Photographer David Burnett was born in 1946, almost two years after Allied forces landed on a stretch of heavily fortified beaches along the coast of Normandy, France, marking the beginning of the end of Nazi-occupied Europe. While Burnett had a couple of uncles in the military, he did not have a personal connection to World War II. That is, until 1974.

Fresh from photographing the Vietnam War, Burnett was in Paris that June when he and a few friends went up to Normandy to check out the 30th anniversary of D-Day. This was the beginning of what will be, on June 6, 2014, a 40-year span of witnessing the reunion of this “band of brothers”; being privy to the memories