May promises to be a big month for the National Museum of the Mighty Eighth Air Force. Starting on Thursday, May 12^th at 6:00 PM The Herman Lodinger Memorial Lecture series will feature Kimberly Guise presenting “Pride and Peril: Jewish American POWS in Europe.” Ms. Guise is the Senior Curator and Director for Curatorial Affairs at the National WWII Museum.

This lecture is made possible through the Herman Lodinger Endowment Fund, established for the National Museum of the Mighty Eighth Air Force by a gift from Mr. Lodinger’s daughter and son-in-law, Holly and Paul Mandelkern. Second Lieutenant Herman Lodinger was a lead bombardier on a B-24 heavy bomber assigned to the 389^th Bomb Group. His plane was shot down in July 1944, and he was captured by the Germans and held prisoner until his 1945 liberation.

The second annual Flags for the Fallen: 26,000 Flags|One Mission begins on Thursday, May 26^th at 10:00 AM. This tribute, located in the museum’s Memorial Gardens, honors the 26,000 Eighth Air Force airmen who made the ultimate sacrifice in World War II. 26,000 48-star American flags, the flag under which these men served, and many are buried, will fill the garden and give visitors a chance to walk through and remember those heroes who didn’t return home. The flag display in the garden will be open to the public from Thursday, May 26, through Monday, May 30, 2022, and will cover the museum’s entire memorial garden and chapel grounds.

We are looking for volunteers to help us place these flags starting on Tuesday, May 24^th. Those interested in volunteering should go to https://www.mightyeighth.org/flagsforthefallen/.