World War II Memorial

The World War II Memorial on the National Mall in Washington, D.C., commemorates the sixteen million Americans who served in the Second World War and the roughly 405,000 who died. It was designed by the Austrian-born American architect Friedrich St. Florian and dedicated in 2004, set on the axis between the Lincoln Memorial and the Washington Monument inside the Rainbow Pool, an oval basin laid out in 1922. Fifty-six granite pillars stand for the forty-eight states of the time plus the capital and the U.S. territories; two thirteen-metre pavilions mark the Pacific and Atlantic theatres. The Freedom Wall shines with 4,048 gold stars, each representing one hundred American war dead. Open to the public around the clock, free of charge, the memorial receives Honor Flight veterans every morning, welcomed by school groups. The site is gently illuminated after dark.