Monday, May 28, 2007

It's Decoration Day

"Memorial Day, originally called Decoration Day is a day of remembrance for those who have died in our nation's service.

Memorial Day was officially proclaimed on May 5, 1868 by General John Logan, national commander of the Grand Army of the Republic, in his General Order No. 11, and was first observed on 30 May 1868, when flowers were placed on the graves of Union and Confederate soldiers at Arlington National Cemetery".

To help re-educate and remind Americans of the true meaning of Memorial Day, the "National Moment of Remembrance" resolution was passed on Dec 2000 which asks that at 3 p.m. local time, for all Americans "To voluntarily and informally observe in their own way a Moment of remembrance and respect, pausing from whatever they are doing for a moment of silence or listening to 'Taps." (Taken from http://www.usmemorialday.org/backgrnd.html)

Remembering those who have given their lives...


and those who mourn their loss.

(The Four Freedoms by Norman Rockwell.)

2 comments:

SamandSawyersMom said...

I got really choked up yesterday when I told Sammy what this day meant. I told him about how brave our soliders are etc. He seemed to get it.

Lura said...

Yeah. The boys were watching me post this and they saw the picture of the soldiers. They said "I don't like those guys" (which is what they say about people they don't know or are unsure of) or something like that and I was telling them that those are the good guys and that they have to fight the bad guys. Very hard to explain to a 3 year old!