History books show war zone pictures and tell the stories of battles, but people may not consider where the content came from. That information is produced by U.S. military journalists, and that’s what senior Talia Brown hopes to do in the U.S. Marine Corp.  

“As of right now, I’m wanting to go into the Marines,” Brown said. “I have looked at the jobs, and I saw one that had to do with journalism and photography in the Marines.”

Brown, who has been a photographer for Legacy yearbook and Staley News for her entire high-school career, has done some physical training with Marines. She said at her first training she wasn’t able to make it through the full AT&T route.  

“It’s a lot of running, more than anything else. We kind of just start at the pull up bar and everyone just does as many as they can do,” Brown said. “So, the AT&T route, you spilt into two groups, and it’s basically a race to whoever can finish the route first. And whenever they yell ‘AT&T,’ you have to touch someone in your groups to make sure you’re not too far away from each other or too close to each other.” 

Brown already has three tattoos and said she needed to check the requirements since they were different for every branch. She was worried about them originally but found out it is not a concern. 

“I’m looking at tattoo requirements, and it has to be at least an inch below the elbow.’ I did all this mapping in class. It was so funny. It was in my government class, too,” Brown said. “So, then I asked about it, and then they were like it’s not updated. That website’s not updated, so none of that is true.”  

Brown said she was surrounded by military members her whole life. One friendship Brown said she has had since sixth grade was through her dad’s relationships in the U.S. Navy. 

“My dad is in the Navy, my grandpa was also the Navy, and then my one of my aunts was in the Army,” Brown said. “One of my best friends actually comes from like, we call it the Navy families. And one of the guys that’s in the Navy with my dad, his daughter is my age. And I would say that was one of like the best friendships I could have, and now we are in our senior year.” 

With lots of training, working to meet the requirements and support from her friends and family, she hoped to become a part of the U.S. Marine family.