National Marine Corp Museum Part I

National Marine Corp Museum Part I

The other weekend we met some out of town friends for lunch at the Tun Tavern at the National Marine Corp Museum. After lunch we toured with our friends the marine museum which has one of the most impressive history galleries in the United States. You come away with a quick and dirty military history of the United States from the Revolutionary War to the current gulf conflicts. Above is a photo of the main lobby of the museum that has marine military aircraft suspended from the glass roof. More about the glass roof later.

On the walls of this lobby are famous marine quotes and photos of marines.

Near the front entrance to this lobby we noted the U.S. flag, the marine flag and a type of non-manned plane that is currently being used for bombing operations in Afghanistan.

There are galleries devoted to each major U.S. war effort. The one I like the most is the Korean War gallery that depicts Korea in the cold winters of 1950, 1951, 1952 with snow on the mountainsides and in the valleys. You enter this gallery and quickly realize that it is refrigerated so it really and truly feels cold like winters in Korea in 1950's. The scene depicted above in the lobby shows the marines landing by helicopter in a desert setting.

The day we were at the museum which is located at Quantico, VA there was a boy scout troop taking a guided tour of the museum.

There was also a contingent of young navy personnel touring the museum. We were wondering if they were from the Naval Academy in Annapolis, Maryland.

Now back to that glass roof. Look at the bottom rows of glass and you will see black tape covering bullet holes in the glass. Yes, our new D.C. sniper has shot out windows here as well as at the pentagon and a marine recruiting station and a coast guard recruiting station in Northern Virginia. The sniper shootings started October 19 and in spite of intense investigations by various authorities including the FBI this person still has not been apprehended. Scary.

Tomorrow I'll tell you about our lunch experience at the Tun Tavern at the National Marine Corps Museum.

Final Thought For The Day: This past Sunday, November 14, was the anniversary of the founding of the U.S. Marine Corps. Celebrations for the anniversary had already started the previous weekend that we were there.