Gertie, the Darling Duck of WWII

In April 1945, a duck later named Gertie nested on a high piling in Milwaukee’s downtown river near a drawbridge. Her unusual nesting place drew crowds to the bridge as people waited to see whether her eggs would hatch and her ducklings would be safe. After a storm sent ducklings into the choppy water, bridge tenders repeatedly rowed out to rescue them. Gertie and her young were reunited, displayed briefly in a department-store window, and then released at a local park lagoon.