Memorial Day Tribute: 1945 VJ Day (video)

Happy Memorial Day Weekend, everyone! While we sit back all weekend drinking, stuffing our faces and engaging in other sorts of ass clownery, let’s not forget all the brave men and women who died for your right to act out in such a manner.

To commemorate the holiday, OTR’s dad passed along this brilliant video. Posted by Richard Sullivan, he says his dad shot this in Kodachrome 16mm film, capturing the celebration in Hawaii when news broke that Japan had surrendered to the allied forces.

He writes:

65 Years Ago my Dad shot this film along Kalakaua Ave. in Waikiki capturing spontaneous celebrations that broke out upon first hearing news of the Japanese surrender. Kodachrome 16mm film: God Bless Kodachrome, right? I was able to find an outfit (mymovietransfer.com) to do a much superior scan of this footage to what I had previously posted, so I re-did this film and replaced the older version There are more still images from this amazing day, in color, at discoveringhawaii.com.

So check out this awesome video and remember who fought for your right to spend this weekend so housed that you lost $40 on one hand of poker because you thought there was no way he caught the straight on the river.

VJ Day, Honolulu Hawaii, August 14, 1945 from Richard Sullivan on Vimeo.