While U.S. flags come out on Memorial Day, poppies are more identified with Veterans Day. Originally called Armistice Day and commemorating the Nov. 11, 1918, armistice that ended the fighting in World War I, the date is linked internationally to the opening lines of the haunting war poem “In Flanders Fields”:
In Flanders fields the poppies blow/Between the crosses, row on row.
The commemoration became a U.S. national holiday in 1935 and was renamed in 1954. Unlike Memorial Day, a holiday dating from the end of the Civil War and honoring those who died while serving in the armed forces, Veterans Day honors all veterans.
Andrew Guiding Young Cloud Morales, from the Gabrieleno (Tongva) Band of Mission Indians, offers a blessing during a Veterans Day ceremony held at Plaza Park on Friday in San Gabriel.
(Irfan Khan / Los Angeles Times)
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Attendees stand among 201 flags installed for the Veterans Day ceremony at Plaza Park.
(Irfan Khan / Los Angeles Times)
U.S. Navy veteran Ruth Pico, left, with her 8-year-old son Nathan, pays her respects on Veterans Day at National Cemetery on Saturday in Los Angeles.
(Irfan Khan / Los Angeles Times)
Marine Corps Junior Reserve Officer Training Corps Color Guard members from John C. Fremont High School in South Los Angeles listen to a panel of retired, Black, high-ranking military veterans discussing their military service and career challenges. The panelists also spoke about their work relating to the renaming commission, which seeks to assess the plausibility of renaming Confederate monuments. Later, the Color Guard members explored the Kinsey African American Art & History Collection exhibit at SoFi Stadium in Inglewood.
(Jay L. Clendenin / Los Angeles Times)
Marine Corps Reserve Maj. Gen. Leo V. Williams III, center, takes pictures with John C. Fremont High School students, including Eenni Alay Mendez,16, on his right, while looking at the Kinsey African American Art & History Collection exhibit at SoFi Stadium. Williams took part in the panel discussion as well.
(Jay L. Clendenin / Los Angeles Times)
Allyson, 3, hits during the Dodgers Veterans Day batting practice event with her father, Marine Corps veteran John Lemus, on Friday.
(Brian van der Brug / Los Angeles Times)
James Courson, 95, a WWII-Korean War veteran, left, Larry Stevens, 99, a WWII U.S. Air Force veteran, and Mike Valdivia, 97, a WWII Navy veteran, sit with others being honored at a Veterans Day ceremony at Plaza Park on Friday in San Gabriel.
Irfan Khan was a staff photographer with the Los Angeles Times from 1996 to 2024. He previously served as a freelance photographer for the publication beginning in 1989. Khan started his career as a commercial photographer in 1973 in Pakistan and moved to Dubai in 1977, where he worked for an advertising agency and at a leading English newspaper. Khan’s assignments have taken across Southern California and the U.S. Internationally, he has photographed the Hajj in Saudi Arabia and war zones of the Pakistan/Afghanistan border in the aftermath of the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks. He was part of the team awarded the Pulitzer Prize in breaking news for coverage of the 2015 terrorist attack in San Bernardino. In his spare time, he enjoys listening to semi-classical music of the Indian subcontinent and playing cricket on Sundays.
Jay L. Clendenin was a Los Angeles Times staff photographer from 2007-24. He primarily covered the entertainment industry, with a focus on portraiture.
