Iconic 9/11 pic almost excluded from museum for being too 'rah-rah' American

A new book has revealed that an iconic photograph of firefighters raising the stars and stripes in the rubble of Ground Zero was nearly excluded from the 9/11 Memorial Museum for being too vehemently American by some staffers.

According to the Elizabeth Greenspan's 'Battle for Ground Zero', the museum's creative director Michael Shulan had considered the Tom Franklin photograph too cheesy and 'rah-rah America' to be included in the 9/11 collection, the New York Post reports.

Greenspan discloses that chief curator, Jan Ramirez, had proposed a compromise to minimize the Franklin shot in favor of three different photos via three different angles of the flag-raising scene.

Shulan said that his concern was not to reduce 9/11 down to something that was too simple, and in its simplicity would actually distort the complexity and the meaning of the event.

Earlier, there was an argument by the officials and the family members over display of human remains or photos of body parts in the museum, the report added.

Dust from the collapse of the Towers was tested and determined not to contain remains, the book mentions.