Willy F. James, Jr. was one of seven African Americans to receive the Medal of Honor for service in World War II, an award delayed decades by bias and discrimination.

Hear about four unique items from our Collection that saw action.

The National WWII Museum’s Bollinger Canopy of Peace will soon take its place as a new landmark on the New Orleans skyline. The iconic architectural structure, scheduled for completion in 2018, will rise 148 feet above the center of the institution’s campus. The Canopy—a steel lattice framework supporting Teflon-coated fiberglass panels—will be 482 feet long and 134 feet wide, held aloft by four steel legs anchored in more than 1,260 cubic yards of concrete.

As the Museum celebrates its 20^th anniversary, we are also taking time to remember some of our volunteers who play a vital role in many areas. The Museum has been fortunate over the last 20 years to have WWII veterans serve as volunteers. One of those was Jimmy Dubuisson, who volunteered with the “Higgins Boat” crew for nearly 20 years.

Before her historic protest in the Montgomery Bus Boycott, Rosa Parks was a Home Front worker at Maxwell Airfield.