Memorial day in the US

Memorial day in the US: (traditions and history)

Today, the last Monday in May, all of America is thankful for those women and men who have sacrificed their lives for America and have died while serving in the armed forces; a day to memorize. Memorial day or decoration day, also considered to be the unofficial beginning of summer.

What do people do on Memorial Day?

• Some parades are being held around America, On the last Monday of May; especially in Chicago, New York, and Washington D. C.

• Many people go to national cemeteries and memorials to express their gratitude.

• Some volunteers hang America’s flag on military personnel’s graves.

• Red poppies are also among its traditions and people wear them in the memory of those people.

Now let’s take a look at its background:

If we want to talk about its history, we have to go back to the civil war, a war that killed many Americans, and therefore, the first national cemeteries were built.

Detecting the exact beginning of Memorial Day is hard; records show us that some formerly enslaved people in Charleston, South Carolina were among the first people who organized something like Memorial day in 1865, some months after the war ended. Waterloo, NY also set an annual event on May 5th, 1866 to honor those who died in the war, later in 1966 the government chose this city as the birthplace of Memorial Day.

General John A. Logan was among the people who played an important role to nationalize Memorial Day, and he called it Decoration day; but why Decoration Day? Well, back then, people used to decorate the graves with flowers and flags, nowadays some people are continuing this tradition. Since there were no battles on May 30th and therefore, it could be a day to celebrate all those people who died during their military service, General John A. Logan set May 30th as its national date.

In 1968, the government changed the date to the last Monday of May and made it a federal holiday so that the employers could have a 3-day weekend.