Grim yet hopeful addition to National WWII Museum addresses the conflict’s world-shaping legacy

By KEVIN McGILL
Associated Press

The latest major addition to the National World War II Museum in New Orleans is called the Liberation Pavilion. And it’s ambitious in scope. Exhibits commemorate the end of the war, emphasize its human costs and capture the horror of those who discovered the aftermath of Nazi atrocities. It also spotlights the war’s enduring social and geopolitical legacies. Those include the acceleration of U.S. civil rights and women’s equality movements, as well as to the formation of world alliances. The pavilion opened Friday  with ceremonies attended by surviving veterans of the war, Holocaust survivors, historians and actor Tom Hanks, who is a longtime supporter of the museum.