''We Will Never Forget''

244th Birthday of the United States Marine Corps

Jim “Daddy Wags” Wagner for more than 30 years was the owner of Cookie’s Tavern at 10th & Oregon Avenue in South Philadelphia where he hosted an annual Marine Corps birthday celebration every November 10th. Marine Sergeant James Wagner served two tours in Vietnam earning numerous decorations and a Purple Heart.

Jim "Daddy Wags" Wagner was the kind of guy who, if there was a pothole in the church parking lot, he'd pay for it to be filled," Col. Harvey C. "Barney" Barnum, deputy assistant secretary of the Navy and a Medal of Honor recipient, said. "There's not enough room in the biggest mansion to house this man's heart."

USMC 244th Birthday at Cookies Tavern in South Philly