Marine Corps Museum: Blood, guts and history

By Joan Hennessy
The National Museum of the Marine Corps near Quantico, Va., tells the story of American history while highlighting Marine contributions. Image: StudyHall.Rocks photo.
The National Museum of the Marine Corps near Quantico, Va., tells the story of American history while highlighting Marine contributions. Image: StudyHall.Rocks photo.
You can’t miss the National Museum of the Marine Corps, particularly at night, when the shiny glass building is bathed in light. 

     It is near Quantico, Virginia, off Interstate 95, on the right if you are northbound and left if you are southbound. But don’t keep driving -- stop. The museum is worth seeing, even if you have no plans to become a Marine.
     It is relatively new -- opened in 2006. The building itself, the work of architect Curtis Worth Fentress, evokes the silhouette of Marines raising the flag at Iwo Jima on Feb. 23, 1945. (That flag is on exhibit inside, by the way.) The rolling campus features memorials to the Marines' contributions -- and notably, a statue of the famous Lt. Gen. Lewis Burwell “Chesty” Puller, who received the Navy Cross five times.
     The museum also presents a marvelous overview of American history through the prism of the Marine Corps. Not only that, it is free.
      Before you go, here is some Marine Corps trivia:
  • The Marines formed during the American Revolution. Where did they first meet?
      The first Marine Corps recruiting office was in a tavern – to be precise, Tun Tavern in Philadelphia on Nov. 10, 1775. Visitors can get a feel for the tavern on the second floor of the museum, where a Tun Tavern  replica serves up pub food and drinks. A painting on the wall depicts famous Marines throughout history.
  • Why do they call Marines leathernecks?
      Their uniform in 1776 featured a leather collar meant to protect them against close attacks.
  • Why do Marine uniform trousers have a red stripe?
      Those "blood stripes" on the dress-uniform trousers commemorate the loss of life at the Battle of Chapultepec (see the next paragraph), according to the Marine Corps website.
  • The first two lines of the Marine Corps Hymn note two famous missions. What are they?

     1. From the Halls of Montezuma: This is a reference to the Mexican War, when Mexico clung to territories it inherited from Spain, while the U.S. pushed westward. During the Battle of Chapultepec, Sept. 13, 1847, Marines and soldiers stormed and captured the castle known as the Halls of Montezuma, but 90 percent of the commissioned and noncommissioned Marine officers were killed, according to the Marine Corps website.
     2. To the shores of Tripoli: In the early 1800s, President Thomas Jefferson sent the Marines to fight Barbary pirates off the northern coast of Africa, which is where we get the line, "to the shores of Tripoli."

  • What is the Marine Corps motto?

     Semper Fidelis: Always Faithful.

     If you go: Hours are 9 a.m.-5 p.m. For directions, see the website.  

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