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Posted on 04/28/2013 3:48:16 PM PDT by lowbridge
Alan Wood, a World War II veteran credited with providing the flag in the famous flag-raising on Iwo Jima, has died. He was 90.
Wood died April 18 of natural causes at his Sierra Madre home, his son Steven Wood said Saturday.
Wood was a 22-year-old Navy officer in charge of communications on a landing ship on Iwo Jima's shores Feb. 23, 1945 when a Marine asked him for the biggest flag that he could find.
After five days of fighting to capture the Japanese-held island, U.S. forces had managed to scale Mount Suribachi to hoist an American flag.
Wood happened to have a 37-square-foot flag he had found months before in a Pearl Harbor Navy depot. .
Five Marines and a Navy Corpsman later raised that flag in a stirring moment captured by Associated Press photographer Joe Rosenthal.
Steven Wood says his father was always humbled by his small role in the historic moment.
In a 1945 letter to a Marine general who asked for details about the flag, Wood wrote: "The fact that there were men among us who were able to face a situation like Iwo where human life is so cheap, is something to make humble those of us who were so very fortunate not to be called upon to endure such hell."
(Excerpt) Read more at foxnews.com ...
Marine IWO JIMA PING
That was the second flag. The first was much, much smaller.
Rest in peace. You gave use a memory that few will forget.
RIP, Good and Faithful Servant.
I talked to a guy that believed he supplied the mast for the flag
RIP.
My late father-in-law served with the Fourth Marine Division and barley made it off that island. He was wounded, a serious leg wound (’’the million dollar wound’’) but he made it the hell out of there. Everytime I read of a WW2 vet passing away I’m on one hand sad for their passing and a little fearful on the other. That generation saved the world. And as they leave us I fear we are losing the values that saw them through and win the most destructive war in human history and that built the world after it was over, the world I was born into.We seem to be losing a lot of the values that generation had.
God rest his soul.
May his soul and all the souls of the faithfully departed, though the mercy of God, rest in peace.
If I recall correctly, the flag Lt Wood obtained at Pearl Harbor was removed from a ship that was damaged in the Japanese attacks on December 7, 1941. Seeing the large flag flying over Mount Suribachi, Secretary of the Navy James Forrestal (who was present for the invasion) told Marine Corps Lt Gen Holland Smith (the amphibious force commander), “that guarantees a Marine Corps for the next 500 years.”
Obviously, Secretary Forrestal and General Smith never met Barack Obama. Under his watch, the Corps will lose 60,000 Marines over the next 2-3 years, leaving at its lowest strength since before Pearl Harbor.
That flag is on display in the Marine Corps Museum in Triangle, VA. It was a moving experience to stand there alone for a time with it. Behind you as you stand there looking at it, is a huge wall display of EGAs and Navy collar insignia. There are a LOT of them, pinned to a piece of hardwood.
There’s one for every Marine and Navy KIA on Iwo.
My father-in-law, a member of the Army Signal Corp’s 75th JASCO (Joint Assault Signal Company), third wave in, told me of seeing that flag when they had come down the mountain to their rest camp (next to the 5th Marine Corps cemetary).
He gave me a brown photo of one of the two flags on a piece of pipe. A treasured family momento for the next generation (my son is a veteran of Iraq - he gets it, and my So. Vietnamese flag).
Our fathers, father-in-laws and other WW2 relatives and friend were “The Greatest Generation”, though my friends from Vietnam were pretty darn good too, as are our men and women from Iraq and Afghanistan.
We are lucky to be able to produce a “Greatest Generation” every time they are needed.
There is a very interesting book that seemed to get a lot of it right. It is on generational theory - and that the “Greatest Generation” of WWII has a similar makeup as the “Millennials”. The book was written before 9/11 happened. And it said that the millennials would be successful, independent people with lots of striving in them for selfish reasons. Much like my parent's generation of WWII. BUT - they would be united in purpose if something like the attack on Pearl Harbor happened again. Something so big as to unite them in one cause.
The young men and women that joined to fight against terrorism sure showed that. And I hope that more and more of them will be joining the leadership ranks in their communities and nation as they grow older.
http://www.amazon.com/Fourth-Turning-American-Prophecy-Rendezvous/dp/0767900464 My still-living uncle was a radioman (Hey - would that have meant "signal corp!!") that was on the runway on Iwo Jima shortly after it was taken. (A few days?) Although he said "taken" was an optimistic view as the Japs were still taking potshots at the airplanes as they came in. My other uncle never talked about WWII - it never even crossed my mind that he had fought. Found out at his funeral that he had been on bombers flying out of England. My old man was on a minesweeper. He had lots of interesting stories. (He never got to see any actual fighting!)
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