Storming D-Day Beach in Nebraska
Columbus, Nebraska
If you've seen Saving Private Ryan (or any war movie with a beach invasion) you've seen Higgins Boats. Everyone calls them "landing craft," which means that most people don't know that a guy named Andrew Jackson Higgins invented them. He was born in Columbus, Nebraska, which is about as far from an invade-able beach as it's possible to be in America.
To call attention to its forgotten hometown hero, Columbus unveiled a memorial to Higgins in June 2000. It features a bronze statue of Higgins himself, plus a full-size Higgins Boat and three bronze GIs, storming ashore in an amphibious landing on sand collected from several actual invasion beaches.