Washington, D.C
A preview of the new World War I Memorial in DC — and why it’ll hit you hard – WTOP News
WTOP got a preview of the new World War I Memorial in D.C. ahead of its opening next weekend. See photos.
The finishing touches are being put on the new World War I Memorial in D.C. It’s a three-acre site sitting right along Pennsylvania Avenue between the White House and Freedom Plaza.
On Friday, WTOP got a preview of the new memorial ahead of its opening next weekend.
The centerpiece is a 60-foot wall of sculptures, 38 in total, which aims to tell a story from the start of the war all the way to the end. It took sculptor Sabin Howard about four and a half years to make it.
“The story is of a soldier, a dad, in an allegory for the United States where he leaves home, enters into battle,” said Howard. “From that horrible experience, he’s transformed, shellshocked, and then he returns home to hand his daughter, the next generation, the helmet. And she is World War II.”
What stands out the most is the vivid detail given to each soldier’s face. Anyone looking at it can see the emotion — whether it’s fear, despair or pain. The dirt, sweat and tears are all there to behold.
“We spent an average of 650 hours on each one of these figures, working from a life model. And a lot of those models from the middle to the end of the sculpture are veterans from the Marine Corps, Navy SEAL and Army Rangers, and so their faces had all seen PTSD,” said Howard.
“And that kind of changes the whole thing because, now all of a sudden, you’re sculpting real people … You’re actually learning from them what it’s like to go into war and then leave your family and come back completely changed,” he added.
Howard used words like energy and power to describe some of the sculptures, arguing that “emotion is movement” as he stood in front of the wall.
“This is (a) symphony happening behind me, where you go from quiet to like maximum animalistic energy, to a primal scream, and then all of a sudden quiet,” said Howard. “Where you go to cost of war, where it’s dead silent. It’s actually death. And then from that moment of being shell shocked, you go into a parade scene home, which is this sense of energy being turned on again. And then the final scene, the brakes get put on, where it’s really quiet, where the dad returns home, he’s changed. He’s awkward when he hands his daughter the helmet, she’s completely still, and the weight on her neck, it’s heavy.”
He added, “It’s not like a ‘Yahoo!’ moment. It’s like when you send people to war, they come back, they are not who they were when they left. And that needs to be recognized.”
Organizers behind the memorial spent the last 16 years getting to this day.
(WTOP/John Domen)
WTOP/John Domen
(WTOP/John Domen)
WTOP/John Domen
(WTOP/John Domen)
WTOP/John Domen
(WTOP/John Domen)
WTOP/John Domen
(WTOP/John Domen)
WTOP/John Domen
“World War I is largely forgotten in our country, and it was the most consequential event of the 20th century that led to the other wars that are commemorated on the National Mall,” said Edwin Fountain, the vice chair of the World War I Centennial Commission.
“It’s also important because the scale of sacrifice in World War I of American forces is largely unknown. We lost more American soldiers in World War I than we lost in Korea and Vietnam combined. … And so the significance of that war, the character of American service and accomplishments … needs to be commemorated by a national memorial,” he added.
Those who are behind it feel that the location — between 14th and 15th streets Northwest, right across Pennsylvania Avenue from the Willard Hotel — actually provides a better home for the memorial than the National Mall does.
Besides the proximity to so many downtown hotels and attractions, the amount of space it provided to honor those who served in World War I is much bigger than what the National Mall can provide. The memorial site includes a seating area, a wall with a series of quotes and maps related to the war, and a rehabbed Gen. John J. Pershing Memorial.
It’s also where the World War I homecoming parade crossed in the 20th century.
“I just want people to leave and be interested in World War I, and want to ask questions and want to know more,” said Joe Weishaar, the lead designer for the entire memorial. “It’s the war that changed the world in so many ways, and it’s such a valuable piece of history to really wrap your head around.”
But anyone who visits will be drawn to the centerpiece sculpture, and many will find it hard to take their eyes off it.
“Oftentimes, war memorials aggrandize what happened to cover up tracks,” said Howard, the sculptor. “I didn’t do that. I made something to elevate human beings and bring them forward as the primary subject of a war memorial. It’s not about the governments or the elites. It’s about the ordinary people that are caught into the vortex of having to go to war.”
“If you look at this, this is a memorial to humanity, not to war. It is, yes, the national World War I Memorial, but humanity is what the primary concern and interest of this project is.”
The first illumination ceremony for the memorial will take place at 7:15 p.m. on Friday, Sept. 13. Several other activities are set to take place Sept. 14 and 15, including live musical performances and historical presentations, as well as authentic World War I vehicles from the National WWI Mobile Museum.
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Washington, D.C
12th Honor Flight Tallahassee returns home from successful trip to Washington D.C.
TALLAHASSEE, Fla. (WCTV) – Seventy-two veterans took a trip Saturday to our nation’s capital to visit memorials honoring their service in the armed forces.
This year marks the 12th trip to Washington, D.C. for Honor Flight Tallahassee.
Early Saturday morning, veterans and their guardians met to take a charter flight up to D.C.
Throughout the day, veterans were taken to the World War II memorial, as well as the Korean and Vietnam War memorials. The veterans also visited Arlington National Cemetery and the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier.
More Tallahassee news:
The day ended with a wonderful welcome home celebration.
Our Jacob Murphey, Julia Miller, Taylor Viles, and Grace Temple accompanied the veterans, capturing moments from throughout the day.
The team will have live coverage from Washington, D.C. on Monday to share more from the day’s events.
We will continue to have coverage throughout the month of May, leading up to our Honor Flight special on Memorial Day.
To keep up with the latest news as it develops, follow WCTV on Facebook, Instagram, YouTube, Nextdoor and X (Twitter).
Have a news tip or see an error? Write to us here. Please include the article’s headline in your message.
Be the first to see all the biggest headlines by downloading the WCTV News app. Click here to get started.
Copyright 2026 WCTV. All rights reserved.
Washington, D.C
Storm Team4 Forecast: A chilly, gusty Sunday before a cool start to the week
4 things to know about the weather:
- Chances of rain in the morning
- Gusty Sunday
- Chilly Monday
- Temps will rise again through the work week
Download the NBC Washington app on iOS and Android to check the weather radar on the go.
After a nice and warm Saturday, changes arrive for part two of the weekend.
The first half of your Sunday will have a chance for showers. Winds will pick up with our next system and are expected to gust to about 20-30 mph. Cooler air will settle in, and lows Sunday night fall into the 40s.
Highs temps Monday will reach only into the mid to upper 50s.
However, temperatures will rise through the week, so you won’t need your jackets every day.
QuickCast
SUNDAY:
Showers, then partly cloudy
Wind: NW 10-15 mph
Gusts @ 30 mph
HIGH: Lower 60s
MONDAY:
Partly cloudy
Wind: NW 10-15 mph
Gusts @ 25 mph
HIGH: Upper 50s
Stay with Storm Team4 for the latest forecast. Download the NBC Washington app on iOS and Android to get severe weather alerts on your phone.
Washington, D.C
‘It’s a twilight zone’: Iran war casts deep shadows over IMF gathering in Washington
The most severe energy shock since the 1970s, the risk of a global recession and households everywhere stomaching a renewed surge in the cost of living – hitting the most vulnerable hardest.
In a sweltering hot Washington DC this week, the message at the International Monetary Fund meetings was chilling: things had been looking up for living standards around the world. But then came the Iran war.
“Some countries are in panic,” said the fund’s managing director, Kristalina Georgieva, addressing the finance ministers and central bank bosses in town for the IMF and World Bank spring meetings. “The sooner it [the Iran war] ends, the better for everybody.”
Such gatherings are not typically used to fight geopolitical battles. “You don’t get people shouting at one another at these things,” one senior figure remarked. But, as a record-breaking April heatwave swept the US capital, no one could ignore the mounting damage from the Iran war.
Those familiar with the mood over breakfast at a meeting of the G20’s representatives on Thursday, which included Donald Trump’s treasury secretary, Scott Bessent, and the outgoing US Federal Reserve chair, Jerome Powell – said the atmosphere in the room was sombre amid an open exchange of serious views.
“It is such a twilight-zone meeting,” said Mohamed El-Erian, a former IMF deputy managing director who is now chief economic adviser at the Allianz insurance group. “There are several shadows hanging over it: one is the shadow that comes from concern about the global economy as a whole.
“The second is that some countries are going to be particularly hard hit, and it’s mostly countries that very few people are talking about. But the third concern is the adding of insult to injury: the fact that the US, which started a war of choice, is going to be hit, but by a lot less than elsewhere in relative terms.”
Before Thursday’s breakfast, Rachel Reeves had started her day with an early-morning jog. Joined by her counterparts from Spain, Australia and New Zealand for a run down the iconic National Mall, she posted an Instagram selfie with a not-so-subtle dig: “Friends that run together – work together.”
A day earlier, the chancellor had told a CNBC conference that she thought “friends are allowed to disagree on things” as she criticised Trump’s Iran war as a “mistake” and a “folly” that had not made the world safer.
Speaking at a venue just steps away from the White House, before a one-on-one meeting with Bessent, she said this “fair message” was needed because UK families and businesses were feeling the pain from higher energy prices triggered by the conflict.
Those close to Reeves insist her meeting remained cordial. Britain and the US have significant shared interests in AI, financial services and trade. The chancellor also said the UK government had little time for the Iranian regime.
But with the IMF having warned on Tuesday that the Iran war could risk a global recession – in which Britain would be the biggest G7 casualty – it was clear Reeves had travelled to Washington ready to pick a fight.
“I’m struck by how vocal she has been and the words she used,” said one global financier. “We know the disagreement between Bessent and [European Central Bank president] Christine Lagarde earlier in the year. But that was in private.”
At a cocktail party held at the British ambassador’s residence for hundreds of diplomats and financiers – including the Bank of England’s governor, Andrew Bailey, the chief executive of Barclays, CS Venkatakrishnan, and dozens of senior figures – this transatlantic tension, weeks before King Charles’s US state visit, was a major topic of conversation.
The other, in the balmy residence gardens, was one of its former occupants, Peter Mandelson, as revelations about the former ambassador’s appointment threatened to further rock the UK government.
Before the war, the agenda for the IMF had been about global cooperation; the adoption of AI, jobs and work to eradicate poverty. Each of those tasks had now been complicated, but not least the task of countries working together.
For many at the meetings, the focus was on forging closer global cooperation without the world’s pre-eminent superpower.
“Everybody is talking about how you hedge against American decisions,” said David Miliband, the former UK foreign secretary, who now runs the International Rescue Committee. “You can’t do without them, because they’re 25% of the global economy. But, in a lot of fora, they’ve pulled out.
“So everyone has to think, how does one structure international cooperation? The old west is not coming back. And so everyone has to figure out how to position themselves for that world.”
For those gathering in Washington, there was irony in the fact that they were meeting in the halls of institutions founded, under US leadership, to promote global cooperation after the second world war. The whole idea of the Bretton Woods institutions was to avoid the dire economic conditions and warfare of the 1930s and 1940s. Yet this year’s meeting was taking place amid these intertwining problems.
In their conversations about the best economic policy response to the shock of conflict, the economists also knew the real power to make a difference lay two blocks across town from the IMF and the World Bank – behind the security cordons and construction equipment blocking the White House from public view. “It is not clear they can do anything about it,” said El-Erian.
Still, with a booming economy driven by AI – including Anthropic’s powerful Mythos model, the topic of much conversation – most countries cannot afford to completely break off US ties.
“People want to find ways to insulate themselves from the mess. But, on the other hand, they admire the US private sector,” El-Erian said. “The best way I’ve heard it put, is: they want to go long the private sector and short the mess. But it’s almost impossible to do.”
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