08/25/2026
The faces changed, but the bond never did.
In May 1966, four young Marines fresh out of boot camp posed together on a beach in Oceanside, California, just weeks before they were deployed to Vietnam. The photo captured the innocence and camaraderie of youth, a moment of levity before the horrors of war. They had trained together at Camp Pendleton, and all of them knew what was coming.
The four men—Bob Falk, Dennis Puleo, Tom Hanks, and Bob DeVenezia—were in the same weapons platoon, and once they arrived in Vietnam, they were split up. Two of them earned Purple Hearts; DeVenezia took a bullet to the shoulder, and Puleo was given last rites after being hit by shrapnel. They all survived, but after the war, they went their separate ways, scattered across the country, and lost touch for nearly 45 years.
It was not until 2011 that Hanks created an online memorial for a fallen comrade and Falk stumbled across it, which eventually led to the four men reconnecting. The reunion took 50 years to happen, but on April 23, 2016, they met again, this time on Cinnamon Beach in Florida. Their mission was to recreate the iconic photo they had taken half a century earlier.
They brought a surfboard for the photo, found clothes that matched the original, and recreated the exact same pose—Hanks in the back center, Puleo on the left, Falk on the right, and DeVenezia crouching in the front. The result was a side-by-side comparison that showed not just the passage of time, but the resilience of a bond forged in war. "It was one of the best days in my life," Hanks said. DeVenezia added, "It was like nothing had changed even though 50 years had passed."
