Marine Corps War Memorial

The Marine Corps War Memorial, perhaps more commonly known as the Iwo Jima Memorial, is actually located just north of Arlington National Cemetery. It depicts the famous flag raising on Iwo Jima, a bronze incarnation of Joe Rosenthal's famous WWII photo.

Perhaps second in the American psyche only to the D-Day landings on Omaha Beach, the flag-raising at has inspired two US postage stamps and numerous movies. The photo was brought back to the forefront of American thought in the wake of the post-9/11 photo of firefighters raising the flag at the World Trade Center; numerous political cartoons likened these two photos.

Aerial view.

It was bright and sunny when we visited the Memorial, so the half of the pictures with my back to the sun look really nice, while the half of the pictures facing the sun did not turn out nearly so well.