Santa Ana : Marines Will Re-Enact Iwo Jima Flag Raising

Six Marines from Camp Pendleton will re-enact the flag raising on Iwo Jima made famous in a World War II photograph at Memorial Day services next Monday in Santa Ana, an organizer said Monday.

The AMVETS second annual Memorial Day services will be held in the Orange County Veterans Memorial at Civic Center Plaza to honor those who died in World War I, World War II and the Korean and Vietnam wars.

The Civic Center was chosen among all the county’s Memorial Day programs for the flag raising because the monument there is the only one “with all the wars represented,” said Hal Camp, spokesman for AMVETS, a national organization with eight chapters in Orange and Los Angeles counties.

Among those expected to participate in the ceremonies next week will be Board of Supervisors Chairman Roger R. Stanton, Rep. Robert K. Dornan (R-Garden Grove) and officials from MIA-POW Southern California and the AMVETS Department of California Service Foundation. Along with the traditional placing of wreaths around the monument, there will songs, including one by a Vietnamese choir, and speeches by veterans. Last year, AMVETS held its first Memorial Service near the four-sided monument and the emphasis was on remembering those veterans who are still listed as missing in action or prisoners of war, Camp said. This year the emphasis will shift to a more traditional patriotic theme titled “This is my country.”

Camp said that the public will have the opportunity to take pictures of Marines from Camp Pendleton, who will wear World War II uniforms and helmets in re-enacting the flag raising, made famous by photographer Joe Rosenthal 42 years ago.