Mobile will honor one of its most celebrated native sons with a birthday tribute at Battleship Memorial Park, marking what would have been the 90th birthday of former U.S. Senator, retired Navy rear admiral and prisoner-of-war Jeremiah A. Denton Jr.
The celebration is scheduled for mid-morning inside the park’s Aircraft Pavilion. The Battleship Commission, which oversees the memorial park, is also designating the day as an annual Denton Day in honor of the occasion.
Denton, a Mobile native, died earlier this year in Virginia Beach, Virginia. His life story became one of the defining Alabama narratives of the Vietnam War era. As a Navy commander, Denton was shot down and captured by North Vietnamese forces, spending more than seven and a half years as a prisoner of war. During that captivity, he became internationally known for an act of defiance captured on camera in 1966, when his captors forced him to participate in a propaganda film. Rather than cooperate, Denton blinked out the word ‘torture’ in Morse code, signaling to American military intelligence that he and other prisoners were being abused despite the regime’s claims otherwise.
After his release, Denton continued his Navy career and eventually retired as a rear admiral. He went on to make Alabama political history by becoming the first Republican elected to the U.S. Senate from the state since Reconstruction, representing Alabama through the 1980s.
Denton’s connection to Battleship Memorial Park deepened in 2008, when a restored Navy A-6 Intruder aircraft, similar to the type he once flew, was unveiled at the park in his honor. That aircraft remains part of the park’s collection today, standing as a tribute to his military service alongside the other historic vessels and planes on display.
Organizers say the birthday event is meant to celebrate both Denton’s wartime courage and his decades of public service to Alabama, giving residents an opportunity to reflect on the legacy of a figure whose story of endurance in captivity resonated far beyond the state’s borders. The public is invited to attend the ceremony at the park.