The 70th Anniversary of D-Day will be observed Friday with a special commemoration at the Ernie Pyle World War II Museum in Dana.
The museum will be open Friday from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m., with the D-Day observance scheduled for between noon and 4 p.m. Reading of Pyle’s columns, a flag ceremony, and singing of the National Anthem will take place during the afternoon. Refreshments will be available.
Vermillion County native Ernie Pyle was working as a war correspondent for the Scripps Howard News Service when Allied Forces invaded France at the beaches of Normandy.
The successful invasion was the first major step in driving Nazi forces out of France and back into Germany and led to the eventual end to the war in Europe.
Pyle entered France the day after the June 6, 1944, invasion and walked the beaches of Normandy before joining U.S. troops as they moved further into the French countryside. He wrote three columns that now stand as defining descriptions of the battle¹s aftermath.
Pyle died less than a year later covering the war in the Pacific when he was hit by a Japanese machine-gunner¹s bullet on Ie Shima, a remote island near Okinawa.
The museum contains a special D-Day tribute with an audio excerpt of a Pyle D-Day column recited by Hollywood actor William Windom.
Dana is located in western Indiana on Indiana 71 one mile north of U.S. 36.
The Ernie Pyle World War II Museum is owned and operated by the Friends of Ernie Pyle, a nonprofit tax-exempt organization dedicated to the preservation and advancement of Pyle¹s legacy in Dana and beyond. The museum, which consists of Pyle¹s birth home and adjacent museum housing multimedia presentations and artifacts, is open from May through Veterans Day in November. Hours are 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. Fridays and Saturdays, and 1 to 4 p.m. Sundays.
Private tours are available at any time by contacting the museum in advance, (765) 665-3633. For more information, visit www.erniepyle.org.
