We thought that one of the best ways to celebrate Memorial Day was to spend it learning more about WWII History witha tour of the National WWII Museum in New Orleans.
Entering the space we got oriented to the museum layout. The first activity is a train exhibit–always up the Liddy alley! We did the road to war and home front sections, and moved on the the Campaigns of Courage: European and Pacific Theters. After that we went to the amazing movie experience, Beyond All Boundaries. Narrated by Tom Hanks, there were also props and special effects that made it even more dramatic. After the movie and lunch, we spent a long time in the section with the most airplanes, the US Freedom Pavilion: the Boeing Center. The boys had challenge pages with the silhouettes of different planes, along with brief descriptions. Their task was to match them with the planes on display, so we took some extra time for them to finish their worksheets. For the final few hours we rushed through the two different campaign sections: The Road to Berlin, and the Road to Tokyo. We spent all day, but did not see it all!
Road to War
Fire Direction Tower model
Uniforms and Equipment
From the Leaders
By Air and By Sea
US Freedom Pavillion: the Boeing Center
The Road to Berlin
We had the opportunity to follow a service person with the Dog Tag Project. Clayton’s was Doris “Dorie” Miller, and we found some of his story in this section. The boys also loved the large equipment, and the “hole” in the ceiling with the planes going by. The museum was about to close, so we did have to rush through these.
Back to the Bayou!
A quick drive through town, and it was back to Bayou Segnette! We enjoyed some different views on our walk; the boys thought that the line-up of boats in the auxillary parking lot were pretty funny! We watched some tour and fishing boats go by, considered buying an island, and laughed at al of the large birds roosting in the power tower. All-in-all a great day!
