A colorful look at Tarawa in 1944 ...

[Mark Allen M]

93 color photos of Tarawa Atoll in 1944. Many of these photos show airfield activities on Batio Island. I've placed them in a Flickr album below.
1944 Photos by: J R Eyerman - LIFE Collections

https://www.flickr.com/photos/142209609 ... 0481907333

[airnutz]

Cool pics of the guys settling in. Wind powered washing machine. Tarawa Lumber Co. The signs are a hoot, Tarawa National Park..No Fishing, No Hunting and Absolutely No Romancing. Do Not Feed The Animals. Cooks and Bakers Local 9999...Warden Pisscall Charlie. Neat stuff, Thanks Mark!

[Michel Lemieux]

As always excellent series and story telling pictures......

Thank you for sharing Mark.

The one that got me to scratch my head is the no smoking anywhere on the island sign. And in fact I do not think I saw a simple military with a cigarette????

Why is that? Supply issues fixed by a rule?

[Invader26]

I was at Tarawa just last week. The only visible war relics to see are a Sherman tank stuck in a hole at the beach plus several Japanese bunkers including the big command post. Their is a memorial to Australian and New Zealand Coastwatchers that were killed by the Japanese. Four big Japanese naval guns [purchased from the Brits circa 1903 still stand guard....

[Richard W.]

Looks exactly like the movie “South Pacific”!

No smoking must have been a hardship. If it was because of all the aviation fuel, I wonder why they couldn’t rope off some safe areas to smoke.

[Adam Kline]

I think the ice maker was probably the most important piece of equipment on the island. I like "the nightly meetings in foxhole" sign too.