August 22, 2006
Flags Of Our Fellow Citizens
The passing of Joe Rosenthal - the war photographer who took the immortal shot of the flag-raising on Mount Suribachi - prompted a number of emails to Scott Johnson at Powerline, including this bit:
The last surviving member of the first flag-raising at Iwo Jima is a Minneapolis resident--Charles Lindberg.Let the record show that Charles Lindberg is a native of Linton, North Dakota. He is a retired electrician who lives, if memory serves, in New Hope.
He wrote a book in the fifties or early sixties about his experience in the Marines before, after, and especially during the Iwo Jima campaign that made him an unwitting American icon. The book has been out of print for several generations, now. It's written in the awkward, pre-college-level prose of someone who grew up on a farm, worked with his hands, and spent his formative years fighting his through hell; plain, direct, not fancy in the least. But I read it in high school, and it had a huge impact on me - the story of someone who, as a kid not much older than me from a place not much different (or far-removed) from my own hometown, had done something quite extraordinary.
It'd be quite a job to find the book - I'd suspect it would be buried deep in the innards of the Minneapolis, Saint Paul or U of M library systems, if you can find it at all.
Posted by Mitch at August 22, 2006 07:05 PM | TrackBack
Iwo Jima. What a quagmire. FDR and his stooges obviously underestimated the Japanese insurgency.
Posted by: Kermit at August 22, 2006 06:50 PMWCCO did a feature story on him a while ago.
http://static.wcco.viacomlocalnetworks.com/~wcco/lfr/
Posted by: IndyR at August 23, 2006 01:09 AMGood point, Kermie. Of course it took a couple of Democratic presidents a little over 3-1/2 years to win a two-front global war. So how's your guy doing?
Posted by: angryclown at August 23, 2006 10:09 AMPretty sure there were a number of countries involved back then doing the right thing. Not lining their own pockets with oil for food kickbacks. Not to mention if todays newspapers were reporting the news back then, Kermit comment would be the jist of the reporting.
Posted by: buzz at August 23, 2006 11:20 AMPretty sure there were a number of countries involved back then doing the right thing. Not lining their own pockets with oil for food kickbacks. Not to mention if todays newspapers were reporting the news back then, Kermit comment would be the jist of the reporting. Plus I dont remember reading anything about the loyal opposition (back when it meant just that) back stabbing those democratic presidents giving aid and comfort to the enemy. Other than that, your dead on target.
Posted by: buzz at August 23, 2006 11:22 AM"a couple of Democratic presidents"
...whom the current Dem leadership would toss under the bus, if it were today.
Posted by: myatch at August 23, 2006 11:22 AMThat's "gist", buzzkill.
Unless you meant "jism", in which case, ewwwww.
Posted by: angryclown at August 23, 2006 12:31 PMqgpe knawltd cqmdxtlpg tqhvycai wkjyoxvh bqfh qlzemj
Posted by: stiup bupmoxvzq at September 13, 2006 07:49 PM