Battle of Midway vet to be special guest at Legion Post meeting, May 31

Battle of Midway veteran Jack Crawford will be a special guest at a luncheon meeting of American Legion Post 20, which is associated with the National Press Club, at 12 noon on Thursday, May 31, in the McClendon Room.

A retired Navy captain and U.S. Naval Academy graduate, Crawford was a junior officer aboard the aircraft carrier USS Yorktown, which was sunk during the battle. He abandoned ship with the rest of the crew before the ship went down.

Speaker for the meeting will be Battle of Midway expert Jim D'Angelo, who will discuss his recently published book, "Victory at Midway: The Battle That Changed the Course of World War II." Crawford will also make remarks.

The speaker portion of the meeting is open to all Club members.

The 76th anniversary of the famed battle is Monday, June 4. While most military historians and authors consider the Battle of Midway the turning point of war in the Pacific, D'Angelo argues that the devastating U.S. naval victory over Japanese forces -- Navy aircraft sank four enemy aircraft carriers in a single day -- was the critical event that changed the course of the entire war.

A retired physician from the Washington area and Air Force veteran, D'Angelo is founder and chairman of the International Midway Memorial Foundation (IMMF). For more than 20 years IMMF has strived to ensure that the battle and those who fought and died in it are properly commemorated.

Post 20 has been associated with the National Press Club since the post was founded in 1919 at the suggestion of storied World War I Army General Jack "Black Jack" Pershing. Serving in Washington at the time, General Pershing was an associate member of the Club.