Memories of D-Day Maps

A couple of articles commemorate the 64th anniversay of the D-Day landings in Normandy from a mapping perspective.

The Evansville Courier & Press has a story about Karl Sensmeier who landed on Omaha Beach. Incredibly, Mr. Sensmeier returned home after the war with a top secret map of the beachhead. The map shows where air corps personnel would be deployed as well as locations set aside for naval units and transportation elements. The map is framed and displayed on a wall in his widow's living room along with other memorabilia.

The Allentown Morning Call recounts local reaction the invasion. In age when Google Earth could not even be imagined large maps of battlefronts in Italy, the Pacific and France were erected in the downtown square. The day after the landings it was announced that a map displaying the Normandy invasion would be erected so that citizens could feel a part of the action.