KEY TAKEAWAYS: The National WWII Museum will host its annual D-Day commemoration on June 6. More than 30 Rosie the Riveters will be honored during the ceremony. The event commemorates the 82nd anniversary of the Normandy invasion. The public ceremony will take place at the museum’s U.S. Free dom Pavilion in New Orleans.   The National WWII Museum will commemorate the 82nd anniversary of D-Day on June 6 with a public ceremony in New Orleans honoring World War II veterans and the women who supported the Allied war effort on the home front. The annual Dr. Hal Baumgarten D-Day Commemoration is scheduled for 11 a.m. Saturday at the museum’s U.S. Freedom Pavilion: The Boeing Center on Magazine Street. The event is free and open to the public. This year’s ceremony will feature more than 30 women known as “Rosie the Riveters,” who were selected as recipients of the museum’s 2026 American Spirit Award. Organizers said the program will recognize the role wartime factory workers played in producing military supplies and equipment that supported Allied forces during the June 6, 1944, invasion of Normandy. D-Day, known as Operation Overlord, marked the beginning of the Allied campaign to liberate Nazi-occupied Western Europe during World War II. More than 150,000 Allied troops landed in Normandy, France, in what is considered the largest amphibious invasion in military history. The commemoration is presented in memory of Dr. Harold “Hal” Baumgarten, a D-Day veteran and longtime supporter of the museum. Museum officials said the event is supported through the Dr. Hal Baumgarten D-Day Commemoration Endowment, funded by Karen and Leopold Sher. The museum said the participation of the Rosie the Riveters also highlights the broader social and economic impact women had on the wartime workforce, taking on industrial jobs traditionally held by men during the war years. Travel for the honorees is being provided through the Gary Sinise Foundation‘s Soaring Valor program. Founded in 2000 as the National D-Day Museum, the New Orleans institution was later designated by Congress as America’s National WWII Museum. The museum has become one of the city’s leading tourism attractions and educational institutions focused on World War II history and its lasting global impact. ...read more read less