Iwo Jima and Gordon Ward

It was Saturday morning, just a day before our visit to Washington DC would end. We had visited Teddy Roosevelt Island that morning after five days at all the major sites, as we have seen in previous posts. And we went to see the US Marine Corps. Memorial, the famed statue depicting the even more famed Joe Rosenthal photo of the raising of Old Glory on Iwo Jima.

We circled the statue, we took traditional photos and creative angles. We were beginning to get ready to leave, ready to plan some further sightseeing on our way back to the hotel. And there was a man, a man in a wheelchair with a baseball cap on his head. The cap told us that he was an Iwo Jima survivor.

We spent twenty to thirty minutes with him there, that morning, meeting his daughter Ana Ward and meeting other people from Gordon's life through his album of 8x10 photos. Many photos of his wife and family, but also a shot or two of him, including some post war shots. A highlight is his body cast being autographed by Boris Karloff. What a wonderful chance to meet a wonderful man, a live hero of the events depicted in the statue. Meeting Yona Dickmann at the Holocaust Museum and meeting Gordon Ward at the Iwo Jima statue were certainly the two highlights of the week in Washington.

Thanking them for the memories, we prepared to leave. And we went back to the hotel, happily finished with our sightseeing. Thanks to you for a wonderful morning, Gordon.