Navajo Code Talkers Memorial

Created in 2008, this memorial recognizes the service of military members known collectively as the Navajo Code Talkers. Utilizing Native American languages that were known only to members of various Native American tribes, Navajo and other American Indians were able to develop codes to quickly send and decipher secret messages, most notably during World War II.

One of the best-known examples of Native American military service in the 20th century, the use of Native American languages allowed for the United States and their allies to quickly send coded messages using a system that was never broken by Germany or Japan in World War II. Major Howard Connor commented his Marines would have been unable to take Iwo Jima without this advantage. Navajo Code Talkers were close to the front lines, not only at Iwo Jima but in many other significant battles both in Europe and the Pacific. 

According to the USO, there were originally 29 Navajo Marines working to create a code. As the war progressed, more Native American soldiers became involved with this process, and the code itself became broader. At the end of World War II, the Navajo code came to include 411 words, practically doubling in size from the beginning of the war.  

According to the Smithsonian National Museum of the American Indian, a small number of Native Americans helped the U.S. Army in World War I by sending messages in their language as code. This success led to the use of the Navajo language and others in World War II.

There were two different types of code that the Navajos used. The first type used Navajo words, which were used to represent a single English letter. The second type of code just consisted of Navajo words that could translate to English. Some words did not translate easily, so they found other ways to describe certain things, using different words or phrases, which were added into the dictionary of terms they created.  

"Navajo Code Talkers," The Historical Marker Database. November 16th 2020. Accessed November 15th 2021. https://www.hmdb.org/m.asp?m=26823.

"Living the Culture," National Museum of the American Indian. Accessed November 15th 2021. https://americanindian.si.edu/nk360/code-talkers/native-languages/.

"American Indian Code Talkers," The National World War II Museum New Orleans. Accessed November 15th 2021. https://www.nationalww2museum.org/war/articles/american-indian-code-talkers.

"How Navajo Code Talker Marines Used Their Indigenous Language to Help Win World War II," USO. November 1st 2021. Accessed November 15th 2021. https://www.uso.org/stories/2511-how-navajo-code-talker-marines-used-their-indigenous-language-to-help-win-world-war-ii.