Lincoln library WWII exhibit to open on D-Day anniversary

SPRINGFIELD, Ill. – An exhibit focusing on World War II is to open on the 75th anniversary of the D-Day invasion at the Abraham Lincoln Presidential Library and Museum.

Museum officials say “In This Great Struggle: The Greatest Generation Remembers World War II” opens Thursday at the Springfield institution. The exhibit includes short videos that feature interviews with men and women who served and fought in World War II. There also are artifacts from the war, including Gen. Dwight Eisenhower’s helmet, a doll carried by a girl in a Japanese prison camp and propaganda posters from the presidential library’s collection.

Visitors will enter the exhibit through a replica of a D-Day landing craft. Inside the craft are videos documents the war through Illinoisans’ stories. The museum’s Oral History Program conducted the interviews.