Author Topic: Celebrate VJ Day with a Kiss In!  (Read 5562 times)

Offline Paul Farace

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Celebrate VJ Day with a Kiss In!
« on: August 02, 2010, 01:18:31 PM »
Here is the press release we're sending out to promote our V-J Day event on Aug. 15, part of the Spirit of '45 national campaign.


U.S.S. COD Invites Public to Celebrate
WWII Victory with Kiss-In

CLEVELAND – U.S.S. COD Submarine Memorial will mark the 65th anniversary of the end of World War II on Sunday, August 15 at 2 p.m. with a kiss -- lots of kisses in fact.  The crew of the veteran WW II sub docked on Cleveland’s North Coast Harbor is inviting the public to come aboard that day and reenact the famous kiss between a sailor and a nurse celebrating the end of the war and immortalized on the cover of LIFE Magazine that week in 1945.

The event aboard COD is part of a national campaign to recognize and honor WW II veterans for their accomplishments in bringing peace to the world after a long and bloody war.

The day remembered by veterans as V-J Day (for victory over Japan) was unparalleled in American history, says COD Memorial President Dr. John Fakan, who was 11 years old on V-J Day.  “After years of heart-breaking losses of loved ones in the Armed Forces, we realized our sacrifices were at an end,” Fakan explained. The son of a Navy sailor, Fakan remembers the jubilation on that day.  “Everyone realized that the war that claimed millions of lives around the world had ended. That was certainly worth kissing a stranger in public.”

The V-J Day anniversary party at the COD Memorial will include period reenactors, Big Band music, jitterbug dance demonstrations, and as the climax -- a mass restaging of the famous Times Square kiss.

“We want everyone to bring their special someone down to the COD on Aug. 15 and honor the achievement of our veterans with a kiss.  We’ll even have nurse caps and sailor hats available for our kiss-in participants,” Fakan said.

The national campaign to honor America’s WWII veterans on V-J Day is headed by actor Hugh O’Brien. As chairman of the Spirit of ’45 campaign, O’Brien is asking organizations and historic ships like COD to salute the veterans who achieved victory and restored world peace in 1945.  COD’s crew decided the best way to mark V-J Day was with a restaging of the smooch heard around the world.

The image of the kissing couple by veteran LIFE photographer Alfred Eisenstaedt shows nurse Edith Shain getting a “Hollywood kiss” from a passing sailor during spontaneous celebrations in New York’s Times Square following news that the Japanese had accepted unconditional surrender. The photograph soon became one of the most recognized images of the war and is even immortalized with a statue of the kissing pair near the site where it occurred.

O’Brien remembers that he was not surrounded by nurses when news of the war’s end was announced. In 1945 O’Brien was the youngest U.S. Marine Corps drill sergeant and was busy training Marines for the invasion of the Japan. Today the star of TV’s Wyatt Earp western drama and major movies claims to be the oldest surviving USMC drill sergeant at age 86.  O’Brien worked with nurse Edith Shain on the Spirit of ’45 campaign and planned to be with her in Times Square for the anniversary of the famous photo kiss. Sadly, Shain died of cancer on June 20 in her home in Los Angeles, CA. She was 91 years old.

The anniversary festivities aboard USS COD will also include prizes for the best jitterbug dancers as well as a prize for the best impersonators of the sailor and nurse Shain.

“We don’t plan on judging the kissing,” Fakan remarked. “We’ll leave that up to the couples.”


A National Historic Landmark, submarine COD is docked on North Marginal Dr., between East 9th St. and Burke Lakefront Airport. Commissioned in 1943, COD served in the Southwest Pacific and had just returned to her base in Perth, Australia when news of the war’s end was broadcast. COD’s crew was attending a party in their honor thrown by the crew of the Dutch Submarine O-19 they had just rescued after the Dutch sub ran aground in enemy waters.

 COD is a non-profit memorial that honors the more than 3,800 men who gave their lives in defense of our Nation as members of the U.S. Navy’s Submarine Force since its founding in 1900. COD is open daily for public tours from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. Admission is charged. For more information, visit the COD website:  www.usscod.org

Although nobody disputes the identity of nurse Edith Shain in the photograph, many sailors have claimed to be the dipping kisser in the photo. Lois Gibson, a forensic artist with the Houston Police Department recently took up the challenge and identified the sailor as 83-year-old Glenn McDuffie of Texas. The Navy veteran has fought for years to prove his claim and is now battling lung cancer.

-30-
Johnny Cash's third cousin, twice removed

Offline Mark Sarsfield

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Re: Celebrate VJ Day with a Kiss In!
« Reply #1 on: August 08, 2010, 07:26:29 PM »
LOL!  I hope you get a good turn out... and that you don't get blamed for a cold sore epidemic.

Regards,
Mark Sarsfield
USS Batfish reenactor



"If you have one bucket that can hold 5 gallons and one bucket that can hold 2 gallons, how many buckets do you have?" - IQ test from Idiocracy

Offline Paul Farace

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Re: Celebrate VJ Day with a Kiss In!
« Reply #2 on: August 09, 2010, 11:36:46 PM »
Yea, it's not Norman Rockwell's painting of a kissing booth is it?   VD and Herpes in 2010, a smooch from a wolf in 1945!   :-*
Johnny Cash's third cousin, twice removed