On April 19, 2025, American Legion Post OK28 (Okinawa, Japan) held their annual Ernie Pyle Memorial. It was the 80th ceremony honoring Pyle. Retired Air Force Maj. Tom Cowan, the cousin of the famed war correspondent, along with his daughter Angelica Shaklee attended this year’s ceremony. Cowan serves as president of the Ernie Pyle Legacy Foundation. The memorial service was held at the Ernie Pyle Monument on Ie Shima Island, 3 ½ miles off the western tip of the Mobuta Peninsula of west-central Okinawa, the site where Pyle was killed by enemy fire on April 19, 1945. The Legionnaires have held the memorial service and maintained the memorial at this site since 1952.

Attending the ceremony were Okinawa officials, U.S. Marines and Legionnaires. The significance of the 80th anniversary brought more attendees than in previous years, said Lawrence T. Occomy, commander of Post 28. “Many of those World War II veterans are no longer here to tell the stories,” Occomy, an Army veteran, said after the ceremony. “However, Pyle captured those stories, specifically for the infantrymen. That story to this day still lingers on in the many writings he published.” Occomy thanked everyone for taking the time to remember and honor a remarkable war correspondent and American hero: "Together, we keep his legacy alive.”

Ernie Pyle was a Pulitzer Prize-winning newspaper war correspondent who reported on World War II from England, North Africa, Italy, France, Saipan and Okinawa. He became a national folk hero by reporting on the average soldier. President Harry Truman said of Pyle, “No man in this war has so well told the story of the American fighting man as American fighting men wanted it told. He deserves the gratitude of all his countrymen.”