NEW ORLEANS (September 3, 2009) – Seventy years ago, on Sept. 3, 1939, Great Britain and France, responding to the Nazi invasion of Polan...

When President Franklin Roosevelt created the War Refugee Board in January 1944, he tasked this new government agency with rescuing and providing relief for Jews and other groups facing Nazi persecution and murder in Europe. By that time, more than five million European Jews had already been murdered. The War Refugee Board staff used creativity and the near-certainty of Allied victory to aid hundreds of thousands of people in the final seventeen months of World War II.

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.

Although the Washington Naval Conference concluded nearly two decades before the attack on Pearl Habor, its outcome shaped the course of World War II in the Pacific between the United States and Japan.

Many Americans greeted the news of the Atomic bombing of Hiroshima with jubilation. Beginning shortly after the war, however, a number of prominent US military leaders began to question the bomb's use.