AT D-DAY MUSEUM, VOICES OF VALOR.

Byline: Story and photo by Eric Noland Travel Editor

NEW ORLEANS - The photo could be of any group of young men. An athletic team. A school graduating class. A factory crew.

The men line up in terraced rows and grin toward the camera, and you get the distinct impression there was a lot of horseplay going on just before the shutter snapped, quelled no doubt by the bark of an authoritative figure off-camera.

But this wasn't just any collection of guys, displayed here on the wall of a museum in New Orleans. These were the fresh faces of Company A, 116th Regiment, 29th Division, U.S. Army.

A short while after the photo was taken, on June 6, 1944, they were the first wave at Omaha Beach as Allied forces launched a D-Day attack against the Nazis. Stiff resistance hadn't been expected on the stretch of French shore, but the landing craft doors opened onto a nightmare.

Of the 170 men in Company A who stormed ashore in that first assault, 91 were killed and 64 were wounded. It all happened in about seven minutes.

There are a lot of impressive exhibits at the National D-Day Museum, founded in a cavernous warehouse here three years ago. There are video clips and maps that light up and oral histories at the touch of a button. But on a recent visit, that one photo and the information accompanying it are what most gripped me.

Everyone who ventures through the doors of the exhibition is probably touched by some aspect of it in a similar manner.

As survivors on the beach that day took control of a chaotic situation, they and their reinforcements moved up and ultimately overwhelmed the German defenders. A first bloody step was taken toward reclaiming the European continent and overthrowing a tyrant.

The D-Day Museum, the brainchild of the late history professor and author Stephen Ambrose, examines that assault in meticulous detail. But it doesn't stop there. All of World War II is addressed here - the buildup, the fighting, the home front, the conclusion.

We wandered in there on a warm spring day and spent three hours without scratching the surface of the war's Pacific theater. Throughout, we found it exhaustively informative ... and profoundly sobering.

One of Ambrose's strengths as a war historian was taping interviews with participants. As he sought out World War II veterans, he valued grunt soldiers who did the dirty work as highly as officers who plotted strategy. Many had never told their stories - they'd returned from the war in an era when men weren't expected to open up and vent their feelings.

Ambrose's tapes became a treasure trove as the veterans began to die. And the abiding strength of the museum is their spoken words, uttered in two-minute snippets in darkened alcoves. Some visitors will sit down in there and not leave until the voice behind every photo is heard.

One soldier talks of the war following directly on the heels of the Depression. ``We thought it was a part of life to have difficulty and not be dismayed by it,'' he says quietly.

A 50-minute film, chock-full of soldier testimonials, begins the visitor's experience. Then it's on to the exhibition rooms for a look at the invasion and the war from all manner of angles. If you don't pace yourself, it can be overwhelming; I overheard an exasperated woman telling her boyfriend, ``I don't want to read every plaque!''

To its credit, the museum doesn't shy away from controversial subjects. An exhibit addresses the fact that African-American soldiers were kept in separate regiments, and an information board declares bluntly: ``The world's greatest democracy fought the world's greatest racist with a segregated military.'' Even the blood in the Red Cross supply, it continues, was separated by race.

The museum also exposes military blunders, notably the use of plywood glider planes to transport men and machines into Normandy on D-Day. When they tried to land amid the hedgerows of the rolling farmland, they splintered apart horrifically, earning the nickname ``flying coffins'' from the troops.

One exhibit displays items soldiers were issued before the invasion - including French phrase books, French currency and condoms.

The fellows from Company A didn't find much use for any of it.

Eric Norland, [phone]

eric.norland(at)dailynews.com

The National D-Day Museum, at 945 Magazine St., is open daily from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. Admission is $10 for adults, $6 for seniors age 65 and up, $5 for kids age 5 to 17. No charge for military members in uniform. Information: [phone]; www.ddaymuseum.org.

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An exhibit showing how the military forces of Japan and Germany dwarfed those of the United States at the start of World War II is part of the National D-Day Museum in New Orleans.