July 2021
Written By: Joi Harvey, Trinity Riollano, Katherine Archila-Mejia, Mollie Owen, Rushella Epperson and Varsha Palaniyandy
Edited By: Mollie Owen, and Varsha Palaniyandy
 
The National Museum of the Marine Corps recently held a Public Affairs summer program for high school students. Their culmination project was to interview eight military combat veterans, asking them about their experiences in theaters of war around the world, in both the Vietnam Wars and the War on Terror. 

Meet the Veterans:
Al Adler served in the Marine Corps from 1981 to 2001, reaching the rank of gunnery sergeant. A few jobs he had were being a recruiter, various jobs in the intelligence field, and a rifleman. Al Adler fought in the Persian Gulf War.
Larry Britton served in the Marine Corps from 1966 to 1998. He was a helicopter pilot and was forward-deployed during Vietnam. Larry Britton fought in the Vietnam War.
Ron Echols served in the Marine Corps from 1964 to 1968. He served as an infantry platoon commander and lieutenant. Ron Echols fought in the Vietnam War and earned two Purple Hearts and the Bronze Star Medal.
John Hoy served in the Army from 1969 to 1997. A few jobs he had were as a defense contractor, an infantry ground troop, intelligence field, and was a part of the Special Forces. John Hoy fought in the Vietnam War.
Roger McIntosh served in the Marine Corps from 1955 to 1976. He served as an air traffic control warrant officer, and was enlisted. Roger McIntosh fought in the Vietnam War.
Randy Shuck served in the Marine Corp from 1968 to 1993. A few jobs he had were first sergeant,  tanker, recruiter, drill instructor, and he served for twenty years in the CIA. He fought in the Vietnam and Panama.
Tom Smith served in the Marine Corps from 1966 to 1969. He served as a truck mechanic and as sergeant. Tom Smith fought in the Vietnam War.
Andy Traynor served in the Marine Corp from 1965 to 1992, reaching the rank of lieutenant colonel. A 'few jobs he had were tank officer, and infantry ground troop. Andy Traynor fought in Vietnam.
 
The Public Affairs Summer Program is excited to share the memories and stories of these military veterans with you. We hope you enjoy this article as much as we enjoyed writing it!
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There is so much to see and do at the National Museum of the Marine Corps!

If you are an adult or group of adults who has a few hours to spend at the Museum, check out our graphic below! If you need more ideas, stop by our Information Desk when you enter the Museum and our Hospitality Ambassadors will be happy to assist you!


Adult/Adult Group with a few hours (3-4 hours):

Stroll through Legacy Walk to the WWI Gallery entrance.  See how the Marines made a name for themselves at the Battle of Belleau Wood during WWI.   Then take in the WWII Gallery, and make sure you see our most treasured artifact, the flag that was raised on Iwo Jima and also pictured in Joe Rosenthal's icon photo.

Grab a quick lunch at Tun Tavern on the second deck!  (If you have time after lunch, check out our Combat Art Gallery on the second deck!)

Return to Legacy Walk.  Explore the Korean War Gallery. Feel the chill of the Chosin Reservoir exhibit where Marines faced bitter cold conditions while fighting off the enemy.   Make sure you save time for the Vietnam War Gallery, where you feel the heat and wind while exiting a CH-46 helicopter landing atop Hill 881 south at Khe Sanh.

Have more time?  Continue on Legacy Walk to our newest exhibits No Better Friend, Terror Strikes and Marine Families or check out the We, The Marines movie in the Medal of Honor Theater.


If you arrive after 5 pm:  Walk Semper Fidelis Memorial Park. The grounds of the Museum are open until sunset.  

Check our Calendar of Events to incorporate events into your itinerary!   

On 1 May 1944, GySgt Perry Fischer reported to the 8th Marine Ammunition Company at Montford Point, New River, N.C.  Young and confident, Fischer exhibited the spirit of many Marines of the "greatest genera­tion." Born into a Jewish family on the tough streets of Chicago, he loved the Marine Corps and had excelled during his brief career. He had risen steadily through the ranks within four short years. In the process, GySgt Fischer had acquired a reputation for being tough, fit and fair with all of his Marines.

However, serving in administrative and ceremonial duties in Washington, D.C., was not what he had wanted. Like many Marines, Fischer yearned to do his part and be closer to the fighting.

With no previous knowledge of the unit to which he had been assigned, GySgt Fischer could not conceal his surprise upon arrival at Montford Point.  Black Ma­rines marching up and down the parade ground outside his new command was almost the last thing he expected to see. He wondered aloud to his fellow white enlisted staff if he was being punished for an indiscretion of which he was un­aware. Most of them had wondered the same thing. Until their new assignment, the majority of them were not even aware that African-Americans were allowed to join the Marine Corps. It seemed impos­sible to many that black and white Marines could work efficiently together, let alone prepare for the rigors of warfare in the Pacific.

At the start, tensions within the 8th Ma­rine Ammunition Co were high. Black noncommissioned officers (NCOs) who had led their men through basic training had to stand by silently until they could ascertain the degree of authority their new white superiors would allow them. White staff, both NCO and officer alike, with varying levels of conviction, made mistakes in attempting to gain their men's trust. Slowly but surely, however, men like Fischer and the rest of the unit began to embrace the Marine Corps' unifying spirit of dis­cipline and pride. Despite fears from both sides, the Marines at the small-unit level started to see beyond racial differences and recognized each other as comrades in a common cause. Their duty, not their color, came to be what truly mattered.

By Kater Miller, NMMC Outreach Curator
January 21, 2021

First ground-oriented combat action of Operation Desert Storm
Today marks the 30th Anniversary of Marine Corps ground combat troops firing in support of Operation Desert Storm. F Battery, 2d Battalion, 12th Marines fired at an Iraqi military formation early in the morning of  January 21st. It was the first of twelve artillery raids that the Marines conducted against the Iraqi Army in Kuwait. The Marines that performed the raids paved the way for the ground assault that began the following month.

​Planning the Offensive
U.S. Army General Norman Schwarzkopf, U.S. Central Command commander and commander of Coalition Forces for Operation Desert Storm, assigned the Marines to attack Iraqi forces in Kuwait. Saddam Hussein’s troops had constructed two obstacle belts that stretched from the Persian Gulf through Kuwait into Iraq and covered them with several dug-in infantry divisions. He intended for the obstacle belts to slow Coalition forces down and turn the war into a grinding, bloody stalemate. Saddam also believed that his entrenched forces were sufficiently protected from Coalition airstrikes that they could endure the anticipated pre-attack bombardment and still fight the Coalition to a standstill.  

Marines knew that the Iraqi Army, one of the largest in the world at the time, would be well entrenched. Iraq had just completed a bloody war against Iran where they had defeated massed Iranian attacks using similar fortifications. The Marines also knew that the air campaign would not destroy the bulk of the forces defending the obstacle belts. To evict the Iraqi Army from Kuwait, the 1st and 2d Marine Divisions would have to punch through these belts while under intense fire. If the Iraqis knew where the Marines planned to breach the obstacle belts, they might have reinforced the area. The Marines conducted a series of deception campaigns to keep the Iraqis guessing where the ground assaults would occur. One of the deception campaigns was staging an amphibious feint off of the coast of Kuwait. The other campaign would feature Marine artillery strikes against Iraqi targets within the obstacle belt fired from different locations at the Kuwaiti border. Another component featured a psychological operation featuring Marines with loudspeakers broadcasting anti-Saddam messages over the border and leaflet drops on Iraqi military positions to encourage defections.

​by Joan Thomas, Art Curator


After the tragic deaths of 220 Marines and 21 US service personnel on 23 October 1983 at the Battalion Landing Team Headquarters, in Beirut, Lebanon, the decision was made by the Marine Corps to send a combat artist to document the event and aftermath.
 
Major John T. “Jack” Dyer, USMCR (Ret.) was the curator for the Marine Corps’ art collection and had served as a combat artist during Vietnam. Following the terrorist attack, he was recalled to active duty, and within several weeks he received his orders to Lebanon.  Dyer departed in December 1983 and remained in country for the next several weeks, creating on-the-spot drawings, sketches and watercolors of what he was seeing on the ground.  Upon his return to the States, he resumed his retired status and once again took up his position as curator of art for the Marine Corps’ Museum and History Division (the predecessor to the National Museum of the Marine Corps).  During his time in Beirut, Dyer created over ninety-five works, and later continued to use his sketches and drawings to create finished studio works in watercolor.
 
For many of his pieces, Dyer preferred sepia brown toned ink in his drawings and sketches.  The ink also served as the underdrawings for several of his later finished watercolors.  The ink could also be combined with liquid to make a wash of brown toned color.  Below is a small sampling of the drawings and watercolors the artist completed or composed while in Beirut.

​"Hotel" Battery, 3/10 BLT, 2/8, Beirut by Major John T. Dyer, Jr., USMCR (Ret)
Pen and ink, wash on offset printing blotter paper
Accession number: 2012.1001.318
The remains of BLT HQ building in Beirut, Lebanon, which was destroyed by terrorist bombing on 23 October 1983.

The last weeks of August 1945 were extraordinary for as it seemed WWII was finally coming to an end.  That was especially true for those held as Japanese prisoners of war, who found themselves elated yet still uncertain of their future. Such was the case with Marine 1stLt Woodrow M. Kessler.
​
Kessler began the month of August 1945 at a coal mine near Nisi Ashibetsu, Hokkaido, Japan, focused on acquiring enough food to survive. He had been a prisoner of the Japanese since 23 December 1941, when Japanese Special Naval Landing Force troops captured Wake Island and forced the 1st Marine Defense Battalion, along with detachments from Marine Fighter Squadron 211, the U.S. Navy, the U.S. Army, and several hundred U.S. civilian construction contractors, to surrender. Since then, he had suffered through a torturous ten-day journey in the hold of a Japanese prisoner transport ship, interned in a camp in China, and later suffered a harrowing train ride through Manchuria into Korea where he and his fellow prisoners nearly starved to death in cramped box cars. He arrived in Japan in July 1945, and was cut off from any news of the war until a British prisoner passing Kessler’s work group on 8 August 1945 whispered, “Old Joe is in.”[1]

“Old Joe” was a British nickname for Joseph Stalin, leader of the Soviet Union. The Soviet Red Army launched a massive land and sea invasion against Manchuria, Korea, and Sakhalin Island on 8 August 1945 after declaring war on Japan on 7 August 1945. The Soviet Union had adhered to its non-aggression pact with Japan for the duration of its war against Nazi Germany from 22 June 1941 to 9 May 1945, but declared war after the U.S. Army Air Forces B-29 Superfortress Enola Gay dropped an atomic bomb on Hiroshima, Japan on 6 August 1945. The Japanese high command was forced to confront the fact that they would soon be overwhelmed by Allied ground forces as their empire crumbled and their cities faced the threat of nuclear annihilation from the air after a second atomic bomb was dropped on Nagasaki on 9 August 1945. Japanese Emperor Hirohito decided to accept the Allied demands for surrender on the evening of 14 August 1945 and prepared to address the nation directly for the first time during his reign on 15 August 1945.

Kessler and the other prisoners at Nisi Ashibetsu were locked in their barracks on the morning of 15 August as the guards and camp commander gathered to listen to the Emperor. Later that evening, the prisoners attended a special dinner at the mining company office , and were later informed by a Japanese officer that the war was officially over. The next morning the prisoners awoke to find that their guards had neatly stacked their rifles outside the prisoner barracks. Kessler and some other prisoners wandered into town and heard Gen Robert L. Eichelburger, USA, Commander of the U.S. 8th Army, broadcasting a message for all prisoners in Japan to return to their barracks, paint the letters “PW” on the roof, and await U.S. air drops of badly needed food, clothing, and medical supplies. The prisoners acquired cans of yellow paint, and soon supplies of soap, clothes, boots, candy, and canned food rained down from the skies. Kessler filled his belly for the first time in years, bartered with the local Japanese villagers for chickens and eggs, and eagerly awaited the arrival of U.S. forces on mainland Japan.[2]

The Caribbean Marine’s Beverage of Choice: Hatuey Beer
By Owen L. Conner, Curator

As International Beer Day celebrates the global appreciation of one of the world’s most beloved beverages, it should come as no surprise that even the Marine Corps has their own historical connections (and preferences) for beer.

From 1927 until the 1960s, one beer was closely associated to Marines and sailors of the fleet serving in the Caribbean – the Cuban beer Hatuey. First brewed in 1927, in the town of Santiago de Cuba, the beer quickly became an important part of Cuban and island culture. The Santiago Brewing Company was owned by the famous rum-making Ron Bacardi Company. The success of the Hatuey brand spread across the Caribbean and into Florida with the sale of over 12 million cases in their heyday in 1959.

By Owen L. Conner Curator

In association with National Martini Day, the Museum is sharing the Corps’ connection to a lesser known gin cocktail from the 1930s, known as the “Bees Nees”.

Since 1925, Leatherneck magazine has documented the service and culture of Marine Corps life. The articles, columns, cartoons and poems provided a time-capsule of the interests and activities of Marines of many eras. The official magazine of enlisted men, it kept them in touch with each other throughout the far flung outposts of Marine service, and provided numerous opportunities to poke fun at their beloved Corps.

One of the more lighthearted humor columns published throughout 1932, was called the “Bees Nees”.  Written by a young Marine named Thomas P. Cullen (under the pen name “Tay-Pay” Cullen), the monthly columns dished out semi-humorous poems as well as a series of rapid fire, stand-up quality jokes about life in the Corps or popular culture of the time.

In a letter to the magazine from July 1932, one inquisitive reader asked Cpl Cullen where the curious name for the humor column originated from. His answer dutifully informed of its connection to a popular prohibition cocktail called the “Bee’s Knees”. 

Sampled by “a correspondent” in an illegal Chicago speak-easy, Cullen skirted the specifics of the bath tub gin used to make it, but expertly relayed the recipe as follows, “…take one part strained honey (for the Bees) and one part lemon juice (for the Knees) and three parts [gin]… Put it in the old shaker with plenty of cracked ice, and give it the Gilda Gray motion until you can scrape off the frost…” (Gilda Gray was a popular movie star of the 1920s, famous for her “shimmy” dancing.)

With a bit of modern interpretation, you can make your own (legal) version of Corporal Cullen’s favorite gin cocktail as follows:

• 2 oz Gin
• 1 oz Fresh Squeezed Lemon Juice
• 1 oz Honey Syrup*

Add ingredients to a cocktail shaker filled with ice and shake in a proper Marine Corps motivated manner.

*To make Honey Syrup simply dissolve 1 part honey into 1 part hot water. Stirring vigorously until
dissolved.