Supper was on, and 6-year-old Vic and his other brother, Albert, headed out to feed the cows.
“It's the last chore of the day before Dad comes home,” Charlo said this week, describing the short story he wrote about that day.
Charlo, a Dixon poet, will read his story Sunday night at the Wilma Theater, in a program that precedes a special showing of “Flags of Our Fathers.” The film, directed and co-produced by Clint Eastwood, premiered in Missoula and nationwide Friday.
Marine Pfc. Louis Charles Charlo of Evaro, a great-grandson of Salish leader Chief Charlo, helped raise the first, most historic and less famous American flag on Mount Suribachi at Iwo Jima on Feb. 23, 1945.
A few days later, the man his buddies called “Chief” was shot and killed by a Japanese machine gunner.
The closing scene of Victor Charlo's story is centered around the brothers' return to the house. In the dim light of kerosene lanterns, they see the fateful telegram on the table.
“That's when we know for sure that Chuck was dead,” he said.
“Flags of Our Fathers” is based on a New York Times best-seller book by James Bradley. It tells the stories of six men - one of them Bradley's father - who raised the second American flag at Iwo Jima early in the 35-day battle.
The flag that the 18-year-old Charlo helped post was ordered replaced by a larger one later in the day. It was that raising that was captured on film by photographer Joe Rosenthal and became an icon of Iwo Jima's capture, though the battle raged for another month.
Another Marine photographer, Louis Lowery, captured the first flag raising. Charlo's back, with a radio pack strapped on, is visible in that shot.
“Here was the first invaders' flag ever planted in four millennia on the territorial soil of Japan, and that (18-year-old) boy from Montana was helping to hold it upright,” Missoula attorney Tracey Morin wrote in a tribute to Charlo at the Arlee-Jocko Valley Museum.
Another photo of Charlo standing behind three fellow Marines, seated on Suribachi, appeared on the cover of Stars and Stripes.
Both Charlo and the flag he helped post, as well as some or all the soldiers who raised the two flags, arrived at Iwo Jima aboard the USS Missoula, a 455-foot naval transport.
Not to be confused with a larger armored cruiser that helped carry troops home from France after World War I, the later USS Missoula was named for Missoula County.
Sunday's program will officially launch a fundraising campaign for construction of a model of the USS Missoula for the Rocky Mountain Museum of Military History.
Some of the $11,900 cost is already in hand, according to Stan Cohen, a member of the museum board and part of the ad hoc committee responsible for the program at the Wilma.
The model and an acrylic case will be 6 feet long and will take a professional model maker in Houston close to a year to finish, said Cohen. An attempt three years ago to build a granite or marble monument to the USS Missoula was unsuccessful.
“But this model is not fizzling out,” Cohen said.
An Iwo Jima survivor, Bill Worf, lives in Missoula but won't make it to Sunday's proceedings. Worf left with his son Monday for Italy, where he's helping his granddaughter celebrate her 29th birthday.
Worf, who was born near Rosebud and went to school in Forsyth, was one month older than Charlo. He was one of the thousands of Marines on Iwo Jima when Charlo's platoon crested Mount Suribachi and posted the flag at 10:20 a.m.
“I don't know if I could say I saw it being raised, but I knew when it went up,” Worf said last week. “The men around me, and I think all the way through the island Š just a big cheer went up.”
Worf, working as a tank infantry liaison, was a mile or so away near the lower of three airfields on the island. He said he's heard it was 5 1/2 hours later when the second, larger flag went up.
“We knew that it had been raised, but as far as we were concerned the first flag was the important one,” Worf said.
In a letter dated 2004, Louis Charlo's platoon leader on Iwo Jima wrote to Charlo's cousin, Roger Shourds of Polson, about the circumstances surrounding Charlo's death.
“I was told later that while he was advancing in an area called the Meat Grinder, his buddy Ed McLaughlin (a kid from Boy's Town, Nebraska) was hit,” wrote 2nd Lt. Raymond Whelan of Florida. “Chief went out to him and managed to get him on his shoulder and was well back to cover when he was hit by machine gun fire. They both were killed.”
Doug Hacker of Missoula, one of the organizers of Sunday's program, said it will have a patriotic air. A U.S. Marine Corps color guard will present the colors. Local veterans are urged to come in uniform, and a brass sextet from Hellgate High School will play the “Star Spangled Banner,” “God Bless America” and the “Battle Hymn of the Republic” before the movie starts.
In an unusual arrangement, “Flags of Our Fathers” will be on a one-time loan from Carmike 10 in Missoula.
“We started this in July and ran into a lot of obstacles,” Hacker said. “They were actually going to give us a pre-premiere date” earlier in the week.
But Paramount Picture and Warner Bros. would permit a preview showing only at Carmike Studios. Organizers needed a larger theater, which the Wilma offers. It seats more than 1,000 people.
“It's the only practical venue in Missoula,” Hacker said. “Richard Taylor of Carmike took it on himself to make this happen. He really gets a vote of gratitude from us.”
Reporter Kim Briggeman can be reached at 523-5266 or at kbriggeman@missoulian.com
On the big screen
The special benefit showing of “Flags of Our Fathers” is scheduled for 7 p.m. Sunday at the Wilma Theater. Doors open at 6:15. Tickets are $7, $5 for seniors. There are no advance ticket sales.
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