Touring Indy’s Treasures: The Indiana War Memorial
The Indianapolis area is home to a number of “treasures” — interesting places, museums, and landmarks that make Indy special. Join News 8’s Hanna Mordoh on a tour of Indy’s treasures.
INDIANAPOLIS (WISH) — The Indiana War Memorial in downtown Indianapolis conveys the contributions and sacrifices of Hoosier servicemembers.
“Welcome to the Indiana War Memorial,” Retired Air Force Brig. Gen. J. Stewart Goodwin, executive director of the Indiana War Memorials Commission, said. “We like to say we are the best-kept secret in Indiana, and we don’t want to be.”
Goodwin took News 8’s Hanna Mordoh on an in-depth tour of one of the state’s most powerful tributes to the men and women who served.
According to the commission, the exterior of the 210-foot-tall Indiana War Memorial is richly adorned with historical significance.
It was designed to closely resemble the appearance of the original Mausoleum, one of the Seven Wonders of the Ancient World. Each side of the building has six columns, with six sculpted figures representing courage, memory, peace, victory, liberty, and patriotism. The Pro Patria statue on the south steps of the memorial aptly communicates all that the memorial stands for with its Latin meaning, “For Country.”
General of the Armies John J. Pershing, commander of the American Expeditionary Forces in Europe in World War I, laid the cornerstone of the Indiana War Memorial on July 4, 1927.
The most compelling feature of the memorial’s interior is the elaborate Shrine Room. The room was dedicated on Armistice Day, 1933.
“Alright, this is where I say, ‘Prepare to be surprised,’” Goodwin said as News 8 entered the Shrine Room.
“This building was built for this room and what it does is, it talks about the countries that served with us in World War I,” Goodwin said. “It is special because it pays honor to those people who helped us win what was supposed to be the ‘war to end all wars.’ This room is actually the shrine to those countries that helped us win the war.”
Goodwin continued, “It actually starts in the heavens with the star of destiny. The star of destiny was the symbol of hope in this country in the 1920s and 1930s. Now the star you are looking at is made out of Swedish crystal. And the crystal just pops! And what we have beneath that is the garrison flag. This is the largest flag that we fly at a military installation.”
The Shrine Room is adorned with two dozen red marble pillars that serve to support the ceiling.
“(They’re) based on the colors of the flag, red white, and blue. The columns are from Vermont. They are hollow because we hadn’t invented hydraulics or Numatics yet, so they were put in by hand,” Goodwin explained. “Why is red in the flag? It is to honor the blood that was shed for our freedom and now white is in the flag for purity. White is in the frieze and this frieze actually tells the story of the war. Blue is the flag for freedom.”
Blue stained glass shines natural light through the Shrine Room and into the building, and the same poet who wrote the quotations on the Lincoln Memorial wrote quotations featured in the Shrine Room.
At the center of the room is what looks like a tomb — but it’s not, according to Goodwin.
“This is not a tomb — it is an altar,” Goodwin said.
At the center of the altar is the Pledge of Allegiance as it was written when the room was constructed.
“And to the republic for which it stands, one nation indivisible. It doesn’t say ‘under God,” Goodwin explained. “Well, what happened is, this is the Pledge of Allegiance when the building was built in 1933.”
Goodwin’s guided tour of the memorial continued through the stairwells, which are adorned with the names of Indiana veterans.
“These are the names of the 135,000 Hoosiers who served in World War I,” Goodwin explained.
In addition to the names of Indiana’s World War I veterans, the names of all Hoosiers killed or missing in action from World War II, Korea, and Vietnam are also listed.
Another of the memorial’s breathtaking features is the Pershing Auditorium, named for the general who laid the memorial’s cornerstone back in 1927.
“This is the second-best room in the house,” Goodwin said. “This room is acoustically perfect. Because of how this room is situated, if you are sitting up here, they can hear everything you are talking about down there.”
In addition to the Shrine Room and Pershing Auditorium, the memorial is also home to the Eli Lilly Civil War Exhibition, the Congressional Gold medal awarded to the final crew of the USS Indianapolis, and a museum dedicated to Indiana’s military history.
To wrap up the tour, Goodwin took News 8 to an area that is not open to the public — the top of the building, which offers an amazing view of the American Legion Mall.
“We are up on what is known as the third floor,” Goodwin said. “It gives you an idea of what that mall looks like. And it was actually designed after the mall in Washington, D.C.”
Goodwin says Indianapolis is home to more monuments than any American city other than the nation’s capital.
“We have 48 here in Indianapolis, but I really appreciate the opportunity to tell these stories because once we get people into the building, we got them… “
Goodwin says many visitors to the Indiana War Memorial have the exact same question for him.
“We have over 120,000 people that come to this building each year. The most often-asked question is, ‘How much would it cost to build this building today?’ Well, we know it was a little over $2 million in 1920 money when a gallon of milk was five cents.”
Goodwin says expert architects reviewed the building and they determined, that with all the memorial’s hand craftsmanship, it can never fully be recreated and would likely be worth more than $500 million today.
Since the start of the coronavirus pandemic, visitor numbers have been down at the Indiana War Memorial, but Goodwin says he hopes that will change moving forward.
The Indiana War Memorial is free to visit and open to the public Wednesday through Sunday, from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m.