Marine Corps

  • Marines pose for a photograph in Egypt in front of the Great Sphinx in 1907. (Official USMC Archives Photograph via Flickr)

  • Marines of the USS Texas pose between the No. 3 turret's 14-inch guns in 1914. (Official USMC Archives Photograph via Flickr)

  • Marines in France during World War I, approximately 1918. Note the gas masks around their necks. (Official USMC Archives Photograph via Flickr)

  • Upon the death of unofficial mascot Sergeant Major Jiggs in 1927, the Royal Marines present the U.S. Marines an English bulldog by the name of Private Pagett. (Official USMC Archives Photograph via Flickr)

  • Members of the 1st Marine Division Staff pose on Guadalcanal Island in August 1942. (Official USMC Archives Photograph via Flickr)

  • Marine Field Cook Dewitt M. Waite, who as a civilian was a baker in New York, is shown with the cake he baked for the Marines' 168th birthday in 1943. (Official USMC Archives Photograph via Flickr)

  • On the way to Japanese-held Tarawa Island in November 1943, a Marine takes a last look at his good-luck picture, a pin-up girl. (Official USMC Archives Photograph via Flickr)

  • Despite enemy fire Marines wade through the surf off Tarawa Island in November 1943. Landing boats and barges brought them to within 500 yards of the beach but the coral bottom prevented the boats coming any closer to the shore. (Official USMC Archives Photograph via Flickr)

  • 2nd Marine Division advances under heavy fire on Tarawa Island in November 1943. (Official USMC Archives Photograph via Flickr)

  • A Marine shoots on a Japanese pill box on Tarawa Island in November 1943. (Official USMC Archives Photograph via Flickr)

  • Women Marines learn to rig parachutes at a training school at Camp Lejeune, N.C., in 1943. (Official USMC Archives Photograph via Flickr)

  • A Marine pauses in June 1944 in a Japanese shrine garden on Saipan to make faces at a "mad lion" statue which seems to have escaped the rain of shells and bullets. (Official USMC Archives Photograph via Flickr)

  • Sacrifice.

  • Chaplain John H. Craven, Regimental Chaplain, 14th Marines poses with Army soldiers of the 476th Amphibious Truck Company off Iwo Jima in 1945 after performing baptisms. (Official USMC Archives Photograph via Flickr)

  • Marine Infantry move along the flank of the column between Hagaru-ri and Koto-ri in 1950. (Official USMC Archives Photograph via Flickr)

  • Marines scale ladders to storm ashore at Inchon, Korea, in the amphibious invasion on Sept. 15, 1950. (Official USMC Archives Photograph via Flickr)

  • Reckless, being a race horse, took quickly to American football. Reckless and the Marine Corps football team defeated Army, 23-7, in Korea in 1954. (Official USMC Archives Photograph via Flickr)

  • Marine officers dressed in the uniforms depicting the different eras of the Marine Corps. celebrate the 180th birthday of the U.S. Marine Corps at the Naval Gun Factory in Washington in 1955. (Official USMC Archives Photograph via Flickr)

  • The heroics of U.S. Marines became so ingrained in popular culture that their adventures were immortalized in comics books in the 1950s. (Official USMC Archive Images via Flickr)

  • 1st AMTRAC Battalion makes its landing in Vietnam in 1966. (Official USMC Archives Photograph via Flickr)

  • Marines pause near a bunker in December 1966 in Vietnam to participate in a short Christmas service. (Official USMC Archives Photograph via Flickr)

  • Private First Class Waldo Roame’s scout dog, Hobo, sniffs out enemy troops encircled during Operation Meade River, a cordon operation 13 miles southwest of Da Nang in 1968. (Official USMC Archives Photograph via Flickr)

  • Marines of the 5th Marine Regiment move forward on a sweep through elephant grass during Operation Meade River, the largest heli-borne operation in Marine Corps history. (Official USMC Archives Photograph via Flickr)

  • Leathernecks of the 7th Marines are served Easter dinner atop a fire support base in 1969 during the multi-battalion search and clear Operation Oklahoma Hills 18 miles west-southwest of Da Nang. (Official USMC Archives Photograph via Flickr)

  • Carrying a small Vietnamese child, this Marine from the 26th Marines moves toward a collection area, where the child and its mother will be moved to a temporary relocation center, safe from fighting as Leathernecks sweep through villages and hamlets of the Batangan Peninsula in 1969. (Official USMC Archives Photograph via Flickr)

  • Marine Corporal Larry G. Nabb, of Brush, Colo., finds a moment of peace in front of a Christmas tree in 1968 at Quang Tri Combat Base. (Official USMC Archives Photograph via Flickr)

  • The 4th Marines move along a ridge line following a battle with a well entrenched North Vietnamese force near the Demilitarized Zone in 1969. Thirty-one enemy combatants were killed. (Official USMC Archives Photograph via Flickr)

  • Marines of 3d Battalion, 7th Marines [3/7], 1st Marine Division, unload C rations 12 miles south of Da Nang, April 21, 1969. (Official USMC Archives Photograph via Flickr)

  • Marine Fighter Attack Squadron 333 (VMFA-333), Operation Desert Storm, 1991. (Official USMC Archives Photograph via Flickr)

  • Marine John Courtenay in front of the road sign to Kuwait City and Khafji in 1991. (Official USMC Archives Photograph via Flickr)

  • Marine Col. John Wiggins serves the first piece of cake to Marine Gen. John Allen, commander of International Security Assistance Force and U.S. Forces Afghanistan, during a celebration in Kabul for the Marines' 236th birthday in 2011. (U.S. Air Force photo via Flickr)

  • Happy Birthday to the United States Marine Corps! November 10, 1775. (Photo by Lance Cpl. John Suleski via Flickr)