalion of the Fifth Marine Division and their assigned naval corpsmen had a little peace after five days of hell.

The next morning they had go back down and rejoin the battle to take the rest of the island.

Sometime after I moved away, Dad decided to put a full-sized flagpole in their front yard. I thought that was a little too patriotic, but my Mom understood.

Now that I know the story of the flag on Iwo Jima, and what it means to my father, I understand a little better. When we visit, I try to help him with his daily ritual of raising and lowering the flag. I've learned the proper way to fold it.

And now, whenever I hear a flag snap in the wind, I think about soldiers spending a cold, tropical night on top of a volcano half-way around the world, a half century ago.

Thanks, Dad.

The Stars and Stripes will be flying off our porch tomorrow.